NOT MUCH TO DISCUSS. Work stays the course.

MC12; end in sight, audio being plugged in. I'm keyframing like a madman and trying my best to keep from tying off the ending in such a way that is grotesquely unsatisfying. There's a few neat parts of this cartoon, it's just over seven minutes (and idk how many kills, but tbh the sheer number of kills might be on the low side). As usual I'm of the mind that this one is either 'pretty good' or the worst cartoon of the series. I really think it's plausible for me to be done before madness day, and if that happens I will have to decide if I wish to save if for sept 22, or release it just as soon as it's done. How do you feel about that one?

MPN: The workshop is live, and swain continues to work with the modding teams in order to continue developing it's robustness. When this is complete it will untie our hands for future game development projects.

Anyone going to short shorts fest, here in PA?

Got a lot of people sending me art on my birthday, this week. I tried to collage the ones I could find here. It goes without saying but I'm saying it anyways; THANK YOU.

MPN Modding is coming along wildly, too. If you haven't poked your head into the Steam Workshop associated with Madness: Project Nexus, you oughta take a look. In a couple weeks I'm going to be doing a run down of some of them. I can't single out any single modder, here, the dudes beating themselves up to throw content out there are doing an insane job.

Finally, There's a week left on Doc's plush, from Makeship.

I'll be in touch. Next update will be an in depth dive into MPN modding, where MC12 is, and my expectations regarding that lil animation. Thank you for everything.

MADNESS: PROJECT NEXUS WORKSHOP PREVIEW

Truly excited to pass along the progress Swain and the rest of the Modding beta team. I've had very little to do with this step of the journey but I have been watching over the shoulders of the people working on it, and offering help to the artists who are putting together the first run of mods that will appear in the Steam Workshop. It's unreal, at release we really didn't think this game could support workshop but Swain performed miracles, here. More data on how that's coming along in the article linked above. One mod pack I'm particularly excited about is Lurk's stab at a making high definition versions of what exists in the game, a proper remastering. Very exciting.

Madness Combat 12 Update

I'm not making MC12 into two parts, I've decided to tell the whole story in a single entry and it's going to take a bit longer as a result. I've got too many ideas for what needs to come next to spend this long here. The music will be good and the audio will be crunchy as hell if the animation isn't up to snuff. There'll be something of value in there. There's a bit where sanford has a lever gun and it's pretty cool. Bless Cturix and Cheshyre for making the animation GOOD.

For cartoons after MC12 I'm going to be making a team to expand on what I go, or going to be reaching out for assets once I have a punchlist of all the things I need. Things might get disjointed... I'm too old and tired to handle these mammoths on my own, especially given that game development has long cemented itself as central to my schedule, leaving me with less time to focus on animation, or even art. I'm aware of, and frightened of, the need to organize and communicate effectively, but I think I can handle it. We'll see.

Thanks for hanging out, guys, and how could I forget? It was awesome to meet some of you guys last weekend at PICO DAY.

Musing over the idea of making MC12 a singular episode instead of breaking into two parts. I realize I have blown past the point that would have been a fine way to fade out into a 'to be continued' (not unlike the midpoint of MC9.5), so.... we'll see how that goes? Still going to be several months off, but I get work on this thing nearly daily. I'm happy with how -dense- this cartoon is, so far, but I am not happy about how short the runtime is. These two thoughts are in direct conflict as lengthening a 'toon bites at the density and vice versa. In any event, if I screw this all up and make garbage my pals Chesh and Cturix will cover up the bad animation with cool music and sound. Tarkade's provisions for combat scene backgrounds have been a great addition, too. Optimism.

Cobbling together cutscenes is a nice change of pace. I've outlined what I have left to do, which is weird for me. I literally just handle things one scene at a time while keeping my hopes and dreams on a couple stickynotes around my office. It makes for a very flexible plot, and to an advantage in my case because the first 10,000 ideas i have, or so, aren't good. All that said I don't MIND having a scene outline right now, as a test. Maybe whatever I animate next can have a stronger structure behind and under it. It would make it easier to invite more people into the project if I were more structured. Hm.

Thanks for reading. Tell me what you have on the horizon!

MERRY CHRISTMAS, YOU MANIACS.

Thank you, those of you who dropped by the stream last night for some chrismas(ish?) themed art.

This year definitely felt like a cold year for me. Chipping away at this monument of a project.

2024 should be a hoot.

Supposin' a lil update on what I'm up to is in order, given that we're on the other side of Madness Day.

I'm basically spending my daytime hours fielding asset requests for MPN updates, and working on assets/concepts for a non-Madness project that we (Swain and I) have been working on. It'll be a bit, but when we have something that's worth showing off I'm stoked to bring it to the light of day.

The evenings are filled with animating mc12 part 1 (or getting caught up playing Ground Branch). It's been a painstakingly slow process given how absolutely turbulent this last year has been for me. NOW, however, stability is on the menu. I am going to be getting back to my art streams regularly, and a stronger schedule for animating.

You're the heart and soul of this whole Madness thing. Thank you all for your continued support and patience.

edit; drew sanford punchin' a guy

-Matt

Hello.

There was a bloodbath this last weekend. The judges and I swung it out and deliberated at length on everything submitted for this last Madness Day. We got a little tilted about it this year around, the quality this year being such that trying to parse out which are 'better' than others is an absolutely absurd task, but one we took on. The sheer volume of kick ass entries this year made it excruciating at every step. There's blood on these hands.

Total Prize Pool; $2520 - I have 18 messages to send out, which I will be doing tomorrow. If you're on this list I will be reaching out to you via Newgrounds DM. HUGE THANKS to our judging panel; absoluteDETH, Isolave, Cheshyre, Vix, Zep, Funkle, and Miss Ebola. Could not have done this alone.

-1st Place: Madness Revolt 1: The Maelstrom

-2nd Place: Madness VS Takis

-3rd Place: Hank Kills

-4th Place: Soul Madness 3.5: AFTERMATH ACT II

-5th Place: Madness Rogue Collab

-6th Place: Madness Nightmare

We had a lot to fight over this year. Approx 116 animations and every one of them brought black, white and red all over in high energy, creative and passionate ways. The fact that we could only pick six winners left us fighting tooth and nail for entries that didn't make the list. That said each of the judges had an entry we wanted to single out as an honorable mention. 

 -1st Place: Yipieee Madness Day!

-2nd Place: Madness Day 2023

-3rd Place: ROMP.FLA Poster

-4th Place: Madness Day 2023 - S-3lf Eater

-5th Place: Lightning Strike

-6th Place: MADNESS DAY

Total art submissions this year with the tag #MadnessDay2023; Approx 717

-1st Place: Mayhem

-2nd Place: The Whole Circus

-3rd Place: S4NFORD

-4th Place: Men in Shades [SIN3.5]

-5th Place: MT1-07. Refraction (Maximal Ninjutsu Edit)

-6th Place: Damaged Artificial Nervous System

Total music submissions this year with the tag #MadnessDay2023; Approx 90

Something worth mentioning; GAMES. WE GOT GAMES THIS YEAR. EXAMINE THEM.

Madness Combat - The Sheriff Clones

Madness: Fueled By Hotdogs

Madness: The Battering

Madness SEVERED

Madness Collab'23

Madness Combat Deimos Pew Pew

Madness Clicker

Madness: Ludicrosity

That was brutal. That was Madness. Thank you all for supporting the series for more than two decades, and the continued mayhem and violence you guys put fourth year after year. Could not even BE without you.

We made it, we all made it to another Madness Day! We're going to let some entries pile up in the portal, and around 2pm EST I will be going live on my Twitch channel. I'm keeping my eyes off what's coming through the portal until I am on stream. I'm excited to start digging into what you guys have been working so hard on!

We got $2,520 in cash prizes, thanks to the incredible donations from you guys! We also will be giving out plushies, shirts and posters to winners chosen by the judge panel! (edit; last minute dono of 320 dollars really boosted the prize pool! Holy shit! Thank you Sk1tz!!!)

edit; Alright we got a LOT of entries this year. Going to take a bit to chew through all this. Thank you everyone who showed up, this is a consistently insane experience to see this much content relating to madcom stuff manifesting on the same day with such intensity. Deliberations and judging are well underway.

Oh god there's so much music.... and art.... and animation....

Animation

1st - $400 + Makeship plush (Hank or Tricky)

2nd - $290 + Antipathy shirt

3rd - $195 + Choice of poster from Etsy shop

4th - $100

5th - $75

6th - $50

Art

1st - $275 + Makeship plush (Hank or Tricky)

2nd - $165 + Antipathy shirt

3rd - $100 + Choice of poster from Etsy shop

4th - $75

5th - $55

6th - $35

Music

1st - $275 + Makeship plush (Hank or Tricky)

2nd - $165 + Antipathy shirt

3rd - $100 + Choice of poster from Etsy shop

4th - $75

5th - $55

6th - $35

Thanks for stopping by, watching, and supporting the Madness, fellas/fellettes, this is all possible because of your involvement!

HELLO.

September 22nd is coming fast, and it will mark the seventeenth Madness Day here on Newgrounds.com. Madness Combat has been on this site for over two decades, and we're sitting here celebrating yet another Madness Day because the fandom (read that as: you guys) keep the fire burning hot and we're going to champion that, put the love on display. We're celebrating the enthusiasm, talent, and passion that has been drawn to this series that I had the good fortune to start here on this portal.

The prize pool will be done through Ko-Fi, this year. I will be putting in 250 of my own cash in initially. This year we've got merch prizes, too! I've recently come into the possession of new Madness Antipathy shirts (available in S, M, L, & XL), and I intend to throw in some Madness plushies and posters from my Etsy store, as well! As we get closer to September 22nd I will be adjusting the winnings, based on Ko-Fi prize pool donations.

Prize Pool as of 9.18.2023: $2,180.00! (Aggregate from Ko-Fi and Twitch Donos + initial $250)

Animation

1st - $350 + Makeship plush (Hank or Tricky)

2nd - $200 + Antipathy shirt

3rd - $135 + Choice of poster from Etsy shop

4th - $100

5th - $75

6th - $50

Art

1st - $225 + Makeship plush (Hank or Tricky)

2nd - $160 + Antipathy shirt

3rd - $90 + Choice of poster from Etsy shop

4th - $70

5th - $55

6th - $35

Music

1st - $225 + Makeship plush (Hank or Tricky)

2nd - $160 + Antipathy shirt

3rd - $90 + Choice of poster from Etsy shop

4th - $70

5th - $55

6th - $35

Rules/Guidelines/Expectations;

• In the event of a collab placing, all winnings will be sent to the collab organizer for them to distribute as they see fit
• Music submissions can only be judged as individual songs. Soundscapes or Albums should be parsed/broken down into their individual tracks so that judging can be done on a individual basis.
• All winnings will be distributed via Paypal.
• In order for us to find you, please tag your submission with #MadnessDay2023, this is very important!
• We can only consider submissions which debuted on Sept 22nd, or 23rd, any later or earlier and it's out of our range.
• YOWO - You Only Win Once. A person can post multiple entries across every category, but can only win placement once.
• It should go without saying, but just in case; post it here on Newgrounds!

Godspeed, and thank you.

September 22nd, 2023 will mark Newgrounds.com's seventeenth Madness Day. We're 75 days away, and already I'm excited for what this year brings.... every year some absolutely incredible stuff comes through, I encourage you to take a trip down memory lane and investigate some of the years past.