Game Mods - Guest Tsunamix

00:00:02How was your week? been so far? It's been good. Looking forward to this specific program. It's the first one we have in English. Yeah, that's going to be a little bit special, but that's something you need to do when you have international guests. And I think it's something that we need to do sooner or later, so to speak. Well, seeing as we're into gaming, and gaming is very much an international field, so I mean, if we want to get in touch with interesting people, interesting guests and interesting topics, this will probably be the first one in a series of English programs, I would think. Yeah, so as I said when I started this show, today we will talk about game modding and modding or adding stuff that wasn't there before and refining games and generally talk about how and why.

00:01:25People are doing that, and with that I think I'm going to welcome our guest for tonight. He is doing some voice modifications to Final Fantasy VII, but I think I will let him introduce himself. Hey guys, how are you doing today? It's fine, it's fine. And you? Yeah, not bad. My name's Brendan, but I tend to go by Tsunamix online, and I am creating a project that I have named Project Echo S. And essentially, this is a mod that will allow Final Fantasy VII to actually have voices inside it. So it would be kind of like one of those YouTube fan-dubs that you find online, except this time, you'll actually be able to download it and play it along with your game completely for free. Alright, and how did you get in contact with...

00:02:11the game? How did you get into modding overall, so to speak? Well, I only came across Final Fantasy VII when I was about maybe five or six years old. I got it the year that the game was originally released, which was 1997. But when it comes to me actually getting into modding in the first place, it was actually due to Skyrim, if you've ever played that. And when I first started to play Skyrim, I immediately... I mean, I loved the game for everything it was. But I did immediately start to notice a few things that I weren't happy with, like the fact that even with what I'm doing specifically with it being voice acting, the first thing I'll mention is the voice acting in Skyrim, that you could pretty much talk to a guard anywhere in the world and they will have exactly the same voice no matter whether you're on the north side of the map or the south side of the map. And I do understand that...

00:03:03being able to hire the necessary amount of people to play every NPC that's in the game is going to be very difficult. I mean, I understand that very well at this point because I'm pretty much literally having the same problem myself. And that's all well and good, but it really does start to take away from the game if the player starts to notice these kinds of things. And if you ever just sit on the Nexus forums and start scrolling through the amount of mods that they have for this game, they are literally in the hundreds. There are just so many of them. And then you'd wonder to yourself that if there's this amount of mods out there available that the public were able to make, then why weren't these kind of things available for the creators? You know, why weren't they in the game in the very first place? So after finding out just the sheer amount of mods that were available for Skyrim, I decided then just to have a look to see if Final Fantasy VII happened to be there, and luckily it was. And I was pretty happy to find that it was there.

00:03:58But at that particular time, there was only actually one available mod up for it. Yeah. I don't think I've ever actually downloaded it and tried it. But from what I remember, just through reading the description, I think that it was a more of a model, a 3D model overhaul, or something like a difficulty mod. And even to this day, it is still the only mod on the Nexus forums for Final Fantasy 7, other than my own one now. So naturally, once I found out that the game was actually, it was... it was able to be modded, I decided to just head to Google and look for some mods in other websites and stuff. And after a little bit of searching, I did come across a forum named the Quimforums, and they actually have a huge variety of mods to the point where a new user would almost think, is there anything that they haven't done? So that place was essentially the place that allowed me to start doing what I'm doing now. But I went to college for two years to study in games development.

00:04:56But then even after having the knowledge that I gained through going to college, because the game itself is over 20 years old now, the knowledge that I had learned basically meant nothing. Because the way that they used to be able to make games on whatever platforms is, it's very different to the way that we do it now. And the knowledge I have is for today's sort of technology. So it didn't help me at all. The knowledge I have, it just... you know it didn't help at all and that really it it did make me sad because i had to relearn everything from scratch and it just wasn't fair at all but it was it was worth doing i'm happy that i did decide to do it and it was a huge pain in the ass to have to do that but um after scrolling through the forums and i searched everywhere i did come to the realization that there was one thing that this game was still missing and that was the voices

00:05:51And immediately after noticing that, it became my goal that I would be the person to do that because there wasn't much opportunity left to basically become somebody that would be remembered for something amongst these guys. And after a little bit of searching, I did manage to find a way that I could put the voices into the game and that was where my journey began. But it wasn't even a case of just realizing, oh, you know, this is a good software and it will allow me to put voices into the game. It was basically just a sound replacer. And then I figured out or, you know, I was kind of told at the same time by the creator that I could actually attach certain voice files to an ID tag in the game. And every dialog box that comes up in the game has an ID tag.

00:06:37So, you know, one thing led to another. And of course, boom, we had our answer and project was a go. All right. And I think I was probably the most excited I'd ever been in my entire life. All right. But you don't have any, do you have any back? backgrounds with the voice editing or voice manufacturing of any source or it's just that it was the glitch that you were able to fill so to speak? No actually before this I had no experience whatsoever when it came to voice acting or being a producer type thing or even audio editing. I had no skills whatsoever. I just happened to be the guy that came across the ability to do this. And, you know, I just took the project into my own hands and I'm learning as I go. And that's basically it. You know, I just got thrown into the deep end pretty much. Right. But you are some kind of programmer or something from the beginning or what you studied? Well, I did learn a little bit of coding when I was at college for, you know, just basic stuff for JavaScript and things like that.

00:07:37But when it comes to that stuff, most of the time I would use the likes of a program called Unreal Engine 4. Yeah. And getting to know how to use Unreal Engine 4 was a big help when it comes to games development, at least, because instead of having to write a script for everything, because... it has a it uses a node system where these nodes already have a section of code inside them and you can just put two nodes together and the program will work already you know you don't have to do any of the coding yourself no but mostly i enjoy doing things on the graphical side of things okay i would really enjoy doing things like making models in blender and things like that um i'm actually a part of a private forum that does the 3d models for final fantasy 7.

00:08:18But unfortunately, I can't give the name or any details about it because they're private and they don't want to give their work away because they've worked on it for so many years now. And they basically do have everything finished when it comes to the 3D models. They've got all the characters, the NPCs, the enemies, the bosses. Literally everything is done at this stage. All right. That's kind of interesting. And I had to actually earn my rights into that forum by providing models of my own. And they don't want to release any of the models that they have finished because they've personally spent years doing it. They feel like, why would I share all this work that I've done for the sake of other people? So, I guess it's something kind of Chrono Trigger Resurrection Project. We all know how good they got for them, so I understand why they want to be private. Until they are done, at least. I guess release it on to rent or whatever. I mean, there has been talk occasionally of releasing things to the public.

00:09:21But I don't really have a standpoint to be able to contribute to it because I've only done maybe a few models myself, whereas these guys have done literally hundreds of them. Yeah, yeah. We totally understand because we will get to that later, but we all know how unforgiven the bigger companies can be when it comes to fan-made projects and stuff that is really fantastic, but they are cutting it short, so to speak. Yeah. But I guess that modding is mostly a hobby, and I guess you do something else. besides doing this? I do, yeah. Most of the time I would just work from home, but my family also owns a CCTV company and they do want me to just continue doing that. But it really just wasn't the sort of motivation that I had. You know, it's all well and good being able to follow in your family's footsteps and stuff, but I always wanted to go into games development because, you know, as well as that, in my own opinion, there are two different types of jobs. There is a dream job and there is a reality job.

00:10:27And you should always have at least one of each. Yeah. And the likes of games development is basically a dream job. So I do have to go out and do the other jobs and stuff as well. But mostly I would just be online looking up information, finding new things that I can do. And I would be applying for jobs on the likes of Facebook and other websites and things like that, you know. For instance, I would find web pages to promote games and stuff that have the green light on Steam. Oh, okay, cool. And it does work occasionally, but most of the time they tend to be looking for the likes of coders and the such, and that really isn't my forte. But I thought that many projects needed the graphic touch, because they know coding, but they are no artists. But maybe they are more common the other way around.

00:11:12Well, a lot of people do already tend to have their 3D designers and stuff. So by the time that they do have the green light on Steam, they have already got their main characters designed. They've got their animations going and all them other necessities. So I think I'm basically just finding them that little bit too late. No. Well, that's still really like an interesting little niche you got there. Like helping out basically projects that are in need of extra graphical help. just because you're interested in the gaming, like, business, or like, not maybe the business, but much as it is gaming itself. Yeah, I mean, sure, it's everybody's dream to be able to get where you want to be and have your own thing, but I'm perfectly happy with just working for somebody else and trying to help them fulfill their dream too. And then in turn, maybe end up fulfilling my own.

00:12:05in doing so do you have any kind of a dream company or organization that you really would like to work for if or is it just an indie studio that would be the preferable working place so to speak when it comes to gaming well not exactly i mean the industry as a whole any of them would be a main goal you know i wouldn't really be too bothered about who i ended up working for i mean i mean i have been following square enix or square soft as they were called just you know square Yeah. 15 was a little bit of a recovery, but of course it's not like something... It's a new thing, but at least it's a bit better than previous stuff they made. See, I think that one of their main problems is... I don't know, I'm going to use the word problem just for a lack of a better word. Because they've been around for so long and they've been using the same system the whole time...

00:13:24Damn you. Just talking about Square and Square Enix as an example, I think they have the problem of having had a golden age of gaming in their repertoire. If you look back at all the classic Final Fantasy games, those defined a generation and a genre in many ways, and they gained a lot of fans. So I think it is exactly as you say, if they mix with their recipe too much, they'll probably lose the bulk of those old fans who are, like, they have the vintage glasses on and it's rose-tinted and all that stuff, but they may not gain a lot of new fans if they stick to the old stuff. But if they don't reinvent themselves now and again, they will not grow as a company. So, I mean, it's really tough for them. Yeah, like, I've never looked at the numbers or anything, and chances are they're not available to just anybody, but I think, personally, the...

00:14:47the amount of existing fans they have from before will always exceed the amount of fans that are available to be gained in the future. so it would make a lot of sense to stick with their original stuff but i'd say mainly because uh you know like the the new battle system that they're doing it's it's very similar to a lot of the other games that are already out so they're not exactly inventing anything new anymore they're just trying to catch up to the things that are already there whereas what they had was an original idea And many, many people are very annoyed about the fact that they're going to change the battle system. And yeah, sure, I mean, it's probably very enjoyable, but one thing, and you guys have probably heard about this as well, but it hasn't actually been mentioned that much, is by looking at the way that it's being used in the demos, trailers, and such.

00:15:41is that it seems to, it just might eliminate the need to play as anybody except the main character. Yeah, it sounds, it looks very much like Crisis Core. Because for the sake of making the game easier, I suppose, if you can play as Cloud and only Cloud and just keep leveling him to get as strong as possible, then why bother playing as anybody else except for, you know, enjoyment, I suppose. That's a fair point. Yeah, it's really a fair point. But that's also about what, when you're talking about naming it like Final Fantasy VII Remake, I think it should be Final Fantasy VII Reimagining. Because, like, as you said, they have made it perfectly clear that the battle system will be this newish Final Fantasy XV version.

00:16:30i would really hope but i don't think that will be so very likely to happen but they could that they could just include like a classic switch so that you could switch to freeze the battle and do it as you did before or at least if it ever gets out to pc maybe some could mod it in but that's that's one thing but then of course games need to evolve also but there should be a way to keep what is good and make it something in between this hack and slash RPG thingy and more if you go to the other side it would be like something turn based as Final Fantasy Tactics for example Yeah, like I do believe their best bet, and I really hope they're listening to this, is they should just have the option on the main menu. You know, you click that new game, or even in the in-game menu screen, you go down to config, you know, the options and stuff. There should be an option to choose either the new system or the old system, and that way you get the best of both worlds. Yeah, like the data in the beginning.

00:17:39yeah to be solved i mean yeah that will solve everything because if there is an option for it then whether you're a new fan or an old fan none of them can complain about it because you know if they did you just say well just turn it off or turn it on you know either way yeah yeah and just just that it would fix everything specifically with final fantasy 7 which is the Final Fantasy game, if you will, at least in modern age. Seeing as they're spending so much money on this project already, they might as well add something like that and also promote it, because people who had played the original would rejoice the possibility to use the old battle system, and people that are loving the new style of Final Fantasy game, like in XV, which probably has a lot of merit to a lot of people.

00:18:29would also find that they are in the scope of the company. So I think that would be a win-win situation, which might be a little bit more expensive, sure, because it would require developer time and stuff like that. But I think it would also give them a lot of kudos. Yeah, definitely. But they lose nothing by trying. If Capcom could add authentic scanlines and lag to their Street Fighter anniversary editions and stuff, then they could add a little bit of fan service into Final Fantasy VII Remake also. Of course. Yeah, even if they just made a 10-minute demo and had it at conventions and stuff, and then they could get a few reviews from people that the demo would have the option, and then depending on how it went, they could just scrap the demo, and it means nothing. Or they could sell it as a DLC package for 15 bucks and everyone will buy it.

00:19:26That actually seems like something they would do as well. Yeah, I would be all over that. They were perfectly fine to get it founded also, so I think that would not be the problem. It's more of them being like, yeah, we're going to break with our own history and we are the new company and blah, blah, blah, but I still think they are shooting themselves, especially with this game in particular. Yeah, but to me, perfectly blunt i mean this game is not the standard like final fantasy game it's it's a special case in every way you look at it so i mean for this particular game it might be worth to do special solutions but i mean overall maybe they could continue to do stuff like with i am satsuna that kind of deal like they have ways to bring out new old games if you will and

00:20:24have the major studio work on new stuff. That might be a way that could work. Perhaps. Well, yeah, yeah. I mean, one example that I have is there is a gamer that uses Twitch, you know, he livestreams and stuff, and he goes by 4-8 Productions, or Death Unites Us, he sort of goes by different names depending on where he is. And he emailed me there back, maybe a few weeks ago just, and he says to me... Was it okay if I sent him a playable demo of some kind and he would live stream it to his 17,000 fans? And I was like, yeah, go for it. You know, I'm not going to turn down any publicity. Yeah. You know, any publicity is good publicity. Yeah, of course. And, you know, I sat watching it as he did it. And many of the people that were watching had said that what they were seeing was actually what the fans want and not what Square Enix needs. Hmm. Hmm.

00:21:21And a lot of people believe that the only actual reason we're getting this remake in the first place is because this is that little trump card that they had the whole time to be able to bring the company back from the dead. And for them to succeed, they are going to have to make what we want and not what they need, you know? Yeah, I mean, it's kind of true, I would say, because there's been a lot of talk for a lot of years. When is that Final Fantasy VII remake going to show? Or when is it going to happen? I mean, all the time since they showed that technical demo way back. Yeah, what was that even for? Yeah, was it like the PS3 or something like that? Yeah. So it's been a long time, like 2006, 2007, that happened. And that basically brought up the point that this is something that you could do.

00:22:16Because you have already done it for the intro, so why not do it for the entire game? So I think it's making them... It was bound to happen at some point, because their old school fans are bugging them about this all the time. But it's also, as you mentioned, kind of a golden bullet. It has to be used at the correct time. And they must do it right, because it's really a break it or make it. Oh, yeah. It would have been nice if they would have had this planned well in advance, ready for a release on the 20th anniversary. If they could release the game on its 20th anniversary, that would have been spectacular. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I was really disappointed what we did end up with. You know, we got, like, a picture. And then they made that snow sculpture at a festival that they had in the last seven days or so. Yeah, that was pretty sad. It was kind of lackluster. I really hoped they would do more.

00:23:11But it is also making an appearance in another game. If you've ever heard of a game called Mobius Final Fantasy, which was originally a mobile game, but has now just been converted over to Steam. Yeah, we've heard of it, yeah. And they're hosting a Final Fantasy VII remake event on there right now. Mm-hmm. I mean, I don't think it actually has anything to do with the remake, but it does have, like, higher quality up-to-date models and such. Oh, okay. And as a modder myself, I will be eventually taking them out of the game and putting them into the original Final Fantasy VII as well. Yeah, that's cool. At some point. How did you get in touch with Final Fantasy in the first run? You mean just the first time I played it, how I ended up playing it in the first place? Yeah, initially.

00:23:56So, yeah, again, when I was about maybe five or six years old, I had no games, no consoles, nothing of the sort. And at the time, my grandfather worked over in America. And at some point, you know, he'd been working over there for quite a few years at that point. And, you know, he decided to come back over for a holiday to see me and the family and stuff. Because, you know, he hadn't seen us in such a long time, perhaps even since I was born. And he came back. And he came back and he brought this PlayStation 1 with me. The really old sort of big square grey ones. And it had Final Fantasy VII with it. Oh, right. And, you know, at the time with me being such a young age, I had no understanding of games in general. And, you know, I couldn't even get past the first boss. Yeah.

00:24:37And I'm not sure if other people out there somewhere have experienced the same thing as me, but I'm almost positive that playing that game actually helped me learn how to read quite a lot. When I was a child. Yeah, I can imagine. And because of them reasons and, you know, just the general fact that I absolutely love the games, I bought them every year when they came out all the way up to number 10, I think it was. Maybe 10-2, I'm really not too sure. and after that you know number 11 came out which was online only and i didn't have the internet growing up as a child so you know i wasn't able to play that one and then after that you know number 12 came out and i i don't really like that one uh there isn't really i don't have specific reasons like it's not as bad now that i've played it a few times but it's

00:25:22It's way down on the list for my favorites anyway. And these games have always been my favorite games throughout my whole life. You know, a lot of people would say to me, you know, why do you find this so interesting? Why don't you just be normal and go and play Call of Duty or Gears of War or something? And I'm like, sure, yeah, you know, them games are very action orientated. They're very interesting and you could play them for hours without even knowing where the time went. But when it comes to Final Fantasy, you know, if you've ever seen, if you've ever read a good book or if you've even just watched a really good movie, The point is, if you play a game, you get both of those aspects at the exact same time. Yeah. The stories. It's the story behind every Final Fantasy game. Well, the older ones, mostly. They're just unbelievable. And even just the smaller things, like every random encounter you come when you're going through, it's not just a case of being able to level your characters so you can do better. You really get a feeling of how much they struggled throughout their whole journey.

00:26:21and all the hardships that they went through to get to their final destination. Yeah, the touching story is one of the things that actually gets the grip on you. I imagine I did something similar of a travel when I tried out my first JRPG. I think it was actually Final Fantasy IV to SNES. And the same thing, I could barely read English at the time. And as you said, it quite got me through the English lessons just to be able to understand the games. Because then I watched Final Fantasy VI and VII and so on and so on and so on. And yeah, it's been with me the whole time since then. So it's really kind of a love story there. I think... For a lot of people in Sweden, like in the generation that me and Oskar are in, a lot of the English lessons we got was through gaming, because there aren't that many games done in Swedish, at least not ones that we were interested in playing. Yeah, there is one, actually.

00:27:42Yeah, I mean, there are some. Shadowrun was adapted to Swedish. Some of them were translated and had voiceover and stuff like that. But most of the stuff, and especially when we're talking about JRPGs, that was English. And it wasn't like beginner's English at that. So if you wanted to get the most out of it, you had to get down and learn stuff. And you had a good incentive to learn. So I think a lot of us learned. english and english vocabulary through gaming which is kind of cool yeah it really is i mean it's it's a really cool thing i mean sure nowadays you can just go on to you know the likes of the quim forums and you'll be able to get a translation for basically every language yeah it's the fact that something so simple or small or you know i wouldn't really know how to describe it properly but you know something like a game can end up teaching you an entirely different language you know without the need of school or anything like that

00:28:39Yeah, and teach you about history and teach you about everything. I think games are a fantastic source to teach people about almost anything. And, of course, there needs to be such a variety and mix in order to teach different stuff. I think you maybe don't teach so much about, for example, the language play in Counter-Strike for 10 years, but Counter-Strike will, of course, learn. teach you other stuff like team building and so on and so on and so on, but especially role-playing games will teach you a lot of stuff. Like, there's no way you would ever prove it, but I'm pretty sure that just from playing Final Fantasy growing up throughout my whole life, it has actually made me a more intelligent person than I would have been without it, because you have to think about your situation and assess everything and try and work out what you've got to do.

00:29:36Like, for example, you know how most of the time, you know, in pretty much every case, you are going to be similar to at least one of your parents. And many people have actually said to me that, you know, I was nothing like either of my parents. And even my parents themselves, you know, they've questioned the fact that I'm pretty much nothing like either of them. And the way we worked it out was, you know, we tried to think of things that, you know, what did I do different as opposed to what they did? other than, well, the console in general, gamings and stuff, but I sort of do theorize that Final Fantasy may be the reason for that. And don't get me wrong, I'm probably giving the game, like, way too much credit, and it's probably not true, but even the fact that it could be possible is quite very, you know, it's very interesting to think about. Yeah, it's, like, even if it's just the smallest thing, as long as it is a thing at all, it's something that was brought.

00:30:31entirely into being through a game which is really cool and i think it's also the entire thing is that it's positive like it's a positively loaded thing you have stuff that you learn and i mean talking about like school and education a lot of the times the the problem is that we don't have enough interest in it to learn yeah but this is something that people find by themselves, because they want to learn, and I think that is a thing that gaming has that a lot of other stuff lacks. Like, you know, with modding specifically, there could be hundreds of thousands of gamers in the world, and most of them won't actually have any sort of internal knowledge of these games, you know, how they work behind closed doors and all that sort of stuff. True. But...

00:31:23If any of them were like me, then, you know, I just, like, the reason that I started modding Skyrim in the first place was, it was just because I was fussy. Just the simple things, like, if you're dual wielding, if you have two swords and you've got to put them away, you know, you will sheath them both into the same sword sheath thing. Or even the instances of, like, walking on snow, it doesn't leave any footprints. And once I learnt that, you know, being able to change these things were possible, I was able to... pretty much um i don't want to say change my career path you know when i was in school and stuff i i took music as my career and then you know once i'd learned about this stuff i i started second guessing everything and i thought you know maybe music isn't the career choice for me maybe i'll start thinking about doing some computer stuff instead so people out there might be more adept more knowledgeable about the likes of technology just because of modding as well

00:32:20But what tips do you have to our listeners if they would like to get into the modding scene, and especially if they would like to contribute to the modding of Final Fantasy VII? How should they begin? Well, if I was to use my own story as an example, what I would suggest is find one of your favorite games, one that you would play all the time, or maybe not one of your favorites because you will end up ruining it for yourself, but play a game that you're sort of very familiar with. And then find things that either you don't like about it or things that you would like to be able to add to it. And then once you have a rough idea, you're going to want to go on to Google and see if that thing already exists. And you want to actually hope that it does exist, because if it does, then you can go and find it. You can download it, open up the mod.

00:33:09And then you'll be able to learn how it works. And, you know, with that information, you'll be able to start learning how to do it yourself. So, yeah, again, from my own story, when I eventually came across the Quimforums, which, as far as I know, is the biggest modding forum for Final Fantasy VII, at least. And pretty much everybody there, you know, they all collaborate together. They work very well and coordinate very well. They were pretty much all, we'll call them veterans. You know, they were modding veterans. They've been doing it for so long. And they'd got to a stage where they really had no intention of helping a newcomer if you didn't know what you were doing. And because of that, you would basically have to find your own way of doing it. You'd have to build up your name and your credibility as a modder before certain people would actually talk to you. That's quite sad, actually. And because of that, you would basically have to find your own way of doing it. You'd have to build up your name and your credibility as a modder.

00:34:06before certain people would actually talk to you. Because they just... they hate it I guess it's a bit easier to get into modding to a game that actually has the support for mods because Final Fantasy 7 is basically like reverse engineered at it's core and just added so I guess that for example Stardew Valley or Skyrim or something Witcher or something would be easier to begin with because there's like some type of documentation some type of like official help in one some kind of regards yeah there are like other than you know games that are outside of Final Fantasy 7 specifically I haven't really modded or well no I have modded them but I've never made my own mod for them because a lot of the games that are very acceptable of mods you know they will be able to take them very easily which you know most of the games that you would find on the Nexus forums

00:35:07And by using these, all you've really got to do is, you know, when you find the game and the mod that you want, you pretty much just click download, it will go into your manager, you activate it and play the game. You know, you don't really have to do anything. Whereas with Final Fantasy VII, up until sort of, well, relatively recent, I'm not sure how much exactly, but it was just a case of, you know, here's a mod, here's an instruction list, and you'd have to go and do it yourself. Is it the seventh heaven that is the boatloader nowadays? It is, yeah. It is, yeah. Because back in the days there was something like Tifa's Boatleg or something that was... Yeah, it took hours to complete. Yeah. I hated it. But for Final Fantasy VIII you have the Tonbury stuff. Yeah, I haven't modded Final Fantasy VIII too much.

00:35:58I think that as soon as you get into it, I guess it will be quite rewarding because you're adding something new to something that I love. So I guess that is the main drive of why people mod games in the first place. Or what is your opinion? Yeah. Or do you think there will be a way for people to actually get paid for modding in a reasonable way? I don't think so. A lot of the time when people create mods, it would contain files from the original game. So when it comes to trying to sell the game, you know, you'd immediately get done for copyright infringement. Yeah. Which, you know, which is a huge problem. I mean, me myself. I mean, yeah, I would absolutely love to be able to sell my project when it finished. So I'd be able to build up a few wages so I could hand something to my actors.

00:36:53And the only way I can really go about doing something like that is if I start a Patreon or a Kickstarter or something along the lines of them things that take donations because they don't come under the same rules. Because donations don't come under the same situation for the way the law works. And, you know, I will be doing that eventually, but I just don't feel like now is the right time because we're perhaps not... um like well enough known and you know is it's the sort of thing i don't want to fail at and then have to try a second time because i don't think you can try to do the same thing twice yeah true but um when it comes to modding in general and reasons and you know for why companies might allow it i believe that that's a a very double-edged sword because as a um as a company if you think you know why if if there's so many mods that exist for your game

00:37:41then either people are just getting smarter and they're playing around with whatever you've created or it's the other side of it and they actually your game they're saying that your game is not good enough because they had to go out their own way to make it acceptable like the the newer games now they're it almost seems like they're not up to people's standards and people are having to go out and to to mod them to be able to enjoy it Which basically suggests that, you know, the future of games and stuff, they're just getting worse and worse, and everybody's having to learn how to do these things just to get the chance to really enjoy it. I mean, it's either that, or because we're so used to getting all the good stuff now, you know, we're just really hard to please, you know, we're being very fussy, I suppose.

00:38:31When it comes to companies allowing mods to be created for their game, there are certain companies that, you know, they would follow up and they would take certain mods down. Like perhaps, for example, you know, Nintendo don't like the idea of anybody doing anything to their games. They're being quite harsh, especially like letting... projects actually be finished and then force them to get down even if they are being ongoing for many many years it's kind of they are almost want to see if they succeed pick the best pieces and then just shut them down yeah it is a very cruel thing to do but you know i think that if i was to put myself in a um a game developer shoes i think that modding would still exist and stuff you know it would i would i would welcome it with open arms because to be fair

00:39:20If you happen to come across a modding forum dedicated to the game that you created, you know full well that everything you find on there is things that your fans are basically telling you they would like, and you can use all of their ideas and put it in your next game. I mean, you're basically hiring beta testers, but you're not paying them anything. And they even post their results online for you to see for free as well. Yeah. Like for a main example, there's one mod for Final Fantasy VII, which is the menu overhaul, which essentially it brought the Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy IX's battle interface back into Final Fantasy VII. Which would then tell Square Enix that, you know, we liked these ones and we liked it so much that we're willing to try and recreate it in an older game. So basically, you know, you're saying to them...

00:40:14We enjoyed this. Use it again. Keep going with this idea. I think a good company that they actually are... try to do stuff like this, even if it is an online game. I think that CCP is doing quite a good game with EVE Online, where they have this player-based console of people that are basically Q&As and taking in new ideas from the community, and then they put it into the game. So there are a few that try to do this, but of course it's not true for all of them, especially not Nintendo. Yeah, like, a lot of games that you come across now will actually have an option for mods on their main menu. And it's very helpful. It's really good that they've just embraced the idea of modding and they've accepted it and allowed it to just continue. I mean, sometimes, you know, even on some cases, perhaps, they will give you the resources to be able to do so. You know, they're not just going to hand out the likes of the source code or anything because, you know, that's worth a lot of money and you could just steal it, but...

00:41:19But they are handing you the power to be able to go out and mod the game knowing that it'll just be fine. Most of them provide some certain types of API these days so that you can do external things. And some of them try to... give you the power to get some money for them even if not really as you said no one has really succeeded that well so far they made this try with Skyrim but that was like taking down just in a couple of weeks because it was not fair and so on and I think that Blizzard made an effort with the Starcraft 2 editor but I still think the best The best thing to go is that you keep modding, at least on a certain level, to a fan love fan thing. And if the game makers really like it, they can reward you in buying your stuff and then put it into the game. Or hire you or whatever has been done with a certain amount of people.

00:42:29And if the mod is really growing, then it should probably be its own game. For example, Counter-Strike or Dota or something like that, that is a complete new game. Right. Well, I think they have the opportunity. Usually the modding communities spring up around fairly large AAA titles. Like, for instance, Final Fantasy VII. That was a huge game when it came out. The companies had a bit of perspective on what they're actually getting. They could build services around this. Like, for instance, they could have a devoted service for people that have a finished mod that they could then put through a review or something. And if it met the quality standards set by the mother company, they could acquire it and then add it maybe as DLC or as a mod that you could get.

00:43:27in the proper game and also like combining the best out of two worlds because the modders would probably get a little bit of recognition and they would feel appreciated and also they would bring in the information as we said they're basically the best kind of testers you could have and also the mother company would get the product and they could cherry pick the best part of it and put it into something that they already own Yeah, that does sound like a very good idea. Yeah, and I think it would satisfy both parties, because modders are probably in many ways passionate fans to begin with, or they have small irks with the game that they feel, as you mentioned, like, why aren't there any footprints? I'll fix that. And I have a very hard time seeing any company that wouldn't mind stuff like that being brought into their game, because...

00:44:23At many levels, they are people that probably have the same kind of thought process, but they are pressed for time when they develop games, they're stuck in crunch time, stuff has to be done at a certain time, and it has to be launched. But if people do this for them, and they have a proper review track to get stuff done, then it would be, in my opinion, I think, a win-win situation. Yeah, yeah, I would totally agree with you. But I think... I wonder what... I guess that bigger companies like Nintendo at some point do need to some way better to meet the audience in a way that is not just forcing down fan love and fan-made stuff, because... People were really angry, both with, of course, another Metroid 2 remake and especially with the Pokemon Uranus project. And at some point, it will be more... They will start losing a lot of customers based on that they are...

00:45:32how they are handling so i think i hope that in the future that there will be less of a combat and more of this system that peter is talking about and that we will see a better world in that regards yeah it would yeah it would be uh it'd be very good but you know i'll give you my word right now if for any point in the future I become a games developer, I will have that option in the game that I release. Yeah, I think I can sign the same sheet right away, no doubt. I think it has to do with, for my view anyway, it's like, if you don't put any personal prestige in it, I know this was as best, when we released this game, it was hopefully the best product we could put out at the time. But for, you know, there's always leeway for improvement. And I think as long as you look at it like that, it shouldn't be like something that hurts your ego and it probably won't hurt your brand and the company in itself. As Oscar said, if Nintendo had embraced the positives, they could actually probably have gained a lot of money. We do acknowledge that these people have done something good and we will now have the official brand on it.

00:46:53Bring it out there and have people buy it in some way. Well, yeah, I mean, like, you can't, you just, you can't expect to put a game out there and then expect everybody to be happy with it. So then, you know, as long as you were able to acknowledge the fact that everybody's different, you would be able to please a much wider, like, a vast amount more of people. Yeah. Have you ever been in fear that your projects will at some point get a cease and desist? I don't really know. I don't quite have an answer. Like, you know, I have thought about it, but, you know, on the exact same thing, I've really tried not to think about it. I mean, yeah, if I did get an email from them saying, you know, this is a cease and desist, you have to stop what you're doing immediately and blah, blah, blah. Chances are, you know, I would continue doing it, but just not publicly. I would release it to myself and, you know, like family members, close friends, cast members.

00:47:52Or any even diehard fans or whatever, you know, that emailed me, that kind of thing. Yeah. Because at this point, you know, like, you know, modding originally to me was just a hobby. I just enjoyed doing it. But now that I've started doing this project and I actually have people working under me, it actually feels more like work now. Because, you know, I have to keep everybody in check. I have to send out things and give out deadlines and make sure everybody knows what they're doing. And, you know, it's just... It really does feel a lot more like work in that regard. Have you seen any projects on the forum that has actually got taken down? Or has it been like a safe haven just for the Quim forum? I did hear about one, but it wasn't so much a mod. It was actually, they were trying to recreate a game.

00:48:40as a TV show. Oh, okay. And they got taken out before they'd even released their first episode. You know, they just put out a trailer on YouTube and just immediately they were gone. Oh, okay. But I do believe that there are actual members of Square Enix in our forum. And I think that, you know, as long as we all follow certain guidelines, we won't get taken down. So... If I haven't been taken down yet, I don't think I will. What are the kind of general guidelines just so that people that might be interested in this know so they don't do anything stupid? Well, the main one they have, you know, it would come under the whole copyright thing as usual, would be to open up a more advanced game or a newer game and take the 3D models from it.

00:49:24and then release it publicly. I mean, sure, you can use it for personal use, but you just cannot give that sort of material away to anyone. Main one that comes to the top of my head would be the likes of Dirge of Cerberus. And people would take Vincent from it and then put it back into Final Fantasy VII because, of course, it was a newer, higher quality model. But you just, you can't do that. I mean, I don't even think you're allowed to officially take the music from a newer version either. And there mustn't be a single link. that would take you to any place that will allow you to get content for free or, you know, them kind of things. I don't really think they've ever just straight up came out and said, this is the rules, abide them. But, you know, a lot of people know, you know, they're obvious basic sort of guidelines and you just follow them anyway.

00:50:13Yeah, but I guess that, as you said, that the game and the modding community has been there for almost 20 years. It would be strange if not Square Enix has knowledge about it, or in some way maybe even support it behind the scenes, so to speak, in some regards. Oh yeah, I think I definitely would. I mean, they're finally coming out with the Final Fantasy VII Remake. And the one place you're going to find the most amount of fans is on the forums. And at the very least, they can sit there and they can look and they can look at all the mods that all the fans have made and then just go and make it. Like sharing the best bits. Exactly. Yeah. You literally cannot lose by using that method. Yeah. And like I said earlier about the whole live streaming stuff and the people.

00:51:04the uh the fans that were commenting on it said you know this is what we need this is this is what we want and not what square enix needs there is literally your answer on exactly how to get that yeah so by any chance that there's a square enix representative out there listening to this then there you go yeah definitely agree on that i would be perfectly fine with if that I would say that there would really not be for me personally at least it wouldn't really be a really need for a remake if for example that if your project was done and the HD background project was done then I would say that I would be perfectly fine with that version yeah I'd probably be the same you know I mean there's one person that is actually working on the field backgrounds because they did actually die for a while and this one person himself has come back or not so much come back but you know he's brought the topic back in general and he actually does have quite a few of the areas done and they look really good as far as i know he uses a program called google sketchup and he'll recreate the 3d area and you know take a screenshot or whatever put it in game and there you go

00:52:21Yeah, I heard something also, but that's just upscaling when they use this like Wafu 2X or something. But that's like taking a real image and then it tries to scale up the backgrounds. Yeah, it's just increasing the resolution. And don't get me wrong, there is a noticeable difference and fair play to those guys. But, you know, this person and a few others that have done it. in the past, you know, they're actually recreating the whole area as a 3D environment. And he has made a tutorial and he's put it up there on the forum and he's been trying his very best to recruit some more people because, you know, he's obviously very passionate about this project and it's going to take him way too long to do it himself. And you? You don't have the time, I guess? No, you know, it's due to genuine lack of time, yeah. But I mean, I will when I finish.

00:53:15And don't get me wrong, that could be years. It could be finished by then. Yeah, I think there are like 20 or 25 backgrounds that are done. Most of them was, I think it was Spox and Mayonnaise that did them through the Avalanche project. But I think they, as you said, it's someone that is taking this up again and see what's happening. For quite a while, I did try and find another forum somewhere in a different language or something. Because I was thinking there's bound to be another forum that's in Japan or something that's pretty much done everything that we are already doing. They're way ahead. Because they're pretty much ahead of us for practically everything. At some point, I did come across a French forum, but they have basically just outsourced everything that we already had. So I had no luck there, unfortunately.

00:54:13Do you think it will be still by the rules if you say that you have the resources yourself, that you stick to the rules, but if you had the money that you would apply it for, let's say, an India graphics company or someone that could mass produce the stuff and then just release it? Or would that be like creating your own game? Well, if you're saying something like taking something that already existed and then mass produce it and try to resell it, then no, there's no way you'd be able to do that. I was more thinking that if you had the resources, because it's hard to get people to do something for free, if you had the resources to actually pay people, then it might be easier to get them to help you, so to speak.

00:55:10But then again, then you need the funds to do it. Yeah, I've actually managed to get all my main cast, all my minor cast, and so many of these others. And they all work for free. They would just work for me genuinely through passion and just through love of the game itself. And there'd be the occasional one as well that just liked the idea of it and wanted to get some credibility to their voice acting name. And see, my main issue with this is because at some point, you know, I decided I was going to voice every single line in the game, you know, including the NPCs and, you know, just everything, tutorials. And the sheer amount of people you need to be able to do that is insane. Yeah. Because I really don't want to end up doing what Skyrim did, as we were saying earlier, you know, how the repeat voice actors here and there. I mean, sure, a few of my cast will do many different NPCs, but they will at least be in a different voice by the same person.

00:56:06So having enough actors to be able to fill every NPC spot is going to be very difficult. But, you know, as well as that, I'm not very... I am quite fussy with my quality of my actors. Maybe not so much with the NPCs because, you know, they are just... A lot of people, maybe sure through their first playthrough, they will go around and talk to everybody because it's new and they're excited. But, you know, I will accept a certain degree of bad quality when it comes to NPCs. So if I was able to have access to unlimited resources, providing that money would be part of that resource, my main thing would be I would like to be able to have wages that I could give to my actors every week or every month. And as well as that, I would actually be able to say, you know, if...

00:56:56if people came in and did interviews with me or something like that you know and they were actually genuinely good at voice actors but just had bad quality microphones i would say i would just be able to buy a microphone for them and then have it shipped to their address yeah yeah because one of my uh my main things is of course even i know myself my mod is not going to please everybody you know they're ever people are going to be have they're going to have a lot of things to complain about yeah of course And one of their main things is going to be the quality of the microphones. So if I was able to buy everybody some top-notch microphones, then I would, you know. Yeah. How many actors do you think you need in order to fill all these NPC voices? Do we talk like 500, 5,000? Or what do you think your cap is? Well, I don't think it would be more than 1,000.

00:57:52But it's definitely over the couple of hundred mark anyway. So a fair amount of people are necessary. Just cutting back to a thing we already mentioned, have you run into the problem where people that are good at voice acting have turned down this project because they want to get paid? Or is it always people showing up because they want to be a part of the project? Well, originally, when I started doing this and I started the advertising, I was using a website called Casting Call. And I still am today, actually. And on there, you know, I did specify that all the work that was coming from my project was free. So anyone that did come to me came in well aware that this was the situation. Right. There's only been two actors so far that I actually went out and sort of headhunted myself because I thought that they just fit a certain part.

00:58:49very very well and you know it did take them maybe a few days to decide whether they wanted to do this because they they tended to be voice actors that had worked before and you know as a voice actor you have your name to to keep upholding the stuff wow that's uh that says something about the the people involved if they did know that they had to do for free and then still wanted to be a part of it it's probably saying something about the project as a whole Yeah, one of the main things that really did make me smile was, well, there's two things, actually. You know, when I first started this project, I didn't have any videos out. You know, there was no genuine proof of concept that what I was doing was genuinely real. And many people knew that this sort of project had actually been attempted before. And, you know, it had failed just about five years ago. So, of course, everyone's a little skeptical about it, just in case.

00:59:47But then once I did eventually get a video of sort of in-game, you know, gameplay, a lot of people had seen that and they decided then to sign up and try and get involved because the proof of concept, you know, they thought, oh my God, you know, this is actually real. I want to be involved with this. Yeah. And on top of that, I do have a few actors that I think, I think at least are sort of, you know, semi well-known, you know, they don't have like a, you know, a big voice acted career, you know, like. the fellow that plays Shrek or that kind of thing. They might not, but they have actually gone out and got paid work before. And when I had got in contact with them about my project and I asked them what they would like their cast list name to be, they would actually provide me with a fake name, like an online alias sort of thing, which is perfectly acceptable, of course. But then after me actually releasing my episode one, I would receive emails here and there from people saying, actually, I'm really...

01:00:44Happy to be a part of your project. And I hate to be a pain in the ass, but, you know, you may now use this name instead on your cast list. And I'm sorry that, you know, I sort of doubted what you were doing or, you know, anything like that. And then hearing them be able to say that, I mean, of course, I understand completely that if it's a completely new project, you don't know what it's going to be like or anything like that. Of course, you want your credibility to stay secret. But then, you know, once you hear them sort of words or, you know, read them words on an email from somebody who has got somewhere. It really made me smile. It made me very proud of what I had accomplished. Yeah, that's really a seal of approval. They like what they heard, and they want to be an official part of it. That's great. That's really cool. When we're talking about voice actors, what are your favorite voice actors when it comes to gaming? Is there some sort of one that you really would like to have into your project? Well, the main thing is that...

01:01:40With many of the voices, you know, like NPCs, minor cast, anyone basically who wasn't in the movie or a different branch out of the game, you know, they've never had a voice. So it didn't really matter what they sounded like per se. But then you get, you know, the ones like the main cast that were actually in the movie and have had voices. So when it came to hiring them, I did try my very best to get somebody who sounded as close to as possible or in certain cases identical because I do believe I have one or two. that would be exactly the same as the voice actors from the the real movie that's cool but i don't know if there would be any specific actors that i would go out and headhunt myself you know like famous ones i mean sure it'd be great to have the likes of eddie murphy and whatever working for me but you know i wouldn't be able to just choose one actor over another for any particular reason it's i don't know it's kind of hard to explain you know and i'm i'm not very clued up with this sort of stuff you know it's still all new to me and whatever so i don't really

01:02:39I don't really know what I'm doing, to be fair, just yet. So I wouldn't want to just hire somebody that has a name for the sake of them having a name sort of thing, you know. But, you know, I've never even considered the possibility of that happening, so I'm quite literally just trying to think of my answer on the spot here. It's pretty tough. That's a tough one. Someone that would be really cool if you could get to, even if I don't think he'd maybe not be interested, would be Joseph... Q-Can, or what his name is, the guy that is doing Kane in Command & Conquer. Yeah, yeah. I don't know, I'm not sure if I've ever heard of... I mean, sure, I've played the game, but it was so long ago that the voice does not stick in my head. He's basically the one who's the evil dude through the whole game. I think it's really great, but there are a lot of people that have great voices.

01:03:34But I do believe, well, ever so slightly, that he's probably not going to like me talking about this, but there's one person in my cast in particular, I won't give any details about him, but his email address and, you know, his cast list name, every bit of information he's ever provided me is sort of anonymous, you know, it's an alias-like. And he auditioned for one of the characters for me, and he just happened to sound pretty much damn near identical to a well-known famous anime actor. And it sounded exactly like a particular person that plays a character in an anime named Code Geass. Yeah. And, you know, once the rest of the cast had actually heard his original audition, we all sort of spoke amongst themselves. You know, we were like, we've got to ask him. It was like, are you this guy or not? Because we are all positive that it is actually him. I mean, like, if you were a big sort of well-known famous actor, voice actor,

01:04:31And, you know, you just had no work coming around for a little while. I believe that I would just scroll through sort of the casting call page, find some cool projects, no matter what the budget or quality may be, and think, you know what, I would like if that existed. Yeah. That's the sort of thing I would do. Yeah, of course. And I really do hope that one day, you know, he will just turn around to me eventually and he'll be like, you know what, I'm really sorry that I lied to you for all these years or however long it's been, but I am actually this guy. And I'm just going to be sat there like, oh, man, that's awesome. You know, I've been working with such and such for years and just didn't even know about it. Yeah. For a reason I can't state, I couldn't tell you before now, but, you know, you got me. Or that he just says that I am your evil twin brother. But there is another actor that I have who is actually playing Barrett, Vincent and Sephiroth, which is an awful lot of work to do. Yeah.

01:05:26He's, you know, been as that he is actually playing three main characters and probably will end up more with more work than anybody else. Ironically, is probably the person with the least amount of time to be able to do this because he's actually filming a movie right now. So, you know, I do actually have a couple of people in my cast that, you know, they potentially could end up getting somewhere at some point and become very well known. And it'd be such a pleasure to have worked with them for all this time. Yeah, it's really cool. And I'll be glad to have even known them, you know, never mind worked alongside them. Yeah, and I think also the real great thing with the thing that you do, especially when you keep this positive thing around it and so on, if someone really makes it and really gain traction, he could also potentially be quite of a drive in order to make...

01:06:18the project happened or another upcoming project or whatever it's always great to have great connections like as well like if um if i ever get the opportunity to actually try and promote my actors for you know other work that's out there paid work then i will try my very best to actually try and get them more work you know because it's it's all well and good saying you know they're going to be part of my project and they'll probably gain a lot of skills and experience over that time But of course, I want to do my very best to actually build up their career, promote them as much as possible, and just genuinely help out as much as I possibly can. We have spoke quite a few times about many different things. Most of the time we would meet up on Skype or Discord. We have group chats. I have two separate group chats, actually, for my cast in particular. I have a professional chat for work-related things and questions.

01:07:11such and such but then i also have a friend chat and you know the the friend chat it tends to mostly be just meme wars and just random crap you know but we have spoke about the fact that you know chances are when we finished this project it will get you know at the very least square enix will have heard about it and you know they'll it could have some recognition from them And, you know, one day I could potentially receive an email from the likes of Square Enix, you know, anyone that works there. And it would just say something along the lines of, you know, we're going to we're holding an event in such a place at such a time. And we're going to be paying for you. And we'll say your main cast, you know, the seven or eight main characters to come over here. Yeah. And, you know, it would be like an interview sort of thing, you know, like a conference call. And I genuinely do believe that that could happen eventually, providing that we finish the project.

01:08:00And, you know, everybody would know, you know, it's like, these are the guys that ended up doing this. What is the status of your project? Is it like 40% done or 50%? Or what is your kind of roadmap for it? Well, I'm assuming that you know the game pretty well, right? Yeah. Well, right now I am around the area where you first meet Aerith in the church. No. It's, you know, it's only the first, say... well it'd be what maybe half an hour of the game but with the voices in providing you went around and spoke to everyone you know it'd be about two hours maybe worth of gameplay yeah yeah yeah we're not very far in at all i mean you know we've we haven't long really started so yeah But how do you plan, because you have released the demo and so on, will you keep doing this for each section, like releasing Midgar and then releasing some other stuff, or will you keep it until it's done, or do you have a plan on how people will actually be able to interact with this?

01:09:05Yeah, I will be releasing playable demos every now and then. It won't be after every single YouTube video, because if that was the case, then people that followed along quite often would have basically finished the whole game before the mod even came out. Then there'd be no point in downloading the entire thing when it was finished. The main reason I released a demo in the very first place was it was basically just a... an experience that you could go through to prove that you know this could actually be done yeah and then as well as that you know i do have the likes of my pseudomods facebook page which i will be posting updates on maybe not regularly because i don't want to paste pointless stuff you know i just want to i just want to put up genuine updates and you know i'll put up comments and stuff for you know different areas and whichever area say gets the most likes

01:09:58I will then do a sneak peek preview of that section in the future or something like that. And I'll be doing the same thing for playable demos as well. You know, I'll ask the fans where they would like the playable demo to go up to or from and stuff like that. I mean, right now it's not doing too particularly well because I'm not quite well enough known to get a reasonable amount of answers to that sort of thing. And I did post about one of the demos and without trying to give away any spoilers for any listeners here that may have never played the game before, you know, the first time... well, not the first time you encounter Reno, but you know when you have to escape from the tower. And then there was also Leaving Midgar, and I think it was just after you get on the boat from Junon, and it would have just the whole boat sequence, and then it would stop when you got to the other side. So I was going to sort of let the fans decide whether demos would be released more frequently or further apart from each other. Yeah. Is it...

01:10:57A lot of legwork to actually get the recordings into the game, or is that an easy thing? Well, yeah. To be fair, you know, it is pretty difficult. But most of the reason for it being difficult is actually my own fault. Because when I did first figure out that I was able to do this mod, one of the very first things I did was I sat and I tried to think about all my options. Now, I knew that this mod would not please everybody. And there were certain options I came across that I knew not everybody would enjoy, and a lot of people would really, really enjoy. So I decided to make this four separate versions of the mod. I mean, it all comes in the same mod, but you can choose to tick or untick certain options that you may or may not want to use. Like, of course, you have the normal one where it's a completely original Final Fantasy VII style with the voices. And then it has a subtitled option, so everything's in the bottom left and the boxes are invisible and stuff like that.

01:11:55And then there is an auto-text option, which is essentially like cutscenes. You know, as soon as an audio file will finish, it will move on to the next one whenever I tell it to. And it would sound a lot more like fluent conversation. It'd be a lot more real. Which essentially means I have to code the whole game four separate times for different options. To have each of these options available. Right. So it is quite a bit of legwork. Yeah, so I did. I went out and I made it so much more extra work myself. Because if I would have just said, you know, you have no choice. These are the options. You have to have it subtitled and auto-texted like the new style games would be. Yeah. Then it would have took me maybe about a quarter of the time to finish the whole thing. But, you know, I know there are a lot of people out there that do really enjoy the original style where it has the blue box in the middle of the screen. And, you know, I don't want...

01:12:46I don't want to take that away from everybody. I have seen that you have pushed a bit for your sister project that is doing the voice coverage for Final Fantasy VIII. Do you do some kind of helping out with each other, or is it just like pushing the thing together, so to speak? Well, yeah, actually, an actor that applied to work for me was also working in this Final Fantasy VIII dub. And yeah, well, his isn't actually a mod, sort of like mine would be. It's just a online YouTube fan series. You know, you could go and watch it and whatever. But because so many of their actors actually started to apply to my project. So I was thinking on the same basis as we were talking about earlier about promoting my own actors and such as much as I can, I thought, right, what can I do for these people? And the first thing that came to my mind was, you know, if I if I get in touch with the director of this other project, then we could merge our projects together. And, you know, I would I would share my actors with him for whenever he needed them. And in turn, he would return the favor and do the same thing for me because, you know, I do require an awful lot of them.

01:13:56And, you know, he did say yes. And so since then, we have been sort of promoting each other. You know, I would post things like when they make new videos, I would post that up on my Facebook and he would do the same for me. And, you know, it's just a win-win situation. You know, neither of us particularly lose anything by helping each other out. Yeah, that sounds like a good thing to do. Seeing as you probably have the same kind of drives in many ways as well. And I did say to him at one point that, you know, being as he's doing this anyway and he is voice in the game and, you know, it's the exact same, pretty much the exact same amount of work to be done, why not turn it into a mod anyway? Because it is possible. And, you know, he basically, he replied to me with, you know, he wouldn't have the know-how or the knowledge to be able to do that kind of thing.

01:14:43And, you know, I says to him that whenever I finish with my project, if he keeps all the voice files, I'll go ahead and do that for him. Yeah, so five years down the road. I mean, I have actually been asked by a few people to actually make my mod in different languages already. I think there was two different ones so far, you know, not including English. Yeah, I understand. And, you know, I basically said, yeah, go on ahead. I will do this, providing that you go out and you get your crew and your cast and, you know, you do the scripting and you translate everything from your own language. And I says, all I've got to do, I mean, I says, all you've got to do is translate everything for me, send me the files, and then all I've got to do is drag and drop it into my mod. And, you know, that's it. We're basically done.

01:15:29So yeah, I will happily do it in other languages as long as somebody is there and willing to translate and do most of the other stuff. That's really cool. We are getting closer to the end of today's show, so I would just ask, is it something else that you would like to add before we wrap up this episode? Yeah, there'll be... One or two things I'd like to say here. Well, first off, when you post this, are you going to be able to put links and stuff under the video, like captions or whatever, for the listeners to click on? Because one thing that I really do need is I am looking for more actors. I am hiring all the time. So if I give you the link to my casting call on my Facebook, would you be able to put that on the post for me?

01:16:24Or if I was to give you an email address or something, you would be able to say, you know, if you would like to inquire about this project, you know, you can email this guy at such and such. Yeah, of course. Something like that. Of course. And, you know, I'm actually going to feel kind of bad here, but, you know, I'm going to use mainly this section to just promote myself. No, it's why we have this show. But if anybody out there who would like to be a part of this project, and, you know, they're not even voice actors per se, I have a few other jobs as well. Like, I'm in need of beta testers. Anybody who is willing to sit and play through the game and test the punctuation, spelling mistakes, grammar, you know, literally everything. It's a horrible job, I know, but it's gotta be done. And if there's anyone out there that may even have knowledge of how the inside of Final Fantasy VII works, I am looking for coders as well.

01:17:14I mean, it's not even coding. It is nothing similar to coding. I just do not have a better name for it. Because I am quite literally doing everything right now myself. You know, and if I had 10 coders, I could potentially chop down the time, the speed that, you know, it would take for this project to come out from maybe, we'll say, five years to, you know, like two or one and a half. And if there's anybody here that hadn't previously heard about my project and, you know, have... sort of drawn inspiration from this you want to go check it out then i can give you guys a link to my youtube channel and you'll be able to go over there and you can watch my videos and see exactly what we have been talking about for the last hour yeah and then lastly on top of that we have um we actually use you know how i says we use the skype and the discord chats well the discord chat i have actually got specific channels inside there for followers or fans where they can actually come in to our discord

01:18:10And they'll be able to talk to the voice actors themselves. They can come and meet us. And, you know, it could be really fun because, you know, a lot of them, I'd say a lot of them will actually respond to people that come down. And you can just have some fun while you're there. Most of them will be willing to talk to basically anybody that comes up, you know, providing that they're nice enough people. And if they do have sort of criticism, it will be constructive criticism. You know, they won't just outright attack you for it. But, you know, there will be, of course, one or two here and there that won't want to just talk to anybody because, you know, they have other things to do. Yeah, we will certainly do that. And we will also, of course, as we usually do, we will make a small YouTube video related to this program and your project.

01:18:58We'll also, of course, add any kind of information that is needed in order to get involved in this, because I think all of us really would like this project to happen as soon as better, basically. Yeah, no problem at all. If you give us the stuff, we'll make sure it's both included where you can listen to this and also included in the video so they can watch it. So we'll definitely help out if you give us the stuff we need. And then my very last thing, but not least, of course, is I have to just say, you know, huge shout out to all of my actors. I cannot thank all of you enough for helping me out with this project. You know, I know that you guys probably do it for yourselves, but I see it as you're all doing this for me. You know, this is one of my personal things that I always wanted to do. You're all working for free and it's just fantastic. If I give you deadlines.

01:19:5199% of the time you will do those deadlines and your skills, your talent, and just the reasoning behind what you do is fantastic. I cannot thank you guys enough. And, you know, we're the way that most of the actors, not all, of course, most of you guys, you know, you'll come into the friend chats on the stuff and we've got to know each other pretty well. And it's been absolutely great getting to know you all. I'm really looking forward to the huge journey that we have in front of us. So just overall, thank you guys so much. And, you know, that's from fear of repeating myself, I'm leaving it at that. I think that's the sentiment that a lot of people have around this project. So, yeah, shout out to everyone involved in projects such as this one. Definitely.

01:20:42Alright, and with that we say thank you and goodbye for tonight. And we will hope that anyone who is listening to this will turn in for next week's episode. So till then, goodbye and good night. Yep, bye for now.