A video review of the site changes, the poll questions, articles published, feature highlights and, of course, the maps and mods posted on the site in February 2009.
Vimeo
PlanetPhillip February 2009 Video Review from PlanetPhillip on Vimeo.
Articles
Poll Questions
- Poll Question 112 – Do you want to play as Father Grigori?
- Poll Question 111 – 5 short mods or one long one?
- Poll Question 110 – Do you prefer to walk or drive?
Maps and Mods
- Hard Escape – Half-Life 2: Ep2
- Nova Prospekt Under Attack – Half-Life 2: Ep2
- Combine Surveillance – Half-Life 2
- The Great Forever Tomorrow – Half-Life 2: Ep2
- Eye Of The Storm: Episode 1 – Half-Life 2: Ep2
- Big Explosion Theory – Half-Life 2
- I Hate Headcrabs – Half-Life 2
- Sentenced to Death – Half-Life 2: Ep1
- Cyberscape – Half-Life 2: Ep2
- Secret Lab Assault – Half-Life 2
- Strider Mountain – PreRelease – Half-Life 2
- Camp Trip – Half-Life 2: Ep2
- Sector 9 – Half-Life 2
See My Other Videos:
Published
8th March 2009
Categories
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38 Comments
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[...] Planet Phillip February 2009 Month in Review [...]
8th March 2009
I think you used too much bad homour, was fun at first, but after a while it got annoying. The rewind sequence or whatever it was, was just too annoying.
After watching 9 minutes and 5 second the video stopped working for some reason, the image froze and the sound stopped, while it claimed it kept playing. Same thing happened after a F5 at the same place. Maybe the video’s corrupted?
8th March 2009
plays ok for me. Where did it stop? The sound you hear is me listing the games but speeded up 3 times normal speed.
8th March 2009
Worked ok for me.I liked it too and normally never watch these things lol.
8th March 2009
very informative makes all viewers of this video right at home i really hope too see more of these videos in future & thank you for giving a heads up on whats worth playing & whats worth a look
your voice was very easy to hear & the background music you used wasnt blaring just alittle faint but never overlapping the dialogue.
this video has made my day thank you Phillip hope to hear more of this Have a Nice Game Day
8th March 2009
I really enjoyed this, very humorous and informative.
Unlike Sortie, the humor didn’t annoy me at all!
Unfortunately it also jams at 9 minutes and 5 seconds for me, which is a shame since I really want to see the whole thing.
8th March 2009
Sortie said (and Splatzone had the same experience)
“After watching 9 minutes and 5 second the video stopped working for some reason, the image froze and the sound stopped, while it claimed it kept playing. Same thing happened after a F5 at the same place. Maybe the video’s corrupted?”
I had exactly the same experience ; it happened at exactly 9 minutes and 5 seconds of the video, it’s not the part where you speed up the sound Phillip, that part starts at 4 minutes 23 seconds, at 09.05 the image and the sound froze, while time was running normally at the bottom of the screen, strange…
I will try again tomorrow, I really like the monthly video-review.
8th March 2009
Sounds like other people are having problems at 9 minutes 5 seconds, but not everybody. Sounds like it’s browser related, or maybe Adobe Flash Player? I’m using Internet Explorer 7 and Adobe Flash Player 10. (It’s a shame the video doesn’t work, because I still find this video review very entertaining)
8th March 2009
I also use IE7 and Adobe Flash Player 10 , just tried to look at the video on the VIMEO-site , the same thing happens after 9 minutes 5 seconds. (I had no problems with the january 2009 video review last month)
I hope you can find the problem and fix it Phillip, I really want to see the rest of the video.
8th March 2009
I just played it again and fast forwarded to 8:30 and let it play.Still no problem
IE7 with Flash10a.ocx
8th March 2009
I don’t see that there is anything I can do.
One possible option for some users would be to download the original version. The link is in the bottom right area of the Vimeo page:
http://vimeo.com/3524376
I will upload it to FileFront tomorrow and maybe another video sharing website.
8th March 2009
Thanks Phillip, just got done, played very well on this end! The only thing is the very small type size makes it a little hard to read! To the peeps having trouble, try installing “K-Lite mega” codec pack it helps alot with vid problems, been using it a long time! I also use explorer 7 with latest Flash installed.
9th March 2009
It would be helpful if there were links to the mods listed in the video in the post.
9th March 2009
I saw the video all the way through just fine, using Firefox. Anyways, I would have liked to see a couple of Half Life 1 mods up there, but I guess that’s just me. Aside from that, I thought that the review was great. Silly Grigori..
9th March 2009
Played fine, nice work Phillip.
9th March 2009
I liked the review, and look forward to your next one.
It played OK for me using the Firefox browser.
9th March 2009
I don’t think it’s needed since they can be found with one click in the Dated Archives. But I’ve added them to make life easy for readers.
No, not just you but others as well. However, this is a review of everything I posted on the site in February 2009, if there were no HL1 maps or mods released then, there’s nothing I can do about it!
Thanks to everybody for the nice comments.
9th March 2009
I never planned for the viewer of the video to actually read anything in the video, except the blue title pages. If I make the video size bigger, the file size increases too much.
9th March 2009
YouTube video should be online any time now.
9th March 2009
The Vimeo-hosted video loaded fine for me.
I have to say I agree with Sortie about the humor. It was too forced and it really doesn’t suit you in my opinion, Phillip. I much preferred the frank, mildly jovial tone in which you conducted the last video. As for the reviews, I got the feeling they were a *bit* too breezy and didn’t go into quite enough detail, and this is just my personal opinion but I think it’d be best to stop the background music while doing the mod reviews, because some of the gameplay videos also contain music and it kind of clashes.
Nitpicks aside, this is good work, well done.
Also, I’d like to apologize for the noticable stuttering in some of the gameplay videos, I’m really not sure what’s causing it but I’ve had some issues with sudden irregular hard drive activity while recording lately.
9th March 2009
Everybody is allowed their opinion. I can’t please everybody, so I will just do what takes my fancy on the day.
I think we have two issues here. Firstly, I don’t consider myself a good reviewer and only do the videos as a review of the month, rather than a proper video review of each mod.
Secondly, with the time frame of each video it is hard to decide what to say, especially since I feel I need to follow the video to some degree. It would be strange for me to be talking about architecture when viewers see gameplay action. That’s not a critisim of the videos you supply, just my way of doing things.
I didn’t realize you had added music to the background, since we never discussed that. I assumed it was part of the mod itself. I put the background music in, to make it sound better. Just a person’s voice can sound too plain.
I will make the March Video Review then decide if I want to continue, partly because it’s a huge amount of work (it took me nearly the whole of Saturday and Sunday to edit, record, render, upload and post) and partly because the number of views is quite low for the amount of work.
I also get a little annoyed at the negative comments. It’s just a bit of fun and if people don’t like it, let them make their own video and see how easy it is.
9th March 2009
I have removed the YouTube video because it was refused for being longer than 10 minutes.
9th March 2009
Thank you Phillip.
Having the links makes this a better executive summary.
I do hope you continue this, as it is very useful to have.
9th March 2009
Loved this video. Very funny!
10th March 2009
Yeah, I didn’t have any problems running it yesterday morning, using Firefox and Adobe Flash. I thought it provided a pretty good summary, and seeing some of these maps in action was a lot more useful than just screenshots. The humor felt… well… forced, but I think we can chalk that up to this being the first time out, ne?
Interestingly, on that whole “5 short mods or 1 long mod” poll, I think I may have been confused about your intent there. I had assumed you meant that the 5 short mods were all part of the same overarching campaign (that is, episodic) as opposed to 5 completely separate mods. I’ll take the 5 completely separate mods any day!
10th March 2009
You assumed right, I didn’t add any music to the videos. If it’s there, it’s because it plays in the mod. Anyway, it’s a small thing, I just felt it was worth mentioning.
10th March 2009
Thank’s Phillip, this worked for me, the video-quality of the downloaded version was better too !
To be honest, I liked the way you did it, just a bit of fun, without your commends, I wouldn’t have wathed the full 26 minutes.
10th March 2009
I was surprised with Phillips outburst in response to the overwhelming vote in favour of long mods, I know he much prefers short mods; however I have always thought that he was in the minority on this point. Why would anyone prefer to download and install 5 times if much the same fare is offered in one download. I agree, downloading and installing is a lot easier and faster these days but I still often need to download a second time due to corruption.
The major issue I have with small mods is the fact that the bulk of junk releases fall into this group, I will predict that out of the next 5 short mods posted on PP only 2 will be worth playing, well maybe 3 at a push.
By the way Phillip the humor was ok and why anyone should take it serious I don’t know, the cheesier the better.
10th March 2009
Just to add, things a getting way too serious around here.
10th March 2009
The humor was a plus, but then I get the occasional complaints about my own brand of funny.
I too was a little confused by the 5 short / 1 long mod discussion. I associated it with the episodes or big game discussion a little earlier, and figured that the 5 short mods were all related episodes. I still voted for the 5 short ones though.
10th March 2009
How about discussing the opinions given by the commentors in the poll question? Although it’s nice to hear your personal opinions, I don’t always agree, and I’d like to have you comment on what other people think. After all, poll questions are a discussion of a topic.
11th March 2009
Discussions about that happen in their own thread here:
/posts/category/poll-questions/
Any others maybe removed, this is about the vid and not its contents.
11th March 2009
Gald you liked it.
I should have been clearer, sorry.
Well of course! The online version is very compressed in both size and filesize.
Good to know.
I wouldn’t have exactly called it an “outburst”.
Agreed. But the poll was very clear the the quality of all the levels were the same. Of course just becasue a mod is long doesn’t automatically make it good. But that does raise an interesting point, which I will probably use for this week’s poll questions since I don’t currently have one lined up. Thanks Mel, you often provide poll questions with your comments.
Exactly, it was just a bit of fun.
Just to clarify on the “forced” part. I planned nothing until I actually started to edit the video. I got to the poll with Father Grigori and thought it would be funny to get him to say a few words, so I checked what he said and added a few lines.
The same with the trumpet joke. I wanted soemthing to make the 25 Game Giveaway sound important but when I added the fanfare it sounded pompous, so I added the one line to (hopefully) make peoplem realize I wasn’t being serious.
Anyway, we’ll see what happens next month. Maybe I’ll be straight laced, maybe not. Whatever mood takes me
11th March 2009
That’s a good idea. Me responding and highlighting some of the points made would make that section of the video more interesting. Of course it will make the video longer.
@anydb, I know what you are saying but Sortie is thinking about the video specifically. I think it’s hard to separate the video from its contents.
In fact I do want to hear what people think about its content. Perhaps viewers would like me to do something not directly related to the site itself. Maybe a rant about something, that doesn’t have a post. That way it would contain something unique and give viewers more reason to watch it.
ANy thoughts viewers?
11th March 2009
A Monty Python sketch with you playing all the main characters, only problem I see is which one, can’t make my mind up between John Cleese and Michael Palin. Maybe you could do them both with the ‘five minute argument sketch’
11th March 2009
I think the site changes part is a little boring and perhaps should be cut in the future Video Reviews, or at least be moved to the later sections.
Overall, I think the videos are really entertaining and interesting to watch. Despite having read the reviews posted on the site of the mods, it’s really cool to see a video of the mod with commentary on it. It adds another layer to the reviews and gives me a glimpse of the mod that I wouldn’t have seen, if only I had seen the screenshots. Though if the length of the podcast is too long, perhaps the screenshot-only mods should be cut from it? They’re not that enjoyable, though, not necessarily boring, at all. Otherwise the main contents of the video reviews are great and I really hope you keep making them.
11th March 2009
Awesome video Phillip, again. This month felt even better. I really enjoy the topic summary and I just love the mod reviews. Keep up the good work, I am looking forward to next video already!
I had trouble watching the stream from vimeo (it stopped at 9 minutes), both in firefox and iexplorer. But since you provided a download link I could continue and see the whole thing. Thanks!
12th March 2009
Please keep it that way Phillip, keep doing things the way you like it (you can’t please everyone)
When I heard Father Grigori say ” Aim for the head !! ” again, I smiled and it made me think back of my very first encounter with him in HL2 , when I received the shotgun and had to fight the annoying fast zombies for the very first time.