Today is a very important day.

[captainspud]

January 9th, 2012 is a very important day for me and, whether you realize it or not, for every single person here.

This is because January 8th, 2002 was the last time your evil was wanted here.

That's right: the game that catalyzed the most incredibly creative, diverse, and resilient community I've ever been a part of hit stores exactly ten years ago. It's pretty staggering to think about, but it's true. For those of us who picked it up on day 1-- well, okay, technically I picked it up on day 4, because I wasn't allowed to go to the mall on weekdays-- we have now lived a decade of our lives alongside this incredible phenomenon Irrational somehow conjured together out of blood, sweat, and pixels.

Fair warning: this is going to get really awkward and teary by the end. But, I'm going ahead with it anyway, because everyone, even jerkish potatoes, is entitled to one day of being mushy every decade. Today is my one day. Tomorrow I go back to being cold and distant. For now, though... let's get poignant.

I know I'm not really an active presence here anymore, but I've nonetheless been thinking about this milestone as it approached for the last few months, and about what it meant to me in very personal terms. Freedom Force had an effect on my life that goes far beyond video games, comic books, and even the unbelievable group of people I had the privilege of working with over the years. It wasn't just a list of experiences to me-- I really have been changed by what Irrational and all of you amazing people gave to me.

I assembled my thoughts on the subject by writing about today's milestone on the blog I allow Gdaybloke to claim that he runs, purely for tax purposes of course. The article is aimed largely at an uninitiated audience of miniature wargamers, so I did my best to explain the game and give them the briefest glimpse into the history we shared here. I knew there was little chance my outside audience would really grasp what I was saying; the article is really written so I could link you guys over to it, because you're the ones I was really speaking to when I wrote the following pile of girly emotional gruel.

Oh, also: 1) the article is super long, 2) I was really loose with the dates and other minor details, so please ignore any discrepancies, and 3) it doesn't go up until 7am, so I'm just gonna post it in spoiler tags here.

Spoiler

Your Evil Is UNWANTED Here!
January 9th, 2012



Today is an important day for me. And if you understood that title, then it just might be an important day for you, too.

On January 9th, 2002, a company called Irrational Games, then known mostly for having developed System Shock 2, released a PC game called Freedom Force. Freedom Force is an isometric tactical RPG themed around Silver Age comic books– the period of brightly-coloured and unabashedly contrived heroes that birthed the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, the Justice League, and dozens of others. The game arrived to very positive reviews, as its developers obviously had a lot of affection for the source material, and thus managed to perfectly walk the line between silliness and melodrama that a Silver Age comic needs to.

When the game came out, I was in my second-last year of high school. I was heavily into comic books, and as much into video games as my parents had allowed (my dad told me growing up that Nintendo was a plot by the Japanese to undermine a generation of American children. I'm not making that up), so I excitedly picked the game up the weekend after it hit stores. I took it home, played it, and loved it.

I was still playing it three years later.

What kept me around wasn't the game as it shipped; Freedom Force has a fairly substantial single-player campaign, which is both well-written and challengingly designed. But really, how many times can you play the same game, great or not, start to finish?

No, the reason I stuck around was that when Irrational created the game, they understood that the potential of what they'd created went far beyond its extant state as a well-built video game. They realized that what they'd built wasn't just one product; rather, it was a platform others could build on. The game box I bought for fifty bucks wasn't just twenty-odd missions starring a pastiche of the JLA and the Avengers; rather, it was an engine by which a previously unserved market of comic fans could endlessly smash together their favourite heroes in whatever variety and combination they wished.

When they shipped the game, they did so with the art resources of the game almost entirely unlocked. If you opened the game's install folder and dug around, you'd quickly find a folder called "custom_characters". In this folder were a half-dozen files:

    male_basic
    male_heavy
    male_basic_cape
    male_rotund
    female_basic
    female_longhair

In the parlance of the game, these were six "meshes"– 3D models of generic superhero bodies. They also released a tool that let you view the models, and the game was set up to recognize new "skins"– the flattened-out texture files that get laid on top of the meshes to colour them in.


This one is of a naked man. No, don't look away. His eyes will only follow you longer.

The final piece of the puzzle was the custom characters menu in the game, which let you take that awesome Spider-Man skin you'd just made or downloaded, and actually teach the game how strong, fast, web-shooty, and bad-guy-punchy he should be, then bring that custom hero into the game alongside the superheroes it shipped with.

Around these simple ingredients, a massive community erupted overnight. Within a few months, the community had produced hundreds, maybe thousands of skins to cover every hero imaginable, starting with the Batmans and Spider-mans, but quickly running down the list to the vast cast of also-rans comic books continually pour out. After a few months, Irrational, who regularly interacted with the community on their forums (Word up to Irrational_Ken!), also released the working 3D files for the meshes they'd released, and an entirely new line of community innovation sprouted up. In the early months of the game, a person wanting to make a skin had to make do with the six original meshes, even if they weren't a perfect match to the costume he was creating; Gambit had no staff, Jubilee was too tall, and Wonder Woman left her lasso at home. Once we had the tools to make our own meshes, though, those constrainst evaporated.

A year after the game shipped, the community was at its height. We had hundreds of productive members making every possible game resource you can think of. We had a massive library of skins and meshes, but with the arrival of a modding tool Irrational put out toward the game's first anniversary, we were also making voice packs to let our heroes sound exactly as they should, custom "FX" to make their powers look exactly right when fired, and even entirely scratch-built fan campaigns for the game to use it all in. Thanks to the dedication of the fan community, we had top-notch Teen Titans, Suicide Squad, and Marvel vs. DC campaign arcs that rivaled the original game in quality.

Amidst all of this, I exploded.

The second day I had the game, I made a skin of Captain Spud. This is the only picture I can find of it, ten years and three computers later:


I'm throwing a rusty meathook. It's... a long story.

Over the next year, I made 80 more. I basically learned Photoshop entirely to make these things. Over time, I drifted into other things; I learned to use 3D Studio Max to make my own custom meshes, and later to make custom FX (the only part of my creative output that still completely survives to this day). I drew up custom art for people's avatars (being a community heavily focused on superheroes, everyone in the community had a superhero to represent themselves online), made a voice pack or two, and even tried my hand at coding up a mod (which ended in total failure).

I spent three solid years just building things. The game offered me an outlet for whatever I felt like doing, and the community offered an encouraging audience for all of it.

Beyond the raw, joyous productivity, the community itself was awesome. I met a ton of really amazing people in the Freedom Force community. It was my first experience of interacting with such a large number of people united in a common interest; it was a totally alien experience to me to be able to drop a reference to an obscure comic character and have several people immediately know what I was talking about. If I hit a snag on something I was working on, the community had a dozen experts to help me figure it out. When I made something I thought was awesome, they understood how much work it had taken, because they were all building the same kind of thing.

The community was so strong that it quickly became about more than the game it was founded for. The member avatars started to have a whole mythology built up around them; Captain Spud was a dick who impaled annoying people on meat hooks (clearly not based at all on real life; I prefer broken broom handles), while Gdaybloke was the CEO of H.A.M.S.T.E.R., a paramilitary organization dedicated to combating clone villainy by lobbing incendiary rodents at them.

Seriously. That was an actual thing:



As the years went on and people played the game less, the community held strong by diversifying. We became one of the largest and most-recognized Supergroups on City of Heroes' most populous server, and had strong presences in Second Life and other MMOs. Freedom Reborn (the replacement forum the fans put together when Irrational's forums cracked and shattered from the traffic we shoved into them) evolved into an open-ended community to share art, discuss movies, and do whatever else the members felt like. I made friends in that community that I still talk to today, including one I allow to write on my blog out of the intense pity I feel for him.

And all the while, new generations of skinners, meshers, coders, and FXers came in; the original crowd had gorged themselves and had their fill, but each new arrival got to experience the staggering breadth of creative options as if they were brand new. The community is still alive, active, and producing to this day.

Freedom Force wasn't just an amazing game. It wasn't just a creative platform, nor just an enormously resourceful and resilient community. It was a phenomenon. Irrational Games lit a spark in 2002 that, while perhaps slightly dimmed, still burns ten years later. People are still finding new things to do with the game and its sequel, and many of the people I met in high school are still around and still being awesome. The thing we made so long ago– on the crumbling forum, in Dr. Manbot's Chat Shack, and across the array of games the community branched out into– defies description, and for me personally, it marked a very important period in my development from an insular, insecure jerkass to a cockier, more public jerkass.

But all of that– Irrational's brilliant first draft, and the iterative innovation of the masses– aren't why I consider today an important day. I've played better games than Freedom Force, I've modded for other games, and I've participated in communities just as fervent and creative. I'm not really one to glamorize normal events in my life; in most cases, a great game is just a great game, and a good community is just that. I've experienced a lot of amazing things in my life, but I have no problem leaving the past behind me. Cool things happen, then they end, then I find something else to find cool. It's the great Circle of ADD.

But Freedom Force is special. Ten years of this game in my life is an important milestone, even if I spent five of them largely forgetting it existed. Because even though Freedom Force is in my past, its direct effects impact my life every single day ten years later.

I had trouble explaining it in words, so I made a chart instead.

A really big chart.



Freedom Force may be my past, but this wouldn't be my present if it hadn't happened. I wouldn't play Warmachine– I had little affection for minis games after I burned out on GW's tripe. This blog wouldn't exist, because Gday wouldn't have stuck with the VS community very long without a local scene to play with. I might not even live where I do now; the main deciding factor in the debate on where to live after I graduated was between staying in a city I liked more (Ottawa) or moving back closer to my friends in the GTA, and I wouldn't have that particular set of friends if I hadn't found HK, which I wouldn't have done if I didn't play VS, which I wouldn't have played if I hadn't picked up Heroclix first, which I wouldn't have done unless Gday was already doing it, which he wouldn't have had money for if I hadn't rescued him from that homeless shelter, which I wouldn't have found if he wasn't hanging around in a Freedom Force chatroom on a stolen 486 laptop in the basement of a free clinic.

What do you want, we were barely out of the 90s. That wasn't a terrible rig. Plus... he was a hobo. Jeez, you're judgmental.

Freedom Force gave me my artistic skills and the realization that I was capable of many different kinds of art, which led directly into the field I chose to pursue in University. Freedom Force gave me my current job, as one of the references on my CV when I applied was a guy I'd met through the community and done some web design work for– and they did call him, and my boss later told me good references were part of why they picked me. Freedom Force gave me my community leadership and organization skills, as it was the first place I'd ever had the confidence to try to band people together to accomplish amazing things, a skill that has served me very well when I've decided that I wanted to assemble 10 scenario boards for a Warmachine event in four months, or inflict a cruel joke on Gday in the three weeks before Christmas, postage time included. Freedom Force (somewhat ironically) put me back on track to enjoy "analog" geek hobbies, as I had been drifting more into video games before Gday's Ludditism forced me back onto the tabletop in dank basements (that's... not what it sounds like).

Any way you look at it, Freedom Force made me the Spud I am today. And because I'm that Spud, you just had to read 2,000 words of sappy and confusing nostalgia on what was until now a perfectly serviceable Monday morning.

And so, for all of this and more, I mark today as an important day. In large part due to the work of Ken Levine and his magical oompa-loompas at Irrational Games, I've had ten good years. I thank them for that– they probably never considered that their actions might have positive consequences that abstract and far-reaching, but they did nonetheless.

And since I'd prefer to get all of my limp-wristed sappiness out of the way in one sitting, I'll go ahead and thank not just the Freedom Force community, but all the communities I've intruded on over the years, who have in equal part goaded me on when I was awesome and reined me in when I was a douchebag. It takes a village to raise a child, and it takes the combined worldwide force of thousands of nerds to raise one passable Spud.



If you'd like to try out this amazing game, it's available for like $5 on Steam, and you can find the wreckage of a decade of content output for the game on the Freedom Reborn forums. It's a solid tactical RPG, an amazing encapsulation of everything that's awesome about 60s comics, and a chilling insight into the upbringing of an unrependant anthropomorphic potato.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is all I have to say about that.
-Spud

I really mean everything I said there. Words won't ever suffice to express what I got out of my 6ish years here, all of which was initiated by the release of a video game.

Apparently I'm getting wordy and need to split this into two posts... conclusions and thanks after the break.

[captainspud]

So, even though I'm not here anymore, and most of the people I'd like to thank aren't either, and even a few of the ones who are here basically aren't on speaking terms with me anymore (more on that in a sec), I'm just going to pretend all of that isn't true and give a decade's worth of shout-outs.

• I'd like to thank Ken, Jon, Maxx, and all the other insane people at Irrational for unleashing this wonderful mess on us in the first place.
  
• I'd like to thank Volt for being my first super-fan. He raved about my skins when they weren't any good, which kept me motivated until I learned how to make ones that were worthy of his praise. I'd also like to thank him for giving me a home for two years at Electric Freedom.
• I'd like to thank MJB for being my last super-fan. Even when I gave everyone a perfectly justifiable reason to decide enough was enough, MJB stuck by me. You did a lot more for me over the years than that, but it's for that that I'm most thankful. I didn't deserve the esteem in which you held me.
• I'd like to thank Glitch Girl for putting some order into things when they got messy, and for giving me endless critique and inspiration. You were always very helpful.
• I'd like to thank everyone in Electric Freedom for giving me a standard to aspire to. You made me feel like I was part of the cool kids' club and made me work hard to make sure I deserved the honor.
• I'd like to thank Mowgli for being the first real artist I ever knew and spoke to, and who knew and spoke to me back. You inspired me to keep drawing and keep improving, and answered a million stupid questions. So, I guess thanks for your patience.
• I'd like to thank Tortuga for being a grown-up I could talk to when I acted like a five-year-old. You were right, I was mostly being an idiot. Oh, and thanks again for the reference.
• I'd like to thank Tater Tot for the ego boost.
• I'd like to thank the Gryphon for showing everyone what could be done.
• I'd like to thank the Beyonder for his patience-- with all of us. We asked so much of you, and you never shrunk back or hid away. You were always there in the shack to answer questions and do custom work, even if 90% of your responses were "Lol".
• I'd like to thank DYAM and BWPS for making me laugh.
• I'd like to thank Robin for being our ray of sunshine. I've never met a more relentlessly positive person than you.
• I'd like to thank Mikey, Bujin, Darkmagik, and everyone else at FXForce for giving me a home late in my Freedom Force career. Your excitement and approval kept me working.
• I'd like to thank the Chat Shack crew for keeping me entertained.
• I'd like to thank the Havenites for conspiring with me.
• I'd like to thank Camma, Beau, Funeral-Pyre, and Top Defender for doing awesome stuff with me in CoH. For someone with obsessed with exclusiveness as me, it was tough for me to accept friends who didn't originate from within the circle, but I'm glad that I did. You were all awesome. I hope Camma and Beau are still happy, and while I'm too terrified to read Pyre's book, I hope it does well.
• I'd like to thank absolutely everyone else for absolutely everything you ever did. The people I liked kept me motivated, and the people I hated gave me the drama I fed on. The people who did amazing work kept me inspired.

And because if I don't do it now I never will:

Warning, spoiler contains a major tone change toward the "bummer" end of the spectrum. Skip if you want to keep riding the happy wave.

Spoiler

I'd like to apologize to the community at large for treating everyone like crap for so many years. I was an unhappy kid, and I took it out on the people who had given me nothing but friendship and patience. When they made me a mod on the official forums, I demonstrated exactly why I didn't deserve it. When idealistic kids wandered into the community, I treated them like dirt and kept them out of the "clique" so that I could feel superior to them. When people in CoH wanted to have some fun, I stomped my feet and ruined it for everyone before storming out. I believe the AFBL I ruined was the last one that ever ran-- indicative of the level of poison I'd injected into the experience for everyone involved.

Most of all, I'd like to apologize to Mike. You were by far the nicest, friendliest person I ever met in my FR tenure. You never had an unkind word to say about anyone, and you did all the hard work that made my quickly-knocked-out FX cores actually work. You gave endlessly of yourself and kept everyone in good spirits. The fact that I somehow managed to urine you of all people off was a sharp shock of reality that has made me regret my behaviour here more than anything else. I realized far too late that your patient "Heh"s were your uneasy way of concealing a growing disappointment with my petulance, taking them instead as approval. I'm not exaggerating when I say that you are the only friend I've ever regretted losing. This is partially because until I finally grew up properly-- far later than I should have-- I had precious few I cared enough about to make a difference, but also because I know that the fault in that whole mess lay nowhere but with me. I threw you away and destroyed years of trust and good faith.

I'm sorry I disappointed you. And I'm sorry it took me three years to say that.

Freedom Force, and the community that sprung up around it, was one of the most important influences I've had in my life. It allowed me to excel, but also to fester into a really ugly person at times-- I'm glad in the end that I had that unpleasant experience and could eventually learn from it, and I'm thankful and endlessly sorry to all the people who had to grit their teeth and put up with me while I was going through it all. Thank you, everyone, for the ups and the downs that made me who I am.

But anyway, enough of my Twilight soap opera crap. Today is a happy day.

I think I'm going to skip game night at the store and punch Nuclear Winter in his ugly face instead.

FOR FREEDOM!!!

[stumpy]

Wow! An important day, indeed. That was quite a post, captainspud. I wasn't around for the early days of FF and FR, so I really appreciate the timeline, too. An excellent commemoration of FF's ten-year anniversary and a reminder of what a journey it has been. Thanks for putting it all down.

[BlueBard]

Hey, Spud

No matter what, past disagreements aside, you'll always be one of my favorite curmudgeons.

We always knew that under that crusty exterior was ... well, more crust.  But there have been times when you've allowed your pure spudly core to show, and this is one of them.

I don't forget that when you left City of Heroes, you dropped oodles of influence to anyone who wanted them.  Sure, it was just imaginary currency in a game, but it was still generous.

Thanks for sharing!  And don't be a stranger.  Lord knows I've thrown my own little fits around and I'm still here.  We've gone past being about a game... we're a Community of writers, artists, geeks, and fanboys who believe that irrational behavior can be kind of fun sometimes.

[Nyte Dragon]

 Holy doodles on a stick! Today is also my daughter's b-day, so that makes it extra cool. 

I can't believe it's been ten years. One whole fracking decade! And things are still being made for the original game as well as it's follow-up. I'm not sure if very many other games can brag about that. It's a testament to not just how great a game IG made, but how great a community formed afterwards.

From myff on to this current board, this community has weathered moving from one web address to another, board shut-downs, and other events that may have, nay should have, been the end. But, like in comics, nothing stays dead forever and the same held true for these boards. These boards are like the X-Mansion, they get ransacked, blown up, tore apart, or what-have-you, and boom enough time and lots of effort from some truly great folks, and it's back and better then ever.

Spudly, you're post made me nostaligic about how awesome things used to be, and weepy sad missing some of the folks that have drifted away from here (Dark Magik, Volt, Maxx, Grizz, EmJay, G'Day, B.A.D., DYAM, Zapow, Bujin, Mike, Lude, Hells...... Yeah getting weepy sadder even more now).

The boards came at a really needed time for me, living in Ironton I was away from my family and friends. It sucked beyond sucking. I bought FF a few weeks after it came out, having saw previews in Wizard. And then I started searching for FF content and one thing I came across was GG's site. I started reading some of the fan fiction wrote there, then I came across the Irrational PodPace Saga.  (Trust me, if you never read it, go to GG's site and do so.... NOW!) I figured I'd at least check the boards out, and hesitantly decided to sign up. My original idea for a login name (Powerhouse) was taken, so I sat and thought. I wanted something cool and unique, after all I saw all these other posters with such wild names. Then it hit me, I had always loved dragons, and I was (and still am) a night person, thus I came up with Night Dragon. 

I've meet people that I have to say touched and influenced my life through that one silly awesome game. And least anyone here think I'm just chest-puffing and riding the sappy train, as I said earlier, today is my daughters b-day as well. Her mother and I had an agreement (we never checked to see the sex of the baby, wanting to be surprised), if the baby was a girl, she got to name her first name and I got to name her middle name. If it was a boy the reverse would hold true. So she choose Caitlyn, and I choose Marie. (I always was told you name a child after someone you want them to take after, and there couldn't be someone I'd be more happy for her to be like. ) And if she had been a boy, two of the names that I had in mind were Christopher Jay (that being G'Day and two of my best friends in HS) or Talon Micheal (Grizz and both MikeB7 and EmJayBee). Yeah, I'm a bit of a sap I guess.

And Spudly, can't lie, you were harsh, rude, and out of line sometimes. But you also had a good heart at times, sometimes you needed a foot up the butt to get that heart jumpstarted. If not for you, there would have been no forum secret santa. And you did such a cool pic for X-Stream's Apartment. I'll give your leg some good Direcub action anyday.

If I were to list each and every person in this community I felt deserved gratitude and thanks, I'd be here possibly another ten years just typing it all out. I do have a few though that I definetly want to say thanks to (and I reserve the right to get extra sappy 2 times here) :

• She-Cat - For doing a skin I requested from her, even though she didn't know me from adam. This was the first signs of what kind of people FF attracted.
• Lightning Bug - LB did what I consider the definitive skin and look of Night Dragon.
• Thunder - For always offering to be an ear to listen to when I had problems
• TUE - For always trying to skin me for a jacket and boots. Wait. The hell? I'm not thanking you for that! 
• Robin - Spud summed that up perfectly. Nuff said.
• G'Day - At a time when my beliefs had me at odds with alot of people, you befriended me and showed to me that there are people out there who live what they believe. You are a true shining example of the phrase "Practice what you preach"
• EmjayBee - Dude, if they ever have a artistic version of 'America's Got Talent' you would be the next Landau Eugene Murphy Jr, and show them what a country boy can do!
• Mowgli - Mowgli did the most AWESOME drawing of ND ever for (i believe the 1st FR calander) and it so rawked!! Plus he schooled my butt on heroclixs in the shack. 
• X-Stream, Grizz, and Vage - Sorry to lump you guys together, but the whole X's apartment was one of the best and funniest things I ever read or was involved in here, except for.....
  
• Dark Magik - This is gonna the first extra sappy moment. I never had someone who could so put me into fits of laughter as DM could. She could force me into being the straight man to her incredibly off-the-wall insane posts. In the FR family shrub, DM somehow managed to end up as my sister. And like any little sister, she could torment me and always come out smelling like a rose (yeah one buried in....errr I digress  ). My favorite post I still remember to this day was I had just said DM was a delicate flower, and her reply was "Delicate flower this! *kicks ND in the nads*" . DM if you ever manage to see this, I miss ya lil sis !
• Volt - For being one of the coolest people on here, but also one of the nicest. And I'll say it one time only, yes your bum rules us all.
• Zapow, Tort, and B.A.D. - I have indivdual reasons I could thank all three of you, but you three were the triforce of comedy with Dr. Man-Bot. You three hit a vein of gold and shared it with us all. And guys..... I think the Doc could give it a go again in 2012 (hint, hint)
• MikeB7 - Mike you are by far another of the funniest people I've had the priviledge to call a friend. But even more then that, you are one of the most creative and encouraging people here. I made a FX for tie-dyed fire breath (long story.... don't ask, and don't eat the brownies.) and your reply to me in PM made me feel so good about what I had done, I kept it until one of the board crashes erased it.
• Lude - Site Wars! We had such a blast with the whole concept. I wish the Mod could have been made, we would have had even more fun with what could have been the first FF comedy Mod.
• GG - For being you. Yeah, sappy post #2 got here. At times you have been the voice of reason and sanity for the community, the boards, or for various individuals (*whistles innocently* ). You always try to come up with things to get the forum members involved in, be it fiction challanges, posting games, or your current writer's workshop one. You did some seriously awesome images of ND, as well as the chibi versions of forum members. (Never, never steal GG's snickers bars.... trust me!) I have always enjoyed when we got to talk, either via PM, chat shack, YIM, or phone. And if I was in a bad mood, you always managed to make me feel better afterwards. So, yeah, thank you for simply.... being you. I named Catie appropiatly enough, and hope she does take after her "Auntie GG".... except for the whole frelling electronics up, we can skip that one part.

Yeah there's still ton and tons of folks I'm forgetting, and there's not going to be a way to thanks every single one person I feel has made this place so great in the last decade, so instead I'll end this long drawn out mush fest by saying, thank you to every member of this community past and present, who has helped this community thrive and grow beyond that simple game that came out ten years ago.

[ow_tiobe_sb]

I suspect that another clone plot is afoot...

Where is the real Spud, and what have you done with him?!

And what's up with ND?  Is my eyesight failing me, or has he hand some wingspan enhancement work done?

ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

[Panther_Gunn]

I suspect that another clone plot is afoot...

Where is the real Spud, and what have you done with him?!

perhaps this might provide a clue:

Fair warning: this is going to get really awkward and teary by the end. But, I'm going ahead with it anyway, because everyone, even jerkish potatoes, is entitled to one day of being mushy every decade. Today is my one day. Tomorrow I go back to being cold and distant. For now, though... let's get poignant.

From this I would conjecture that he hasn't actually been cloned, but is currently on a Jamaican holiday, and just prior to this post, he was mugged and savagely beaten, pummeled, perhaps even whipped, and it's scrambled what there was of his brains.  The the warm feeling he was experiencing at the time of the posting was nothing more than that created by the friction of the beating.

Besides, after confessing to being in such close proximity of G'day for such an extended period, I doubt a successful Spud clone could ever be passed off for more than the 30 seconds or less it takes G'day to spot him.  .......unless......G'day himself has also been cloned.  If that's the case, the only question remains is should we (I, really) attempt to rescue him or just put him out of his misery?

It's times like this when I wish I had had more of a clue to what was going on back then.  Not creating an account here until 5 months into things put me on page 35 of "late to the party".  Lord only knows what I missed out on in that amount of time.  That was a fairly lengthy post there, Spud, and probably as accurate a telling as we're likely to get from ya (girly-ness and all).  Bravo.  Now get that pasty-white carcass of yours in here more often.....even ND is making you look like a slacker (as much as I hate to admit that he's doing something positive).

Speaking of which, you're makin' a mess in here again, lizard-boy.  Goopy!  Get in here & sweep up all these unsightly, dried up scales.  We're tryin' to run a family-friendly place around here.  Lord knows what kind of reaction, allergic or otherwise, all this could cause someone.  I swear, you just can't find, hire, nor beat good help these days.

[Mr. Hamrick]

It's times like this when I wish I had had more of a clue to what was going on back then.  Not creating an account here until 5 months into things put me on page 35 of "late to the party".  Lord only knows what I missed out on in that amount of time.  That was a fairly lengthy post there, Spud, and probably as accurate a telling as we're likely to get from ya (girly-ness and all).  Bravo.  Now get that pasty-white carcass of yours in here more often.....even ND is making you look like a slacker (as much as I hate to admit that he's doing something positive).

Bah, I was here earlier than 5 months in and I still am not sure I figured out everything going on.

[ow_tiobe_sb]

'Tis all very plausible, P_G.  Present day H.A.M.S.T.E.R. may be nothing more than a front for even more insidious, covert clone activity than previously conceived.  I will raise this issue with Bunburyists 2 through 5 at our next Security Committee meeting.

Bah, I was here earlier than 5 months in and I still am not sure I figured out everything going on.

In that case, what's your opinion of the latest episode of Ninja Dominicron, Season 21.5?

ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

[PreRaphaelite]

Speaking of which, you're makin' a mess in here again, lizard-boy.  Goopy! Get in here & sweep up all these unsightly, dried up scales.

What? Me? Why me? Is it because I'm glorious? Because I'm so amazingly, incredibly special? Because I'm...

It's because I'm a puddle of goo, isn't it? Lovely. Well, I can change. Honestly, just give me a chance.

Please, not the broom... Anything but the broom.

I suppose this is further proof that a good running joke can last over 8 years. Curse that chat shack... It's been a good run, and I've bumped elbows with a lot of fine people. And some fools. Some fine fools.

[robinka]

>hugs<

It seems silly how one silly little game can make such an impact but I totally agree!! You guys were there for me and helped support me through some difficult times. For that, I am forever grateful! This community is a part of me even today even though I haven't been to this forum in ages! (I'm also totally flattered that I was remembered here after all this time!!) Thank you all for being my friends!

[lugaru]

Come for the game, stay for the community.

Dont be too harsh on yourself, when I look at my old forum posts (moreso on other forums) I was a major troll, even played a couple of elaborate pranks on RPG.NET

What matters is where we are now, and that aint a bad spot.

[Figure Fan]

Wow, I was 13 years old when I started playing this game. Hard to believe 10 years have gone by already (though I didn't join FR until about a year after the game was released).

I've met so many cool people on here who encouraged my art and motivated me to explore graphic and web design. Things would certainly be different without this place.

Thanks for the reminder, Spud

[Outcast]

Ooops...pardon me for intruding. Must have walked in a wrong room or something....

But it's great to hear from you guys though,and all the good times you've had before....

Oh and Happy 10th anniversary Freedom Force.

[catwhowalksbyhimself]

It's hard to believe it's been that long.  I probably started being involved with the community about 8 years ago and got more involved 7 years or so ago. I really had no idea it's been that long.  I have been thinking of myself as one of the "late comers" but it seems I've been around most of the time.

Yeah, that means I know most of those names.  I miss those who have gone (and even some who have passed away) but am hopeful for the future.  With 2 of our community members makes new games, Freedom Force's legacy will continue on I hope for many years to come.

[deano_ue]

prem told me about this and honestly my reactions **** off

its been ten years wow

Nd it was always a way of gratitude, dude you hosted my first work at dragon force damn that was ages ago. my first ever skin released and it was a hordak standard for grens mesh wow i feel really old now

honestly i can say this board made me the artist i am today, no really. i started learning photoshop to create my own skins here, i thought if i wanted these character i might as well do them myself rather than pester and beg people for characters they themselves may have no interest in

this lead on to my developing what limited skills i had, and channelling that into illustration, giving my first piece of published work ever (the fr calender) which looking back at now i truly cringe at, this lead to college which in turn led to me picking up a camera and having to make a choice between pencil and the lens

i was able to take the skills i learnt from my skins and use the techniques in my photos, and now i 10 year later i'm near 30 and work as the house photographer for northern ireland's premier arena, and have photographed alice cooper, eric clapton, rihanna, def leppard.

all due to me wanting to skin hordak in a pc game i seen in wizard magazine

you guys rock

[Mr. Hamrick]

Bah, I was here earlier than 5 months in and I still am not sure I figured out everything going on.

In that case, what's your opinion of the latest episode of Ninja Dominicron, Season 21.5?
ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

voice acting hasn't been the same since season 15, writing has gone downhill from there since season 18

[Nyte Dragon]

even ND is making you look like a slacker (as much as I hate to admit that he's doing something positive).

I is confused (like that's something new, they all say). Is Spud the one doing something positive? Or me? Cause I swear.... it was just that one time in Chi-town, and Volt had got me drunk anyways!

Nd it was always a way of gratitude.

I know TUE, Hell I went hunting up the He-man DVD that had your art on it just to show folks that I knew the guy who did that. (couldn't find the blasted thing though ) Buttttttt you keep that shiny pig-sticker away from me, all the same. 

Bah, I was here earlier than 5 months in and I still am not sure I figured out everything going on.

In that case, what's your opinion of the latest episode of Ninja Dominicron, Season 21.5?
ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

voice acting hasn't been the same since season 15, writing has gone downhill from there since season 18

Psssshhhh, voice acting.  The whole thing went to pot after they changed formats for the show and started adding in unneccassary CG just to make it look cool. Overkill much.

And don't even get me started about Ichiro finding out that Juni was actually his long lost half-sister. Total Star Wars ripoff!

[XStream]

  *Flies into room, pulls out trusty lounge chair, and takes a seat*

I realized a few weeks back that we were nearing the 10 year mark. Even now, as I sit here with my laptop in my lap... I am at a loss of words to express to you all what this community has meant to me, and the place that it still holds in my heart. Spud, man, you did an awesome job expressing how much FR has meant to you. And I would just like to say, that I am proud of you man! It was good to get an update of where you have been. You were a butt, but we loved you for it. You really pushed the envelope sometimes, but I was always glad that there were people who wouldn't give up on you. You were always talented at everything that you tried (except maybe that mod...), and most of us knew that you cared.

I would like to take a few sentences to reminisce about this community as well.     I found Freedom Force by accident. I believe it was an issue of Wizard that had an article about City of Heroes that sent me into my local EB. The guy at the counter sold me a preorder for FF. When I got home that evening I looked the game up online, and was pretty disappointed when I realized it was not the game that I had been looking for. But on Irrational's website I came across the forum and lurked until after the game came out. It was the community that kept me from getting a refund. Once FF came out I fell in love with the game, but it took me a while before I actually posted for the first time. In fact, my original login was RdNkdHero. Which people thought mean Rude Naked Hero, but it was supposed to be Red Necked Hero. I believe it was Gday who made my first avatar with overalls! 

After a little while I got involved in some of the mischief, and started hanging around the Chat Shack. The FF community and eventually FR become a good outlet for me. I found so much joy just from talking about this video game, reading through the latest issue of Dr. Manbot, discussing comics, and just being a little crazy. There have been so many talented people come through FR. I still spend hours looking through all of the content, it amazes me. I tried my hand at skinning, but I did not have the talent for it. Thankfully Glitchy came in and made me a proper hero skin for one of our Secret Santas...

I could go on forever, but for me... the the most amazing thing about FR was that you all let me participate. Besides a silly thread here or there, I do not believe I have contributed much at all to this community. So many talented people pouring content into this community and no one ever made me to feel like I didn't belong. I always felt like part of the family. Thank you all for that.

My fondest memories are from the XStream's apartment threads. Late one night, much like tonight. I noticed all of these secret lair threads and I decided that X needed a place to hang. I could never have dreamed the craziness that would pursue. Grizz, Vage, Night Dragon, MJB and Dark Magik and everyone else who participated in the thread were AWESOME! I remember explaining you all to my girlfriend one time... Oh boy, she didn't get it!  I know Grizz used to archive those, and I hope that one day I can reach him and get those... I remember sneaking during drafting class in college to join the fight against Hell's clones, or facing Glitch Cat on the apartment's fire escape.    Or the time that X was turned into a werewolf and kept peeing on everything!

I have many grand memories of this community. So many of you to thank, and so many that I miss. Thank you all for the past ten years. And I want to end this post with sharing one of the most awesome pics Spud ever created.

[BlueBard]

>hugs<

It seems silly how one silly little game can make such an impact but I totally agree!! You guys were there for me and helped support me through some difficult times. For that, I am forever grateful! This community is a part of me even today even though I haven't been to this forum in ages! (I'm also totally flattered that I was remembered here after all this time!!) Thank you all for being my friends!

Omigosh!  This truly is an event.  Glad to see you back, Robinka, even for a bit.

[deano_ue]

even ND is making you look like a slacker (as much as I hate to admit that he's doing something positive).

it was a uk release mate, so that may be why. i always feel bad about that dvd, the art i submitted is terrible now and sadly i submitted 2 pieces but they added my name to 3 always felt bad about the poor person

[Tomato]

No one has mentioned me in their list of people to thank. I am disappoint.

But no, seriously, while I cannot claim Freedom Force has had even close to the impact on my life as it has for some of you guys (though it is the community I've been with the longest... I have a habit of jumping from one community to another when I get a new obsession, but for some reason even if I'm not interested in FF skins or I'm just burnt out on comics, I'll still putz around FR to BS about a TV show or a game that I like) it's certainly been a huge part of my life for the last decade. As much as I rant and scream about the horrible n00bs or how dumb someone is being or how I wish Murs would stop peeing on the carpet, I wouldn't trade up this community for a billion dollars. I've got my own little sappiness to follow, but I'll leave it in spoilers for those who don't want to bother

Spoiler

I was twelve years old when Freedom Force came out. I was a dumb kid, and like most dumb kids I had a bad combination of an overly huge sense of entitlement, and an inherent laziness. Even before FF, I was notorious around the Skindex boards for kittbashing parts of other skins... so much so that I was booted out of Electric Freedom for stealing another person's Green Arrow arms for a Red Arrow skin (Kingdom Come). But for some reason, I always came back to FF... maybe because of the customization it offered, maybe because it was the first good superhero game for PC, or maybe it was because I was always blown away by what people here were doing with it. For a long time I just kind of lurked around the edges of the community, but eventually I adopted a new persona, "Tomato" (a nickname I picked up from another board) and joined the somewhat newly created Freedom Reborn.

Things weren't peachy though. While I may not have kittbashed from then on out, I still wanted a lot of attention for very little work. I know this will shock people, but I wasn't really that great of a skinner at the time. We who have been here long enough speak of the dreaded "sim6s" that ran rampant during that era... I didn't even qualify as that. I wanted so badly to be better then any other skinner at the time, but I look back now and I can't imagine how I thought my skins were good, let alone at the level my peers were doing.

It wasn't until about 2005 (a few months before the original NPI/FA boards went down) that I really started to grow as an artist. I'd always been intimidated by the NPI boards... they had a reputation as being intended for more serious critique then FR, and I think deep down I knew my delicate ego couldn't have handled it. But I finally plucked up the courage to start posting there, and I really owe Syn and HQ for the help they gave me over there... I made my first base on that board, I did some of my first meshes over there, and I was able to take the groundwork from there back over to FR and build upon it here.

At this point, I feel like I've settled into a comfortable spot within the community... I'm not as good a skinner as C6 or AA or whatever, nor am I as good a mesher as Gren or as good an artist as... well, mostly everyone who does art. But while I may not have become master of any one thing, I'm probably more versatile then anyone else. And I'll be honest, I'm a lot happier to randomly see someone use one of my mesh pieces or to help out someone on a project then I ever have been getting praise for some random skin I know will be outdated in less than a year.

[Glitch Girl]

Guys IO have to admit, reading this did make me mist up a little bit. 

I can't believe it's been this long already.  And its' great seeing so many "faces" (not literally of course) either returning or having never left.

I learned about Freedom Force a couple of months after it came out.  I was curious and somehow ended up on the board and decided to try my hand at skinning.  Unlike a lot of gamer boards which, let's face it, aren't exactly female friendly, the community here was so much nicer, more mature (where it counted), not to mention amazingly creative.  I actually felt welcome. 

Since then, I've had the chance to meet a few of the FR denizens in person all over the country, worked on many projects I have greatly enjoyed with people who are fun to work with.  You guys have been with me though the adoption of Glitch Cat, the purchase of my first home, my father's death, and a bazillion of other ups and downs too numerous to mention.  Sometimes when the internet is getting me down, FR reminds me that not everyone out there is like that and sometimes, that's what you need.

10 years is an eternity in internet time, and I'm glad we're still here. 

So, thanks guys.  All of you, past and present.  Here's to the future.

[ow_tiobe_sb]

Here's to the future...

*movie trailer voice-over voice* ...In a dark, gritty world, where Tomato has forced us all to pony up...

ow_tiobe_sb
Phantom Bunburyist and Whirled Braker

[Tomato]

Hey, I just started that poll, the titans as a whole voted to submit FR under the domination of the Pony overlords.

[Thunder]

This thread takes me waay back.   I will never forget being a lurker for so long.  Then i started to make friends and posted just a few times.  FF (and FR especially) have always held a place in my heart.  My creativity knew no bounds when I began to skin and then became part of Dragon Force and then later on being a proud contributor to the Gamma Patrol of Lichtensten.  I remember early attempts to put together a JSA mod that never quite came to fruition, but enjoyed the hell out of doing skins for it. 

There are so many people within this community who have inspired me to contribute back then and I still occasionally do a skin once in a while due to newer mesh releases.  I have been part of two calendars (which were super-fun to do).  The Thunder t-shirt is still up at Freedom Reworn. 

There are so many people to list who I have conversed with, collaborated, and conspired with over the years, and I apologize if I leave anyone out.  They are in no particular order: Zapow, BAD, Glitch Girl, Juancho, MikeB7, MJB, NightDragon, Lightning Bug, Grizzlybeartalon, Robinka, Volt, Tortuga, Captain Spud, Mowgli, Bujin, and G'Daybloke.  Again, if I've left anyone out, I sincerely apologize. 

And to my good buddy ND

Thunder - For always offering to be an ear to listen to when I had problems

The ear is always here.

I may be a phantom here, but I still check in everyday....Being one of the original Titans is an honor and privilege because of all the people I've met here.  FOR FREEDOM  (and cheeseburgers  )!!!!!

[MikeB7]

Wow, that was really nice, Spud.  Thanks for saying that, it means a lot to me.  Sure there was a rough patch, but I still consider you a good friend and always will.  There was just too much fun had in FF and then CoH not to smile when I think of you.   

[Reepicheep]

Holy crap.


I thought this was a World of Warcraft forum.



Serious edit - my conscience could not cope with a post saying the above: It sounds to me, Spud, that you've fallen into the same pitfall that just about every other human being does. All those negative things you remember doing have left a bit of a guilty scar, and you probably look back at those dark, dark FR days and only see those worse moments. Theres totally no need to. I don't know if you categorise me in those idealistic young'uns that you shunned a decade ago. But I wouldn't blame you if you do. I wouldn't blame you for shunning me. Sure, I was only really guilty of being young (I still feel a little guilty for pretending I was over 12 when I joined up), but what else could you do with an annoying, scrappy kid endlessly asking if he could play your grown up games?

You - and those of the central FR 'clique', as you said - were all people I looked up to. I admired you guys. I wanted to be you. I wanted to be like G'Day and have my own HAMSTER. I wanted to be like XStream and have my own apartment. I wanted to be like you and have my own Rusty Meat Hook in-joke. You guys were awesome. You should really look back at those FR days and remember what fun they were, and what a great role you played in this community. Look at all these posts in this thread, of people reminiscing good times. You were a part of that.

We all have things to apologise for. And this thread would go on for several hundred pages if we were to list them all off. But really, you and everyone else in this community, have majorly contributed great things to it. There is no reason to remember the few things you're sorry for, when you're also responsible for a myriad of fantastic moments.

[BlueBard]

{Sniff} Aww.  See?  Our little Reep has grown up.

(Kidding aside, Reep, couldn't have said it better...)

[XStream]

Sure, I was only really guilty of being young (I still feel a little guilty for pretending I was over 12 when I joined up), but what else could you do with an annoying, scrappy kid endlessly asking if he could play your grown up games?

I knew it!  LoL. 

Kidding aside (yeah right), FR has been pretty awesome. And I for one am very thankful for those of you who stuck around throughout all these years. I remember when Reep and a few of the other "young'uns" starting hanging around the forum, and started causing "trouble".  LoL. Here we were on a forum website dedicated to a video game about super heroes, we were discussing comic books, and sharing pictures that we drew during Western Civ.; and we couldn't figure out why so many young boys (and maybe girls) kept crashing in with their new millenium humor. I can't help but laugh at our dilemma. I am really glad that we chose not to run off some of the younger members. In fact, I believe that was one of the things that made FR succeed! Everyone decided early on that it WOULD be a family friendly forum, and that meant we had to accept everyone. I doubt we were always successful, and I am probably just as guilty as anyone else of being intolerant some times when it came to some of the annoyances (no offense to any of the "young'uns").

I would like to say, that I for one am proud of all of you for sticking together. I have been excited every single time that I have come back to visit the forums. Not because of something I did (because believe me, I was a small cog in this wheel), but because you all have continued the legacy. I would love to have a chance to chat with some of the "veterans" from the early days. It would be cool to catch up with them, but let me publically thank all of you. So thank you "young'uns" for keeping this forum going, and I tip my hat to you.

*Tips his hat*