I don't think I need to go in depth with what happened three months ago - I already said my part. But, as I predicted, I've been finding it extremely hard to fully let go of what happened. And it's not because of the community I'm surrounded by in FNF.

What happened back then has been rippling in every group he had a hand in.

Since then, I've been hearing more and more about what's been happening under the dirt. I don't intend on starting fires from ashes; instead, I want to simply speak my mind. This is, after all, the only place I feel safe to do so. Even though I make lots of documents on Twitter about friends or see things that happen on Twitter, I really have been neglecting this place which started everything. Now, I intend to use it again. This isn't going to be spread around or advertised - this is something I wish to throw to the wind and anyone who can catch it.

What happened is more than the winners have written in the books.

There were two things I was taught about the situation.

One was how to lead a team. Yes, I had experience with this before the team was assembled, but this was the time where I saw how detrimental leadership is. I tended to take an opposite approach with my leadership, and still do. That approach is simple: ask people about their thoughts on x, y, z. When I led this past ADM, I took that method; when I led this past Tankmas, I used that strategy - neither of them turned into great successes, but they managed with very little conflict. His method was that his word was final and could only be added to, not removed. I hated this - and still do - because I feel it's very similar to becoming a mini-dictator. I don't want to spread my power or grow an ego to flex, I want to make people happy and give everyone who works on my projects the respect, love, and potentially money they deserve. My goal is to make my people feel wanted and happy; the money and fame is a byproduct to me.

This was the point where I should have seen what it was like to treat people like people and not like workers, especially when only one person was getting paid outside of the main leader. This was the place where I should have seen what power can do to someone.

I should have seen that.

But that's where I learned the other thing - I was blind in that entire situation. It's true that I didn't know about what was going on and probably couldn't have known otherwise, but there were signs that I should have taken into consideration. I was, after all, in a really bad mental state because of everything that was happening. Maybe that's why I was so blind to everything going on in that development server, all of the pushes and screaming and whatnot.

One thing that I don't believe was mentioned - when the final update was delayed from its original December 4-5 release, there was a ping sent in the announcement channel. It simply read "thanks guys." and included the link to the delay announcement tweet. I questioned him on it and he said something along the lines of "it wasn't against you" - I still have all of the messages he sent to me but I don't want to check anymore.

The only reason I've kept him unblocked after all this time is if I have to tell him to screw off. There can be a chance he revives this whole thing despite everyone and their mother saying that things should die, and if he uses my music again then you can bet money I will message him telling him to remove them all before I send DMCA claims up his behind. I'm not made of stone and am not gonna immediately hit him, especially seeing that I originally gave him permission back in June and haven't written my lack of current consent at all since then, but I'm not going to forgive him either. I wrote on a Twitter post that I wouldn't be ready or willing to forgive him unless he shows change - and with the problems he has, it should take at least a year or few to show any progress or a hint of change. And yes, I do mean show change.

I'm not gonna take his word anymore.

There's a friend that I have that knows me both online and in real life. We used to be just a few minutes' walk from each other before they moved during the holidays. We still are really good friends to this day, and we still even meet each other from time to time in real life.

When they was here back in October, we had met one night for dinner. It was there that they told me about something interesting with him, and that was with his behavior in calls.

Now, when the mod got popular he spent most of his time that I could see in a VC in the development server, only doing work half the time. But he had other friend groups outside of the server that he would drop by in, including one that both me and my friend were in alongside a lot of other people. In that specific place, he told me that his behavior often was, in my opinion, a classic manipulative behavior - when someone like my friend would say something or give an idea, he treats it as "meh, okay"; when one of his closest friends says that same thing, it's suddenly amazing to him.

Back then I paid it no mind but had made a mental note. I think I remember saying then that it was common because of how close he was to that specific friend, but I also realize now that it should have been a red flag to me. Again, I realized in the aftermath that I was much blinder than I should have been.

What's more, and they told me of this more recently, was that they was approached to work on the graphic design for the mod. He came to them and asked for examples of their work, which they provided. After that, he then proceeded to ghost them and picked his closest graphic design friend over them.

Some of the things he did were things that I wouldn't want to do to people, especially since I want to respect others in the same way I want to be respected. But yet... I still believe he did all of that.

And the more I think on it, the more I realize: he wasn't just cancelled for being a sexual predator, although that was his nail in the coffin; he was cancelled for being a horrible person to others and treating them like mud or machines.

And now I'm paranoid to become like him.

I've mentioned this to a few friends already, but have never said this publicly.

I have a very strong feeling that around half of the people on the team at its peak are jerks, sexually provocative, or somewhere in between. I say "at its peak" because a lot of the people that have been called out were brought on after the original mod was uploaded. Back then, the only people on the team were those who worked with TheMaskedChris on Starlight Mayhem and musicians that he had contact with, since none of the musicians from Starlight carried over to this mod. When it got big however, most if not all of the people brought on were from him. This is where the problematic people came in.

I'm probably missing a few people, but here's who I know got called out that was on the mod team:

• Before everything went down, there was someone who got called out and cancelled back in July for being an extreme groomer. I'd argue this was the first person in the community that got called out for behaviors like this.
• One of the planned musicians got called out and cancelled for being an extreme manipulator and a groomer.
• One of the planned writers for a Week 2 update got called out twice for things they did, and there's some things they have yet to be called for (which I won't do the first honors on because I'm not that kind of guy). I'm honestly surprised they still are on a platform in the community, but that's not my place to start raising my pitchfork.
• One of the artists, the graphic designer and the person that was the close friend to him, got called out and cancelled for being sexually provocative and being an extreme manipulator.
• There's two person who I have a feeling will get called out, one of which is the only person out of the group that was actually on the original team - not gonna say who they are or what they did, but I wouldn't be surprised if they get called for stuff. The other, I expect them because they were another close friend of his and their behavior towards the matter personally puts me a bit on edge.
• And of course, you have him.

Do you see why I've become uncomfortable with the team and the mod now?

There's really only a few people from that original team that I can trust, and they're people that I still talk and work with often. But... I really am worried about becoming those people that are part of that group because I was brought on by him. I just hope I don't become that way, and am so paranoid about it that I'm willing to ask people to tell me if they notice a change I don't see. Because even though I might have a goal to be cautious of myself, I still realize that I'm in a precarious position.

I still realize I'm blind.

I feel like I can't escape this issue because it's seeped almost everything I knew to its very core.

Not everything is affected by what happened three months ago, but what is is noticeable and distracting from the very things I used to enjoy without shame. I won't go into too much detail, but there's quite a few things I notice.

1. Before everything happened, there was only one person called out in the FNF community, and that happened back in July as was aforementioned. After what happened with him though, suddenly everything started ramping up to the degree that it has been. It feels like someone new is being called out and cancelled every single week - and sometimes, these people are trying to force a "boy who cried wolf" situation, which I absolutely hate beyond compare. Kids feel like they can do anything for a quick fame grab, but when you have something as serious as sexual abuse or grooming, things like that aren't jokes or cash grabs. People at least know how to shun them, but that doesn't stop the issue at hand.
2. When everything happened, things started getting bad in one of my friend groups - the one I mentioned earlier. I'm not going to mention what happened or who's involved or any details since a) it's not my place to and b) I'm not wanting to mix any pots; however, things feel extremely tense there and almost all of my old friends are getting involved in some way or another. It just hurts.

It feels like I can't stop thinking about it because I'm constantly surrounded by it and all of its effects, no matter how much I wanna shake it or get it off of me. It hasn't changed my opinion too much on people, but it just doesn't feel right to me right now. I want a natural state to return to again, where I could go into rooms without fear or worry of someone being sexually provocative or secretly a manipulator. I guess the issue is that times changed since then, and either I have to take this new knowledge or leave everything behind.

What about the music?

I talked with a Newgrounds friend of mine who went through a similar event, and they advised me to not upload anything from the mod's final update. They had solid reasons, and I agree with them, so nothing from that update will be published. A reminder, however, that this does not give anyone permission to release them on other platforms - just because I don't push them doesn't mean they're no longer my works.

As for the rest of the songs from the previous updates... I don't know. I might take them down depending on if someone gets called or not, or I might just take em down for the heck of it. I have plenty of other songs to put up anyways from other mods - one of which I actually should put up here. I need time to just think about stuff, but at the very least the images in each song is going because of obvious reasons.

I've been putting my focus into two mods right now, both of which are almost complete in their soundtracks (or at least, my contribution to them). I think I'm more proud of these than I was with the others, but I'm not sure yet. I still got work to do.

But thanks for the nearly 500 of you that are sticking around. I know times are hard right now, but the spring is coming very soon - stay warm until then. <3

Heyo! So I've been keeping up to date on my Twitter a lot, but admittedly I've kinda forgot about being here because most of my recent work involves Twitter. not so much Newgrounds. So I do wanna provide an update especially considering the last one on here was a large response to events and stuff.

For those who are also wondering, for the most part I'm doing fine. I know a lot of people have formed opinions on the issue since then, but I personally have been going (or at least attempting to go in many cases) with the separate art from artist route. I think it's possible knowing that the OCs the person made have basically taken a life of their own with alternate universes and whatnot, but I realize that it's also still drawing attention to the person and that's why many people don't like to separate. I've said my fill for if they decide to come back, but if their first return to someone's stream was anything I don't think he'll have a stable platform on any place. Regardless, I'm doing alright.

I guess I'll talk about FNF first since that's what's been happening the most recently. I've mentioned that I've become a part of thirteen to fourteen mods total, one of which I'm going to lead myself. It might increase depending on how a situation pans out, but I've been making a lot of music for it as of late. In fact, that's been what's taking up a lot of my music-making time. I don't mind it too much, but a change of pace is something I'll hopefully look forward to.

Being in the fandom has its ups and downs. I feel the current state of the fandom entire right now is that they're at a bit of a civil-war "boy who cried wolf" state. A lot of this has to do with sexual allegations toward others, and a lot of it started with the situation that I was heavily impacted by.

If you look around, there's a lot of "he said she said" when it comes to drama, especially involving large figures. I haven't really seen too many people legitimately owning up to themselves, but when they go after others it doesn't feel grounded. There's especially been quite a few situations where I don't feel enough evidence has seen the limelight - and mind you, we're talking about allegations involving sexual relations. Unfortunately, this has led me to naturally become skeptical of allegations unless there's some pretty hard and convincing evidence, which is kind of a sign to me that something bad's happening.

It reminds me a lot of a previous state Geometry Dash's community went through. While it's died down as of recent, there was a time where people would make all these allegations against others for being genuinely scummy people, a lot of which were true and a lot of which were staged. Not everything's healed up, but it seems to be turning into this phase for younger communities to go through, especially when a large figure is legitimately called out. Suddenly everyone wants to point fingers and get clout to exploit the masses on how horrible a person X is - and it muddies the real accusations from the fake. In some respects it's a larger problem in FNF's community than it was in GD's (or at least I've seen it become a bigger problem), but it's a problem that needs to be addressed nonetheless.

But honestly, my biggest thing I'm conflicted on with the community is this.

I'm sure it's common knowledge I've been friends with ninjamuffin for almost 3 years at this point. Knowing him, I think the reason why FNF was made in the first place was to be a fun challenge with friends - after all, it was made for a Ludum Dare and wasn't even the winning centerpiece. It just so happened that it became big in the process and is now Newgrounds's most popular thing ever. But in becoming big, what I'm seeing is that it's lost its charm in the modding fandom with a lot of people. It can be easy for a mod to get popular really quick, and that's what people are aiming for - fame and fortune.

My question is, what happened to having fun?

Don't get me wrong, I know there's a lot of mods I don't know about that have this goal in mind. But I guess the community's become overall greed-hungry and want to push quantity over quality, at least from my perspective. I'm in mods where time is of an essence and things need to be done before X, but I'm also in mods where the focus is on having fun and no rush to it. It seems like the community, especially on the smaller side of things, is focused on working for a big shot spot in a temporary fandom where the focus should be on making friends, coming together and having fun.

I want to go for that in the mod I'm leading. Yeah we have some unique ideas, but the goal for it is to toss stuff against the wall and see what sticks with others. I don't want to regard the people working on the mod as a team, but rather as a group of friends passionate on what they work on. And that's what I want the mod to live off of - passion. If it isn't there, why drag people through the mud to make it happen, especially if it isn't gonna have fun and effort put into it and is just gonna be something to give to people?

But, I digress. I have no plans to leave as of yet, but I do want to get stuff done and shake off some of the things I've been worried about. There's a bunch coming and a lot I can put here on Newgrounds, so be on the lookout for that.

In terms of competitions and Newgrounds-related stuff, I'm planning to keep myself involved on the judging side of things.

I'll actually share that my original intent back in 2018 was to flip-flop between competing and judging in audio competitions. That way, I could improve my skills and help others improve theirs - give a little, get a little. I stuck on to the panels after 2019 though because I had so much fun judging and being on the other side of the table. I guess I'm more of a giver than a getter, hehe.

Last year, I organized and ran the Audio Death Match. It wasn't a huge hit, but it was a learning experience especially in the face of what was going on at the time. This year, someone else expressed interest in running it and I've allowed them to take it on and keep the fire going. I'll still be on the judging panel for this year, but given their current plans things are in the right hands and I would not be surprised if we hit the marks that we had in 2019. I'm excited for this year's competitions and am hopeful that you all will keep posted here on them.

There's also been another competition that I hope will lift off the ground sooner rather than later to avoid conflict with the train of AIM, ADM and UAC. It's really unique and definitely something I hope will become tradition, and this year I'm glad to hop on the judging side of things. Listening to music is such a good experience since it gives you a good palette for what's happening around you and can even inspire you to challenge yourself. This competition especially is a good challenge for myself and others, so again I hope it gets a good liftoff.

I also helped in running the ADVENTure calendar last year, which was a pretty good success. There were things I wanted to implement that never saw the light of day, but I still think things went well in terms of leadership. I stepped up since it was a possibility Geo and Brandy weren't able to lead it due to real-life conflicts, so I'm more than happy to step back down from organizing if they request for this December. Like the competitions though, I'm gonna apply again to be a member of the team and I even have ideas of things I want to do in this next ADVENTure. They're a bit ambitious, but it would be interesting to see them happen if I have the chance.

Speaking of ADVENTure, I do wanna mention something as well. Those who are familiar with Pixel Day, we were actually planning to include an advert for it in the theatre. I talked with @ThatJohnnyGuy , who had the idea for the tradition in the first place, and they got art from @DrOrcham to put in. We got as far as placing it in the game, but the client started blocking the image when we created builds so we unfortunately couldn't place it in an official release. However, we do have this image from testing so please give love to both Johnny and Orcham for their work on promoting Pixel Day:

Again, I seriously cannot thank all of the people who worked on the calendar enough. This year may not have had all of our ideas, but it had a good amount of charm and solidified ADVENTure as a tradition that I'm happy to be a part of in the future.

I'm hopeful I can catch a bit of a break with my current things. Right now I'm grinding out for FNF mods, but I hope to make a song sometime that isn't FNF related. While my priority is on the mods especially considering a lot of them are good songs, I know a lot of people can get tired of the FNF mod songs, and I kinda have been too. I wanna see if what I've learned from FNF can work well with making music outside of the community, and I'm hopeful that it can work. I just need the time.

So for those wanting the regular music, bear with me for a bit. I will make sure to deliver. <3

https://twitter.com/splatterdash_ng/status/1474937534123757569

9:58 pm, saturday, december 25, 2021

the end of the holidays

good afternoon.

more than 17 hours has now passed since the events that basically changed the course of fate for myself - and others - in an instant. i can't tell myself if i've become better or worse off of it, but i devoted myself last night to healing these scars and fixing these broken parts i have laying in front of me. it'll never get fixed, not for a while, but maybe it's starting. i can't tell anymore.

in any case, i want to share my thoughts that i have swirling in my head with you. i choose to share them because i realize how harmful they can be if held onto alone. i realize nobody may read this, but that's ok to me.

i choose to become vulnerable.

if you wish to continue reading, please know that there is talks and mention of sex abuse and death/suicide, so viewer discretion is advised while reading. if not, i truly understand and hope you have a good day, wherever you are.

these are my thoughts, disoriented, disorganized, and true as i can make them.

i found it hard to sleep last night.

my original plan was to turn in early and get sleeping around 11-11:30 last night. in the wake of what happened, i tried a usual plan i had to cope with issues and listened to some ambient, soundscape-similar music. i had a few selections, including music from a documentary i had seen a while back, my previous starry ocean, and phonometrologist's latest sehnsucht. i played through it all, some of it twice or more, and i could feel myself getting somewhat better and getting my mind away from the fire.

i had prepared for sleep, but i couldn't get myself there. i found myself lying awake, checking socials and telling myself to stop it. i think i'm too connected to let go anymore, to the point where it hurts me.

i fell asleep at around 1 am. four hours later, i awoke in the middle of the night. i don't know why, but i fell asleep again for another four to five hours before awakening to start the day.

throughout the night, there was a thought burning in my head. it was something i wrote last night.

"maybe i should cry myself to sleep."

last night, though, i didn't cry. i just sat there, in silence. my mind was filled with darkness and a canvas, one which a pen drew over in some shape but leaving no marks.

why didn't i cry?

i had met him back at the end of april 2020, last year.

back then, he was somewhat of a different person. obviously fnf didn't exist back then, so he resided doing geometry dash, which he was just coming off the heels of a popular level he did for april fools day. during that time, he was doing art for a self project he wanted to do involving and drawing members of the community.

this was why i joined the streams at first.

i don't know why i wanted to have myself drawn back then. i had no oc or sona, and back then i basically had no art or thing i could point to for myself. all i had was what i created, which was nowhere near the standard of professional art. it was something i slapped together.

so what would i do if he asked about what he should draw for me? my stupid, worn-down years-old logo?

i didn't ask to be drawn by him throughout the time he worked on the project. i just simply showed up, interacted and made some friends as per usual. i didn't want to annoy him, similar to how i didn't (and still don't) want to annoy others about asking for art of me.

it was during that time that i remember being thrown off by his behavior a bit. i noticed some of it could have... implications, but i also noticed that he had more energy back then to do a lot of things, including acting like a monkey (yes, that was an old channel reward). i guess back then i chalked it up to just being an energetic person and a personality that didn't go too far.

it's here that i should mention back then that someone had "called" him out at one point. while the actual reason is foggy in my brain, it went something along the lines of someone requesting art from him while he was younger that involved a girl. i don't remember if it was suggestive or straight up nsfw, but back then it was shut down for two reasons: first, it had been done a while back; second, the person who did said callout wasn't exactly liked at the time by the community. i'll even admit i didn't like them at the time because they seemed too hostile to others.

maybe i should have listened back then.

there's a prejudice that i have to overcome as a man. heck, there's a prejudice that everyone has to overcome. it's tailored specifically to what you are, never to who you are. that's why my prejudice i have to work against is because i'm a man.

and that prejudice is this.

us men seem to have a problem of keeping our horny thoughts out of our minds, let alone keep our penises in our pants. it's not the majority, but it's enough to set that bar where it is. think about it, how many cases have you seen where someone other than the male caused sexual violence, or rape, or just couldn't keep his penis in his pocket? it's not none, but compared to the cases the male has had it's certainly nothing in comparison. or at least, nothing the public notices.

that's why i vowed to never tell a woman or girl "i love you" or "i wanna have sex with you" or even imply those things unless i really meant it and was ready to respect it and them.

that's why i vowed to stay away from private conversations as much as i could with girls or people outside of my age in general, making sure that the only ones i had included some third party - a person, or an audience.

that's why i vowed to listen to others and would respect their words if "i don't feel comfortable" is said or mentioned about something i do or say, and i'd try to encourage people to say them if they felt them.

and i made these vows before all of this happened.

two months later, in july 2020, a call went out for people to assist in a project he was hosting. he was just completing the first season of his survival multiplayer server on minecraft, which went pretty well. for the next season, he wanted to up the stakes and looked for people to help. in a nutshell, he wanted to create the experience of a mod, with custom textures, items and music, all within a resource pack that people would use when they entered the server.

i applied and expressed interest to the project manager, known as argon.

over the next five to six months i would create a total of fourteen tracks on my own that had the potential to be used in the mod. there were a total of seven of us at the development's prime - the most people on any other part of the team. it was also the point where i created my first oc, which was before mug splatter was created by midgetsausage in his 2020 tankmas art, DEBUG TEXT. i just didn't share it since it wasn't public knowledge yet.

the project, however, never came to light. on january 2 of the new year, argon announced to us that he had left the project, and it was now going to pivot to their ideas. he still remained in the server, but took the role of a spectator. it took nearly another three months before they announced the project would be shifting from one development server to another for the purpose of getting more financial backing, and i chose not to follow. him and most of his friends weren't there in the server anyways by this point. my fourteen tracks then became an ep that i placed here on newgrounds - "my craft".

why did he leave the project? the reason we were fed was that there were disagreements, most of them being argon's fault, in the later months. however, i was not there behind the scenes to confirm or debunk any of it.

what can i confirm? sooner after the announcement, argon would be found to have their own problems on another server they hosted, smp on air. their biggest problem was stealing credit from their team, and according to a friend of mine, they had the habit of not paying their members even when they asked - they just told them to either suck it or leave. following the revelation of argon, they would close smp on air at its prime popularity.

so it wouldn't have mattered either way.

i realize i'm stronger than perhaps i give myself credit for. it's just that i don't feel that way sometimes, and this is one of those times.

i've accepted the fact long ago that people have different perceptions on something they experience, and their perceptions differ from the person next to them, even if they experienced the same thing. there's a load of reasons for it that i think is somewhat self-explanatory, but why do i mention this?

i'm afraid someone experiencing this might consider ending their story.

i would never consider it nowadays - i've done my share of consideration in the hardest points in my life, but that was when i was younger and hadn't gone through the pain or the magnitude before. even then, i obviously never committed, but i also never attempted. something about me just couldn't follow through to making myself bleed. every time, i found myself numb but never determined to follow.

i kept living, despite everything i went through. i kept living because something, somewhere, told me i should - for them. they weren't someone on a screen, "them" was a real person or real people who came into the crevices of my mind. eventually, another thought came to me to assist them.

this will all pass.

the coldest night of the winter always leads to the warmth of the spring.

in the past year, i've had friends consider, some attempt. i've given them my thoughts and my strength, and they've kept going throughout their pain.

maybe that's why i feel weak now, because i helped them more than i helped myself.

at the end of may 2021, i got a message from him.

we had kept almost no conversation since the end of the smp project, so i talked with him. the conversation started with us asking each other how we were doing, then he popped the question about the mod. i considered it for a bit, but then i finally said sure and asked what he needed. i was only faintly familiar with fnf, as i had started only two fnf mod projects back then - terrance and elanor takeover. both were, and still are, untainted by this new mod, which he told me needed jazz.

within a day, i had created the beginning of the melody for the song that would become swing. within two more days, i finished the outline of the song with placeholder vocals for the opponent. it took me another week to figure out how to do the vocals and to get a good result, and finally i could finish the song and bring it to the mod. it was the first one done in terms of instrumentals, but around the middle to last in terms of vocals and compiling.

it should be mentioned that there were two voices being considered for the character back then. one of them gave me a huge amount of difficulty on ableton in terms of making them into a vocal stem that didn't sound robotic, but the other big factor was how they interacted with him and the voice actor for the other main character. in the end, when the voice actor for the main character was chosen, the other basically disappeared. the only time they came back was when they had a place in a later week.

they became a part of the yap squad.

during that time, i got somewhat used to the new faces i saw. back then, the team was only 17 members strong, and that's being generous. we were a small team, most of whom were brought over from another mod, starlight mayhem. in fact, everyone from starlight mayhem was brought over except for one group.

mudstep had made the instrumentals for starlight mayhem, and i had worked with them for the aforementioned minecraft server project when it was still a thing. however, they had been going through hard times with their computer and couldn't continue with the mod. nevertheless, there were only four other music people from the server's team that were brought over to this mod. they all, however, had one-hit wonders - one had the original menu theme, another the credits theme, and a third did the vocals for split and split ex. that was it for them, they had one song.

i was the only exception.

i realize how different i am from the other members of the team. yes, i'm the only one who shares the same fnf spirit and embraces and helps newgrounds with open arms as much as the mod, and yes, i'm the only one followed by tom fulp (although it wasn't because of fnf that he followed me). at one point, i was the only one who was friends with ninjamuffin.

but there was another difference.

i chose, despite everything going on, to interact with the community in more ways than one. it started with a member named pieroshiki, who created interactable desktop figures, something called a shimeji, for both main characters. i hung out on one of their streams and spread the word on my twitter for people to join, and that was the stream where i encouraged myself to keep coming back.

it was also where the term "maid splatter" came from, heh.

i was introduced to the academy server, where a bunch of people gathered in voice chats, and i joined them to have fun and say hi. i was introduced to the fanartists server, where i met some friends of piero. i was introduced to the alternate universes and the ideas they sprung. i was introduced to java and the team of funky friday, a roblox game that brought songs from popular mods into one place with author's permission, to get songs in and made available to the public. and i wanted to help them.

that was where peppermint kisses came from. i had ideas for holiday covers that i created within the span of four days, with polishing to happen afterwards. i wanted to see the universe succeed, and we were even so close to getting there.

i'm sorry for them.

this difference in wanting to help is not something i hold above myself or use to consider myself "better" than anyone else, and i don't want it to be that. if anything, i think it makes me unique, with the only other person doing similar things being one of the voice actors, the one whose vocals i used in my song for the original week. it made me want to connect with the community, to have fun with them.

but maybe that's why i feel so torn right now.

when we released the mod around june 22, 2021, we didn't expect it to be a hit. because of the efforts of themaskedchris, it got placed on gamebanana's ripe list within two hours of being published. some popular content creators got on it within a day, it became featured, and it eventually became one of the best of the banana entries.

and he began to change.

when it blew up, we were on our way to creating week two of the mod. but then we stopped for a second and made a detour. we wanted to up our game further, to make it as best as we could with what we had. we pulled out ideas, many of which came from our sole coder at the time, ash. they literally pulled out a speedrun timer to get in as many things as they could - menus, ui's, songs, memes.

we released the update around august 8, and again the mod blew up. it was at this point that the fanbase was really formed, and it was one of the largest in fnf. we had one of the only mods with its own dedicated community, and it was helped by the fact that he streamed during this time. he became a twitch partner during this time. he became youtube verified during this time. he planned merchandise and had a release for it in october during this time. in fact, i wanted to get some, but held back originally from laziness, later from a gut feeling that i wish i followed more and more.

it's also worth noting that during the development of this update, i caved to some of the pressure i had been given from him. i created a twitter and wanted to keep it positive as much as possible, to stay out of drama as much as possible. i didn't want to ruin myself.

a fool's wish.

i had felt that i had been undergoing something during the mod's development that i felt for a while. growing pains.

i had been given a lot of pressure to do things during the development, especially when the mod blew up. go make a twitter, go start a youtube, go create a paypal so i can pay you, go get a label so your music can go up on spotify, go do this, go think about that. i was the only one who kept myself small while everyone else grew and grew.

why did i keep myself small? i realized it was easy to become something different when i grew. i wanted to try and preserve myself no matter what size i was, and i worried that what made me special would be lost if i grew too big. so i preserved myself by being small.

when the mod became big, my shoe size became bigger. there were points where he yelled at me to create a twitter account. it was more passive aggressive than pure aggression, but it still was a huge weight on my shoulders.

i should have stood my ground back then. it would have helped me now anyways.

we had plans to go big.

the week two we had planned was something we wanted to pursue and see come to life. it would have been something no mod had ever seen or done before thanks to the coding skills of ash. to be specific, because the whole mod took place on a computer, we were thinking of platforming sections instead of cutscenes that travelled through the desktop, going folder to folder. we were thinking of including cameos from other mods that the character would encounter and battle in these folders - anders, ridzak, literally every fnf mod ever, starlight mayhem, starving artist. and not only was i assigned to help with the main music of week two, with the battle between two new characters, but i was also assigned to help with the cameos of the last two mods i listed.

and they, alongside the main week's song, are all done.

the merchandise would have gotten bigger, too. we planned plushies of the main two characters that would have been sold in the winter or spring, and we knew they were gonna be a hit because, let's face it, who doesn't like plushies? more designs, more options, just... more.

we had crossovers planned too. originally we did a crossover with literally every fnf mod ever, which came by pure coincidence thanks to a member named jyro. but that opened the door to other options: vs matt, vs imposter, a starlight mayhem one, soft mod, probably a few others i'm forgetting. i remember that i was planned to be in charge of music for the starlight crossover with ardolf, but because he would have been busy with things in his life i would have been the only musician, save for cerbera making cj's vocals (which he deserves thanks for that).

and even then... our final week, week five, was a plan involving all of us developers creating week one when a glitch happens in the system. that's as far as we got with that, but it was still something that would've been ambitious, large and amazing had it come to light.

peppermint kisses, week two, the cameos... now, all i have left to remember that is broken pieces of what was.

i won't bore you or tire myself recounting most of the next update when i already did so prior to this. you can find it on this newspost, but it is where i will now continue.

following the post and its update, i chose to keep most servers muted, with the exception of a few. i basically hung on to the team by a loose wire, one that was desperate to snap. i waited for the update to release. finally, on december 23, i was told it was done and finally out.

when i saw it, i was surprised. i had helped with bugtesting for the final time before the release, and most of the bugs i had found during testing weren't fixed. mind you, i found a laundry list of bugs that took up two messages in length. one of the bugs was with all loading screens cutting to black after a second when you opened a certain "application" (this was leading into the mod's main menu ui). it didn't do it when you went into the freeplay "folder" and selected a song as soon as the mod started up. when i reported it, the coder at the time, which wasn't ash, said that some of the bugs were intentional but they would look into the others.

apparently, they didn't.

but i thought that was it, and that i could rest now. i was told in conversations and announcements from him that we would get a break for as long as we needed before going into the second week for the third time, and this time, we would enter development intending to finish it.

celebrations turned to chaos when, later that night, it was revealed that he was in a conversation with someone who had been confirmed to be a groomer six months prior. it was simply "great job on the update", "thank you", and some other message. while i wasn't going to immediately deny the conversation happening in the first place and the fact that it shouldn't have happened, i took the stance of wondering how the person got the dm message in the first place, since the one who posted it wasn't the groomer. they could have replicated the account or conversed with a faker. but the internet didn't care; they went mad.

he attempted to shut it down with a statement that was, more or less, contradictory to the past messages. it was then assumed he forgot since it was six months ago and people could forget during that time. but one thing was certain: he couldn't stop the internet.

they found the crack, and they wanted to tear down the wall.

they heard the ear, and they wanted the kingdom to fall.

believe me when i say i gave a lot to this mod.

to give perspective, the original launched on the same night as the newgrounds audio deathmatch, and became sour when tankmas was almost ready to launch. both of these were projects that i chose, out of my own free will, to host for the benefit of newgrounds.

yet i placed not all of my eggs, but most of them, in this basket.

it was successful, more than the other two projects would unfortunately ever see. i reached a wider audience with them, and i was needed more because of the work i had to invest to make songs for it. so i neglected the other projects to serve this mod. even other mods - to which i was working on around seven others at the time - were pushed aside for whatever this one needed.

maybe that's why, when everything started to crumble beneath us back on the 26th of november, i had always mentioned that i tasted this poison on my lips. i didn't know why i tasted it or who it was from.

it only came to me when i was thinking about this mod. tankmas was untainted, i turned to the other mods when considering to leave this one, and i had friends on the other side that i hung out with despite everything running downhill into a ditch with this mod. i didn't understand this poison.

now i know why i tasted it.

now i know where it's from.

the kingdom continued to fall from beneath us throughout the holidays. and it infiltrated the team to its very core.

on christmas eve's night, i watched as one of the members, who was brought in many moons ago to write a script for week two, began sharing dm's they were having with someone else on the team. it was someone who used to be their friend, to where they claimed they were practically dating because they were that close. it was regarding that person having conversations with the same groomer, but for different reasons than he did. i knew some of their words were valid, but i didn't agree with their actions to get those words.

i agreed with pieroshiki, who commented that if a private manner didn't need to be public, it shouldn't be pubic at all.

i left in a rage. i had a gift created for the community that was supposed to be from the team, which i had told him earlier i wanted to push through and upload, but i didn't want to give it anymore. until i saw the team, i was on two paths - it wasn't a good time to release the gift, or it was what the community needed at that point in time. once i saw the team and the events that transpired, with only one person who i thought handled it maturely and consider all sides instead of immediately and blindly following along, i couldn't give this gift from the team against my better judgment.

i talked with him on it. it was during the point where i was once again back where i was two weeks ago, deciding whether to stay on the team or leave. it seemed like he was desperate for me to stay, as he told me that i should publish the gift, if not publicly then to the team, because that's what was needed. he told me that this was life, that it wasn't meant to be good but the team worked together on problems and that this member wasn't a part of the team. he told me they were staying for week two's writing, but he even seemed to talk with them on their actions and got an apology out of them.

i accepted the apology but didn't forgive them because the scars hurt that much, not to mention i knew what they did - commit something wrong with little to no thought, apologize, get forgiveness, rinse, wash, repeat. while i didn't agree with the public outcry against them, i did agree that it was wrong but never mentioned that to him. i just said i couldn't forgive him yet. and he said that he respected that decision.

and that was the last thing he told me before the kingdom fell.

this isn't the first time i dealt with a situation like this.

in june 2020, i was called out of a meeting and into a room with my parents, who had a phone in their hand. it was in there that i heard a voicemail that changed my life at a time where i thought it couldn't get worse.

someone i knew got arrested. he couldn't keep his penis in his pants.

and it wasn't an accident. around 30 counts of sex, on and off a school campus, happened with someone of my age throughout the entire school year two years prior.

i remember crying then. this was also when everything with blm started to occur, and at that time i was scared for my life and my home.

i was crying then. i cried myself to sleep then.

so why didn't i cry myself to sleep now?

i was talking with a friend of mine, retroupgrade, on christmas day. i made a resolution to stay off of twitter because i noticed something. what i was attracted to the most on that site was the things that poisoned me.

they had mentioned a day earlier that he didn't trust him for the past, when he had the previous callout that got immediately shut down. they were the one that told me that they were concerned i was having mental breakdowns because of the mod, and that they hoped the team wasn't blindly following him. but above all, them and their girlfriend, zombought, were concerned about me getting caught in the crossfire.

we started on christmas day talking about what we got, and they mentioned they had plane tickets to head to see some friends, one of which potentially being someone i knew in real life, which i was happy about. later on, i learned about something typic, the creator of the anders mod, was doing involving them and zombought. it was then, while it was on my mind, that i told them that i was pretty much ready to leave the team and that i wanted to save my message of departure for boxing day. i didn't want to ruin someone's holiday because i decided to leave, and i had the feeling it would be twisted to be that.

the conversation became deep, but it ended at 8:24 pm. at 9:02 pm, i got another message, saying they were sorry for what was going on. i told them i wasn't looking at twitter for the afternoon, and their response was the words "then don't".

it made me want to look further, so they told me to look on their twitter. i got on, went right to their twitter page and...

the rest is in the hands of public knowledge.

but it isn't easy for me to simply say "ok, this happened, next". the issue was that he brought me out of my shell beyond newgrounds.

it was him who inspired me to create my human-like oc.

it was him who gathered together a team of people to create things that inspired and helped me.

it was him who gave me a piece of my name.

and it was him who, in good conscience, destroyed it.

and i know i'm not alone.

it's hard for me to look at what i've done and what i'm doing and not think about it. i can't separate the art from the artist. i don't know if i can keep my songs that i did for him here, willingly.

it's unknown to me if i want to continue with the fnf community or retract entirely to my previous state, a year and a half ago, when all i had was newgrounds. the problem with him is that he was the root of the tree that branched to nearly all of these friends and experiences i have, and it's hard right now to cut the roots until it shrivels and dies on its own.

there are some people who have reached out to take these broken parts and make them whole again, and while i appreciate them for doing that, nothing can fix the pieces to be what they were. to be someone who does good with a dirty secret behind your back is about the same as being a murderous liar, an al capone of the twenty-first century. the moment your secret is known, you might as well start shoving blades into people's backs. because that's how it mentally feels.

it still hurts now. i woke up today trembling, able to recover only from talking to real people and having food fill my stomach. this name hurts to mention, because every time i do i feel like someone, either myself or someone around me, feels the pain of the scars.

i was at the forefront, supporting him and his community.

i was on his teams, to bring happiness to others.

i was willing to trust him, to be naive.

and now... i've been hurt for being myself.

i'm afraid to be myself anymore.

this is my only true safe space anymore.

*Update at the bottom of this post

So this isn't really meant for the people who are interested only in Tankmas or the other shenanigans I do here on NG, but I will say for you guys that I hope you enjoy what we're putting out this year! We've got a lot more coming on and it's only gonna get better from here.

Instead, this is mainly for the people that know me for Bob and Bosip. With everything going on, and with people taking time to share their thoughts, I want to just share with you guys about what's been going on, not behind the scenes, but with me. There's a bunch of other people that explain what's been going on behind the scenes online, but in terms of what I've been going through in that... it's just complicated.

Before I begin, I want to just mention that I am, in no way, inciting or asking for any witch hunts, callouts or cancellations towards any individual member of the team or the team entire; in fact, I ask that this post not be the reason for any of that. In the same vein, I will be mentioning no names except Amor's for the sake of the group anonymity, and I ask that you don't mention or attach names either. I have no hatred or vendettas against the team, and this isn't meant to turn them into villains - we have Twitter for that, thank you very much. Instead, I'm just giving my own recollection of my thoughts and what it's leading to with the team and my involvement. Also, there is a slight trigger warning for the mention of self-harm/suicide later on here, immediately following the second photo in the second section. Don't worry - I'm not taking my life, nor am I making any plans to anytime soon.

Basic backstory for the mod and update: I've mentioned a few times in previous news posts about the Bob and Bosip mod for Friday Night Funkin, which has currently become one of the largest mods in the game. Our last successful update, known as The Expansion Update, came out back in August 2021. Like what happened after the release of the main week, we wanted to go right into Week 2 following the release of the Expansion Update but got an idea to expand upon something already introduced in the mod.

This time, it was the EX difficulty. For those unaware of what that is, think of it as our take on the main FNF's planned Erect Difficulty, with remixed songs and charts more fit for veteran rhythm game players. When we released the Expansion Update, we had it for only the four main songs in the mod - the Tutorial, Jump In, Swing, and Split. People started looking for EX remixes of other songs so much that we decided, why not? So Week 2 was put on hold and we began work on the next update, known as the EX update.

Fast forward a few months, to November. We were working really well on the update, and our spirits were high. We had an EX remix planned for every other song currently in the mod, plus a few aces up our sleeves. Despite missing a few deadlines set earlier on, we weren't really taking it as a big deal, mainly because it wasn't a big deal.

Until it became a big deal.

On November 26 - or as us Americans know it, Black Friday 2021 - the word started to spread in our development server that the mod had gotten leaked. Not a video of Amor showing it off, not a clip of us showing snippets of the music, but a full-blown, most recent, unfinished build. And unfortunately, we weren't the only ones - the other bob mod, literally every FNF mod ever, also got their update, known as Bob's Trick or Treat, leaked to the public by an unknown source, and a handful of mods were getting leaks at around the same time ours was. The issue was, our mod was unique in that it had a large fanbase due to Amor's content creation - meaning people could see it and spread it easily. In fact, the most popular leak video has around 10k views at the time of typing this, from the last time I checked.

Now, at this point a normal person would just suggest we go up to the video, strike it for copyright violations, and go on with our day. And to be honest, I made a promise to do that. I knew the risk of going to court over it and was going to take it if it meant defending my work and the work of others being used without permission.

But here's the problem. If you press the fancy buttons to report a copyright strike on a YouTube video, you're first greeted by a page outlining everything about the copyright process with a link to the forum submission for copyright smack in the middle. On that page, below the forum link, is this piece that outlines what information you would have to provide and how it would be used:

I get everything except for the legal name. Read it again:

Your full legal name is required to complete a takedown request. It may be shared with the uploader of the video removed for copyright infringement.

Sharing your legal name with the person who used your assets without permission upfront and outside of a court? If you ask me, that is basically giving more bullets to someone who is shooting off their guns against an entire team. Let me reiterate this: they don't care about us. Don't believe me? Here's one of the comments from one of the leak videos:

Yeah, we're lazy. We're putting this whole update together for you the fans, we're making sure it doesn't have any bugs in it, and we're lazy.

Oh, and did I forget to mention that I also woke up earlier to another one of my friends cutting themselves in an attempt to take their own life? Because that was going on too, and I had to take up my time to help them and keep them alive because I cared about them. I spent the entire day telling them how much they mattered to me and to others, and all while the mod team was panicking and trying to figure out what to do in response to the leak, since it was the first time this had happened.

And I'm lazy.

So since we were in a stalemate with the leak video, we had only one option: push for the mod to get done. Pretty much everything was done except coding, and the big issue we had was that we had one coder pushing hard while the other had broken communication with us, basically talking with us every so often. As you can probably tell, we had a lot of stress on our hands, and the community where the lunkhead above resided in was laughing and prodding us. It wasn't the entire community, but enough to stress us out.

Worst part is, we still haven't found the one responsible for the leak as of typing this. It was mentioned that there were a large amount of people in the server, but it was because they were people who the team was planning to collaborate with for a number of reasons. For example, one set of people we had in our development server was the people behind the Imposter Mod, who we were planning to collaborate with for a crossover between their mod and Bob & Bosip. We also had people who were content creators and special guests that were trusted individuals - UniqueGeese, JerTheMusicBear, Mepedrop, just to name a few. While that list expanded because of the artist we brought on for loading screens, most of the people in the server were either trusted friends of Amor, people we were collaborating with, or people working on the mod. We didn't bring just anybody into that server, but having that amount of people made finding the leaker similar to looking for a needle in a haystack.

Fast forward another week. We had set a date for release - December 4th/5th. This was also the date that the build needed to be done at, and... you can see the issue here. It also happened that one of the coders got sick on the day of the 5th, and the update's work fell on the shoulders of the other coder, who had somewhat fixed their communication issue.

But for me... I was mentally breaking. After a moment where Amor fell under stress in a VC I wasn't present in but saw unfold in the text chat (nothing bad happened to my knowledge), I felt like I was suffocating and did what I could to wash myself off of the mod for the time. I moved everything related to B&B, including Amor's public server known as The Bob Lounge, into a part of my Discord that I reserved for Nitro emotes and never looked at, and I muted Amor's DMs. The only communication I kept was with a single member of the team, which I won't name, but it was only in the case that I needed to get something off of my chest.

I saw my own mentality taking a skydive in terms of the mod. Despite me doing everything to turn every notification off and keep my conversations down, I basically couldn't stop myself from looking at the server, and when I eventually brought it up to that member I was talking with, they suggested I talked with Amor. Realizing my mentality was dropping out, I took a walk on the cold morning of December 6th for errands and to just breathe, then I came back and asked Amor if I could talk to him. My intention was to speak with him in a call, but when both of us were ready on the morning of the 7th, I couldn't bring myself to do it. So I talked with him in text and let him know everything on my mind, being open to the fact that I knew I wasn't alone in my stress, and asked the question "how are things getting better?".

The conversation went better than expected, with Amor understanding and apologizing for what was going on and saying that he wished things didn't turn out this way and that a lot of it was outside of our control. The communication was the issue with why things were taking a turn for the worst according to him, and I also realized that was a large issue at play here. At the end, when I mentioned that the happiness I had for the mod was becoming stress extremely quickly, he told me:

Then that's fine, you need a break. We all do.

The next day, I had joined a group that was much smaller for bugfixing the update. I had already unmuted Amor and was starting to feel a bit better, just still immensely under the weather when it came to the mod. When it came to the group of the nine of us, we put all hands on deck for playtesting and bugfixing hoping to still push the mod out really soon. I did my share and I continuously asked what needed to be done.

Afterwards, while the momentum was going I took the weekend to go and just unplug from pretty much everything, including Tankmas. I felt legitimately happy and I enjoyed my time, to the point where I didn't feel stressed checking in on the team as they prepared for an update despite having no emotion.

But when Sunday the 12th hit, it hit hard.

My mental health basically found the floor pulled out from underneath. My real life was getting so bad that day that I basically slept for over 12 hours and I didn't eat for almost 24. Tankmas was running into issues because of a late publish from the people I was working with and it led to panic to try and fix it up from both my fellow programmers and the others involved. And the mod... was trying. I didn't pay attention to anything, and I simply sent this message near the end of my day to the group:

Good luck with the release. I'm done with today.

I was going back into the ditch I was trying so desperately to get out of for the past week.

The release was to include a full playthrough of the update, and its premiere went off without a hitch. But when the actual update got released, it was plagued with problems on the coding side.

Twitter exploded.

My home feed got filled with more people saying what Amor's problems were instead of saying "let's give thanks to the team" messages. I get it, the mod wasn't perfect, but to see more people saying the mod's problems was... hurtful.

The issue I had the entire time was something I consider as "runoff stress". Basically, the direct stress was going on with the programmers and the team entire to try and get the mod in as good of a position to release as possible. None of it was directed to me, yet by seeing the stress going on it got onto me. I don't know how or why it does, but... it did.

And it affected what was happening in every step of my experience.

When I went back on the next day, Monday the 13th, my mental health was reset for everything except the mod. In fact, while everything was getting better for me mentally, the mod was getting worse. It had gotten to the point where I typed a message in the group chat (note that this is paraphrased to the best of my knowledge):

Honestly, if the people that are complaining are the majority, then I say we just cancel the update. So what if we please a small group of people? When the general masses are complaining about what you've done, who cares about the small group of people? After four months of work and stress, I don't. If the people are complaining about the mod, and we give them what they want, what are we doing to them? Giving them more to complain about? Telling them that complaining gets them what they want? If it's me, and I really think it is, then I need to leave the team, but... I just don't see it.

I went mad from the stress, and knowing that I said that is just... hurtful to me. No, I didn't mean to direct this at everyone who supported the mod, but that doesn't make it any less worse. I think the others, who were telling me that we shouldn't cancel the mod over a bunch of people causing a stink, took to the situation better than I did. I think everyone else had a better reaction to the situation than I did.

Later that day, Amor held a space on Twitter to clear up what was going on. While others were going on to say their thoughts, I chose not to enter the space, left the group, and turned Amor's DMs, as well as the DMs of many of the other people on the team, completely silent. The only server I have hanging on to say I am still a developer is the main dev server.

Following that space, Amor sent me a DM saying that he apologized for what was going on and assumed that I didn't want to be involved. He was being legitimately hurt from the situation and letting me know he cared about me, and what did I say in response?

In basic terms, I told him to go shove it. In more specifics, I told him that I was balanced between leaving and staying on the team, that I would come to him when I was ready with my decision, and to tell the others not to come to me until my decision was made.

He responded saying:

Ok, you have a good one splatter.

That brings me to now. As I mentioned last night, I'm still unsure whether to stay or leave the B&B team. But the issue I'm facing isn't with or involving Amor or anyone else on the team - the issue is me. I've tried weighing the pros and cons of leaving, tried considering everything with the past present and future, and... I can't make a decision. I still can't mentally accept people around me asking about how I am and what they can do, because I'm worried that I'm hurting them in this state. And the issue is that this is the only place that I'm having this mental instability - Tankmas has been a joy to work on and amazing to see growing, the other mods not associated with the team have been good to look at and help with, but... it's this specific mod that just has this poison on it that I can always taste.

Is it because of the team or Amor? Pretty unlikely, since they weren't abusing me or treating me wrong at all, whether directly or indirectly, intentional or not. Is it because of the leak? Potentially, since it was the leak that started this whole issue in the first place.

But... maybe it's really me. Maybe I shouldn't have this opportunity since I'm being a sourpuss and a negative person as of late when it comes to the mod. Maybe I should take my leave and fix myself mentally or get myself out of the spotlight. Or maybe all I need is a break when this update comes out to just breathe and celebrate the holidays.

It's one of those times right now where I'm just... lost.

UPDATE (12/15/21)

So I came to a decision that I let Amor know about, but I might as well forward it here. I'm gonna stay with the team.

Like I mentioned, this isn't something that happened with just our team, and I ended up seeing it in a new light when taking a step further back. I think I could take this situation and turn it into a learning opportunity for me to deal with this kind of extreme stress both now and in the future. While what I said isn't right, and I knew that pretty much from the time I began writing this and apologized for it, it's nothing I can change and instead something I can learn from. I'm hoping that this update can get its way out, for the better of both myself and the team.

One thing that I don't know if people were wondering or not as well was why I wrote this to begin with. I don't want to look for pity or for remorse, but rather I wanna just be open and check in with myself. As much as I hate getting involved with the drama of different communities, I also realized that I couldn't keep everything on my chest. Sometimes, talking about a situation that's going on is the best way to start getting your mind cleared up instead of bottling it up and chewing on it. Plus, if things went the other way I didn't want the reason to immediately go to "well, it's the team's fault" when they weren't the problem I was facing. Now if it was just that, could this whole post have waited until I made the decision to step down? Of course, and it might have been better to hold it off until then if it was only that reason; because there was the issue of keeping it to myself, though, I chose to simply talk about it now.

Still, I'm hopeful and thankful for the team. I looked back at the development server and things are beginning to look up for both the future and the update. We don't have a release point yet since we still have things to do, but we're looking forward to what's after the update.

Thanks again for being here guys. Make sure you look out for yourselves every day. <3

Heyo everyone, it's Tankmas time!

Just before I place up the link, a huge thank you goes out to everyone who applied this year - it was definitely competitive and while we couldn't accept everyone for space reasons, I'm still happy everyone came together to give it their shot.

Stop in every day to get a new present and give your support to the people who created for the calendar!

GO PLAY TANKMAS NOW!!

The newest update to the Bob and Bosip mod released earlier today! If you don't know what it is, Bob and Bosip is a mod that I worked on for music from the beginning. The new update adds in a whole bunch of new features - a new overarching UI, brand new Gamemode, a side week, and even a crossover with another mod! Go check it out here.

Just to put it in perspective as well, the mod did so good today that we went through four mirrors within five hours after the release - that's insane to me lol. And of course, I know that everyone wants to hear the music that came as part of the mod. Luckily, the new tracks will (mostly) be making their way here to Newgrounds, starting tonight with Swing EX and Tutorial EX! Both the original Tutorial Remix Instrumental and both versions of Swing were also updated and look absolutely clean. Tomorrow, I'll put up Conscience and Intertwined, which you can play in Week In The Background; however, you can find them in the official OST video or even listen to them on SoundCloud!

The only songs I won't upload here on NG are:

• The full Tutorial remix. I actually had the vocals replaced in the song so that they didn't use the ones from the Tutorial in the main FNF game, but I pulled a whoopsie and accidentally submitted the old version for the mod. I take full responsibility for that, and out of respect of the VA for GF (I'll mention them below) I won't put that up unless it goes live in game, which is uncertain at this time. (please don't ask either thanks)
• Both songs from Bob Takeover (Cutscene Ronsip and Ronald McDonald Slide). There's no way I could post them up here without having them removed in best case scenario or getting audio banned in worst case scenario because of the meme samples that were used and/or referenced. There's a ton, and because I respect Newgrounds I won't post them here. You can, however, find their official releases on YouTube and SoundCloud thanks to AmorAltra.

I do of course want to mention and thank a few people who helped with the songs, and I encourage you to check out their stuff (links will be in their songs):

• Ohyaholla, Bluskys and Amor for creating the amazing art that's on the discs and in each song. Seriously, it's so good.
• Every VA that allowed me to use their voice for vocal samples (MiniShoey, Seabo for Bosip, Mango for Ash, AstroSquid for GF). I hope that the voices sound good and the beats sound better :)
• My fellow partners in music, @DPZ0 and @ArdolfGD. I'm glad to be making music alongside the both of you, and man the stuff we have planned lol
• Amor and the rest of the B&B team - thank you guys so much, you guys are some of the best people I've met online.

Newgrounds Audio Death Match

I want to give a huge thank you to everyone who came out and auditioned this year for the NGADM! We had just under 130 qualifying submissions and 64 great people moved on to the next round. Because we had to ensure that our scores were solid, the submission time period for the first round was pushed back a day. You can find the updated schedule in the rules post and I wish luck to all 64 competitors in the main round!

FNF Stuff

Terrance

Recently, @JRetiroX released quite a few sneak peeks of the mod! There's some that include sprites that are being worked on, and there's one that includes a look at one of the songs. You can take a look at the most recent update here!

Elanor Takeover

Things have been going really well with Elanor Takeover on the music side, and the mod is coming along pretty well! Me and @RetroUpgrade are still looking for people to hop on and help, such as an animator, sprite and background artists, and a coder/compiler. Feel free to PM me or Retro if you're interested!

???????

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEEEEE

Bob & Bosip

There's a brand new update coming out for Bob & Bosip tomorrow at 3pm EST! This new update, called the Expansion Update, will include two new weeks (none of them are Week 2 ;) ), a fresh new UI, and of course new music. Similar to the original release, the songs that I made will be put up here on Newgrounds, except for one that I'll talk about when the mod releases.

If you're impatient and want to know what's in the mod, tonight you can tune in to UniqueGeese for an early access showcase of the mod! There'll be a pre-show and pre-party at 6:30pm on his YouTube and the mod showcase will be on his Twitch at 7pm (both EST). You won't be able to see it afterwards until its release, so come in and take a look! More info here.

If you're even more impatient, you can find a preview of one of the songs on Twitter. Whose Twitter?

...yep, I did indeed cave into pressure and made a Twitter account lol. To keep away from the side of the internet that is, well, Twitter, I'm not gonna use it as frequently as I use Newgrounds, and I'll make sure to post and share wholesome things only. It's over here if you wanna follow it, and I'll include it in my links eventually as well. I'll be sharing things from other projects too!

LOOONG post ahead, I needed to talk about a lot so buckle up lol.

Newgrounds Audio DeathMatch

We're currently almost 3/4 of the way through the audition submission phase with 107 submissions currently qualifying! There's still conversations with us judges that we might shift from 32 to 64 competitors for round 1, but I will keep all competitors informed on if that change will happen or not. If you haven't submitted yet and are wanting to, you still have a week to do so! Audition submissions end at 11:59 pm EST July 18, and you can edit/revise your current submissions up until that time. Check up on the previous news post for rules, scheduling and prizes; head over to the discussion thread if you wanna talk and make memes with other competitors; and submit your auditions over at the audition thread!

But what if I'm under 18 years old...?

The question has honestly been floating around for a bit from other users, and I haven't responded yet to it because I didn't have a solid answer. This year, the limit was placed for competitors of the ADM to be 18+ because of the cash prize. While there is a lot of good talent on Newgrounds from people under 18, the issue comes into play of giving said people money - it's not that we don't want to give money to them, but more from the fact that issues can arise if you give a minor a large amount of money (more likely around $200) without their parents knowing, some of those issues potentially being legal issues. I also didn't know how to implement a "anyone under 18 needs parent permission" system without having loopholes or potential backfires, so that's why the age limit was there.

That said, there was a tiny thought that came up from us judges about putting the same restriction on judges. We aren't getting payed for judging entries, but rather we're volunteers who wanted to help and have good histories on giving reviews to audio and/or creating audio that shows some of the elements in action here on NG. The answer is still blurry, but as of writing this the one spot remaining is currently pending from someone who asked about it. If it opens, the discussions will continue and I will let you know about what it leads to.

With other ADM things, the prize pool is still open for donations and most likely will remain open until the final round - more details are in the rules post. Also, HUGE shoutout to this year's artist, @travsaus , for making this year's art that showed up on the NG frontpage! While I won't be posting the image here since I will only post it up for the different submission threads, you can find it here. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them in the discussion thread or send me a PM. If you're looking for other competitions, TaintedLogic will also be starting up the Newgrounds Underdogs Audio Competition soon, so be on the lookout for that in the audio forums too! (I'll be there to judge for it :D )

Originally, I planned for that to be the busiest and biggest thing I would go through this year. But on the same night that the NGADM Audition Round began, something else launched...

Bob & Bosip: Some Questions, Info and Other Stuff

A few hours before the beginning of the NGADM, a mod for Friday Night Funkin' (NEEEEEEWGROOOUNDS FOOOOREEEEVEEEEERRRR!!!) known as the Bob and Bosip mod released to the public. I worked alongside AmorAltra and a team of great developers to create a part of the OST for the mod, namely the Tutorial remix and Song 2 of Week Bob (also known as Swing). The night that it released... it blew up. There are currently a couple of videos from people who have played the mod that has hit over a million views, and the mod itself is sitting at over 50k downloads. I didn't expect the mod to go big, but dang it went big lol.

If you haven't played it yet, or if you don't know what the mod is, you can go download and see more information here! There's plenty of Newgrounds musicians involved with the project as well, so you'll be supporting them too :)

With all that blowup, though, I do wanna address a few things that haven't been asked but are bound to be at some point in time. Might as well take the time now to answer them before things get really hairy lol. As a sidenote, a lot of these also pertain to my other songs, but if you're in doubt you can always ask.

Q: Can I officially release your song on-

A: NO!

NO!

No.

no.

Why not? Simple answer: it's not yours and you don't have permission. It's about as bad as creating merchandise for a large intelectual property (say, a well-known TV cartoon series) without consulting and getting permission from the company that made the property. Not only are you taking something without permission, but in most cases you have the option to make money off of that stolen work, which is a huge nono in any industry. Please do not officially release the two songs - or any song from the OST, for that matter - without permission. And no, I most likely will not give permission for an official release on a platform even if you ask nicely because I don't wish to give that permission to just anybody. There is one person who I have given permission to upload the songs on YouTube; more info on that later. And no - it isn't just me with that mindset; quite a few of the other B&B musicians have the same idea. Don't believe me?

NOTE: Loops, music videos and anything of the sort count as an official release!

Q: Can I use your songs on a large project (i.e. animation, game, etc.) or something that will be monetizable?

A: Please contact me to discuss the details. If you don't do that, the answer is a guaranteed no. Mainly, I want to know a) what the song will be used for, and b) what the context is that the song will be played in; while my songs are free, I don't want them floating around for anyone to just use especially for larger and profitable content. 90% of the time my answer will be saying yes and giving written permission to use and credit the song; however, I can say no if I feel uncomfortable with what it's used for and the context of the project (if I do, I'll make sure to include a reason when I say it and not just say "no have a nice day").

NOTE: General YouTube videos (other than official releases) and Twitch streams do not fall in this category, but rather the next one.

Q: Can I use your songs for anything else not mentioned above (general YouTube/Twitch streams, reaction videos, talk videos, remixes, etc)?

A: Short answer: Sure! Just make sure you give credit.

Long answer: As long as the project doesn't fit into any of the above items, you can use it for whatever you wish! You don't have to ask me for permission, but you can let me know if you want - I'm always interested in finding out where it goes and how it's used. That said, though, please make sure you give credit somewhere in the content or its description. By credit, I mean including the song name, artist (Splatter, Splatterhead, SplatterDash, whatever you feel like for it lol), and a link if possible. For example:

Song Name: Swing (Instrumental)

Artist: Splatter

Link: https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/1048005

As long as those three things are included (or two if a link isn't possible), you can use it for smaller things like background music for YouTube videos, Twitch streams, Discord calls and anything else. You also have permission to remix it if you want!

Q: What if I use your songs without permission for things where I need it?

A: Well, first is a message from me asking to either remove monetization (if you have it on) or replacing/removing the song. If there's no compliance, then the flagging/reporting of the content starts up. That should be as far as I need to go, but I can and will go further if needed.

Q: Where can I find official releases of the two songs?

A: Here on Newgrounds, you can find the official releases of Swing, the Instrumental of Swing, and the Instrumental of the Tutorial remix. Becuase the Tutorial remix ripped the vocals from the original Tutorial, I chose not to upload the full tutorial song since that most likely goes against Audio Portal Guidelines. On YouTube, I've given AmorAltra permission to upload the full versions of Swing and the Tutorial Remix to his account. The Swing video is a standalone, but you can also find it with the Tutorial remix in the full OST video. Other releases - including those songs being found on another platform and the release of future B&B songs - will be announced here as they happen.

Q: I got another question or I'm wondering about something...

A: Feel free to PM me! My inbox is always open if you have questions or wanna clarify something.

More Funkin'

Other than week Bob, there's more that have been in the works for a bit. For starters, the Bob & Bosip mod is far from finished. The whole team has a lot of ideas that we wanna do, and while I can't tell you about much of them, just know what we're making is gonna be something unlike any mod out there so far :D

Besides that, I've also continued working with @JRetiroX on his mod, VS Terrance! There's been plenty of things going on with the mod, and you can find a small bit of it in the first update here. I'll also mention that we're looking for a programmer for the mod, more info here!

Also, I'm working with my friend @RetroUpgrade for the music on his mod, Elanor Takeover! Things are going well there, and there's help needed too. Anyone who is interesting in animation, art cleaning, and coding can find more info on his help thread here!

Yeah, between the different FNF mods, the NGADM, and a few other IRL things, I've been keeping busy. Luckily, with the mods I'll be able to create and release some good music this year. I'll also see if I can squeeze in a piece or two that isn't FNF related to break the cycle a bit. But ye, that's what's been going on with me, and I'll see if I can keep posted on things!

*PLEASE NOTE: Unless otherwise specified, all rules are in place for all rounds.

Below are all rules, schedules and prizes regarding the 2021 Newgrounds Audio Deathmatch (NGADM). Please make sure that you understand the rules, as by entering you agree to be held by them.

General Rules:

1. To enter, you must either: a) be a scouted Audio Portal musician here on Newgrounds, or b) be eligible to be scouted here on Newgrounds's Audio Portal. If you are unaware of what scouting is or how it works, please refer to this guide.
2. You must follow all guidelines outlined in the Audio Portal Guidelines in your submission.
3. You may only submit your own work from the Newgrounds Audio Portal. Works submitted from Soundcloud, Spotify, Apple Music, etc. will not be accepted, and neither will work from your friend made on your behalf.
4. Your work must be original - which means that you should stay away from recognizable hooks and/or memes (sorry).
5. While we do not have a solid limit on song length for each round, we do suggest (especially in the audition/early rounds) that your song is between 2-6 minutes. This allows a good amount of time to develop an idea while still being engaging with a large quantity of other songs.
6. You may submit a song that pertains to another competition, provided that it follows both competitions' rules.

For the Audition Round Only:

1. You may submit any covers, mashups, remixes, VIPs, loops, or any work started before the beginning of the round.
2. You are not allowed to submit anything that is considered a MIDI rip and/or stolen song, as per the Audio Portal Guidelines.

For All Rounds After the Audition Round:

1. You may not submit any covers, mashups, remixes, VIPs, loops, or anything that is not considered original work.
2. You may not start on a piece for the next round before that round officially begins.
3. All members who were close to entry into a round will be considered "backups" and become part of a backup pool for that round. In the case that a main competitor drops out or DNSs, a backup will be placed in their spot if there are any available.
4. If you DNS or drop out of the competition, you will not be allowed into the backup pool and will not be allowed re-entry as a competitor.

Regarding Teams:

1. If you wish to participate as a duo or band, every member must actively take part in every round. Tag teaming is not allowed.
2. If participating as a band, it is recommended that the producer remains consistent.
3. If a member of a team/duo decides to drop out, they are unable to rejoin the team/duo and the rest of the members may choose to continue without them.

Schedule:

1. Unless otherwise noted, all timeframes will begin at 12:01 AM Eastern and end at 11:59 PM Eastern on their specified days.
2. You may not submit a track after the timeframe for submission has passed. If the timeframe ends and you have no submitted tracks, you will be considered as DNS and a backup will fill your spot.
3. You may not start a track for any round until the round begins its submission timeframe.
4. You may not edit/change your track during the judging timeframe. If you wish to make changes during the submission timeframe, you may do so and notify the submission thread (in the case that judges have already judged your work).

EDIT: THE FOLLOWING SCHEDULE IS THE MOST UP TO DATE AS OF AUGUST 2. ANY DATES IN BOLD HAVE BEEN CHANGED FROM THE ORIGINAL SCHEDULE.

Audition Round Submission: June 21 -> July 18

Audition Round Judging: July 19 -> August 2

Round 1 Submission: August 3 -> August 16

Round 1 Judging: August 17 -> August 22

Round 2 Submission: August 23 -> September 5

Round 2 Judging: September 6 -> September 12

Round 3 Submission: September 13 -> September 26

Round 3 Judging: September 27 -> October 3

Final Round Submission: October 4 -> October 17

Final Round Judging: October 18 -> October 24

Judges:

The following people are on the 2021 NGADM Judging Panel:

• SplatterDash
• Troisnyx
• Spadezer
• User-Jacob
• AceMantra
• Glassedhouse
• The-Great-One

1. Any and all judges are not allowed to compete in the NGADM.
2. During the early rounds, the judges may offer feedback on pieces by request following the judging period; for the last three rounds, judges will be leaving reviews on each track.
3. If any questions arise on critique, please do not carry it outside of DMs. The judges are here to listen, but they aren't going to listen if you make the issue into a knockoff Twitter argument.
4. Please be respectful to the judges. Like you, they're human and have many other things to do in life as well.

Prizes:

1. Because this competition involves physical prizes, we must mandate that all participants are 18 years of age or older and are in a location that is open to US trade/shipping.
2. Please note that the prize list may be subject to change. If you would like to contribute to the prize list, make a Supporter donation and PM TomFulp to let him know you are donating to the NGADM prize pool.

It's currently empty in here... why not drop in a few cents in the Supporter donation tab?

Heyo! I'm proud to announce and make mention of the 2021 Newgrounds Audio Deathmatch competition, which is coming up on June 21!

For those who don't know, the Newgrounds Audio Deathmatch is an annual audio competition that pits users up against one another in tournament-style brackets and two-week time periods to compose an original song. Originally founded in 2010 by fellow audio user @Step, the ADM has brought many names throughout the years, including garlagan and F-777. This year, things are planned to get more intense as many new people have joined us from across the Internet, so be prepared for a great competition!

Prizes are yet to be completely determined. If you have a prize you would like to donate - or know of a company who might be willing to sponsor the competition - feel free to reach out to me through PM. Be on the lookout for more messages and updates later on as we get closer to the competition!