So Long and Thanks for EVERYTHING
*Tear*
Thank you too! Man, tonight I am getting all emotional. Logging in and reading all of the developers posts, and participating in the evolution of this game through the forums was a big part of what made the CoX universe so tangible for me.
[Guide to Defense] [Scrapper Secondaries Comparison] [Archetype Popularity Analysis]
In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)
Ok, no crying. I promiss. Even if Black Pebble made an appearance!
Thank you for all the hard work, I have seen some excellent new FX effects since you got on the job.
Thank you too. You are up there at the top of the list of most responsive devs. Your effect work is amazing and I'll never forget the breathtaking destroyed Ouroboros that you made. Your appearance on coffee chats brightened everyone's day.
Keetsie,
I knew your work was great, but when I read that you apparently would sneak into your college's animation studio at night through an unlocked window just to get more time in on the computers, that's when I knew you belonged at Paragon Studios helping to make this game. And it doesn't really matter if that anecdote is true or not; the sheer plausibility of it speaks toward your dedication to your craft, and why you'll be an asset anywhere you work.
Plus, as bittersweet as it is, you and Leo were able to give us customizable power pools, something we'd wanted for a long time. It sits on the beta server, but it's there. So thanks for that as well.
Positron: "There are no bugs [in City of Heroes], just varying degrees of features."
Tunnel rat, you did some amazing stuff for us, and I'll miss the heck out of that. Wherever I go from here, I don't think I'll ever find a community as awesome as this one was, with a dev team as dedicated to our playerbase, so responsive and willing to engage with us.
I loved Praetoria too- it looked so amazing that it was like playing a new game. And I was genuinely sad when Emperor Cole nuked it at the end of the Magi trial. Such a shame
A (Golden Gate) Bridge Too Far- arc 299315
Crazy NIMBY's, Railroad robber barons, and kickboxing Engineers, Oh My! Go back in time and join the fight to save a San Francisco icon!
Now that we were going to get power pool customization, sorcery pool...
Im so sorry we can not enjoy the awesomeness of your hard work no longer!
Makes me so sad.
You rock, Tunnel Rat!
Hope threats you well from now on! Im sure it will!
Keets, it's been an honor every day. If I didn't have a little sister you'd be the little sister I never had.
He'd teamed with enough blasters to get the gist of it.
If the game spit out 20 dollar bills people would complain that they weren't sequentially numbered. If they were sequentially numbered people would complain that they weren't random enough.
Black Pebble is my new hero.
Cough cough...what leaked auras...?
Tunnel bRat, you are the funniest, happiest, bravest and most optimistic person I know. The anti-me. There's a reason I feared you. It's because you made me smile, and that really ruins my image. And that's also why I still consider Honeybadger to be the bravest man on earth, because he has the courage and strength to protect us from you. I'll always cherish our time together, even if you never made that Snot Aura I asked you to make. We all loved you in spite of your evil. And I still think your pigtail looks funny. PS: Thanks for not showing up at the BBQ tonight. You made Protean cry. |
I know it doesn't really matter, but I finally remembered the right name of the community member that told me about you guys talking about my character, lol... Beastyle!! Sorry, Beastie... I kept trying to think of it, but my brain is not functioning on all cylinders right now.
Tunnel Rat... can you just keep making FX for me anyway? Actually... I do need some animators for my current musical project...
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
Thank you for making it a joy to shoot footage in-game. The world FX you (and Honey Badger) added gave me new options and new ideas for my videos.
Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite
THE COURSE OF SUPERHERO ROMANCE CONTINUES!
Book I: A Tale of Nerd Flirting! ~*~ Book II: Courtship and Crime Fighting - Chap Nine live!
MA Arcs - 3430: Hell Hath No Fury / 3515: Positron Gets Some / 6600: Dyne of the Times / 351572: For All the Wrong Reasons
378944: Too Clever by Half / 459581: Kill or Cure / 551680: Clerical Errors (NEW!)
Thanks for all your splendid work on FX in CoH, Tunnel Rat. It's no exaggeration to say that they're more important here than on pretty much any other MMORPG, and here they shone, so to speak. Good luck with your next artistic adventure.
Thanks for everything, Rat. Good luck out there!
I didn't interact with (i.e. complain, cajole, taunt, belittle, provoke, bemoan, distract, harass) the art team like I did the powers team, but that was not because I did not appreciate that side of the house. Its because I felt I could contribute more to the discussion on the mechanical side of the game, and because of the restraining order Matt imposed.
However, first and foremost my love of this game started with being able to jump in, and fly around, swoop down, and energy blast a bunch of thugs. What I could see, what I could hear, the visceral sensory impact of the game has always been my first love. I appreciate the contributions of the artists that made the game something I wanted to play year after year.
The numbers and the mechanics are important, but they are just numbers on a spreadsheet without the animations, the sound effects, and the visual effects that make those numbers sing.
I believe I speak for most of the quants of this game when I say that you and the rest of the artists that created the look of the game were just as important, if not more important, to our love of the game. For that, I thank you and all the rest of the artists of Paragon Studios.
And don't worry about the ones I don't speak for, because I can squish their spreadsheets like a bug.
[Guide to Defense] [Scrapper Secondaries Comparison] [Archetype Popularity Analysis]
In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)
Thanks for all of your great work on the game! Not to mention thanks for lending your name to my very favourite npc in the game.
You know what I'm going to go away with from you, Keetsie? (Aside from that being one of the cutest names *ever,* thank you very much!)
It's Barrier.
See, I made it a point to... I suppose be a royal PITA about the Sonic visual effects, back when they came out. And back when I found that they were giving *me* headaches. I don't get migranes or anything, so this was new to me - but when I found others were getting hurt worse, that a friend and SG mate (RIP Muad Dib) was feeling miserable because he was playing an Ill/Sonic and *causing* problems for friends and teammates.... well, that just couldn't stand.
And so I made a nusiance of myself for, oh, a year and a half, I believe it was. Honestly "hurt myself" trying to find just *what* sort of combinations were causing that problem, making sure it was the sonic shields, not lighting, not the monitor, not something else.
I, and others who had this issue, were called hypochondriacs and flat out liars by some people... let's just say there were some very nasty things directed our way by people who weren't affected, and apparently couldn't get it through their heads that just because they weren't didn't mean other people were just making it up.
I even got an answer from BaBs that sounded, frankly, like "We can't do it." Or just plain "No." I don't have that any more. Of course, I do believe this was when we were down to the Freem 15... or close to it. I nearly cancelled my sub at that point.
Then sonic got changed. There was still some... nastiness in the community, really, over that, from the same few (and one person who legitimately had problems with the new graphics - who actually went to a neurologist and found out he had a problem he wasn't aware of. Apparently the opening from SAW also triggered the reaction in him, but he didn't remember it.)
So, when Barrier came up... well, I made a thread. And I'll be honest, I prepared for another long slog of a fight.
Then you popped in. Said "Oh. Yeah, that can be a problem. Can you give us some info?" And got them changed. Even with the changes that had happened, both technically in the game and with the dev team since Sonic, you floored me. Seriously. You know those burning buildings in Steel Canyon when they go off? Add that with the knockback from standing on the generators when you stop Amanda Vines... and if you've never done that, it's very amusing, and you can really get some distance. Now scale it up by a few thousand percent. That kind of "you floored me."
... instant favourite redname. Not for "giving me what I wanted" - which wasn't really a want, aside from indirectly wanting my friends to be able to play without their migranes triggering off - but for being that responsive, considerate, curious, honest and understanding about it, and getting it *fixed* that fast.
And then we got to hear about and from you in the various coffee talks and such. Never got to go to a con, but from everywhere else, seeing that that - with "fun" and a bunch of other great descriptions put in - was just you...
Yeah, favourite dev.
Thank you for flooring me. With all the good I can say about all the members of the team that made this so much more than "just a game," I think you're going to stay the #1 example of what made the game, the team and how you interacted with the community special.
Thank you.
Thank you for everything.
"Hmm, I guess I'm not as omniscient as I thought" -Gavin Runeblade.
I can be found, outside of paragon city here.
Thank you everyone at Paragon and on Virtue. When the lights go out in November, you'll find me on Razor Bunny.
Tunnel Rat ... the Dev you wanted to cuddle just because she was so darn CUTE in person!
Leo is way too damn lucky to have her ... and he knows it too!
![](http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/7840/groove1.gif)
Thank you for all your wonderful FX work, Tunnel Rat.
@Nanas (on Defiant)
You know what I'm going to go away with from you, Keetsie? (Aside from that being one of the cutest names *ever,* thank you very much!)
It's Barrier. See, I made it a point to... I suppose be a royal PITA about the Sonic visual effects, back when they came out. And back when I found that they were giving *me* headaches. I don't get migranes or anything, so this was new to me - but when I found others were getting hurt worse, that a friend and SG mate (RIP Muad Dib) was feeling miserable because he was playing an Ill/Sonic and *causing* problems for friends and teammates.... well, that just couldn't stand. And so I made a nusiance of myself for, oh, a year and a half, I believe it was. Honestly "hurt myself" trying to find just *what* sort of combinations were causing that problem, making sure it was the sonic shields, not lighting, not the monitor, not something else. I, and others who had this issue, were called hypochondriacs and flat out liars by some people... let's just say there were some very nasty things directed our way by people who weren't affected, and apparently couldn't get it through their heads that just because they weren't didn't mean other people were just making it up. I even got an answer from BaBs that sounded, frankly, like "We can't do it." Or just plain "No." I don't have that any more. Of course, I do believe this was when we were down to the Freem 15... or close to it. I nearly cancelled my sub at that point. Then sonic got changed. There was still some... nastiness in the community, really, over that, from the same few (and one person who legitimately had problems with the new graphics - who actually went to a neurologist and found out he had a problem he wasn't aware of. Apparently the opening from SAW also triggered the reaction in him, but he didn't remember it.) So, when Barrier came up... well, I made a thread. And I'll be honest, I prepared for another long slog of a fight. Then you popped in. Said "Oh. Yeah, that can be a problem. Can you give us some info?" And got them changed. Even with the changes that had happened, both technically in the game and with the dev team since Sonic, you floored me. Seriously. You know those burning buildings in Steel Canyon when they go off? Add that with the knockback from standing on the generators when you stop Amanda Vines... and if you've never done that, it's very amusing, and you can really get some distance. Now scale it up by a few thousand percent. That kind of "you floored me." ... instant favourite redname. Not for "giving me what I wanted" - which wasn't really a want, aside from indirectly wanting my friends to be able to play without their migranes triggering off - but for being that responsive, considerate, curious, honest and understanding about it, and getting it *fixed* that fast. And then we got to hear about and from you in the various coffee talks and such. Never got to go to a con, but from everywhere else, seeing that that - with "fun" and a bunch of other great descriptions put in - was just you... Yeah, favourite dev. Thank you for flooring me. With all the good I can say about all the members of the team that made this so much more than "just a game," I think you're going to stay the #1 example of what made the game, the team and how you interacted with the community special. Thank you. |
Hi Tunnel Rat!
I'm sorry I'm replying to this so late. It was great meeting you and your husband at the Comic Con 2011 Meet and Greet, and the Player Summit! (I posted a picture from the former of you and my then-fiancee, now-wife in this thread if you want to see it!) Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us, we really enjoyed it, and will always remember it.
Also, thanks so much for everything you and Honey Badger have done for the game. So many things we've wished for in the VFX area have come true in the last couple of years.
I hope you both have wonderful things happen to you in the future,
-Liquid
Please try my custom mission arcs!
Legacy of a Rogue (ID 459586, Entry for Dr. Aeon's Third Challenge)
Death for Dollars! (ID 1050)
Dr. Duplicate's Dastardly Dare (ID 1218)
Win the Past, Own the Future (ID 1429)
(FAPARN!)
Thanks for everything, Tunnel Rat. I'm never gonna stop believing that this game had been gutted way before its time--and it's because it's all the life you and the all the other devs put into City of Heroes.
I really, really liked Going Rogue. I got into it way after the initial surge of players so Praetoria was mostly empty, but man it was amazing.
(And I don't know what all you did as visual effects designer, but if you're the one who animated the /tanrum emote, I love you forever.)