Gakumerasara's site

My Little Pwnies - Ganking is Magic

Tue, 05 Jul 2011 05:12:10 +0000

Ponies were recently added to Final Fantasy Online - originally as a joke - spewing inappropriate dialogue and innuendo. Since then, they have been embraced by the playerbase for their cuteness and amazing combat abilities. They are primarily encountered as rare-spawned companions/pets that immediately boost player coolness by 20%. In this video, they show off their uncanny ganking abilities. Thank you to all of the players who gave their lives so that this video could be produced!

The future of FFO

Fri, 01 Jul 2011 02:01:42 +0000

If you are reading this, then you already know that FFO and all other FF games on "the list" will be unlisted from the BYOND Hub. However, most people who have kept up with FFO at all over the past 2.5 years know that I planned to take the game down anyway.

In January of 2009, I decided that I no longer wanted to be constrained by the "FF" universe and that so little about FFO had anything to do with FF that it was time to convert it into something original. The development version of FFO was renamed "Terulia", and both "FFO" and "Terulia" were developed in parallel: with FFO receiving minor updates when they could be easily imported from Terulia and Terulia being rewritten from the ground up in phases. All of the ripped icons were replaced by a few very talented icon artists. (...with the exception of the area spell animations, which will be replaced soon enough...)

Despite being superior to FFO in every way, Terulia at present is not ready for release. Playable content is comparable to FFO's "newbie quest" up through Sludge. There are a few core game aspects that need to be hashed out and tested before I can get to work on quests and game content, and real life is keeping me very busy as of late.

I guess that's all I'll say about Terulia for now. I may be one of the few people who remember that old warning about announcing your games before they are ready... I wasn't planning to post about it at all, except that I want to say: Relax; FFO's unlisting isn't a problem... and if you want to play FFO in the interim, you can play on what is now the "underground" server, which is in the same place it's always been.

TRC/TFS downtime

Tue, 14 Jun 2011 02:22:36 +0000

My apologies for the recent downtime. Once I've gotten situated in my new apartment and dealt with a number of pressing real-life obligations, I'll get back to hosting once again.

TRC/TFS server upgrade, now with free file hosting

Sat, 21 May 2011 16:08:42 +0000

************** Server Upgrade **************

You may remember that the server underwent a huge upgrade a while back. At the last auction in early April, I picked up some even better computers for just $1 each. Now that I finally have some free time to work on them, I've set up one of these computers as the next TRC/TFS server.

Previous:
--- hyper-threaded 2.8GHz Tri-C
--- 8kB L1 cache; 512kB L2 cache
--- 2GB of 400MHz DDR RAM
--- 40GB IDE/ATA HD
--- (backup drive for file hosting not in use)

New:
--- hyper-threaded 3.0GHz Dell Optiplex GX280
--- 16kB L1 cache; 1024kB L2 cache
--- 2GB of 400MHz DDR2 RAM
----- will soon be upgraded to 4GB of 533MHz DDR2 RAM ($22)
--- 80GB SATA HD
--- 80GB SATA HD dedicated to file hosting

The previous server wasn't bad by any means but it had a number of quirks that made it less suitable as a web server. Since being transferred to the new server, the website is now running much more smoothly.

************** File Hosting **************

Terulia Forum Service now offers free file hosting for BYOND users. This should be particularly useful to those of you without BYOND memberships. Visit [ this link ] to get started.

Please don't go overboard with remote image hosting.
This isn't intended to be a substitute for Photobucket.

************** Game Hosting **************

Some of you may be aware that I'm currently hosting several games at Terulia Services. These games are still being hosted on the previous web server. Soon (in a few days), these will be transferred to one of the 3 additional GX280s that I picked up (also for $1 each).

At 4GB of RAM and with loads of processing power to spare, I'm planning to create a remote file upload and auto-hosting system for users of the hosting service.

The way this will probably work is:
1) zip your host files
2) upload your host files
3) host files automatically unzipped
4) existing session is shutdown if applicable
5) new session is launched

This should make things significantly easier for those of you who are uncomfortable with SSH.

************** My Weekend **************

And now I'm off. I'm leading a group to the Ochlockonee River tomorrow to pull a derelict boat out of a tree. I will be scouting the site and floating materials downriver this afternoon. I won't be doing much else toward "Get Something Done" unless you consider pulling a 600-pound boat out of a tree "getting something done". On the other hand, I believe the newly revamped file hosting service qualifies. By my count, I've still got 10 days to finish up the updates to www.terulia.com to satisfy Iain's challenge.

dynamic map generation

Fri, 06 May 2011 14:16:45 +0000

According to BYOND and Within #12, this is the next big thing I guess?

These are some screenshots from a dynamic map generator I created 2 years ago.

TRC sucks!

Thu, 28 Apr 2011 01:06:17 +0000

http://www.byond.com/developer/Gakumerasara/TRC

No one's using it. What gives?

Is it too hard to understand?
Are you opposed to using a library?
Is it lacking some key feature that you want?
Do you not want your players "distracted" by the outside world?

I didn't create TRC as a conversation piece.
Let me know what you want added/changed/removed.

TRC Security Update

Sat, 23 Apr 2011 15:37:30 +0000

If you are a TRC library user and haven't done so already, please download the latest version of TRC. Alternatively, you can update your current version by simply changing the line:

var/e = world.Export("[REMOTE_ADDRESS]:59999?[list2params(cq_to_export)]",,,clients)

var/e = world.Export("[REMOTE_ADDRESS]:59999?[list2params(cq_to_export)]",,1,clients)

TRC will no longer accept non-persistent connections; once the security update is complete, any intercepted SYN packets (e.g. non-persistent BYOND Export()s) will result in a ban at the shell level. This change will go into effect next weekend.

Free BYOND Hosting @ Terulia Services?

Sat, 02 Apr 2011 18:24:19 +0000

I've got a few different points to bring up, so if you're in the tl;dr crowd, skip to the third paragraph.

I just attended the bimonthly university/government auction and got another steal: 19 desktops (mostly crap but some good ones) for $20 total plus a 2.2GHz laptop for $50. Of interest though is that a $2000 server rack (just the rack), with ~25 server nodes included, sold for a whopping $350. This brings me to the very real possibility that, some time in the future, I might actually be able to buy a full multi-node server...

While talking to the buyers who bought the server, I learned that there's a colocation computing center here in town that rents out spots on their gigabit network - unlimited bandwidth - for about $50/month. I'm thinking of moving my own servers there at some point for the speed benefits (currently hosting via DSL) and so I can drop my home internet to a lower tier. Anyway...

What's this about free hosting? I recently offered the use of The Terulia Web Server to SilkWizard for NEStalgia hosting. It was in use for a day or two, and although I didn't hear any complaints regarding speed/lag/etc., Silk has since consolidated his hosting elsewhere. As it is, this computer is now running at about 2% of operating capacity. I see this as a waste of potential, so I'm willing to set up user accounts for 2-4 active users so they can host their games on this machine. The stipulations are: 1) no DBZ games, 2) your game can't be a CPU hog in-and-of itself (i.e. 100% CPU usage with 0 users is unacceptable), 3) you have to incorporate TRC into your game. If you are interested in this free hosting opportunity, post a reply here and I'll get back to you on Monday (leaving for the weekend).

Finally, I wanted to gauge general interest in free hosting at the mentioned colocation center. This is just for my future reference. If enough people are interested in this setup, then I will probably place some bids the next time a $5000+ full server setup goes up for auction.

edit: The promotional 2.8GHz desktop giveaway is still underway.

can relay chat get any easier?

Thu, 24 Mar 2011 16:22:29 +0000

For those of you interested in using TRC but not the Forum Service, I've made some changes to Terulia Relay Chat that allow you to do just that. (As a developer, you have to create a TFS forum, but this is trivial. You don't have to do anything with your empty forum, and your players never have to visit the site.) Here's how simple it is:

as a developer:
1) Log into the Terulia Forum Service using your BYOND account.
2) Create a new forum to serve as your channel.
3) Download TRC.
4) Include the TRC library in your game.
5) Edit the TRC library file "1 - definitions.dm" and set DEFAULT_CHANNEL as the channel you just created.
6) Compile your game to include TRC.

Now, any players who join your game will be automatically subscribed to your channel, meaning they can begin chatting without any additional effort. Once you join the TRC network, you and your players will be able to chat with each other across all TRC-linked games.

And remember, as a developer, you are free to customize your implementation of TRC; you don't have to use the default TRC interface.

I can't continue to improve this system without feedback.
Let me know what YOU would like to see in future versions and updates to TRC.

Terulia Relay Chat video tutorial

Mon, 21 Mar 2011 19:52:01 +0000

This is a simple how-to video for Terulia Relay Chat which describes situations where TRC is useful, shows how to "install" the TRC library, and walks you through activating a TRC account.

BYOND member post with more information
the TRC library hub page
the Terulia Forum Service

If you have any comments or questions, feel free to post them.