TPM MAIN SITE REVIVAL PROJECT!

[Jeff]

300 pix is alot of vertical space. I'm thinking somewhere around 200x800. That'd be plenty tall, but not take up half the screen.

[Asilynne]

Ive wanted to help but I didnt know how to, until Jeff said that you guys wanted to integrate rpg/fanart/fanfic/asb in with the main site too. So I had an idea, Ok you know how mostly everyone in asb has their own persona for asb and a history for their trainers or something, what if we wrote a TPM type fanfic using those characters of everyones and practically make it TPMs own pokemon based series of sorts? Kinda like how instead of misty and brock and whatever other char being famous, its a story that revolves around the characters we have in asb right now. That also might encourage people to join the forums so they can play asb, because who wouldnt want their character in something "famous" lol

Idk just an idea ^-^()

[Ultimate Charizard]

Chris 2.1 has just finished doing something just liek this however it was more of his plot incorporating people from the Boards. I see what you mean about an ongoing timeline sort of basis, including members of the forum, recording battles that way and having them actually mean something.

[Asilynne]

Yeah and I was thinking that that way if someone in asb wants to have a friendly rivalry with someone that can be part of the ongoing story lol

[Jeff]

Alright, in keeping with what I've been doing, here is another look at what I have so far.


Hey, you got Bulbagarden in my Pokemasters!

That's the new news script in action, using Bulbagarden's feed as a test. Once Chris sets up our news forum and feed, it probably won't be too different, if at all. I've also made some other modifications.

The banner at the top is animated. I set it to animate once when the page is loaded. We can thank Telume for that (or Vash as those who have visted IRC know him as). It's really just a test so it's not that good yet. Also, I think in addition to whatever flash stuff we have on there, we'll still need some artwork, so anyone who's offered to help in that area, we still need you!

Edit: made some late modifications. I mainly moved the links to the main sections of the site to the top, and left the community-based sections in the sidebar.

[mr_pikachu]

Hey, looking good! So, you're saying the RSS feeds will be easily established? If so, that's excellent.

In terms of aesthetics, I'll just reiterate my earlier suggestion of wrapping that top blue bar around the whole information box. I'm thinking that might make it appear more cohesive, if we can do it. Of course, I could be wrong on that. What does everyone else think?

[mr_pikachu]

Okay, I'm in a bit of a rut with the Attackdex and I could use some advice.

I don't think it'll be too difficult to finish collecting the basic data for RBYGSC, as we've got a lot of that stuff already neatly compiled. But, as you well know, we have no information on the moves from the third and fourth generation. Obviously, we don't want to rip off anyone else (like SOME Pokesites do), and I'd rather we not go around begging FAQ creators for permission until we absolutely have to do so. This leaves me with two options: figure out how to hack the game myself, or collect the data manually (which would take ages and have a large risk of missing random info).

So. Does anyone have any suggestions? If not, I'll probably have to go ahead with game hacking, or something.

[Jeff]

I remember someone saying they were going to get someone who's hacked the game before. It was probably in this thread somewhere. I don't remember what came of that.

[Jeff]

OK, found it. It was in this thread. fp suggested that Arty2 of Serebii help us, but apparently didn't actually ask him.

[firepokemon]

Arty2 isn't of Serebii. He just provides data information for the site. And I don't know what the deal was with Arty2 other than I got a memo via irc asking to get his forum password back.

I did say a long time ago we needed people capable of hacking into the games. And we still need that as evidenced by Mr. Pikachu working on the attackdex.

[Houndoom_Lover]

I'm lovin' the new PM set-up who ever did that! Great job!! ^_^

[Mikey]

LOL seeing as how my alter ego was GoldenNoctowl77, I was the dominant episode guide writer for both English and Japanese episode guides for Serebii.net for like 3 years. I haven't written any since like mid Hoenn, but you are welcome to everything I have. They are all still on my hard drive somewhere! Good luck! The Pokemasters was one of my all time favorite sites!

<3 Mikey

[Jeff]

Sounds cool, but I'm hesitant about it. If these are the same guides posted to Serebii, I'm sure people would be making a fuss about it. What it comes down to is who owns the guides, you or serebii.net?

HL: What do you mean by new PM set-up? I didn't notice anything different.

Edit: Was just digging through Serebii's episode guides to see if I could find the ones written by Mikey and found one written by Zak!

[Mikey]

I wrote the guides, so I own them lol!

[PancaKe]

Hey guys, just a question. How are you guys going with the website? Do you have a timeframe in which everything is going to be completed, or is the actual uploading of a main site still too far away??


And do you have a marketing strategy to compete with other main sites, such as Serbii and Bulbagarden? Lol.

Seriously though ; I'm just curious as to how far we've actually come.

I feel bad asking cos I'm pretty useless when it comes to the website Sorry all.

[Jeff]

Well, without revealing too much here, let's just say that we've recently hit a snag that we're trying to take care of behind the scenes.

As for promoting ourselves, I was thinking about posting a thread at Bulbagarden about us as we get further along. Yes, we'd have to get Archaic's permission, but he did the same thing here when he brought back Bulbagarden so it shouldn't be an issue.

[mr_pikachu]

To expand on what Jeff said (again, without revealing too much), we're pretty sure we've found our way around the snag. Right now we're just making sure everything will work so that we don't waste our time if there are better alternatives.

Assuming that we're right, then we're moving quickly on the road to publishing the site. There are a few sections that will take a little longer than others, but now that we're streamlining the whole process it should be a snap. With any luck, we may have version 1.0 complete and uploaded within a couple of months.

[PancaKe]

Yay that is way exciting!!

[Telume]

Aside from the snag, I'd say it's looking pretty good.

Edit: I think that for IRC we should revive what Fanha used to do. If anyone remembers that.

and if they don't

Basically: He used to run this thing called the battlearena and he used to have 2 bots RBYBot and GSBot (for Red, Blue and Yellow and Gold and Silver (crystal hadn't come out yet.)) and people used to be able to construct teams and battle them.

If anyone knows how to script in mIRC maybe we can create our own so people aren't only stuck doing one thing on the IRC?

Just throwing that out there.

[Jeff]

Sounds like a good idea. Even though most people use wifi to battle these days, it would be a nice alternative to having to spend hours IV breeding and EV training. I have almost no experience with anything IRC-related so I can't help in that department unfortunately, but if anyone can do it, I'd love to see it happen.

Also, it's been a while since I've given a progress report, so here goes. To be honest, I haven't been able to get online or work on the site nearly as much as I'd like to this semester due to the heaping amounts of homework I've had. I have 3 weeks left until spring break though, so I'll see if I can start getting some more pages put together then.

[Jeff]

Just a quick announcement. Thanks to a snow day and two tests this week, I've been granted a rare homework-free weekend, so I plan on spending my time working on the site. I'll also make it a point to get on AIM and IRC in case anyone wants to chat.

[Telume]

I'll see if I can get a friend on-board with the bot idea and maybe we can have a few people volunteer to test it out? You guys don't mind if I post a recruitment thread to test it out do you?

[Jeff]

Go ahead. Also, I'll be glad to test it out if I get the chance.

[Roy Karrde]

Since no one has really posted here I did want to ask if you guys wanted any 3D Models for the project. I can provide Pokeballs, Pokedexs, Pokegears/what ever with photos with a Alpha Channel layer for easy use.

[Jeff]

Roy, that sounds cool. We could still use some images, so anything anyone can contribute would be great.

Alright, time to take care of some business.

First of all, just wanted to let everyone know that this upcoming week is my last week of classes, after that is finals week and when I'm done with finals, I'll have plenty of time to start working on the next phase of the site, which is getting some of the old content into the new site's format. Once that's done, the initial site will be ready for upload and the next phase will be developing the pokedex, etc. So, if all goes according to plan, the site will be launched sometime this summer (or winter for those of you in the southern hemisphere)

Telume suggested a while back that I use brighter colors for the site, so here's what I've come up with so far. What does everyone think? By the way, the gray links are just dummy links to pages that aren't done yet.

And finally, you'll notice that in that screenshot, there's an Oekaki link. That's no dummy link, it actually functions and links to TPM's Oekaki. This is a dirty little secret that project contributors have known for a while and I've finally decided to spill the beans. Yes, TPM's Oekaki is alive and well, and what's more is that there's still an active community there. If you're interested, check it out at http://www.pokemasters.net/oekaki.

That's all for now, and of course we could always use some more help. If you have anything you want to contribute be sure to mention it!

[Heald]

The Oekaki still being alive without anyone realising is perhaps the most bizarre thing I've seen in a while. The fact it is just as active as the forums is kind of sad. Is there any way of bridging the gap and trying to get that activity over here? We have a fan art section for a reason, seems a bit of a waste if we have a separate board for it when we could so desperately use the activity.

[Drago]

So if we don't know they exist, do they know we exist? Is this like a parallel universe where there's an evil DragoKnight? I find it hard to believe (and kinda embarrassing) that an entire community that come from the same site don't know about us at all... It's rather odd.

Now then, with regards to the new colour scheme... I've got mixed feelings, Jeff. I like the blue/yellow motif on the left, and the red/white isn't so bad either, but I'm really not liking the striped grey background. Feels very... popup advertising to me. I don't know if I'm being picky here, but that's what I reckon.

Comparing this scheme to the last one you showed, I think my final opinion is that it is less neat and clean, but certainly more eye-catching. Could just be the TPM black/blue loyalist in me being picky, but I'm not so sure which I prefer. I certainly appreciate the attempt at trying an alternative though, Jeff. Thanks for all your work so far!

[Jeff]

The background was actually a late addition because it looked too plain before. Here's a link to the older version with a very pale gray background. I'm thinking about going with a solid blue background now, that would fit in better with the forums and oekaki. I'll keep tweaking it and see what works.

[Phoenixsong]

It's a good, clean layout, but eh... I'm just not digging the bright primary colors. Like DragoKnight it may just be me clinging to the good ol' days of blue and black, but it just seems a bit... elementary school, you know what I mean? Nice sort of homage to RBY, but really a bit much, I think. :/ Are there any other color schemes you could use to "brighten it up"?

[Jeff]

Yeah, I kept thinking the same thing when I was looking at it but couldn't figure out how to fix it. I'm working on it now though and the problem seems to be subsiding. I gave it a light blue background and have started playing around with gradients in the headers. That seems to have cut back on the kiddie feel. It's actually starting to look a bit like the Oekaki come to think of it.

[Mikachu Yukitatsu]

Yeah the Oekaki thing is a bit scary. I was actually wondering if it was still around and then I heard it is. What comes to the colors in the new site, I have some mixed emotions as well. But in my opinion one of the most important things is that it should look different from our competitors, which it does as far as I know. On the other hand, other sites just imitated TPM in the first place.

[Jeff]

Here's the latest design.

[Number1ChanseyFan]

Awesome work Jeff, the site is really looking good!! ^_^

[Heald]

IMHO, looks much better than the previous build. Once we have some banners up, it should be awesome.

[Joanna of Castile]

So if we don't know they exist, do they know we exist? Is this like a parallel universe where there's an evil DragoKnight? I find it hard to believe (and kinda embarrassing) that an entire community that come from the same site don't know about us at all... It's rather odd.

Maybe they don't want to associate with a bunch of pretentious 30-year-old men, which seems to constitute the majority of this forum now. I know I wouldn't!

But in my opinion one of the most important things is that it should look different from our competitors, which it does as far as I know.

Besides the colour scheme, tell me how this website differs from SPP. That hackneyed three-column layout is the quintessence of every hideous and unsuccessful Pokemon website out there. I'm aware TPM used the three-column layout once upon a time, but that's no excuse to not try something unique that will simply WOW your visitors, and thus compelling them to return.

We'll see if all this hype was justified soon enough, but it'll probably turn out to be another failure SPP clone. Just wait and see.

[Heald]

We'll see if all this hype was justified soon enough, but it'll probably turn out to be another failure SPP clone. Just wait and see.

That's funny, considering originally TPM came before Serebii and Serebii is often accused of ripping off other sites. Had the situations been reversed i.e. Kevin the one who found a benefactor to save the website and Joe the one forced to scrounge for a living, TPM would probably be the dominant fan-site.

Also, I'm interested: who are you?

[toucheiruka]

at least you guys are bringing it back again, I was once known as Leader Dan 8 or 9 years ago, but after those years passed my name has been wiped off the board, and then now, almost a decade later, things have changed drastically, and to see you guys bringing it back is just plain awesome.

[Dark-San]

We'll see if all this hype was justified soon enough, but it'll probably turn out to be another failure SPP clone. Just wait and see.

Don't trip on your way out! ^.^;

Seriously I don't know why you are here for and what makes you think that SPP is better than us in any sense. If your sole purpose is to stir up trouble here, please don't. It just makes my work harder.

Anyway I can't offer any news about Pokemon but if it is news that you required from the scanlation community, let me know. I could get first hand information from there.

[Jeff]

Also, I'm interested: who are you?

If I had to guess, I'd say it would be someone TPM has had trouble with in the past, perhaps someone who has trolled before in this very thread. Yeah, I'm going with Jay.

Whoever it is though, in response to their comment, Serebii is pretty much a one-man show. At the other end of the spectrum is Bulbagarden, which is all about the community. However, Bulbapedia suffers from the same problem as Wikipedia, in that there aren't enough quality controls in place to filter out some of the lower quality stuff. TPM should strive to strike a balance. Looking at the old site, that's pretty much what it was, it had community-generated content, but didn't give full control to everyone over what makes it onto the site. That's what makes us different, and what would make us more than just another "SPP clone". As for the layout, just about every site you go to uses that general layout, it's best to give the users what they'll expect.

Oh and one more thing: Not all of us are 30, just Gabi and she's not a man. So there.

[Lady Vulpix]

OK, the offender has been banned. Let's move on and get back on topic.