OFFICIAL RULES

Alright you handsome little bastards, we've been getting in some really nice submissions recently and this thing just might have a chance at being GREAT.

As you may be aware, we set the official deadline for the 20th BUT...

ok look, we really want to get this assembled in a timely manner but if you need an extra day or three we can deal with it. Also, we got over a hundred entries so obviously we can't use all of em so if yours isn't picked please no hard feelings, just take it like a man and say to yourself "I'm going to do even better next time!" and high five yourself, and trust me you'll feel better. We do appreciate all of you submitting.

OFFICIAL RULES

You got about a month left on the METAL GEAR COLLAB.

I dunno, based on the submissions it seems like you all know "Snake" and his penchant for sneaking around like a pervert, but there's also a ton of potential for non-snake based submissions that isn't really being tapped. So far I've seen maybe THREE submissions (out of SEVENTY) based on mgs2 and 3. I mean thats just fucking ridiculous...and so far maybe one based on part 4.

Let me help you guys out here alittle. You have to work with:

A LITERALLY GAY UNDEAD VAMPIRE

CYBORG NINJAS

A FAT ROLLER SKATING EXPLOSIVES EXPERT

A CROSSBOW WIELDING SPIDERY OLD MAN THAT USES FEAR TO CONTROL HIS ENEMIES

AN INSANE RUSSIAN COSMONAUT THAT LOVES FIRE (AND IS PRETTY PISSED ALL THE FUCKING TIME)

SNAKES ARCH ENEMY THAT HAS HIS DEAD BROTHERS ZOMBIE HAND GRAFTED ONTO HIS ARM THAT SOMETIMES TAKES CONTROL OF HIS MIND AND EVEN MAKES HIM SOUND LIKE HIS DEAD BROTHER - WHAT

A DUDE THAT LOVES BEING STUNG BY HORNETS

A RUSSIAN MIND READER THAT KNOWS WHEN YOU LIKE PLAYING CASTLEVANIA

SNAKES THIRD CLONED BROTHER WHO WAS ACTUALLY AGED AND MADE THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES (AND WHEN NOT RULING THE COUNTRY WEARS A BADASS EXOSKELETON THAT COULD RIP APART DOCTOR OCTOPUS)

A DEAD GUY THAT CRIES BLOOD AND MAKES IT RAIN

AN OLD FART WHO WAS THE BEST SNIPER TO EVER LIVE AND HAS A PET PARROT AND GOOGLY EYES

A DUDE THAT HAS BOWEL PROBLEMS IN EVERY SINGLE METAL GEAR GAME

CRAZY BITCH WITH AN INSANE RAILGUN THAT CAN'T BE HIT BY BULLETS

YOUR FRIENDLY NEIGHBORHOOD BLACK WEAPONS EXPERT

NOT TO MENTION -

THE SHAGOHOD (THE FIRST METAL GEAR)

METAL GEAR REX

METAL GEAR RAY

You have a ton of material to work with here. If you want info on even more mgs characters and events, check em out HERE.

oh and p.s. all these characters got videos on youtube. just type in "metal gear solid" and their name into the search.

UPDATE TWO

OFFICIAL RULES

We have 45 or so submissions, and a few real good ones have come in.

A few suggestions based on what we're recieving -

Newgrounds specific jokes - not a grand idea. Try your best to make them metal gear specific jokes. Even if the joke introduces some outside elements it should still be based on metal gear.

So far, we've gotten very few movies that don't involve solid snake and or dicks and cardboard boxes. A few of those are very good but still. MGS2 is still completely ignored along with only one or two submissions based on part 3.

Here's a good reference for all things metal gear if you're looking for ideas:

THE METAL GEAR WIKI

p.s. if you're still a little confused about what we want check out the BLAMFORMERS collab again.

p.p.s. if you wanna spread the word around so this is the best collab ever I'll tip my hat to you and throw you a few shillings.

STILL ALSO

kagomehigurashi who voiced meryl in the metal gear awesome series (and does an amazing job) volunteered to do some female voices if you need em. BUT FOR THE LOVE OF GOD dont send her utter shit. PLEASE. if you're gonna bust your ass on something and need a female voice so you don't gotta tuck your balls between your legs and do the voice yourself - then by all means politely ask her.

Two contests have popped up that I'm going to try and join in on -

Opie & Anthony Animation Contest (scroll to bottom, ignore chick with huge rack)

There's no set deadline yet, but they're saying there will be a venue set up in NY with seating for a few thousand and they'll be screening all the best animations with cash prizes. It's apparently sometime in May so I'm assuming you better get done by late april. Hit the link above for rules.

Udon Street Fighter Art "Tribute" Contest

Hey if you like playing Street Fighter or just admire the character designs check this one out. There's no cash prize, but you'll get your art printed in a large Tribute Art Book that will be first appearing at Comicon this July. Deadline is March 31, check out all the Rules and Regulations at the link above.

Both of these could be a big opportunity for anybody looking to get their work seen.

....and yeah I KNOW we need to post a new contest here in NG...SORRY. We'll get on that.

Has anybody else checked out this movie yet?

I ON DEMAND'ED it (for 4.99 RIP OFF) and I'm on the fence about it. Sure a warner bros. cartoon that opens with an artist blowing his brains out can't be that bad right?

It's based on an alternate take on how the JUSTICE LEAGUE orignally formed back in the 60s. Apparently, there's a lifeform that's named itself "the center" that's been here on earth for a millenia and is supremely irritated with the recent evolution of human beings.

Anyways, I hear the graphic novel was highly praised but this entire movie seems rushed just to fit in every character and make sure they get in their sweet little speech about humans working together and not fighting anymore.

Notable mentions:

The "villain" looks like Jurassic Park with tentacles. Don't make me elaborate - that's a perfect description already.
Superman is still a huge niave pussy
Batman looked ridiculous in the 1960s
The Flash is the fasted dickhole on the planet, but has major self confidence issues.
Martian Manhunter's "human form" looks even more ridiculous than batman.
Aquaman has terrible taste in undersea vehicles
Green Lantern is a womanizing jock with a really close male buddy - they're winking at each other the entire god damn movie.
Wonder Woman is a HUGE "C"

I did a search for "tankmen" and "tank men" on deviantart..having no idea what to expect.

Low and behold I was met with feelings of morbid curiosity and terror. I'd say the best one was THIS.

and I know some of you have drawn tankmen fighting dick monsters and all that jazz (and believe me you make me proud), but for SOME REASON a tankman on a horse..WITH A SWORD, acting all chivalrous and valiant just freaks me out more.

I DONT KNOW WHY.

(not to mention the creepy pursed lips on that horse)

I tween a hell of a lot. I'm sure you read that and said "no shit sherlock". what. anyways -

I hate seeing awkward/bad tweens and if you don't use "easing" in your tween you should be ASHAMED.

In Flash 7 and before I would make a tween then put a keyframe in the middle and ease in to that point then ease out to the end of it to keep the movement as natural as possible. After all when you swing your arm it has to accelerate then decelerate to its stopping point - same theory.

In Flash 8 and CS3 you can custom ease. Below, is what I set to mostly all my tweens to achieve that somewhat natural acceleration/deceleration movement.

There's some more advanced examples HERE of what you can do with this handy little tool.

I'll probably be adding a bunch more helpful Norm Abrams like tips to help you make your flash just a bit better - and if you don't know who Norm is you should also be ASHAMED of yourself. :)

update: here's a LINK to Rtil's anipedia entry on tweening and easing. His custom ease in/out curve is a bit steeper than mine but check em both out and experiment.

UPDATE:

This tablet rules. RULES I SAY. It's responsive, a great size, and one of the best features - you can program a hotkey on it (which is set at default) to turn the tablet back to "intuos mode". that is, you can go back to controlling the cursor on your main monitor with a quick button push and it's like I got my old tablet back.

If any of you guys have any further questions, post em here and I'll answer.

For those that still draw and animate in flash with a blasted mouse (LOOKING AT LUIS), I cry for you.

I've been using wacom tablets for maybe 6 years now and as much as I love em, there was always that disconnect of looking at the monitor as you draw on a tablet in front of you. It was never much of a problem, but there was always a few issues that irked me.

I've been eyeing those Wacom Cintiq tablets for awhile (you know, the monitors you can directly draw on) , but I shied away for a few reasons as well. First, they're expensive. Second, I've demoed a few and I was annoyed with the lag of the brush always a fraction of a second behind your pen. Third, using flash, I'm a key command freak. If you're a Photoshop or Painter guy, I'm sure that's not much of an issue, but the constant copying, duplicating, flipping, pasting, etc. of symbols and entire sections of the timeline is a heavy burden when you got a large tablet in front of you and you gotta reach far left or right with both hands to get to your keyboard. I'm the type that puts the tablet square in front of the keyboard so I always have quick access to it. And yes, the tablets do have hotkeys, but I'm not sure they have the flexibility I need.

Anyways, Wacom just came out with a new model in their Cintiq line. Check out a cool video demo/review here.

Besides the fair price (ok it's about 999.00 but half that of the other models), it's small enough that I can set it in front of my keyboard - approximately the same size as my 6x8 Wacom Intuos. Also, the reviewer claims there's zero lag. It looks like there is in the video, but he has a fair explanation for that.

I just ordered one, and hopefully I won't totally regret it. I'll update this post in a few days with some impressions.

...and I hope those of you that got your FREE TABLETS from Tom are enjoying the wonders of them (or when they arrive). Pressure sensitivity alone makes em worth it.

I've admittedly never played unreal tournament, and I'm not a huge FPS fan in general but I ran across this article yesterday.

The producer of UT3 is practically taunting everybody to mod their game. (and all mods will work on the PS3 version)

I just had this wild and crazy idea of a newgrounds themed mod, but since I don't know any 3d whatsoever and don't own a PC (I'm not sure about the mod tools being on a mac), I can't really do much about it.

It seemed to me that this would be one of the simpler ideas, keeping all the level geometry simple and mildly textured, and you'd only need 1 or 2 simple tankman character models and vehicle models could be relatively simple as well.

Anyways, just throwing that out there. Even with the simplicity of the stuff I'm sure it's still a ton of work but hey I felt like blogging like a queer so just indulge me.

When you hear somebody you know hasn't played a certain game you usually don't bat an eye, but will kindly recommend it if you're a fan of it.

A disturbing trend in the office here is when I hear my cohorts haven't seen a particular movie. It just blows my mind. My first reaction is to shout "HOW COULD YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THAT" before I regain my senses and realize I probably just covered them with spit as I was frothing at the mouth in a complete frenzy.

To back up a bit, I play my fair share of games for fun and would obsessively play some games on the hardest difficulty until I saved the fucking galaxy, but my primary form of entertainment has always been movies. It seems like the list still mostly pre-dates this century. In fact, if you watch my stupid cartoons like Tankmen and have seen a trend of me animating macho tough guys with dry wit and bad attitudes it's all grounded in the movies I was raised on.

Growing up, and god dammit I hope some of you can relate to me here, I gradually collected movies on VHS - not the ones you could buy in-store. Oh no, my collection consisted of shit taped off HBO at my grandparents house (because my family never got cable since we grew up far outside the cable companies boundries). Not even good quality mind you, I was a kid and couldn't be buying all these VHS tapes, so I recorded everything at the lowest quality (SLP) so I could fit 3 movies per tape. I know right, some of you have no idea in sweet hell what I'm talking about.

ANYWAYS, I grew up watching the same movies over and over - since you know, I didn't have cable and I beat Super Mario Bros. for the umpteenth god damn time.

All these movies usually featured cops, marines, space marines, etc. kicking ass and exchanging witty dialogue (mostly).

I'll list off a few that fit this Criteria:

Action Jackson
Beverly Hills Cop
Commando
The Running Man
Conan The Barbarian, Conan The Destroyer
Die Hard
Escape From New York
The Terminator
Highlander
Mad Max, Mad Max: The Road Warrior, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome
Predator
Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Temple of Doom
Blade Runner
Aliens
Total Recall
Robocop
Big Trouble in Little China
Top Gun

and of course - Point Break - the movie from which my unshakable username spawned.

These movies shaped me into the idiot I am today. I'm deeply disturbed (perhaps wrongly) when I meet people who haven't seem em. If I ever got stuck in a situation with bank robbers, or terrorists, or acid spitting aliens, or a post apocalyptic waste land filled with assholes wearing spiked shoulder pads trying to kill me, WELL I'd be damn sure I'd be trying to belt out memorable and hilarious one liners the entire time.

That's how I view Tankmen, a movie from the 80s that takes place in the desolate future. Speaking of which, I'm working on new episodes and hopefully they make you laugh and not hate my guts for being super lame.

If you got any movies that shaped that fragile young mind into the psychopath you are today, go on and list em if you dare.