Thinking about posting a thread for your mod/project? Read this first!

Okay, we've had enough threads along these lines that I've got to rant about it.

This. Is. NOT. A. Recruiting. Forum. There is no recruiting forum. Any idiot can come up with concepts; add a small bit of intelligence and you've got good, detailed concepts. Throw in a little artistic ability and you've got some concept art. And that's about as far as you'll get along those lines. In regards to mods, the HCE forum is a place to show off and get critique/suggestions for something you've already made.

You really want to undertake a massive project?

Well, good for you, sport. Start by familiarizing yourself with the development process. There is no market for conceptual people telling everybody how it should be; you've got to know how to make it yourself. Learn to create sprites, UV models, render animations, and such. Once you've got that down, you need a proof-of-concept, not just a concept. Something substantial to show that your little idea is more than just that; it's a possibility. Make and texture a map, and insert some custom weapons and sounds.

You do all of that by yourself, or maybe with somebody you know really well.

Then you start asking around privately.

Show off some custom assets through PMs and e-mails; if your proof-of-concept is strong enough, the right people should take interest. Their job isn't to do the work for you, but rather to provide suggestions, offer assistance, and maybe make a few things if they feel confident enough in the project. Unless otherwise agreed, their job isn't to create your vision, as it's your vision; they're designed to give you the expertise and the knowhow to improve your own abilities and assimilate their strengths into yours. A couple of months should pass, and you should have a couple of working maps with working enviroments and assets at an extremely high quality level.

At this point, you still haven't posted a thread.

So you think you've got enough to show?

Great; compile your assets, record a video, take some screens, post a thread, and get ready to have all of your hard work shredded to pieces in a storm of critique. If people here think your idea sucks (especially if it's a model), they will be perfectly happy to impart that view in the most direct manner possible. Good members will also give you some suggestions for improvement, unless they think what you're showing is so crappy it's beyond redemption. But if you've got the quality, you'll gain a following; at this point, feel free to ask for help where needed. Again, if what you've got a lot of strong material to show, people will be happy to add their own abilities. And then your mod will see an alpha release or two before everybody loses interests and it falls back into obscurity (no really how many mods have actually been completed to satisfaction here?)

If the thread you're planning to post fits any of these criteria, don't bother making it. We don't want to see it.

-Your thread is all text.
-The only custom assets in your thread are combinations of other people's work.
-The only thing you have to show is concept art.

Here's a recent example of how to do it.

Here's a recent example of how not to do it.

We clear? Good.

Someone's angreh. ._. And yes, I have commit this very same mistake... more than once lol.

:golfclap:

Very nice sir

Must spread rep :(

Thank you, sir. You have done a great deed for this forum (and my "new posts" bookmark).

Edit: Nitpick: "If the thread you're planning to post fits any of these criteria"

I like the text incrementally getting bigger. The large text must mean its important :eng101:

sadface.

I think people should be allowed to post recruitment threads if they have a good amount of work to show.
Not people who can't do anything with CE except place stuff with sapien then ask people to make models, animations and do all the work for them.

i like the examples

and here i was about to post an idea for a halo movie to ask if it was a good one when i thought, "Maybe I should read more into rules and stuff first, there might even be a specific one against what I'm about to do."
And here it is. Oh well. off to some other forums, machinima-specific, possibly.