I wouldn’t worry about it. A lot of people are complaining because movies are being uploaded so quickly they’re bumping everything from the first page too quickly. Plus, you don’t have to have the game to review the movies, apparently, and people are making accounts just to trash others’ movies.
The whole rating system is pretty flawed though, no? Pretty much only the top 10-25 will be seen consistantly since they are on the front page already and therefore the rest of the posters will be very shy of awards and vc’s.
And when somebody rationally explained that point to me on the game’s message boards, I conceded the point that forcing movies that took effort to create off of the “newly submitted” list for my computer generated ones really is pretty rude of me.
So is anyone else making movies that we haven’t checked out? Here are the studios I’ve been watching:
[ul]
[li]BraheSilver[/li][li]DeadlyAccurate[/li][li]Max Carnage[/li][li]Only Mostly Dead[/li][li]wolfman[/li][li]Slacker[/li][/ul]
If I haven’t reviewed any movies on the sites above, hang tight, I’ll get caught up today.
Lute Skywatcher, mobo85, and mkl12 - got anything for us? 
I’ll try to make sure I’m up to date tonight on my reviewing. I also made one movie that’s more of an in-joke for Dopers that I need to upload. For some reason, I was having trouble getting the upload utility to work after my first two movies. I also plan to edit a multi-part movie, “The Murder of John Woodley,” using Sony Vegas 6 and upload it somewhere, probably my personal website.
I’m still mostly playing the sim part. But when that’s done. . .
For those of you who like making movies but hate tycoon games, here is how to unlock all of the content in sandbox mode without playing through story mode.
- Open “Unlocking.ini” in C:\Documents and Settings[Your User Name]\Application Data\Lionhead Studios\The Movies\Unlocking.ini.
Note that this file will not exist if you have not played story mode yet, in which case you should create the file.
- Replace the contents of unlocking.ini with the following:
highest_decade = 2000
[prizes]
RANKPRIZE_1
RANKPRIZE_2
RANKPRIZE_3
RANKPRIZE_4
RANKPRIZE_5
RANKPRIZE_6
RANKPRIZE_7
RANKPRIZE_8
RANKPRIZE_9
RANKPRIZE_10
RANKPRIZE_11
RANKPRIZE_12
RANKPRIZE_13
RANKPRIZE_14
RANKPRIZE_15
RANKPRIZE_16
RANKPRIZE_17
RANKPRIZE_18
RANKPRIZE_19
RANKPRIZE_20
RANKPRIZE_21
RANKPRIZE_22
RANKPRIZE_23
RANKPRIZE_24
RANKPRIZE_25
- Start Sandbox mode in the year 2000. All sets and other options should be available.
N.B. There’s some speculation that going to RANKPRIZE_38 may unlock more.
My comments on the game itself:
I bought this principally for the movie maker function, and after tooling around with it for a bit…I have mixed feelings. Yes, it’s easy to use and the library is big enough to give you plenty to work with, but there’s a lot less flexibility than I had hoped for. To wit:
-
Pre-scripted blocking is a good idea. Not including a tool – even if it’s a difficult to use, external to the game, “extra” found somewhere on the DVD and not installed by default – to allow others to script their own blocking and import it into the game is a bad idea.
-
Why can’t I place the camera wherever the hell I want? Give me the pre-scripted blocking and let me choose exactly what I want to film from that. At most, a given scene gives you a choice of two or three camera angles. Sure, the default choices are going to work a lot of the time…so give me a “place camera” button to free up the camera for those few instances where the default angles don’t work for me.
-
I knew this wasn’t going to be in the game, but it still merits a “WTF” – no kids? No short or tall people? Yeah, I know it makes lining up kisses and such very hard, but why not just prevent height mismatches in those types of scenes?
-
Along the same lines – no fat guys? All I can control on an actor is chest size. I can give a girl big tits but not a plump bottom?
-
Why can’t I directly import MP3 files for soundtracks without first converting them to WAVs or OGGs? And why a 40 second limit? How on earth can I film “2112” with that kind of restriction?
Still, in all it’s pretty good. The choices available probably let me do 95% of what I want. It’s that last 5% of polish that will drive me to distraction.
I care less about the limited camera control than I do about the lack of non-scripted blocking. It’s so hard to find a scene that logically follows a previous one. I wish we could set waypoints and assign commands at those waypoints (i.e. pick up prop, sit, sit on prop, fall over dead, etc.).
So you get
Walk to waypoint A and pick up gun prop
Walk to waypoint B, turn and shoot at waypoint D (where the actor is sitting)
Run from waypoint B to A to C, dropping gun prop at waypoint A
They could fill each scene with a dozen or more logical waypoints (even more for the really big sets), and every waypoint can have a certain number of commands assigned to it (pick up gun, point it at the actor standing on waypoint X, shoot).
I don’t have the game, but the way everyone is talking about it reminds me of Stunt Island
I loved that game but there wasn’t a place to upload our movies then, so no one ever got to see my epic battle of F-16s fighting pterodactyls over Easter Island… 
Lat night I finished scripting Superguy 2: The Never Ending Battle and it’s a doozy. Over 50 scenes to be shot, and we all know that will take a while in story mode. What I want to know though is if after preliminary shooting is wrapped and I take it into post, if I discover a continuity or costume error, is there anyway to correct the script without having to “write” the whole thing over again? I realize they’d have to shoot the whole movie again (lame, reshoots should be part of the game…maybe in an add-on), but it took me about 3 hours to write the movie and don’t particulary feel like doing it over if there’s an error.
The folks at Liberty Studios would love to show their work to the world, but I’m using a dial-up connection, and am not able to watch any of the other studios’ output. I’m contemplating a faster connection for the future, though, and if I get it, you’ll be the first to see our output!
Yep! When it’s finished filming, take it back to the script-writing building. The scenes that have been shot will have a green check. If you change a scene it will have to be reshot, and you can also throw in new scenes in case you forgot something. Scenes you don’t change will be left untouched.
I’m always forgetting to check that my extras are dressed the same in different shots. It’s a pain to have three different people sitting in the same chair when the camera turns toward it during a conversation.
Haven’t figured out how to share my movies yet.
I had a pretty good one called A Pointed Affair. It was a romance featuring a sheriff and a madam. The madam got into a bar fight and killed a calvaryman, forcing the sheriff to arrest her until he got everything straightened out.
It’s pretty simple, Lute - just open the movie you want to share in the viewer. If you want to have an image displayed on the site, before you export it drag the timeline to a good shot in the movie and click the little picture icon on the right to create a snapshot. Then click the export button at the bottom right and choose “online” for the size, and it’ll get everything prepared. Once that’s done drop back out to the menu and click “Online” - you’ll need a name and password with Lionhead of course, which you can get here. Once you log in, you just have to pick which films to upload. That’s it!
I’m working on a biggun now so I haven’t posted anything new, so here are a few that I’ve found funny/interesting.
Quick Nick - Bizarre (and hilarious) western with a great story and narration.
Jack Thompson Gets a Flower - Did you know hand/eye coordination is used for most snipings?
Zombotine - They’ll get ya every time.
Scholastic Films Intelligent Design - I’m sure everyone has seen this, but in case you missed it, here it is again. Go get 'em, Billy!
I’m having a heck of a time trying to get Superguy 2 shot. Some issues I’m having:
If you turn on/off all non-filled roles in one scene, does it automoatically shut it on/off in all scenes?
I have a scene in a spaceship bridge and have a supporting player cast as the captain alien. However I don’t seem to be able to costume all the extra roles (aliens milling about) and there’s no way I could hire the number of extras that the bridge seems to hold. Even though I have extras available, they don’t get put in those roles anyway. I want to make sure they are at least the same species/latex head. Any suggestions?
This film has broken me. Can anyone lend me a couple hundred thousand bucks? That’s a lot of scripts and old actors to sell 
Heheheh. Your best bet with any significantly long/involved films is to save 'em for Sandbox mode. I’m working on an epic three parter now, and there’s no way I’d be able to pull it off in story mode. It’d take years just to shoot each part.
In Sandbox mode, you don’t have to worry about the lot, workers, etc, so you can hog everyone you find for your movies. I currently have four stars and ten extras ready to roll.
Once you have enough extras hired, you can assign them to particular role in your shots. Just click the little right arrow above your star panel to flip over to the list of extras, and drag and drop. Make sure you choose their outfits on the main title page though so you don’t have to do it for every scene.
Why, why did I tell myself I can wait to get this game?
Yes, in most cases it does. Sometimes you’ll run into a situation where certain roles are requred and can’t be shut off.
Once you have an extra in place of a mannequin, take that extra to wardrobe and get him (or her) in costume. You need to do this for each scene that extra is in. Your main characters keep their costumes from the main info screen but you don’t have that luxury for extras.
Not automatically. But you can drag a wooden mannwquin on those roles to to shut them off, too. This can, however lead to strange results. In one movie my main character got shot by someone who wasn’t there. I hadn’t noticed that a role I shut off was that important.
Yes you do. In the same screen where you dress your main characters for the whole movies, you can also dress the extras. Just select them from the left side.