Let's Play Information

If anyone actually reads this blog, I am getting close to being able to start a Minecraft Let's Play that I will be uploading to my YouTube channel (link at right), and I decided that I'd post a bit of information about what I have planned.

First off, this will be a modded Let's Play; the list of mods will be "released" once I've finally decided on the medium, spreadsheet, PDF or a Google Doc. If enough people request it, I'll release my config files as a zip file. Counting mods that have multiple modules as one, there are currently 93 mods that I will be using (includes Forge, library files, utilities, content mods and plug-ins for NEI).

Secondly, I will be playing & recording this entire series on a laptop. Before you either laugh at me or start thinking that I must have one helluva laptop, I don't actually. It's fairly average. But, I won't be recording this on Windows (blech, too much resource overhead), I'll be using Xubuntu Linux, a variation of Ubuntu that uses the XFCE desktop environment with the recording program "Kazam." I adore this set-up. In Minecraft itself AND recording, I can hold a steady 30 fps without a problem and the program will encode the file to an .mp4 file live, which allows me not have to deal with TOO much editing and upload it directly to YouTube (unless at some point, I end up having some sort of intro sequence), but my upload rate tends to be rather dismal, so I tend to save the file to the shared partition between Windows and Xubuntu, reboot to Windows, then convert the file to .flv to shave off more bytes. I haven't quite found a decent enough program to do this all under Linux yet, but I'm open to suggestions.

Now for the LP itself. Due to the fact that I will be returning to college on the 6th of January, I'm aiming to keep a rate of at least one video a week at least until I've adjusted to the workload, then I may be able to record and upload more often, but no guarantees.

The series will take the form of a modified version of the "Refugee to Regent Challenge" (Link: Refugee to Regent Challenge - home) that I've taken the time to tweak to fit the mods I'll be using. I have a document that I might publish that outlines the rules of the challenge, some "micro challenges" that I've set myself, the areas of development that I've "taken" from the wiki, and the "chapters" that I'll be going through with their "limitations." The whole thing will be rather chaotic (unless my OCD smacks me around) until the point I enter into "Chapter 7" where I will be taking on the challenge's core: becoming an emperor (yes, I know it's SSP).

Admittedly, I was hoping to have the Let's Play ready and raring to go on New Year's Day (Jan. 1), but some unfortunate crashes have prevented me from starting until I can get those fixed (my own procrastination and anxiety got in the way too) and I doubt these mods have retroactive world generation.

However, this won't be just a "you-watch-me-play" kind of thing. If you're looking through my mods list and come up with a challenge that you would like to see me try (and probably fail), then by all means, let me know! If I like the challenge and can pull it off with my current set-up of mods, then I'll add it to a list of challenges I'll have on hand whenever I'm sitting at my laptop. I like other people interacting with what I'm doing. Also, if you notice a mistake that I made or know of another way I could do something that might be more "fun," LET ME KNOW! Leave a comment here, on my G+ page, or tweet at me, I might take me a little while to respond but I'll strive to interact at some level with my viewers. I will give credit where it's due for a challenge or a correction vocally in the videos; yes, shoutouts. But, if I end up getting popular, I may stop this or figuring out something else.

Finally, one last thing. IF you would like to see a certain mod included in my LP and it doesn't have any world generation or has retrogen, then please do suggest it on any of the three places that I brought up in the last paragraph, include a link to the mod, and I will seriously consider it.

See you all sometime else.