This website is dead

[Freestyler]

Yes it's a pity, but I think the site hasn't been all that active for a while now. It's kind of crazy to think that I've been on this site for almost 10 years. Nonetheless, even at that, I'm not a member of this site for nearly as long as a lot of other people. A lot of you more than likely don't even know who I am! Nevertheless, I really do understand and appreciate all of that

I think my account on PKMN.net is one of the first accounts for anything I've ever (somewhat) stuck to on the internet. For me, this account has always felt like it's just been there. I know I haven't been a regular user, especially in recent times, and I don't really know or never did get to know many of the more well-known members, but PKMN.net has always been a website that sticks out for me in a way other ones simply can't

One thing that has always stuck out in particular about PKMN.net for me is the humour. I just love the humour on this site. Am I the only one who misses that (I think it was called...) Harry Haunter comedy series thing from a few years ago?! There are quite a few people on here who I'd just love to meet sometime.

The community also sticks out, people used to and still do discuss and share interesting/personal/everyday aspects of their lives, which is something you could never see in the same kind of way on monotonous social networking sites like Facebook where everyone is made out to be some kind of cutting-edge socialite when in reality most tend to be moderately average. The discussions here, for me, have always felt that bit more authentic and raw. It hasn't been a case whereby people have been discussing these particular aspects in order to climb endless social ladders, rather, people would talk about them for the sake of talking about them

When I was much younger, I always found most of the members to be so intelligent and charming, it was such a breath of fresh air to see that, especially when I was in my early years at secondary school. I looked back over some of my much earlier posts tonight and, honestly, they feel as if they were posted by some crazy little kid behind a computer. It doesn't feel like it was me, but it was me, and it just goes to show how much has changed and evolved with time since then

I don't think I was liked that much when I was younger on this site but as time went on, I got to know a few people. All the same, I was still just a young teenager with too much time on his hands. I probably spurted out loads of crazy statements and lies as well which just seems so crazy to think about now, but similarly to what I mentioned above, it just feels like they were produced by some kid with a computer who just so happened to be myself at a much younger age

Here I am, defending myself and my misdemeanours as a young teen but I just thought I'd take a moment to reflect, I don't think I've ever written something like this here before! I'm a proud occasional lurker and I'm really thankful for PKMN.net

[Turner]

If this twitch channel became a thing I'd definitely be down to do a show for it! I've been thinking about getting into it recently and this seems like a good way to get myself doing it :p

In that case then I think this has all the makings of an opportunity that should be seized.

Looks like we'd have to share an account though, which I doubt would be a problem. We'd have to make sure everyone who becomes a part of it is responsible and I imagine there won't be any overlapping times. We could always use a Google Docs spreadsheet as a timetable or something similar.

What exactly is everyone here planning to or wanting to stream? I won't be streaming anything myself, I guess I'm just coordinating the idea to some extent.

[aer_dingus]

Well I'm definitely not an active member of this site but I do like to log in every once in a while to see what's up. I used to come here for the sprite art all the time. I still like seeing sprite work and making my own sprites - something that i never knew existed before i found this site.

i'm very glad that its still up and running.

[Shaymin]

In that case then I think this has all the makings of an opportunity that should be seized.

Looks like we'd have to share an account though, which I doubt would be a problem. We'd have to make sure everyone who becomes a part of it is responsible and I imagine there won't be any overlapping times. We could always use a Google Docs spreadsheet as a timetable or something similar.

What exactly is everyone here planning to or wanting to stream? I won't be streaming anything myself, I guess I'm just coordinating the idea to some extent.

As I can only stream via Xbox (my laptop isn't up to scrub to stream), I can stream Dragon Age, Assassin's Creed, and a couple other video games I have.

[Kpyna]

What exactly is everyone here planning to or wanting to stream? I won't be streaming anything myself, I guess I'm just coordinating the idea to some extent.

I personally wanna stream bad (or good!) fanmade pokemon games :p I doubt I'd really have trouble with overlapping other people's stream times, seeing that I'm American and the time differences are kinda stark.

[Del]

I could stream some fun challenge runs of some of the official Pokémon games, I haven't streamed properly in a long time so it'd be nice to get back into it with this, even if my quality might not be as great as I'd like it to be.

On top of that I'm happy to help walk anyone through setting up OBS if they wanna stream from their PC/Laptops, since I know for a lot of people who have never streamed (and even a lot of people who HAVE streamed) it can be confusing and hard to work out sometimes.

[Shaymin]

oh yeah, I forgot about fanmade pokemon games (and i have something to play gamecube and wii games for my pc) so when I set up my main pc/get a new one I could possibly do that too

[Turner]

One important thing to take into consideration with the fanmade games is that these would basically be ROM hacks, which is against the forum rules. I know Twitch themselves aren't against it because plenty of people do the same, but if we were to do anything as PKMN.NET officially on Twitch then we'd have to make sure Joeno was fine with it. It all depends on which rules carry across to twitch and which ones don't. There may be a different reason as to why fanmade games can't be discussed on a forum of a domain/site that's managed/hosted in Joeno's name as opposed to a 3rd party service which cares less.

Even so, thinking more about the content - Does anyone have any opinions on how Pokemon related we should keep the stream? I'm guessing people will want to do more than just Pokemon, but do we keep it in the realm of Nintendo at least or just go all out?

Same question also goes out to whoever is interested in running/managing the tumblr account (if we end up with one), anyone got any content ideas for that? I think it'd be nice if we could have the same people across all platforms, whether it's streaming or blogging or social media - the idea here is to build up more of a community so we don't want people pigeonholing themselves into singular roles too much and becoming too spread out; sharing tasks and overlap = good. Maybe Skype among yourselves and play some games together or something to get used to each other.

[Kpyna]

Yeah, I figured if that was a problem then I could do nuzlockes. But, while of course we don't have official word, the way I look at it is that I feel like on a forum talking about ROMs is bad because you don't wanna be circulating the actual files, or the links, or get the place known as a place to find ROMs. As well, now that I remember, we've had people on Fake Whatever make functioning fake pokemon games before and show off the demos, which... ROMs. And, on top of that, streaming the older games in particular is pretty difficult without ROMs. I think if the use of ROMs would be reasonable so long as we're not really promoting or selling them. Or I was just planning on just kind of pleading the fifth :p But, here I go breaking the rules and talking about them anyway

I feel like keeping at least mostly a pokemon focus would be preferable, but I don't see why other games can't be streamed. I think it would be cool if any of the people interested in competitive battling would stream their showdowns, even though Competitive Battling doesn't get as much love here as other places.

[SaRo|Rapidash]

Yeah, I figured if that was a problem then I could do nuzlockes. But, while of course we don't have official word, the way I look at it is that I feel like on a forum talking about ROMs is bad because you don't wanna be circulating the actual files, or the links, or get the place known as a place to find ROMs. As well, now that I remember, we've had people on Fake Whatever make functioning fake pokemon games before and show off the demos, which... ROMs. And, on top of that, streaming the older games in particular is pretty difficult without ROMs. I think if the use of ROMs would be reasonable so long as we're not really promoting or selling them. Or I was just planning on just kind of pleading the fifth :p But, here I go breaking the rules and talking about them anyway

Re: people with fake pokemon games, I've seen many topics locked by various admins for advertising a fake Pokémon game - Lewis' was slightly different though because he actually made his fake game in RPG maker, so it wasn't actually using a rom to be made. You might be able to find a similar game, and then I don't believe it would be breaking rules, but idk.

Edit: and the current one about a game that shows up first talks about "designing a pokemon game" - he hasn't even said he'll make it, and even if he did he might make it similarly to Lewis so, although I obviously can't speak for admins, I'd assume they felt there wasn't enough evidence he was referring to a ROM hack he was making.

But I think the main reason for no ROM discussion was that the sharing of them would give Nintendo / GF grounds to sue the site, and from that perspective it's not fair that admins - especially Jeroen who I believe holds the domain - to have the worry of being sued (I know the chances of Nintendo suing over a few ROMs is like... Zero, but given we're talking about millions of pounds most likely, it's quite a big risk to take!). I imagine the only way a twitch channel would be allowed it is to have a completely different person registered as the intellectual property owner.

[Kpyna]

Maybe it was made with RPG Maker, but I seem to remember there was a game being made by a user of this site back in '08 or so that asked if we could make sprites and stuff for their game and they eventually released their demo of what they had done thus far. I mean, maybe that one just glided by the admins, but, whatever. I understand if they don't wanna be connected with it whatsoever, but I feel like not allowing us to simulate games on our PCs would limit the twitch idea.

[SaRo|Rapidash]

Tbf as long as you don't say "Here we're playing a ROM of xxx" there's no real evidence to say you are - it could just be being recorded off of something similar to Elgato, so it's safe from any action against it. The problem only arises in ROM hacks, where data is actually edited, which whilst a lot more fun and unique does giveaway that you're using a ROM.

[Lord Raven]

To be fair, this is the only site I've been to that's had a problem with actually mentioning ROMs, ROM Hacks, and Patches.  I mean yeah they're illegal to play, but it's not like sponsors will pull their advertisements from here, because every other forum I've been to has had a bunch of similar sponsors and they still allow this kind of stuff.

[SaRo|Rapidash]

I guess it's easier to just have a complete zero tolerance on them because the moment you give leeway it can grow until it's a bit too lenient. Not saying I agree with it, just that I can see the reasoning behind it.

Would be cool to have a complete PKMN.net regional dex of Fakémon, though, even if not for a ROM, but finding the spriters is generally the hardest bit with fakémon, s you find most spriters do recolours / mixes but draw the line at complete scratches =/ Could give a pretty cool USP to the site though.

[Turner]

I've not seen any other forums with the same rules either. But with that said, I can understand why Joeno wouldn't want them on the forum. If the worst came to the worst, the reality/likelihood is that there would have to be numerous ROM hacks being shared for an extended period of time before Nintendo did anything and at that point they'd probably send a cease and desist of which we'd have to comply. I can see why anyone running a site just wouldn't want to get involved in the first place.

If we were to set up an 'official' channel on twitch, it's not really a case of whether or not you're playing a pirated game (Because there's no real way of telling) but more about whether or not we as 'PKMN.NET' want to associate with ROM hacks of Pokemon games when the forum rules say otherwise. I know twitch doesn't object to people using emulators or playing ROM hacks, one of their biggest publicity stunts was having a bowl of goldfish playing a Pokemon ROM in plain sight.