WotC "Fansite Kit"
I downloaded the fansite kit yesterday to see what it was all about, and was disappointed by a paltry handful of images. Seriously, what the fuck am I supposed to do with this? Is this what qualifies nowadays for a fansite kit? Er...no. No, no, noooooooooooo.
Blizzard Entertainment has a fansite kit for World of WarCraft. Go ahead and check it out. There's no licensing agreement first and foremost, and its got a shit-ton of content that you'll find conducive to building a fansite: actual artwork, logos, avatars, screenshots, wallpapers, renders, psd files for a header, texture, and buttons (allowing you to easily make snazzy rollovers with whatever text you want).
The best part? You are not ready for this: they actually give you html, javascript, and cascading style sheet files so that you can just make whatever tweaks you want or throw it up in Dreamweaver and mess with it that way. They freely do a hefty chunk of the legwork FOR YOU!
Thats how you make a fansite kit. Its got a ton of useful data that not only helps you make a site that looks the part, but greatly speeds up the process as if, I dunno, Blizzard wants to see fansites pimping their game left and right. Wizards, just download it yourself and take a look. Giving us even half of what they did would make for a greatly improved kit. As it stands, you've just given us images that anyone could have pulled from a cursory Google image search. Thats...not really useful to anyone.
Blizzard Entertainment has a fansite kit for World of WarCraft. Go ahead and check it out. There's no licensing agreement first and foremost, and its got a shit-ton of content that you'll find conducive to building a fansite: actual artwork, logos, avatars, screenshots, wallpapers, renders, psd files for a header, texture, and buttons (allowing you to easily make snazzy rollovers with whatever text you want).
The best part? You are not ready for this: they actually give you html, javascript, and cascading style sheet files so that you can just make whatever tweaks you want or throw it up in Dreamweaver and mess with it that way. They freely do a hefty chunk of the legwork FOR YOU!
Thats how you make a fansite kit. Its got a ton of useful data that not only helps you make a site that looks the part, but greatly speeds up the process as if, I dunno, Blizzard wants to see fansites pimping their game left and right. Wizards, just download it yourself and take a look. Giving us even half of what they did would make for a greatly improved kit. As it stands, you've just given us images that anyone could have pulled from a cursory Google image search. Thats...not really useful to anyone.
Comparing Wotc to Blizzard is like a comparing a Mcdonald's cheeseburger to Filet Mignon. Blizzard/Activision is a TOP organization. Wizard's makes a good game, but they fuck up CONSTANTLY as a company.
ReplyDeleteI'm not asking for the complete Blizzard package: just some good art and a few psds (which any intelligent graphic designer WILL have readily available) would be great. Some headers to give it a more official polish.
ReplyDeleteIts not a very difficult task. :-/
I'd be happier is you didn't have to agree to a license before you download it. As it stands, the content is a good enough start and I'm sure it can be added to and improved over time. But agreeing to terms & conditions regarding how I use it and use MY OWN DARNED BLOG? Ugh. no thanks.
ReplyDeleteKeep in mind up front that I agree with you here... and there are plenty of examples from other RPG companies that make very reasonable fansite kits that are designed to spread it around without having you agree to put a large paragraph of text and many, many (R)s and (TM)s on blog posts.
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, the Blizzard comparison only goes so far because I, as a home user, can't create new stuff for it, which limits some of the ass they need to cover.
Also kind of funny a time when 4e should be more like WoW :)
Didn't you just ruin your blog by downloading it and thus agreeing to the license?
ReplyDelete@Greywulf: Oh, totally. I use an image that Elminster found and edited. I mean, if they want to dole out some nifty graphics I'd be more inclined to do that...assuming they laid off the license agreement. -.-;;
ReplyDelete@Dave: The irony of me comparing Wizards to Blizzard isnt lost. XD
@Propagandadroid: I can only hope that they're not so petty as to come crashing down on a fan-blog for their own stuff. >_>