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| Footage from the Xenoblade Chronicles' final hour of its storyline |
For every Rayque3 video, there's always a lot behind the scenes. Most of our viewers don't know what's often going on in our team. What you'll about to read below is just a "short" description of only a small proportion of what we actually do for just only the Single-Part-Videos. Every of our projects follow a total different methodology... and often we have different projects running at the same time!
Definition
What is a Single-Part-Video? As described at our Youtube channel:
[Single-Part-Videos - "Seamless video watching"]
Mainly by Rayque. Ever felt the urge for watching a playthrough in one setting? Wanted to see all the bosses from a specific game? Rayque mainly concentrates on various (older) Nintendo games - by having it all in a single video. That's right, no need to watch several parts. To improve the video more seamlessly, there will be no commentary at all. Every video has a detailed index with all the "hotspots" in the video. You can always come back where you left off - just be sure to remember at which chapter you were watching last time! These videos will rarely appear every year, consider the massive amount of time that is required to create one.
Mainly by Rayque. Ever felt the urge for watching a playthrough in one setting? Wanted to see all the bosses from a specific game? Rayque mainly concentrates on various (older) Nintendo games - by having it all in a single video. That's right, no need to watch several parts. To improve the video more seamlessly, there will be no commentary at all. Every video has a detailed index with all the "hotspots" in the video. You can always come back where you left off - just be sure to remember at which chapter you were watching last time! These videos will rarely appear every year, consider the massive amount of time that is required to create one.
Unlike videos of my good ol' friend MechaRaptor (Luxtuas Patella), I prefer to avoid creating different video parts and put it all in one (near to always) long video.
Similar to most Rayque3 Staff projects, within our team we use abbreviations for multiple purposes. A Single-Part-Video is coded as a SPV in our workspace.
As described in the box above, a SPV can take multiple purposes, depending on the content of the video. Single-Part-Videos could be a playthrough, but other SPVs can be a showcase only. SPV could also showcase a part of an entire game, instead of the entire game itself.
They are not walkthroughs - there has never been an intention to let these videos explain how to and such. That's not my cup of tea, even though that used to be in the past on our channel. If a video has content about bosses, the viewers are able to see how these bosses might be, but they won't really learn that much compared to a decent walkthrough or (video) guide. Similar story to 100% playthroughs - they are just purely focused on entertainment - the viewer might learn to understand what to expect, but no way they'll learn how to recreate a 100%. There are a lot of good websites and Youtubers out there that covers that part on Youtube already.
Currently, we have eight Single-Part-Videos to offer, which will be much more in the future:
1. Lego Alpha Team - All levels, normal solutions, uploaded the 20th of February 2012.
2. Kirby 64 The Crystal Shards - All main bosses, uploaded the 11th of March 2012.
3. Sin & Punishment 2: Successor of the Skies - Isa & Kachi Mode, uploaded the 10th of October 2012.
4. Xenoblade Chronicles "Final Hour" - Final Bosses & Ending, uploaded the 25th of November 2012.
5. Mario Party 7 - All Mini-Games, uploaded the 24th of March 2013.
6. Donkey Kong 64 - All main bosses, uploaded the 1st of May 2013.
7. Super Smash Bros. Brawl - 100% Subspace Emissary, uploaded the 15th of August 2013.
8. Kirby's Return to Dreamland - All Mini/Main/EX Bosses, uploaded the 28th of November 2014.
Only one Single-Part-Video has been removed so far, and that was the Lego Stunt Rally - Flawless 100% Championship. It was uploaded on the 1st of July 2012.
Unlike most Rayque3 videos, this one was not removed by copyright, but because this video didn't meet our quality standards anymore. In total of all Rayque3 videos in our lifetime, almost 80 videos have been taken offline by ourselves because those didn't meet our quality standards. In addition, almost 20 videos that were about as finished never made the cut for being uploaded through the years for the same reason.
Scheduling
There's no actual (consistent) scheduling within our channel about when to upload a Single-Part-Video. Schedules are often loosely made and it'll give me enough time to set the quality on priority (no pressure). However, the birth of the ideas for a new SPV is actually months to years before I start recording raw footages. There's no source or moment when I doodle about ideas for Single-Part-Videos. They just come whenever they pop in my mind. Situations with releasing Single-Part-Videos similar to other Youtubers are purely coincidence, because these videos are scheduled and produced months in closed circuits before they are released on Youtube.
Recording footages are also months before the video is published on Youtube.
Schedules for recording or editing these videos are often planned in holidays or weekends, depending on the type of video. Single-Part playthroughs longer than 2 hours are often done in holidays, while showcase variants can be done in the span of weekends through several months.
Both the Sin & Punishment 2 and Super Smash Bros. Brawl videos were recording during the summer holiday because that requires more than half a day (12+ hours) to set things up and record. I also have to find time for recording these raw footages in one setting because of my own personal schedule outside my recreation.
The Kirby 64 The Crystal Shards - All main bosses and the Xenoblade Chronicles "Final Hour" videos were able to be recorded in a single weekend. However, longer videos like the Lego Alpha Team - All levels, normal solutions and Donkey Kong 64 - All main bosses took several weekends.
In the largest exception, the Kirby's Return to Dreamland video took two months (eight weekends) to gather all the raw footage - and another two weekends for producing the video.
There are many ideas already for future Single-Part-Videos. Some come later due to lower priority or even worse; limitation of the current hardware of consoles/computers and recording tools. For example, the Super Smash Bros. Brawl video was originally scheduled to be released much earlier, but wasn't possible due to hardware limitations of Youtube and any computer back then. There's enough ideas for the SPV series that I can fill the next years.
Production & Finishing
After scheduling, often weeks to months later, the official recording of the next Single-Part-Video will begin. Single-Part playthroughs are often recorded as one long raw footage, while the showcase videos often have a folder full of raw footages. Below an example for the Kirby's Return to Dreamland video.
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| The folder containing all the raw footages for the Kirby's Return to Dreamland video before the video was produced. |
When all the required raw footages are recorded, the next step will be video editing.
Single-Part-Videos that are not PC-platform-based actually tend to have loss in recording quality, no matter how good that recording hardware might be. Depending on the recording hardware, we always modify the raw footage to reclaim some loss of the total quality.
Often, editing these videos can easily take days - consider there's just more going on than "mindless inserting video footages on the timeline". We always rewatch the video content (see Quality Control below), have to apply several edits and create the video index. Not many people realize that to be able to write an index, on a level of the Mario Party 7 and Sin & Punishment 2 videos, we carefully have to watch the entire video during or after editing and write down all the timestamps!
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| Rendering the Kirby's Return to Dreamland video. |
- Uploading the Sin & Punishment 2 video took almost a week. Rendering took near to two and a half days. This video is near 16 GB in size. Unlike the next two examples, this video is only available in 720p, while the next two are fully available in 1080p.
- Uploading the Super Smash Bros. Brawl video took almost four and a half days. Rendering took nearly two days. This video is near 40 GB in size.
- Uploading the Kirby's Return to Dreamland video took about one and a half day. Rendering took nearly a half day - however the rendering failed twice near the end before. This video is almost 20 GB in size.
When a video has been finished uploading, it's often uploaded as Unlisted (which disables the video to be found on Youtube unless you have the URL). For the question why we do this, please see Quality Control below. Often Single-Part-Videos are uploaded unlisted several weeks before they become available for others.
Quality Control
Quality is one of the most important factors to me and MechaRaptor. Most of our viewers don't know that MechaRaptor actually works several days per week on just one walkthrough part! However, his scheduling is much different than a Single-Part-Video.
The following three combined is just a small proportion of what we do for quality control in total, but these are the three most obvious ones to point out:
- We rewatch all the videos we create several times. Yes, that includes the raw footage, the footage that is being edited, the video that is finished and when the video has been uploaded. Imagine that several days are spend to watch long videos such as the Super Smash Bros. Brawl or Sin & Punishment 2 ones.
- In addition to rewatching all the raw footages: whenever a part for a larger showcase is being recorded (for example, one of the many bosses in a video) and it doesn't feel right to me, I actually don't hesitate to record a new one. The Mario Party 7 - All Mini-Games video is one and a half hour long, but the actual raw footage all together before editing was two and a half hours, having a full hour of retrying (often) ten to thirty second mini-games!
- Before a video is published when it's uploaded unlisted, MechaRaptor and I rewatch the video to have the final agreement of publishing it or not. Funny enough, for videos like the Super Smash. Bros Brawl one, we both spend a full day watching the video together and we munched up several bags of potato chips and a few bottles of Fanta.
Publishing & Promoting
During uploading or rendering the video, we combine the (often ready to be used) index with a description and title that follows several guidelines within our Youtube. While MechaRaptor often uses custom thumbnails to raise the convenience of watching many parts, I actually don't like to use custom thumbnails that often portray (game) logo's, non-existent images of the video itself (for example, game artwork or boxart), people (not going to bother to explain what you can expect nowadays) or obvious texts that screams things like "All bosses!" (often in caps), any text that tries to trigger viewers like "Must see!" or <fill in inappropriate words>, and so on.
I do use custom thumbnails, but that's only when the default three thumbnails don't show the frame I would like to present my video with - custom thumbnails in my case are existing frames from the video. I prefer custom thumbnails that don't spoil the final boss or major spoilers in general, in exception to the Xenoblade Chronicles video, since that was all about the final hour of the game. See below for an example.
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| The Super Smash. Bros Brawl video uses a custom thumbnail because the default three doesn't show what I would prefer to present my video with. Other thumbnails I have been doubting between to be used for the video were the Rayquaza, second Galleom and Duon introduction scenes. Eventually I chose for Ridley's intro because that pose really looks great to me compared to what the others had to offer and Ridley has been a recurring character in all the Smash Bros. generations so far. (PS: I'm not a Ridley fan and I don't want him to become a playable character because that just won't do him justice - he's bound and perfect to be a menacing and terrifying boss in my view - I even think that Ganondorf hasn't been justified as a playable character yet in any of the Smash games so far, even with the new custom moves from Smash Bros. 4) |
Most of the larger Single-Part-Videos are actually hinted earlier on the Rayque3 Youtube. Only videos from this series that are almost guaranteed to be released are teased. We hint through various media, including our videos, MechaRaptor's Twitter and even my blog...
Kirby's Return to Dreamland - All Mini/Main/EX Bosses is one of the three future SPV that was hinted in our channel intro. This video was hinted almost two months before the official release. That video was pretty obvious to find out in the channel intro, however new fans to our channel might struggle finding out the other two!
I even added another obvious hint to this blogpost about one of the two remaining, I'll be interested if you could find it!
Criticism
Unfortunately, with anything you'll do, there will be people who disagree or not like your actions.
The same happens with our Single-Part-Videos, where often comments send complaints that are related to misunderstandings. To give a few examples:
- The intention of the Single-Part-Videos is to showcase specific parts of the game. It's intended to be entertaining and not a show off. To enhance the level of being seamless, I often pick the lowest level of difficulty with reason. Certain segments of the game will take longer, or will be much harder in a way that I'll risk a lot more "game over" screens or being much more often hit. This would decrease the level of the video being seamless and in some occasions it might be even tedious to watch it. I doubt that many people would enjoy a video that displays a "game over" screen for more than two times in a video longer than 3 hours (I already find one "game over" screen risky enough).
- In a similar fashion to the first given example, for the Mario Party 7 video, the video is purely made to show all the mini-games from that game. The intention from that would be to show what Mario Party 7 has to offer to people who either haven't played it fully, people who want to relive that nostalgic feeling about the game or are about to buy the game (from the aftermarket). The reason why I continuously win every mini-game is because some mini-games (for example, the Bowser or Donkey Kong ones) are cut off when everyone failed the game - this would just only show a (small) part of the mini-game. Imagine that you just instantly fail at the Bowser's Lovely Lift mini-game within the first few meters - people would complain that they don't know what the entire tower could've been. Similarities of this example applies to all the Single-Part-Videos.
We just deal with these feedback and don't worry, if you give us feedback, we will surely take it seriously. Just be sure to point out what you didn't like about the video when you would leave a dislike so that we know where to improve. There's no point in just go blindfolded in the comment section with (occasionally unnecessary) complaints because that always ends up with flame wars (as seen before in several videos, not only on our channel, but all around the internet/media in general).
Fortunately, on the other side, the majority of the feedback actually does pretty well. There's a lot of positive legacy on the videos, such as likes, positive comments and occasionally some new subscribers to our channel. We monitor the comment section and new subscribers every day, we just can't reply because we don't have Google+. Keep that in mind. No, we won't upgrade to Google+ until the day Youtube forces Google+ to upload videos or when we get that limited that using Youtube without Google+ is unfeasible.
Closing
Phew, what a wall of text isn't it? I hope for you all that this post is informative and enjoyable as well - most people don't know that for a lot of things in life, there's always a lot behind the scenes.
That's it for this behind the scenes - I'll see you again next post!
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