You know, I've been on Newgrounds 11 years, and if anything gets to me these days, it's the quiet.
Got me like ya girl here.
Not the forums. They still talk shit. I'm talking about this new phenomenon of "I came, I lol'd, I left," dropping fivens and zero-bombs without so much as a word, with one-and-done artists coming on the scene as if dumping stuff on the servers and ditching is gonna win us favors.
Back in the day, we used to give back to the community.
Today, I've watched audio, art, and animation come through the Portal without a peep, sometimes going years without reviews -- or even votes. Do you think anyone comes out of that equation looking pretty?
No. Definitely not Jennifer Anniston pretty either.
It makes us look lame -- us, the guys who debase DeviantArt, trash YouTube, and shit on SoundCloud. Y'know, Newgrounds, the first, the baddest, the best? When our own community can't say so much as hi and thank you, it makes it hard to believe household names like the Weebl, Soulja Boy, Waterflame all started here.
And if you ain't of that persuasion, let's just say I'd rather see this in my feed than this.
This is not going to produce more Weebls and Waterflames. This is just gonna suck.
We're supposed to be the cutting edge of user-created content, the nexus of cringe, counter-culture, and cool, but we've forgotten how we came this far.
Community, reviews, encouragement, telling each other how to improve, that's what drives us. Feedback makes us tick. That's what we in this crew aim to do, what other groups have failed to accomplish, if they haven't completely ground to a halt.
And I had a draft for this post, but I trashed it. If you're reading this yes, I'm inviting you -- yes, you, to join me and the Newgrounds Review Crew in our fight against silence, to keep the spirit of Newgrounds alive.
Instead of encouraging link dumping, self-advertising, and bs, we'll be keeping it simple. See something that doesn't have a review? Review it. Like something? Review it. That's it. No requests, no beauracracy, because that gets tedious. Meetings will be held approx. every 14 days or as I am able to FP, events optional, and potentially there will be some paid competitions.
The particular event I have in mind for this month is @dj-Nate's competition, which I will be judging. If Nate can review each of these entries, we can too!
@ChronoNomad will be in charge of making pretty spreadsheets to keep track of progress because I'm a doofus. Yeah. We'll get on that.
Meantime, the only way to get yourself in trouble is to spam reviews and break Newgrounds review guidelines to get ahead. Do that and things will suck.
To apply, post a comment. To vote on the next event or suggest future events and competitions, here!
At some point, there will be a discord server set up to discuss cool junk.
Newgrounds Review Crew Roster - January
New Blood
@ADR3-N
@Cyberdevil
@I0ta
@lilmisfortune
@MaiGeims
@PhantomCritic
Indecision
@Jackho
@MistyEntertainment
@SoundBounce
@S3C
Personally, I've decided to continue my review for review schtick until further notice. Still got a couple to finish, but they're on the list, and if anyone wants 20 free reviews, feel free to sign up here with an email you don't care about. Confirm it and it'll tip me some pennies toward my bills and equipment, which will help keep me and mine from being homeless come August. No joke. Help me out and I'll love you long time.
But enough shameless self-plugging. Drop your personal goals, recommends, and other junk in the comments! Let's review!
Ps: One of these days I'll get back to doing podcasts. Waiting on easy embed functionality. Until then, holla!
PhantomArcade
I dig your spirit to keep Newgrounds moving forward! I wish more people had your mind set. Myself and IvanAlmighty have set up a Newgrounds Discord that we could set up a section for you guys in once it's current function as the DBZ collab chat passes.
Newgrounds is on it's way to a bigger and better future than ever before, and it'll be thanks to people like you and those that we pass the torch to.
ADR3-N
Hey, I'm nobody important, dw. There's been plenty of crews like this out there, just none current and in the same spirit. I'm glad to know that this kinda thing is appreciated though. NG is what springboarded my own hobby into a career and an education to boot. :)
Speaking of DBZ collab, how is all of that going down? About when will things be all set?