Saturday, October 29, 2016

(Reference) The GamingGroundZero Games


(EDIT: A lot of the info here, is generally paraphrased from old forum threads and community sites, to just give users an idea of what GGZ was like back then - At some point I'd like rewrite this article with information from the creators themselves, if I can get in touch with them.)

Established around 2001, GamingGroundZero was one of the first western Rpgmaker communities to rise up from Don Miguels's unofficial translated version of Rpgmaker2000 - QHeretic's Kindred Saga, being one of the more prominent Rpgmaker2000 games, for creating a custom side-battle-view system in Rpgmaker2000, a year before Enterbrain would release Rpgmaker2003.

Sometime shortly after RPGMaker2003's release and RpgAdvocate unofficially translated RpgMaker2003 into English, Enterbrain pleaded with Rpgmaker fans to stop the illegal distribution of RpgMaker2000 and RpgMaker2003. They felt that the continued circulation of these programs had not only hurt their chances of releasing these Makers to the western market, but that their company would eventually go out of business if this current activity continued.

GamingGroundZero, and other RpgMaker communities, took it upon themselves to disallow any RpgMaker2003 material on their site, in hopes that Enterbrain would eventually release RpgMaker2003 in English.

Enterbrain eventually decided to release Rpgmaker XP, instead. 

(from RMN - "Oh, I'm so confused about one of GGZ's rules (which dosen't make sense.)" by alterego - June 6th, 2012)

"...GGZ never let go of [Enterbrain's] promise [to release RpgMaker2003 to the western market] and  eventually that took a toll on the community... When XP finally came out none were too impressed by it, and with no official release of rm2k3 in sight, people just started losing interest in rpg maker all together. =(

[GGZ's] "isolation" occurred in part because upon learning of this decision, people from Gaming World [another rpgmaker community,] started posting rm2k3 content, along the overall drama that ensued. And as anyone would have expected some of them got suspended or banned, but only to register again and keep challenging/questioning said decision. This was the last drop in a history of animosity between the two sites that made Wishmoo close the community and allowing inside only those willing to join in good faith. It was something that was never meant to last, but it did, and that too was part of the site's eventual downfall..."

(from RMN - "Does anyone remember GamingGroundZero?" by Kaempfer - January 31st, 2017)

"I only remember having a small number of encounters with the GGZ legends- namely Wishmoo and, once, QHeretic. I was a pretty small, inoffensive fish, and I thought I could swim around freely. I think I may have been on their IRC and then, suddenly, I was banned. Wishmoo seemed totally insane. I think someone deduced that I was from GW and that was that. I have only vague memories of these names.

I do remember they had a couple of pretty solid games that I enjoyed playing, but my enjoyment was somewhat mitigated by the extreme lengths they would go to "protect resources" (mostly minor edits of rips), including threatening legal action. I seem to remember many tales of Wishmoo threatening legal action, actually. This was a time of people going to extreme lengths to protect their mediocre palette swaps of rips, and GGZ were by far the most ill-spirited about it. It was a doubly weird time because it was well before anyone thought about actually making money from RPGMaker games.

These were legendary days where, somehow, a bunch of nerds in the internet diaspora contrived to be constantly embattled in dramatic back and forths in the arena of RPGMaker feuds rather than just being generally pleasant and thinking certain people are complete fuckwhistles like we manage nowadays.

I feel like a lot of the people from GGZ were sort of shackled to their legacy. They made some great games and wanted to continue that legacy at new sites, but their names also made people think of Wishmoo, so instead they withered away into obscurity. Like, extra obscurity, since we're all already pretty obscure.

I wonder what games could have been..."

Links:


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The GamingGroundZero Games:



(I noticed a bunch of people are looking for the rpgmaker games from gaminggroundzero. 
These aren't all the games - just the ones that I was able to manage before the site was taken down.)
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A Butterfly's Song - Naritus
Rpgmaker Archive Entry
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BEPv212 (Demo) by Qheretic
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Bug Battle by Saind
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Chocobo Panic by KoA-Angel
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ChocoboPanicXmas by KoA-Angel
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Crossbone by Daniel
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Dark Dreams by Titan Omega
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Delta Star by Jensma
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Descendant of Truth by Cecil Beolve
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DupliCity by ryanwh
Rpgmaker Archive Entry
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Eastern Avenger by QuestTracers Team

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Ecothied by Ayruline

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Exile by QHeretic

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Frontiers Extreme by Frontiers
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Heaven and Hell Episode 3 by Matt Fiorvante
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Kindred Saga by QHeretic
Rpgmaker Archive Entry
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Mog's Great Adventure (Complete) by Opulous
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Relevation: Apocalyptic Literature by Staind
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Seekers by Shear Destiny
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Seekers of the Sun by Remainaery (aka Remains of Scythe)
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Shnizzle Pizzo by ryanwho
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Super Turbo Power Man II: Brain Damage by Staind
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Timespinner by Lunais
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Velsarbor by Lachsen
RpgMaker Archive Entry
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Vortex by KoA-Angel
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1 comment:

Aoleorz said...

Wow, never knew there were this many problems back in the early 2000s between the communities. I once heard about some "drama" from some forum users not long ago, but didn't really found out about it.

Really a shame, how it took apart a pretty nice community. At least we did get RPGMaker 2003 in an official release, even if it took to 2015 and from what I get it's still a popular choice, even if VX Ace overshadows it.

Thanks for sharing all these games BTW. I had been looking for Exile for a bit, I did remember the setting, that the main character was an "Alex" (referring to the RTP hero) with black hair wearing a bulky black armor and that he found a sword called Vertexa, but it was never enough to find the game itself.

It's a bit sad how many of the great looking games of the time never left their demo stage. Kindred Saga and Final Fantasy Crystal Wings are good examples. They looked incredible, the story seemed intriguing, had managed to make the Side View Battle system (which was mindblowing at the time) and were very promising. Saying this cuz... well, I left the community and RPG Maker around 2004 I think, shortly after XP was released and cameback in 2015 when 2003 got an official release. One of the first things I did was to get 2000 again (as you said in another post, it's not very compatible with modern systems and getting it to run can be a pain) and try to find the games I loved back then.

It a bit sad to see most of them were left incomplete, the demo we played was as far as they went. A bit disappointing, at the time I just thought the authors were taking their time balancing things in their lives and trying to work it out. Then when I came back I found out that the games had indeed been abandoned.

Most of the time it's simply that the author just lost interest and moved on. While it kinda sucks I can understand it, making a game, even with a program to make it easier, takes a lot of time and effort, especially with ambition. Eventually it becomes tedious for some or time passes the excitement they had begins to die down and find other things. And those who keep into games feel that the RPGMaker isn't versatile or good enough and they just move on to something else, program their own stuff with more liberty or go for something more pro.

An interesting case of this is Final Fallacy 2. Back in the day it ended in a cliffhanger and the author (Spoonybard I think) made a site for the game and teased the second one. Updates stopped and the site was taken down. Several years later it resurfaced and Final Fallacy 2 was released. However, the game took place AFTER the conclusion of the story the first part started and for the most part it was a disappointment for many. If you read the author's comments he pretty much states that, in his words, "got a life" so he abandoned Final Fallacy and this second game was something he threw together quickly for kicks to enter a contest.

At least I found again "The Way" series and got to play entirely its six parts. It was fantastic.

A bit of good and bad in a way, today the standars for games seem to be a lot higher, also solo projects are rare and just cut short most of the time. For the most part, people who actually go through with making the games work on teams. So the most amateur asapect seems to be gone, which was fun with many tounge in cheek games that were a blast.

Sorry for the long comment. Thanks for the great work!