8-bit Memoirs Issue #1 released!!!

[mr_lou]

We'll have to see. I've tried Kodi BR playbak on my Nvidia Shield TV and it was all fine, but it was just a disc's FS (IIRC) containing just a movie. Supposedly it can do ISOs too, but I haven't tried it yet.

I've just found out, that apparently any Android TV box should be able to play the 8-bit Memoirs ISO from USB/harddisk. You simply install VidOn XBMC... Apparently this has been possible since 2015 or even earlier.
So you could try this on your Nvidia Shield, and please do report back. I'm very curious. 

EDIT: Just download it myself. It actually installs on Android phones. But the Blu-ray menu support appears to require subscription, which is $3,99. There's also a Free Trial though. But I can't sign up. The link just gives a blank page here. http://vidon.me/vidon_xbmc.htm
 

[mr_lou]

It's all right, I can wait for the torrent. Thanks!

My webhost has been extremely kind and has created a torrent for me.

I've been given this link to spread:

magnet:?xt=urn:btih:6c45beed4abf12d5be119d3e61b503e988f77548&dn=8bitMemoirs-Issue1-English.iso&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.openbittorrent.com%3A80

EDIT: Better link (I think):

magnet:?xt=urn:btih:6c45beed4abf12d5be119d3e61b503e988f77548&dn=8bitMemoirs-Issue1-English.iso&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Ftracker.openbittorrent.com%3A80&tr=http%3A%2F%2Fpow7.com%3A80%2Fannounce&tr=http%3A%2F%2Ftracker.bittor.pw%3A1337%2Fannounce&tr=http%3A%2F%2Fthetracker.org%3A80%2Fannounce&tr=http%3A%2F%2Ftracker.opentrackr.org%3A1337%2Fannounce&tr=http%3A%2F%2Ftracker.dutchtracking.nl%2Fannounce&tr=udp%3A%2F%2Fopen.stealth.si%3A80%2Fannounce

Does this work for you?

[Targhan]

It seems to work, thanks. It may take a while, but I'm sure I'll get it before christmas .

[Targhan]

Sorry to ruin the forthcoming 2018, but I can't read it . I have only PowerDVD 10, and it doesn't recognize the ISO I'm feeding it with. VLC starts loading, plays music, but no video appears... I can change the track and once again, music and sound effects can be heard but nothing to be seen. Any tips?

[mr_lou]

Sorry to ruin the forthcoming 2018, but I can't read it . I have only PowerDVD 10, and it doesn't recognize the ISO I'm feeding it with. VLC starts loading, plays music, but no video appears... I can change the track and once again, music and sound effects can be heard but nothing to be seen. Any tips?

Hm, well I don't know if PowerDVD 10 supports Blu-ray Disc Java.

(EDIT: It should. According to this article (written in 2009), it recommends PowerDVD. And PowerDVD 10 was released in 2010).

Here are a few things you can try:

Some players (especially older ones (and PowerDVD is version 17 at this point)) will only play folders or drives for some reason. So you can try
1: to unpack the ISO to a folder and see if that helps.
2: Or better: Mount the ISO so it becomes a virtual drive. I think newer versions of Windows comes with this functionality built-in, so you should be able to just right-click the ISO and mount it.

If none of those lets you play it, you can try starting PowerDVD from command line:
c:\path-to\cyberlink\pdvdlp.exe AUTOPLAY BD "c:\path-to\8bitmemoirs.iso"
or
c:\path-to\cyberlink\pdvdlp.exe AUTOPLAY BD "c:\path-to\8bitmemoirs-folder\"

("pdvdlp.exe" is named "PDVDLaunchPolicy.exe" in some versions).


As for VLC, you will need to download the latest nightly build from https://nightlies.videolan.org/
Older versions do not support Blu-ray Disc Java.
And as with PowerDVD, you can try unpacking the ISO to a folder, or mounting it as a virtual drive.
You also have command-line options available:
c:\path-to\VideoLAN\vlc.exe "c:\path-to\8bitmemoirs.iso" --bluray-menu --fullscreen
or
c:\path-to\VideoLAN\vlc.exe "bluray:///c:\path-to\8bitmemoirs-folder\" --bluray-menu --fullscreen
or
c:\path-to\VideoLAN\vlc.exe "bluray:///<virtual drive>\" --bluray-menu --fullscreen

(The "bluray:///" prefix might also be needed with the ISO example. Not sure).


You of course also need to have Java installed, but I assume that's a given.


When you mount the ISO you'll notice a "Play-on-Windows.bat" file. This won't help you with PowerDVD 10 though since it only checks for versions back to v11.

And remember, VLC is still buggy (afaik). So when the background music playlist goes from one track to the next, the BD-J app is killed. The only workaround so far is to simply pause the music (press SPACE).

[Targhan]

It's working with the latest VLC, thanks!! Just one problem (but I'm sure I'll find a trick), the player stops when a song finishes .

[mr_lou]

It's working with the latest VLC, thanks!! Just one problem (but I'm sure I'll find a trick), the player stops when a song finishes .

Yes, that is the bug that currently exists in libbluray, which both VLC and Kodi uses. (Kodi crashes completely when a song ends).
There's sadly nothing I can do about it.
The only work-around is to pause the music by pressing SPACE. That way you escape the bug - because the song never finishes. The downside of course is that you won't be listening to the music.
Alternatively, you can press N when it happens, then ENTER. Then the text will re-appear. But this has to be done every time a new song begins.

I have brought this bug to the attention of the developers (via multiple channels), but they honestly don't seem to care a whole lot. So it doesn't look like VLC and Kodi users will get rid of this bug any time soon sadly. At first I thought it had a low priority because maybe only 8-bit Memoirs used this kind of playlist, but then I was told by other developers that most Blu-ray use playlists that way. So I don't know why it isn't important for them to fix this. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Doesn't PowerDVD work at all? I think that would be a better option despite it being old.
Did you try mounting the ISO as a virtual drive, and then play with PowerDVD? That really should work - and better than VLC.

[Targhan]

I did try PowerDVD, but it doesn't work at all. I have an old version, but I'm not going to pay for an upgrade, I almost never use it.

[mr_lou]

I did try PowerDVD, but it doesn't work at all. I have an old version, but I'm not going to pay for an upgrade, I almost never use it.

I did a search for it and found this page:
https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/General-Discussion/PowerDVD-10-blu-ray-playback-issues/td-p/731063

It seems to apply mostly to Lenovo users though. You're not using a Lenovo, are you?
If so, that page states that apparently PowerDVD 10 needs an update before Blu-ray playback works, and this update can be downloaded from here.

At least users on that forum claims that update helped.

[mr_lou]

Small update:

VLC is improving. A few weeks ago (or so), I tried the latest nightly build on a Windows machine, and playback had improved. Might be worth a try now.

In other news, I learned about iboum.com; a site that contains a lot of info on various hardware media players, and lets you do a search specifically for players that supports full Blu-ray Java menus - and which therefor should be able to play 8-bit Memoirs from harddisk and/or USB.

Click here to see a list of (supposedly) supported hardware media players.

If you own one of those players and decide to give it a go, please do share your results.

Thanks!

[mr_lou]

It was brought to my attention that 8-bit Memoirs was mentioned in issue 177 of RetroGamer magazine. Subsequently I found this sampler:
https://issuu.com/futurepublishing/docs/ret177.issuu

Page 10 does indeed mention the project.

While it's of course nice to be mentioned, I can't help finding it amusing how many people completely ignores all my reasons for choosing Blu-ray as the format. Instead, it's rejected as an "odd format". Well, sure, we can agree it's definitely not a mainstream format - it's much better!    That's the whole point.

To my logic this confusion can only spawn from ignorance and quick-to-judge without looking into it. So, in an attempt to (hopefully) broaden your mind, here are all the reasons why I found Blu-ray to be the perfect format for 8-bit Memoirs:

• Size: The 5-hour long music playlist and the total of 9 hours of supplemental HD video takes up 24gb. Had it been a website, I risked needing to pay additional hosting fees - just to give it all away for free. After spending 5 years and way too much money making this project, just to give it all away for free, I naturally didn't want to also pay an additional hosting fee. Instead, I wanted to use torrents. (Now, there is a web download available (for now) too anyway. This is because my host decided to sponsor the project (for a while anyway). Gigahost has been an overall very pleasant experience).
  
• Impression: On a real Blu-ray player, the 50 fps videos will be displayed at 50 hz, giving an awesome 1:1 smooth result, exactly as it actually looked back in the day - and that's of course what we want. A PC in turn looks crap when showing 50 fps videos on a 60 hz monitor. Jerky and not giving a true impression on how it actually looked back then.
  
• Durability: A Blu-ray disc is long lasting. You'll have it the rest of your life. Had it been a website instead, it would eventually die. Probably within the first decade I imagine. Meanwhile, the chances of software players suddenly removing Blu-ray support is very unlikely. So even if physical discs disappears in the near future (which I don't believe they will), we'll always have software media centers that can still play the project.
  
• Compatibility: Blu-ray can be played almost anywhere nowadays. If you have the disc, you play it in your modern gaming console (Like PS3 and XB1 and later models of both), or standard Blu-ray players (including the new UHD players). If you don't have one of those, you can play the ISO with a software media player on Windows / Mac / Linux - or on one of the many hardware media players that supports BD-J (I've found 77 different models so far). It's entirely your own choice. You can navigate with your gamepad, or your remote control, or even with your PC mouse (if the player supports it of course). The project was intentionally created in a way so that it could be viewed on that many different platforms. So yes, with a software player like PowerDVD, you can use your PC mouse to navigate the pages, just like you did with a diskmag back in the day. VLC has yet to implement mouse support though.
  
• Stability: As I'm sure we can agree; Blu-ray is a "dead" platform. That's exactly what we want! Because that means it doesn't change. And that means that 8-bit Memoirs will run forever without me needing to do any kind of maintenance whatsoever. And that's what I want: To be able to say: "This project is complete now. It's out of my hands", instead of needing to fix a website that breaks every now and then due to new standards and whatnot.
  

I hope this clears up everything for anyone who's been confused about why I chose to go with Blu-ray. And hopefully, someone out there might even appreciate it too.

It's quite possible that I will create other versions of 8-bit Memoirs in the future. Like e.g. a light webversion, or Desktop Java version. But it will be without all the videos then, and the background music playlist will also be much shorter. And making such a version is in no way a priority for me at the moment.

If you do not appreciate my efforts, and the fact that I'm just giving it all away for free, then this project obviously isn't for you. But maybe issue #2 will be. Depends on what platform the next author chooses. You see, each author is free to pick his own platform, and it's up to the reader to acquire a player for this platform. Be it a certain emulator, or a certain eBook reader, or a certain media player. It'll be interesting to see what it'll be. (Assuming someone out there is up to it).

[ComSoft6128]

HI mr_lou,

What about releasing 8-bit Memoirs as a Torrent, say 3 months after the initial Blu-ray release?
This may have some impact on initial sales of the Blu-ray version. Once it is out there for free not too many people will pay for it.

Cheers,

Peter

[mr_lou]

What about releasing 8-bit Memoirs as a Torrent, say 3 months after the initial Blu-ray release?
This may have some impact on initial sales of the Blu-ray version. Once it is out there for free not too many people will pay for it.

I'm not looking to make money on it. That's not why I made it.
I made it to give something back to the community. Hence why it's been free from day 1.
(Both Torrent and HTTP downloads are available for free from 8bitMemoirs.com).

However, as described in the "Guidelines for authors" within the project, authors of future issues is allowed to wait a whole year before releasing the free version of their issue. It's a choice the author is free to make.

[Targhan]

I understand your reasons for using a BluRay, and I didn't give feedback on your 8-bit memoirs. So far I think it was great, really well done and well written. However, I really had trouble enjoying it because of the media. VLC does not work well, at least not well enough to make reading the whole a satisfying experience. The whole thing stops when the music ends. It's very hard to skip a video, it's very hard to precisely select a topic via the number, it's very very hard to use a link inside a page. Some after a few hours I gave up because I couldn't read and concentrate on the reading.


I guess a website would work, but what about an (cross-platform?) executable like any modern discmag? Of course you'd have to code it and it might not be what you want to do. But this is clear to me that BluRay is not a media I like. Heck, I even stopped buying BluRays, PowerDVD forces me to pay a 100 bucks upgrade to see them. So BluRay is a big no-no for me. Which is sad because your project was really interesting to me!

[mr_lou]

I understand your reasons for using a BluRay, and I didn't give feedback on your 8-bit memoirs. So far I think it was great, really well done and well written. However, I really had trouble enjoying it because of the media. VLC does not work well, at least not well enough to make reading the whole a satisfying experience. The whole thing stops when the music ends. It's very hard to skip a video, it's very hard to precisely select a topic via the number, it's very very hard to use a link inside a page. Some after a few hours I gave up because I couldn't read and concentrate on the reading.

Yea, VLC isn't optimal yet. Its only advantage is that it's free.
The bug regarding the playlist should be fixed now though, if you download the latest nightly build. At least it was last time I checked. But that's the problem with anything that is "alive": It constantly changes. (Which is exactly why I prefer "dead" platforms). VLC worked fine with the project for 2 years(!!) while testing!! And then just as I reached the release date, this annoying bug was introduced.

But it's almost there I think. If only the devs were more receptive to feedback, then it could become perfect. But sadly they've generally seemed rather rejective to most of my feedback, so I can't help much.
I still have hope though. I think it's a matter of time. And 8-bit Memoirs can't get too old. So hopefully VLC users will be able to enjoy it eventually. 

I guess a website would work, but what about an (cross-platform?) executable like any modern discmag? Of course you'd have to code it and it might not be what you want to do. But this is clear to me that BluRay is not a media I like. Heck, I even stopped buying BluRays, PowerDVD forces me to pay a 100 bucks upgrade to see them. So BluRay is a big no-no for me. Which is sad because your project was really interesting to me!

The thing about any other platform is the display refresh rates. Phones, tablets, PC monitors - all have a refresh rate of 60 hz. Some have 75hz, and some have 120hz - but the general problem is that 50 fps videos doesn't look that good. Scrolltexts and moving charaters become jerky.
I wanted my videos to give a much more accurate representation of the CPC - and Blu-ray gives me exactly that. No other platform can do that. Well, none that I have found during my research.
It's such a pleasure to watch a CPC scrolltext on the TV with this smoothness, just as we used to see it on the real machine back then. Nowadays only otherwise achieved when using a device like XRGB Mini Framemeister.

There's still a chance I'll make another version later though. Maybe a phone version, or a Desktop Java version - but it will be without all the videos then, and the music playlist will also be much shorter.
But we all know what it's like with lack of time and priorities etc, so currently it's not on the table...

I've heard that DVDFab Player 5 should also support Blu-ray playback - and there's a free trial available. Maybe worth a look?
https://www.dvdfab.cn/media-player.htm

[Shaun M. Neary]

If I'm being honest, the format put me off it too.


Sorry, but blu-ray never took off as a standard format, and as a writable media its always been a niche market. BD writers also never took and only the odd person here and there had one. I understood the reasons for picking it, but it's a large sacrifice of user interest for media content which I'll never understand.


Even as a downloadable ISO, you're gonna find it difficult to push several gigs as an ISO file to users to read a nostalgia file. For me personally, I'd end up downloading it, then forgetting about it.


Between that and the time it took issue 1 to surface. I lost interest unfortunately.

[mr_lou]

If I'm being honest, the format put me off it too.
I understood the reasons for picking it, but it's a large sacrifice of user interest for media content which I'll never understand.

See, I look at it the other way around.
Picking any other format would be a sacrifice of quality.
I absolutely wanted the 50fps videos to be displayed in actual 50 frames per second. Still do.
And I absolutely wanted a format that'll last many many decades without me needing to do any maintenance etc, and without requiring Internet etc.
(I would love to hear about other options that offers all of this!)

And I gotta admit, even though I say the project is my way of giving back to the community - it is - but there are two other recipients ahead of that: My daughter and anyone who's directly or indirectly responsible for the stories existing in the first place. That's why the first track in the playlist is called "Ode to you". And to me it is just utterly important to give an accurate impression of what my creations looked like back then. I'll have none of that jerky movement that exists everywhere else. I can't accept a 50 fps scrolltext on a 60hz display. Just can't. Not for my project. Feel free to call me a purist, or whatever the label is. 

The project is what it is: Something different from what everyone else is doing.
And that won't change. Should there be other versions in the future, it'll be without the videos. I don't know if that's something people prefer? To lose the videos and get a smaller filesize?

I made the project only for those interested enough to either download the ISO for free, or pay 7 Euro to have a budget disc mailed to their door, or pay 17 Euro to have a collectors edition disc mailed to their door. I even offered to mail USB sticks too.
Anyone who don't want to pick one of those 4 options obviously isn't interested enough. And I'm honestly fine with that.

My only problem is when people say stuff like: "I really don't wanna read a PDF on my TV"....  rejecting the whole project clearly based on a completely wrong idea of what the project is. Not knowing that it can run on a PC as well, and so forth. Then I of course gotta explain.

But rejecting the project once you really have a clear understanding of what it is - I'm fine with that. That's your choice. We can't all like the same things.

[mr_lou]

I have decided to create a version 1.1 of 8-bit Memoirs Issue #1, for 3 reasons:

• Despite lots of betatesting, there was an annoying bug that escaped everyone's attention.
• I have received suggestions for additions and improvements that I'd like to add. (For example a progressbar when watching a video).
• I'd like to try to add more work-arounds for specific device/player bugs.

I plan on having this version 1.1 ready in April.
Everyone who's bought a Collectors Edition will receive a new replacement disc by mail.

Since I'm going to make this v1.1 anyway, you might as well tell me any kind of feedback you have, and/or suggestions for changes and additions, so I can (consider to) include these too. That's why I'm posting about it here. So please lemme hear your thoughts and ideas.

Thanks!

(If you don't have any problems with v1.0, there's no need to get v1.1 since the content will be the same.)

[tjohnson]

Hi Mr Lou what was the bug? 

[mr_lou]

Hi Mr Lou what was the bug?

The bug is:
When you start a video, from within a story, by pressing Enter (because there is only 1 menuitem on the page - then that menuitem will get selected), and you let the video play to the end, then the menuitem will still be selected. It shouldn't be. (Had you stopped the video yourself, then it wouldn't be selected).
Because it's selected, you can't go anywhere - because it's the only menuitem in the whole text - so nowhere to go.

To escape, you can simply start the video again and exit it.
Or - if you have a remote control - you can press POPUP MENU to exit to main menu.
But it's still very annoying that it wasn't spotted. And it happens on all players, so there's no excuse. It should have been spotted by someone. 

The same will happen when starting a video from main menu, but here it's not so bad because there are many other menu items you can select afterwards.

Still, it annoys me, and it must be fixed.

[tjohnson]

That does sound annoying, its possible I found it but put it down to me not being very good with PS3 video controls as I seem to re recall getting to a point of having to turn off the PS3 once as I got stuck but only once.  Sorry I missed it or failed to realise it was a bug.


I know you mentioned about creating other 8bit memoirs, did you release all the code, templates etc to allow others to create the content without having to go through the huge effort you did creating it all from scratch?

[mr_lou]

Never underestimate yourself. 
But let's say it was indeed "poor skills" - that counts too. If something is too difficult to figure out, then it must be made easier.

Regarding authoring your own issue, there's a somewhat extensive guide on the disc (article 018) that should help a lot.
It says, among other things, that each author is free to choose his own target platform.
And considering the amount of people who's been unhappy that I went with Blu-ray, you should consider if that's the platform you want for your own issue.

If so, I'll be available to help as much as I can. But you should consider other options too, such as a website (seems to be a favourite among most).

Depends what you want really. Here are my reasons for choosing Blu-ray for my own issue. Formed by my desire to make it a diskmag-like creation.

[mr_lou]

Some semi-related news somewhat interesting to this project. Or at least I find it pretty interesting myself.

It seems that it is in fact possible to view the whole project online. I.e. without needing to download the whole thing first.
The technique to use is a simple WebDAV server. All I have to do is copy the project folder to my webhotel, and upload something like SabreDAV too.

I've done some successful tests with the nightly builds of Kodi v18, which has built-in WebDAV protocol. So you simply click "Add source" in Kodi and enter the values to the webdav server. Then you're all set to view 8-bit Memoirs remotely in Kodi. Works surprisingly well. I did not expect that.

@Gryzor This should mean that you're all set with your Shield. :-)

Of course, we're still months away from an official v18 release of Kodi, and at the moment the nightly builds still suffer from some bugs that ruins the experience. But let's see what happens in the future.

In theory, this approach also works with other media players like PowerDVD and VLC. You simply gotta mount the WebDAV server as a virtual drive first, because these players don't have their own built-in WebDAV protocol like Kodi does.
As always there are several ways this can be done. Here's one way for Windows:

Code: [Select]

net use m: http://path.to/mywebdav

And for Linux:

Code: [Select]

sudo mount -t davfs http://path.to/mywebdav /mnt/mywebdav/

Currently though, VLC times-out. Looks like the developers hasn't thought about the scenario of using a virtual web drive, and the time-out value to fetch a video is therefor set too low. Or that's my guess anyway. Changing a time-out value doesn't sound like a big deal though, so hopefully this will change.

My only problem is that I can't figure out how to make my WebDAV server read-only. Currently anyone can simply delete whatever files they want, which of course isn't optimal. I will of course need to figure out how to solve this before making any such service available.
I don't suppose anyone here knows anything about WebDAV / SabreDAV? 

[mr_lou]

Version 1.1 has now entered its final stage of testing before I'll start sending out discs to everyone who bought the deluxe version.If you're one of those persons - and you've had an address change since receiving version 1.0, then please send me a PM with your new address.
I know I said I was gonna release this in April, but as usual, stuff got in the way.
Also, I figured I might as well implement a bunch of those feature requests I received, since I was making a version 1.1 anyway.

[mr_lou]

Version 1.1 is ready now, and has been shipped today to all who bought the Collectors Edition.

An online version is also available, but I only know of one player that can play it: Kodi v18 - and it's still very buggy.
But if you're curious, then you can play it with Kodi v18 by adding the following HTTP source in your settings:
http://www.8bitmemoirs.com/online/Disc/
 
Or alternatively, add this WebDAV source:
http://www.8bitmemoirs.com/online/server.php
 
If you know of any other player apart from Kodi v18 that can play the project online, please let me know.
 
The download version isn't done uploading yet. It takes a day or so with my slow connection at home. I will update this thread again when it's ready.
 
A special thanks to Adolfo for helping out with this version 1.1 release.