Well when Jake and I started, he emailed whoever owns GameFaq's. (I think it was CNet.) And got no response from them. He called IGN and left a message there with no response. Maybe once we got a site up we could email all of their mailbags and tell them what we are up to. I think IGN Cube would show some interest. Their editor Matt shows a general interest in all good games no matter what system.

It is very good and encouraging we got that response from SE.

We really just need a big site to get our idea out there. If we could get a spot on IGN or Gamespot or whatever that would be perfect. An interview I don't know, I'm not sure this is big enough, but that would be awesome. Maybe we could try to contact a magazine or two about it as well? They might be able to help us advertise in some way. Another place I just thought of was RPGamer.com. Once we get this a bit more organized (i.e. Get the site up) I'll try to email them. The specialize in RPG's so we should at least have a shot.

As I have inferred our biggest problem will be advertising. All it takes is one or two big sites and we could probably get most if not all of the 15 to 20,000 we need.

While it is unfortunate that you didn't get responses at that time, it is quite understandable as to why you didn't. Not only had you just started, but you didn't have anything to really back up your claims. With a website, and the petition ready for download; the project would have gotten far better notice. When advertising something like this; you need to build. Start small, and then, as you become more well-known and respected, go to the larger groups or sites for advertising.

I suggest we:
- build a website
- advertise on various forums
- advertise on smaller, yet respected, websites
- advertise on larger websites
- attempt to advertise in stores or other public locations.


I believe we need to ask around about a place to build a website. Someone might be able to help with that, afterall.

If you guys build a website, I can host it, unless you guys have something else in mind.

I don't have a problem with that, but I'm not very familiar with the whole hosting thing. So I guess we'll just see what Jake and the others say. I think we are wanting our own web address. like www.ctremakepetition.com or something.

But yeah good idea. With some time we could get the IGN guys to back us up. But like you said we have to get the word out.

Agreed. Having a ".com" would probably be the best thing. It is most professional, anyway. Of course, I think money is required. I say if it requires money... forget it. If we can get it without money though, we should do it. If we can't get a ".com", I suggest we take Davideo7's offer.

As for website building... I'm not the best choice. I know a little HTML and have looked a little bit into Java, but I do not know nearly enough to be of aid in the building of a webpage, let alone a professional-looking one.

We probably could find someone up to the task though. For the sake of a CT remake, I'm sure someone out there wouldn't mind helping with a website.

Domains cost about $15 a year. You guys could register for a domain and I could host the site itself, or Jake could host it also.

I own about 4 or 5 different servers, but I have someone else who handles the technical side of things. I'd much rather prefer that Dave host the domain, actually... As for the website itself, don't worry... My best friend's brother is basically one of the best web designers in the world... For samples of his work, check out www.RSJames.biz and www.2experimental.com.

We don't need anything as flashy as those though, so it shouldn't be much of a worry. I'll get him on this.

Apoc, I was just on the phone with a good friend and she actually suggested asking GameStop stores to talk to their customers about the petition and have a copy on-hand. I'm glad you came up with the same idea... I think we could make some serious headway like that if GameStop and other retailers cooperate with us there.

My thought is that the best way to do it is to have the physical petitions sent to a master address -- probably mine -- and I will take care of them until we have enough. At that point, I think the one large package would be the best way to do it.

Apoc, should these "leaders" be representative of their respective regions? Theoretically since most of us live so far apart, just about everyone can be a "leader" for their area, you know?

You know, just the sheer fact that Jake made so much progress with a simple phone call just goes to show you how much S-E of America wants another Chrono game.

This is great, guys. Do you think that once we get the website up, perhaps we should open our own separate forum dedicated to the petition and nothing else?

I'll send out the call for help on CTRP--there will probably be at least 20-30 active people there who have experience with creating logos, title pages, and such.

By CTRP, do you mean CT Remake Project? Or our CT Remake Petiton? LOL... At the Remake Project's forums, they already know about this...In fact, isn't that where you came from? And I know Propogator is from there...

EDIT: I have GameStop's corporate office number in my phone now. Ironically, their central office is less than an hour from my house. So a meeting with their execs is not out of the question... I will call them later today and talk to them about the petition. Fortunately, we now have some serious firepower just in the two words "Square Enix" since we have their cooperation now.

Jake, go tell ZeaLitY and the Compendium about it. I guarantee they will be FAR less likely to doubt us now that we have S-E America's support.

BTW, I was referring to the Remake Project, LOL. I like what Apoc suggested, calling ourselves the "Chrono Trigger Remake Petition Group", a.k.a. the CT RPG. The title is both funny, and factual.

Seems things are moving smoothly. You have a lot of connections, don't you, Jake-A-Roonie? Not only did you get S-E's support, but now you have a designer to build a website for us. Then to top it off, you just so happen to have access to a possible meeting with the Gamestop executives. Quite amazing.

Well then, I suggest that we get a basic website built. Whenever our "designer" is ready, I suggest we get started right away with that. Can't let time go wasting on us, afterall, we don't have the ability to traverse it. We don't HAVE to get one, but I think a seperate forum (once the web page is up and everything) might be a good idea. We would probably flood these forums with a bunch of CT propaganda otherwise.


As for the whole leader aspect, I get what you are talking about. Thing is, everyone couldn't be a leader. For one, these people will just be downloading and obtaining signatures for their petition... then sending it TO the leader. While they are important, they aren't exactly the ones in charge. They're more like the workers... sort of.


As for the whole C.T. R.P.G., I thought it was a little funny myself. It is just a name I threw out. I'm sure many other great names will be thought of for this group.

I don't think it will really matter if we flood this part of the forum. As long as it doesn't spill out into the rest of the forum, which I doubt.

Jake said he was going to see if they would distribute the petition for us. Which he and I both kinda doubt. He said he was going to try to call me and let me know what he found out, so I could go ahead and post it, but nothing yet. I'll post it as soon as I hear from him though.

Originally posted by Stoney

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Jake, go tell ZeaLitY and the Compendium about it. I guarantee they will be FAR less likely to doubt us now that we have S-E America's support.

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Believe me, the Compendium knows about it. I practically live there now. Their problem is that ZeaLitY believes a remake would spell the end of the Chrono series, as there wouldn't be any more titles after that. That's a completely subjective viewpoint, though, and is ultimately baseless. Yet, like a flock, most of the Compendium's population follows his lead without fail.

EDIT: I spoke with GameStop Corporate and they said this kind of matter needs to be handled through the HR department. Everyone in HR had already gone home for the day... I'll call earlier tomorrow.

In my mind, I can imagine how this could very easily snowball out of control if we're not careful. Jake, please don't be hasty--you should first make sure we have a finalized version of the petition to show the GameStop HR department. Otherwise, things could get messy: GameStop might advertise the petition, and suddenly we'd have a massive horde of impatient fans wanting to sign their names, yet there wouldn't be a finalized petition for them to sign.

Anyway, once we've gotten the petition finalized and have dealt with GameStop, I think our next target should be one of the big-name gaming magazines--they'll be perfect for advertising since they reach so many people. 1up.com might be our best bet--just imagine what would happen if the petition got mentioned in Electronic Gaming Monthly! Participant turnout would explode!

Hmmmm...

Stoney has a point there. Requesting Gamestop to show our petition, without actually having the petition ready could be a problem. What if they request to see it? It would be pretty unprofessional to just go to a "meeting" (of sorts) totally unprepared. While Gamestop support would be great to have, I think Stoney is right when he says we shouldn't rush in to it. We have far better a chance the more official we appear to be. With a website, and a MADE petition ready; we would not only seem more professional, but we would also have a far greater chance in getting what we ask for. In this case, lets build a website and the petition itself first. To complete the petition, we need a designer for the title page... and also we have to see if propagator would like to add to or edit his current statement.


As for S-E ending the Chrono Trigger series after a remake; how does that make sense? Wouldn't it be more like a rebirth of the series? The series obviously has many fans; so if a new game comes out... fans will likely want more. Wouldn't this thus cause more games in the Chrono series to come about? I think he is wrong; his opinions must be based on something however. I'd like to see where he gets this idea. I'm surprised Compendium follows Zeality so closely though. I guess he really does have a lot of respect in the CT community...

Originally posted by Apocalypse

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Stoney has a point there. Requesting Gamestop to show our petition, without actually having the petition ready could be a problem. What if they request to see it?

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"Yessir, actually the petition is still in its planning phase, but its verbage is nearly finalized and I can have a copy in your hands in less than a week." Remember, they only need to understand the concept of it in order to decide whether or not to cooperate. Then we give them a few hundred or a few thousand copies to distribute to their stores.

Originally posted by Apocalypse

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It would be pretty unprofessional to just go to a "meeting" (of sorts) totally unprepared. While Gamestop support would be great to have, I think Stoney is right when he says we shouldn't rush in to it.

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Agreed. Get me a copy of the final verbage of the petition (which shouldn't take long) and we'll go from there.

Originally posted by Apocalypse

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With a website, and a MADE petition ready; we would not only seem more professional, but we would also have a far greater chance in getting what we ask for.

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Good point, but also remember that they are used to dealing with games that are in progress; works that haven't yet been finished. PR in the gaming industry is about advertising what isn't done yet. I agree that the petition should be done before I walk into their building. But the website is not an absolute necessity...YET. A decent, professional design from my friend is gonna be about $100 or so. My money is going in all sorts of different directions right now, so I can't just slap it on his desk yet. Either some other people can put it together (though it probably won't look as good) and grab the server, or whatever. Anyway...

Originally posted by Apocalypse

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In this case, lets build a website and the petition itself first.

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Petition, then website, in my opinion. Propogator, how you coming on this?

Originally posted by Apocalypse

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To complete the petition, we need a designer for the title page...

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I believe I may have that part taken care of... Check out this document. Modify as needed. 18 spaces for signatures on this draft. What other information would be needed besides just a signature line? Anything?

Personally I thought I'd mention this stuff ZeaLitY's been saying, but I just wanted to mention it. The Compendium is already up in arms over it... Let's not add to the fire by discussing it even more over here...

It looks like it's a no go with Gamestop. He told me that they have a no soliciting policy, so we are going to have to think of a different way.

As I said earlier, perhaps we should try advertising in one of the big-name gaming magazines. Our best chances of doing so would be through a website or forum of some kind. That's why I suggested Electronic Gaming Monthly -- they have built some VERY close ties to the forums and website at 1up.com. If we go to the 1up forums and tell everyone there about the petition, it might get mentioned in EGM and possibly Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine as well.

I posted the following at the forums at Chrono-Trigger.com. Pasting it here for you.

Originally posted by Jake-A-Roonie

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Glad to see that the word has spread.

I agree that we need to light a fire under Propogator's proverbial butt before ANYTHING else. We have potentially thousands of graphic designers at our disposal, so there's not a solid "need" for them at this point. But in regards to that to-do list Apoc made (and by the way, I'll paste the remainder of this post at Vizzed as well):

Originally posted by Apocalypse

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- Create seperate *OFFICIAL* website for the petition.
- Designate leader(s) (as of now, no doubt in my mind that Jake-A-Roonie should be one).
- Select shipment method.
- Begin "advertising" the petition.
- Create petition "title page".

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Official website: If anyone wants to purchase a domain like www.chronotriggerpetition.com or www.ctremake.com or anything like that, we could have a starting point there. After that, the title page will be a snap.

Designate leaders: I'll leave this task delegated to Apoc, as he seems to have a more firm grasp on it than anyone else.

Select shipment method: The more I think about it, the more it makes sense for leaders to mail the completed copies to my PO Box, and then I can manage them and keep a count of them from there. Speaking of counting them, I also would ask the following be done to petitions before shipping them to me: Some pages may have all blanks filled, some may not... In either case, write the number of how many signatures are on that page in one of the top corners where it can be easily seen for tallying. Just a minor note.

Advertising: This is a continual task that is already underway. Slashdot is a must, if we want an explosive start...and we need to be on Slashdot by August 22nd (the CT 10th anniversary)... That is 4 days from now. Anime and comic conventions are also good sources. If you know anyone in the business or people who would be event staff at such an event, get them in on this so that you might be able to publicly promote or solicit the petition at the event.

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Now in regard to Stoney's post, I'll be the first to admit that I'm clueless when it comes to getting through to magazines. Is there anyone here who is more knowledgable than I am on that? I'm just bogged down lately, and I don't know that I can handle the magazine thing on top of other stuff too right now.

Hmmm... I do not really know many methods to contact these magazines, other than mailing them. But they often don't read them. Magazines might be a little too high for us to start up with. We can't really jump ahead of ourselves, afterall. What we need to do is get a grounding in the gaming community before we start jumping on to magazines. In other words, we need to build a name for ourselves, get some hype going for our group, so to say. If we do not do this first, and then just attempt to contact these higher groups, we will surely be ignored. We need to spread some word about us. As I mentioned earlier though, we REALLY shouldn't do anything until we have the fundamentals set up. Those being the petition itself, and the website. I'm not sure where Props has been, but time is starting to waste. We need to get a response from him. Does anybody happen to know him personally? It might be a wise choice to contact him, if you can, so that we may actually get to work on other details. "Advertising" being one of them. I believe we still need an artist, correct? I really would rather you not have to spend all of that money for a title page. I KNOW there are talented artists in the CT community, so I suggest you make a simple request in one of the various CT forums for a designer. I doubt they would charge you; and it would likely still be quite nice regardless.


Hmmmm... I designate leaders? Hmmmm... well I suppose I won't deny that role. First then, we must define the role of "leader" here, in this project. So far I have seen two definitions, and I'm not sure which one you are really referring to. The first one being, the person or group who collects all of the signatures. Second being the person who obtains signatures in their general area, and then mails it to a certain address. The problem with the second is; they really aren't leaders. They are the "workers" here. I can't really assign them, as they are the ones who choose to help us (they would go to the web page, download the petition, and proceed to gather signatures). As for the first "definition" of leaders around here... I find that my opinion has changed somewhat. Unless multiple members of this group live in the same general area, there really can't be more than one leader. The leader would be the address we would be mailing to, afterall. If there were multiple leaders, things would just get disorganized. So now that I look over it, there really is one person who can be the leader. Quite frankly, the other CTRP members and I have not been part of this long enough to be considered for the role of the leader. That leaves two, really. J-A-R (hmmm... maybe a should nickname you Jar...), and MV7866 have really gotten this all started. It would make more sense for one of them (or both, if they live close to each other) to take the role. Makes sense to me, anyway. It would probably be best for you to discuss amongst yourselves upon who wants that responsibility.


Oh. As for the whole internet thing... that might be a problem. I am a programmer, and am pretty skilled in regards to most things dealing with computers. The only thing I really have no experience with in that field is ANYTHING in regards to building a website. Kind of pathetic, I suppose. If noone else around here can do it, I suggest we ask around.