From PsyHelp
This is a transcription of Ben's Jan 16, 2006 broadcast The numbers indicate the time (minutes:seconds) on the recording. The stuff between ~'s indicates parts I couldn't make out clearly.
see also: Broadcasting.
First Words
~goes over music he played, will transcribe this part later unless someone else does~
0:53 Uh, let me see what mail I’ve got here. I’m gonna start by answering mail that has already been sent, and then what I’m going to do is reply to mail as it comes in, as long as it’s related, cause I want to try and get to the mail that people are sending in during the broadcast.
Con the Dead (1min:07s)
Uh, so anyway, Con the Dead. Gonna jump right on this stuff. Con the Dead says “What are your plans for the interface in Psypets 2?” The interface is going to be the same; it’s just going to be the web-based game. It’s going to be the same kind of stuff, you’ll have the menu on the left, or maybe right if I think that looks better, and um whoops my kitty’s getting all over the place. But yeah it’s going to be the same sort of thing. We’ll have that handy toolbar with a place for icons. Lots of the look will be the same. I’ll, you know, spice it up a little bit. It’s basically going to be the same thing.
gooey (1:44)
Gooey says “How’s your chin doing? Hope you’re feeling better.” I knew this was going to come up eventually. Have you ever played any virtual pet sites, other than your own? Do you ever look at them to see what they're up to?” Heh. Well as for my chin, it actually doesn’t hurt that much. What hurts most is my leg because I fell on it. I forgot to mention this on my wiki, and I’m going to post this. The real reason I that tripped and did so badly at things is because it was cold and I had my hands in my pocket. So I was running over the train tracks, in the dark, with my hands in my pockets. My foot caught on something, and I just slammed into the tracks somewhere, I’m not even sure. I just pulled myself up, and my glasses were somewhere, so I was looking for those. My knee took a good bashing too. They didn’t have to do anything to it, but it’s sore to walk on, it’s a pain in the ass. But my chin doesn’t feel bad. I loathe the thought of when it starts to get itchy, that’s going to drive me absolutely insane. And I can’t shave real well, which is a pain the ass. But overall, I’m feeling pretty well. My sleep schedule is messed up, cause I didn’t get out of the hospital till 3, which is a pain in the ass. Whatever.
Um, played any other virtual pet sites. I played Neopets years and years ago. Like, I don’t think I was even really living in Virginia at the time, so more than five years ago? And I don’t think they were as commercialized as they are now, like, it must have been small. I haven’t looked at it recently. I don’t play a lot of virtual pet sites because …I have this feeling that if I look at other sites I’ll pull ideas from them. I’d rather have everything be my own creation and know for certain that nothing else has influenced that. And that I’ve made something that -- at least from my point of view -- is original. If it turns out that it’s not original, that’s cool. And people talk about suggestions on the forums, and I’m sure that people are pulling stuff from Neopets. That was coming up a lot with flash games and everything. But I hear from some people what other games are doing but I don’t really play them. I – yeah, I don’t really play them that much.
Raiiniskye (3:54)
Raiiniskye2 says “How are the baby pets going to work? Like their levels, sizes, and whatnot.” They’ll work the same. I mean right now pets have an age, but I don’t think people pay attention to it, because level is the most important part. Like what I was thinking for breeding in Psypets 1 – and I’ll do this in Psypets 2 most likely – is that pets would lay eggs, and then eggs would be items that you could trade. You could also hatch them into the pet. So in that respect you could have a litter of pets. You don’t have to keep them all because, you know, you know there’s too many for you or something. But I mean, you know, they’ll be level 1 pets, and they’ll have a tiny size because they’ll be tiny pets. It’ll be a lot like getting a new pet in Psypets. I mean a level 1 is a lot like what a baby pet is. I mean, you can’t leave it for 24 hours without it starting to starve. It can’t eat for itself. They’re baby pets. So it’s kind of going to be the same as it is in Psypets 1. Just that in Psypets 1 – well, probably in Psypets 2 as well – they’re not labeled, you know, “this is a baby pet.” There isn’t anything like that. So, I don’t know.
I try (5:02)
I try says “Stitches are hot. Can we have nakie pics?” No you cannot have nakie pics. Um, stitches are hot. My friend Stephen was – and like Jesse and Zach, these are friends of mine that I roleplay with – they were saying last night that I should take the stitches out early and let it scar, and then I could like tell girls in bars – because I go to so many bars… -- how like I wrestled a shark or something, you know. The girls would melt. Uh, Stephen’s girlfriend declined to comment. I’m not gonna do it. God, I don’t want a scar or anything. I just want it to go away so I can shave and stuff. Whatever. Onto the next one.
Nioki (5:43)
Nioki says “cool a broadcasting day.” Yeah! “too bad I got exams and ~something about missing stuff.~ Anyway Ben, what are the 3 pets you like most here on Psypets? Yeah I know, lame question, but I really want to know.” Um, I guess the graphics you mean? The graphics I really love. I really love the desikh. That should be kind of obvious because it’s the icon for the site. And I also like …If you look at the Psypets logo – the broccoli I do like as well – the guy on the left, which no one else seems to appreciate, the little round thing with wings. I love that guy. My pet Abby used to be that graphic, before I went crazy with my own custom graphics. And now Abby belongs to someone else. Um…I can’t think of my top three. But I really like the desikh. Desikh’s my favorite. And I guess that one that Psfarrow has for her pet, that red one. Like, the tail light reminds me of an anglerfish. I kinda like that guy too. Anyway, so that’s that. Um, a broadcasting day. Yeah, okay.
Vitriol (6:40)
Vitriol says “Ben, why do you have such a big adam’s apple? It makes you look like you have an ~egg?~ on your neck.” Ha ha ha, yeah see I know I’ve got a big adam’s apple. No one cares, whatever, on to next question.
Princess Nikki (6:51)
Princess Nikki says “Hi. I’m not sure if this has been mentioned or anything, but would it be possible to include like a ‘select all’ button in the storage area? It’d be quicker and easier to select items that need to be moved or sold.” Select all button in storage. You can select rows, that should be pretty good. Select all buttons I’m always wary about adding because I don’t want you to select all of your items and then accidentally do something. I think one of the biggest problems actually is something I need to do is add a “Clear all” button. Because it’s quite possible that you’ll check a bunch of items and then you’re like oh wait I want to do something else and you might not uncheck all of them. I’ve had that kind of problem before. I’ve checked too many things, and then I went to uncheck a bunch and missed some, and then you unexpectedly sell something. And that’s what I don’t want happening, people unexpectedly selling things. But if you go into “icon view” you can select by row, and that should make things pretty fast. Especially since you can change the amount of items in each row. If you go into – see, I don’t know how many people use this stuff – but in “My Account” -> “Display Settings” you can change all sorts of crazy stuff. How many pets in each column, or in each row, sorry. All that kind of stuff. So anyway, a “select all” button seems dangerous. I dunno. I could add – I think I did this somewhere else, in the Giving Tree, where it asks you “are you sure you want to select all the items?” or something like that. That might be good too, to do. And a “clear” button. I’ll look into doing those things tonight actually. We’ll see. I’ll do something like that.
Piper Soul-Keeper (8:40)
Piper Soul-Keeper says “What’s your favorite website to visit, other than one you yourself made.” Um, I visit deviantART pretty frequently, that’s a great site because there’s so much fun art to look at. And I use it for my own personal purposes that I don’t share because it’d be illegal. Like, I’m a big dork so my friend and I, Stephen and I mostly, design our own Magic Cards with this Magic Card editor. And it’s great to find pictures there, and stick them in. We printed up a bunch and we were gonna do a draft with each other. But anyway, I could never put pictures of that stuff online, because it’s so illegal to share the art like that, cause someone else made it. So I really love deviantART, and then I’ve got a bunch of webcomics I keep up with.
Con the Dead (9:27)
Alright, Con the Dead says - going back to the pet eggs - "Are pet eggs edible?” Uh, I think they would be actually. And I know that’s kind of disturbing to some people, but I also think that lots of animals eat their young. Like guppies. Guppies are real bastards. Stephen has them and he’s had so much trouble with his fish tank and fish eating each other. Pets eat their young, they do that, they eat eggs, they’re dirty dirty creatures. I don’t know if psypets should necessarily do that, but pet eggs will probably be edible. And you could use them to make scrambled eggs, wouldn’t that be great? I think mostly I want to do it because people would be terrified, but, whatever.
Vicious Ruff (10:04)
Vicious Ruff says “Can we have a sell button in the house?” You cannot have a sell button in the house in Psypets 1, but in Psypets 2, because again there won’t really be a distinction between what is a house, and what isn’t, and what is, you know, shack that you have, since everything can be a house. Oh, and there won’t really be selling. So that’s a Psypets 1 only question, and I’m not gonna do that. It’s again item protection, because I don’t want, you know, you keep your trophies in your house, and I don’t want people to accidentally sell that stuff.
Myst (10:36)
Myst says “Dear Ben, I know this show’s supposed to be about Psypets 2, but are you ever going to enable people to join player-created dynasties in Elementalist?” I’ve been wanting to do that for a while but again Elementalist isn’t a project I really pay attention to. I’m surprised that people still play it. Like I logged in, I don’t know, a week ago and looked at the forums and people still post and play. So that’s cool I guess. But I have to do it some time, when I’m not distracted with other things, like . . . my chin. And MAGFest, which was cool. I’ve been working a lot on Psypets ~not as much as I wanted to, and I feel bad,~ but there’s been a lot going on this weekend and stuff. Oh, let me see what this new mail’s about. Oh, it’s, nevermind.
Niheal (11:21)
Niheal says “Ben” – ooh, this is a long one, okay – “Ben. A random idea occurred to me after finishing a trade for an item that I really wanted, but my pets just couldn’t make for me. In Psypets 2, I think it would be cool – though at the same time potentially harmful, and you’d have to carefully select which items it applies to – but I think it would be cool were it possible to purchase or somehow get a hold of a craftable/inventable item that your pets haven’t made yet, for the purpose of said item being disassembled, and attempt to learn how to make it.” – okay – “so the crafter/inventor pets can produce their own versions. Your friendly neighbor and engineer, Niheal. ~Pronounce long end sound ‘heel’,~ since everyone has trouble with it.” N-heel? Okay. Anyway, so that was a really long mail, but I see what he’s saying. So if you get an item that your pets can’t invent or craft yet, you would have the option to disassemble it, and hopefully educate your pets as to how it works, so that maybe it gives your pets a better idea. That would be interesting. The way leveling up is going to work in Psypets 2, aside from the level-up questions you’ll _occasionally_ get – and, it will be more rare than it is in Psypets 1. Your pets are going to level up stats individually, like they’ll have experience points toward intelligence, and when that finally gets to level, then intelligence levels up. So depending on how much they’re doing, like if they’re doing something that requires intelligence, you know, they’re exercising their intelligence, so their intelligence will start leveling up. So in that respect I could do that same kind of thing with crafting and inventible pets. You could give an item to a pet for it to tinker with, and then have it go toward leveling up a stat. That would be really cool. It seems like – depending on how the economy works, I worry that people would abuse that just to level-up their pets like crazy. Like just buy all these items and have them all disassembled. That’s something to look into. Depending on how the economy works out that could be really cool, actually. So we’d have to look later into Psypets 2, and I’ll have to be reminded, because I’ll forget by then. But that’s a pretty cool idea.
People had had similar ideas about cooking too. Like, I don’t remember if this is an idea I had or someone else or what, but there was this idea going around that you could eat food that you didn’t know how to prepare, and get an idea as to what the ingredients were. Like you’d eat banana bread and it would say “hmm, there must be bananas in this,” which is unfortunately obvious. But you know, it would pick random ingredients, say oh, just flour, or something like that. So that would be kind of cool, to disassemble items. It’s a similar idea, in some respects. That could be cool. Um, right-o. So next e-mail.
Espeon (14:04)
Espeon says “Meow. On the first broadcast Ruff wanted a pizza.” ~Ben makes odd noise~ People wanting pizza. I’m skipping it.
Mr. FluffyMcbuttersworth (14:12)
Mr. FluffyMcbuttersworth says “Do you have any secret accounts that you play that we don’t know about?” I used to, but I couldn’t keep up with them. Like I log into my account uncommonly enough that logging into other accounts like that was almost impossible. I don’t even remember what the names were, or I’d just tell you what they were, but I posted a little bit on the forums. Silly stuff. I don’t remember. I used to, but I don’t have any anymore. And I’m not just hiding that I like _have_ them, and don’t want to tell you or something, I really don’t. I don’t log in enough to take care of any pets. Um, oh. Let me see. New e-mail.
sketchi (14:47)
sketchi: “When shall Psypets 2 be out approximately, and is there anything tremendously different?” Heh, I’ve covered the differences before. Look in the Psypets 2 (discussion) forum. I honestly don’t post there as much as maybe I should with the ideas, but yeah I don’t need to cover all that stuff again. And when will it be out, like I said, I’m not comfortable giving an estimate for that, cause I just have no idea.
n/a (?)
Um. I think I missed something. What's with the whole thing with you deleted all the accounts; what did they do?" I do need a note for this somewhere, 'cause I think people are worried that their accounts will be deleted. Um.. Accounts are deleted automatically after a year of inactivity. Uh, and that's it. It's an automated, completely automated process that, uh, midnight server time. And I'm not really sure when my server time is 'cause I think it's behind an hour or two from me. Um, but anyway. When it takes statistics, it also looks at the accounts that have been inactive and out of vacation for atleast a year. And it has it deleted, automatically. So, I mean, that's all that is. And it automatically sends out the notice to the, uh, City Hall. Which, maybe that's not necessary. 'Cause that's all that is. They didn't do anything, well, they just didn't do anything. They weren't logged in. So, that's what's, uh, causing that to happen.
Frog (?)
Uh. Frog says "Hey Ben. Just wanted to say that I think you can take as long as you want on Psypets 2. As long as you don't make us wait five years or something. ~Ben laughs...kinda~" Well.
Imakoo (?)
Imakoo says "What video games/RPGS did you buy while you were at MAGFest?" I didn't buy any. Um. They were selling stuff, but mostly I played games. Like, I went there and I didn't bring money because I almost never carry cash. Just, a pain. I hate going to the ATM in front for cash. I like to use my credit card. It drive me crazy when I go somewhere and my credit card/debt and they go 'No. We only take cash.' or you know 'Credit Card - three dollar minimum' or something else like that. Which I heard they technically aren't supposed to have a minimum. But, anyway, so I was like 'No, I'm not going to bother with withdrawing cash at MAGFest' because I don't like doing it and I don't want to spend money anyway. So, I didn't buy any games. I played a lot. I played, um. I played Jet Grind Radio there, even though I have it here. At home. I played, uh, that Mario Kart for Gamecube. I never remember what that ones called (he's probably talking about Double-Dash). I never really played that one before. That ones interesting. I never did figure out how to switch who's the driver and who's in the back for that. Um. Anyway, I uh didn't buy any. I looked at games and played games..and listened to the video game remix. ~Ben sounds happy~ That was a lot of fun. Bands playing the music. Anyway, uh.