Topics

1

Editor Development / [Suggestion] Logging into AGS server via the editor.

« on: 12 Apr 2013, 21:00 »

Apologies if this has been discussed before and there are probably any number of reasons why it is a bad idea, but at the time of writing, I think this could work.  Then again, I would not likely one of the people who would have to programme it

Anyway, so AGS users would have the option of logging into the editor using their forum details (or maybe using their AGSer.me or AGSA account).  This could potentially provide any number of useful features and benefits, such as:
*being able to save/load games and WIPs directly to/from the AGSA server, from within the editor (of course this might mean giving Peder lots of money for hosting it )
*being able to upload a game to the games database at the click of a button from within the editor.
*the option to make files/source code public or keep it private (kind of like Google Docs)
*No more "What is a good site to upload my game?" threads
*many more I haven't thought of yet.

Obviously, this would be a massive job, but maybe something to think about for a more distant version?

2

Adventure Related Talk & Chat / AGS Game Ratings Drive

« on: 03 Apr 2013, 01:33 »

I've always been guilty of playing games and then neglecting to rate them in the database.
I notice I am not the only one. It's kind of dusty in there.

Well, no more!  I've just spent the past hour rating and commenting on 10 games which I had played but not rated.
You should do the same.
How about, over the next week, everyone takes some time to rate 5 or 10 (or more) games? If you're busy, do one a day for a week.


Now go... and rate.  Become a serial ratist!

3

Beginners' Technical Questions / (Solved) Displaying player score using my own variables

« on: 19 Mar 2013, 00:29 »

In my game don't want to use the in-built game.score/@SCORE@ system to display the scores because it complicates things I am trying to achieve.  I'd rather use my own variables.  The trouble is (unless I am missing something) I can't show the current value of a variable in a GUI label unless I do use @SCORE@.

I can show the values using Display, but that obviously comes up in a display box which pauses the game.  Is there a way for the score to be displayed constantly in the top corner, much like the normal score system but with my own variables?

I'm sure there's an easy way round it, but I'm going round in circles trying to figure it out

4

Critics' Lounge / Spot the Difference demo.

« on: 13 Mar 2013, 00:43 »

Hooray, I've finally made something on AGS!

About four years ago I made a Spot the Difference puzzle in photoshop and was planning to make it into an AGS game (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=36677).

Well today I actually got around to making a clickable version of that same puzzle, complete with a very basic scoring system.

I'm hoping to make a bigger game with at least 10 puzzles and a better scoring system (that penalizes you for false clicks).

Any critique and ideas will be gratefully received.  Thanks :-)

http://www.mediafire.com/?0d4edls30z0dksz

5

Adventure Related Talk & Chat / Status of the Double Fine Adventure

« on: 28 Feb 2013, 15:12 »

I'm starting to wonder what's happening with the DFA.  There have been no real updates for months and the last couple of videos were pretty depressing.  They had managed to go overbudget!  I must admit, I didnt see that happenning, considering they got 8 times as much as their target amount.  I think maybe the fact that they had literally not even started designing the game might have proven to be a bad idea, because they then started embarking upon a 3+million dollar project when we had in fact backed a 400,000 dollar project.  Obviously with that much extra money, you would have thought they could make a bigger and better game than planned, but of course they didn't have a game planned in the first place... so what should have been a lovely financial cushion, has just been a bigger budget nightmare.

Also, I'm not sure what I was expecting, but I'm a tad disappointed that Ron Gilbert has not appeared to have had any creative input on the DFA at all.  Obviously he has been busy working on The Cave, which I haven't played yet, but looks great.  But I think many people in the early days of the DFA Kickstarter campaign had been fantasizing about a Schafer/Gilbert adventure.  That's partly why I pledged (though I'm sure I would have anyway).  It was only at the KS countdown party, when Gilbert literally poked his head into the room, put a shoe on his head and then left the party to go back to working on The Cave, that I started to wonder what his involvement in DFA would be.  Once The Cave's release (and all the PR that comes with it) has blown over, Gilbert might actually join the DFA team.  I really hope so.

6

Editor Development / 'Undo' function that undoes more than one step.

« on: 20 Feb 2013, 01:14 »

I've often wondered why the undo button only lets you undo one step.  Is there a specific reason for this? It it something that has been discussed before?  (I'm guessing yes, but I couldn't find anything.)  It's never been a major problem for me yet, but there have been times when an extra few undos would have been easier.  I'm going to go ahead and suggest this for any future updated versions

7

General Discussion / Gameboy Advance

« on: 25 Jan 2013, 01:58 »

I've just picked up my old Gameboy Advance, which has been in a box in the attic for about 5 years.
I can't believe how much handheld games have come along in the past decade.  When GBA was first released I was AMAZED at the quality. Now look.

Who here owned/owns a GBA and what were your favourite games?  I loved Golden Sun.  Gorgeous game (until I got stuck and couldnt progress :/)

8

Site & Forum Reports / Private(?) forum threads appearing in the 'From the Forum' box on the website.

« on: 11 Jan 2013, 13:26 »

I just tried clicking on threads entitled 'Pick of the Month' and 'Adv-X Post Mortem' from the Community page of the site, but was swiftly told 'Bugger off, it's none of your business!' or words to that effect.  I'm assuming those are private threads for the people organising the Pick of the Month and Adventure X, so maybe there's a way to stop those threads from appearing in the 'From the Forums' box.

9

Adventure Related Talk & Chat / Adventure Crossword

« on: 02 Jan 2013, 20:00 »

I've spent the afternoon making an Adventure/AGS themed crossword.  It's pretty easy, but I'm pleased with the outcome and hope some of you will have a go at it and let me know what you think. Enjoy

Here's the link:


[EDIT] Here's an INTERACTVE version courtesy of Khris.  Thanks man.

10

The Rumpus Room / 3000 posts? Where did they come from?

« on: 11 Dec 2012, 20:28 »

Just realised that I have posted more than 3000 times     I wish I'd realised at the time, I could have made it more of an occasion.

Actually I'm kind of embarrassed about this See, the smiley says so. How little I've acheived in the nearly 6 years that I've been coming here on almost a daily basis.  It would be fine if I actually had some game credits under my belt, or at least got myself proficient enough with AGS to be able to help out in the technical forums, or good enough at drawing to be able to make comments in the critics lounge that might actually be useful.

I think I'm gonna ban myself from Rumpus and General for a bit and maybe spend more time taking part in contests and stuff. In the meantime if anyone has anything that needs doing for their game (testing or proof-reading, maybe some voice acting) then give me a shout. It would be nice to get my 'games I've worked on' list off the ground.

Cheers!

11

General Discussion / One Free Kill

« on: 21 Nov 2012, 14:50 »

If you could kill one person, knowing you would be fully immune from prosecution or any other legal ramifications, who would you kill?

This hypothetical question comes up once in a while, and I've been thinking about it a bit. I think it would be a great setting for a novel if it hasn't already been done, and I've been mulling over some ideas.  But as well as asking who you would kill (if anyone), I'm hoping to get a bit of a discussion going about the idea.

Things to consider:
Would everyone be entitled to use it or would they have to reach a certain age, social status or income first?
Should they have to apply for it first, or could they just kill someone and then use their 'free kill card' when the police turn up?
Would anyone even use it? As my sister pointed out, using your free kill is just going to make you a target of the friends and family of that person.
How would such a law affect population?
Should their be some regulations that the death must be quick, or even not to be performed by the applicant at all, but by a professional?
Should their be some system in place where people can buy or earn immunity from being the target of someone's free kill?
Would it actually make people kinder to each other (for fear of being targeted) and would this kind of fear-induced pseudo-kindness turn everyone into compliant oppressed robots or would people quickly turn against the government and revolt?

Anything else you can think of apart from the obvious fact that the whole idea is inhumane and ridiculous and would almost certainly result in civil war

12

General Discussion / Disney buys Lucasfilm!

« on: 30 Oct 2012, 21:10 »

Crikey!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20146942
So Disney have bought Lucasfilm for $4.05bn and have confirmed there will be an Episode 7 of Star Wars in 2015!
Wow... I guess this means that Disney now own a ton of our favourite Adventure games.  :-/
I always claim to hate Disney, but I keep forgetting they also own all my favourite things, such as Lost, The Avengers, and now Guybrush?

13

General Discussion / NaNoWriMo '12

« on: 27 Oct 2012, 15:53 »

It's that time of year again. Is anyone planning to do NaNo this year?
If so, what are your intentions? Or are you just going to tap the keyboard and see what happens?

I'm still mulling over some ideas, but can't settle on anything.  But it's likely going to be loosely based on my time in Japan with some surrealist/fantasy elements.

14

Competitions & Activities / The Beach - Fortnightly writing competition - Deadline August 13.

« on: 29 Jul 2012, 00:26 »

Summer is here and my only trip to the beach probably this year has ended in ugly peeling sunburn.

'The beach' is the theme for this contest. Interpret it how you will.

Rules - there ain't no rules.
Voting starts midnight (bst) on August 13th.
Have fun :-)

Trophies:
Gold^* =
Silver^** =
Bronze^*** =

^{*yellow  **grey  ***brown}

15

Adventure Related Talk & Chat / Another Kickstarter. Al Lowe (again) - Undercover Exposure

« on: 30 May 2012, 23:42 »

So Al Lowe has caught the Kickstarter bug and this time he's back with a new project.
Steve Ince is also on board, which is excellent news.

The game is called Sam Suede in Undercover Exposure.

At first glance it looks quite a bit like Kinky Island.  Hope you've got a good lawyer, Mods.

16

General Discussion / Game rage

« on: 25 May 2012, 00:12 »

Do you get angry over video games?

My housemate spends most evenings downstairs playing Gears of War and Tekken and all you can hear is him shouting "Fuck off!... Fuck off!... Fuck Sake man! Fucking stupid cunt!"  And it's not just the odd one every few minutes. It's constant, over and over again for hours at a time, whole evenings in fact.  Sometimes he gets really angry and you can hear him banging the sofa or something.  Nothing tooo bad, no fists through walls or broken control pads... yet.  But it's annoying and has been going on at least 4 nights a week since we moved in together in September.  Some days are worse than others, like today, hence my writing this. Fuck knows what the neighbours must think.

I tell him he shouldn't play games if he doesn't enjoy them. He insists he enjoys it, but it doesn't sound like that.  He must have some severe pent-up aggression going on.  I'm not exactly the most laid back guy on the planet either, but compared to him I'm cool as The Fonz.

How about you guys?  Do you let games wind you up this much?

17

Adventure Related Talk & Chat / Al Lowe and Jane Jensen jump on the Kickstarter bandwagon.

« on: 05 Apr 2012, 01:54 »

Krikey, they're all at it.  Yesterday I noticed that Al Lowe is turning to Kickstarter to help fund the Leisure Suit Larry remakes (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1451923705/make-leisure-suit-larry-come-again), and then today it turns out that Jane Jensen is using it to fund her new game studio (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1005365109/jane-jensens-pinkerton-road-2012-2013-csg), which sounds more like a dodgy adventure game time-share scheme.

18

General Discussion / Thinking in the shower.

« on: 03 Apr 2012, 11:45 »

People have been known to do some of their best thinking in the shower.  Songs have been written, film plots have been conceived, problems have been solved, world peace has been acheived... well, I'm sure a few people have come close.

Just now I managed to write a poignant fairy tale and also to sing myself into a fit of hysterics.  Pretty successful shower.

The story was thus:

There once was village full of people who loved pie and chips.
One day a pie merchant rode his cart full of pies into the village.
But the villagers turned it away because they wanted pie and chips,
so the pies were taken to the dump.
The next day a chip merchant rode his cart full of chips into the village.
But the villagers turned it away because they wanted pie and chips,
so the chips were taken to the dump.
All the hobos at the dump cheered, for there was pie and chips galore,
while all the villagers died of starvation.
The End.

And the song (which I'm seriously considering entering for the Eurovision Song Contest) was thus:

(to be sung in a crooner style)
I love pie.
I love chips.
A moment in the mouth,
A lifetime on the hips.
Meow Meow Moew.
I love chips.
My lovely lovely
lovely tits.

Please share your moments of shower genius.  Thanks.

19

Adventure Related Talk & Chat / Treasure Adventure Game

« on: 27 Mar 2012, 22:23 »

Has anyone played this free game yet?


I saw a link to it on Twitter yesterday and decided to give it a bash.  I also noticed today that GOG.com are also hosting it in their selection of free games.

I started playing it last night, but it actually caused my shit laptop to overheat and crash, so I might not have a chance to play it for a while, but the tiny bit I did get to play looked really nice.  So check it out if you haven't already.

20

General Discussion / first

« on: 04 Mar 2012, 13:54 »

first