MAGS August: "It's Summer!" (VOTE)

[Mandle]

Oh wow....WOW!!!

Sooo many potential entries!

Go guys...GOOOO!!!!

Chicky: Great to see you around! Your name actually came up when I met with Stupot, Cat, and Raeff back in spring for Hello Kittens. You were mentioned as one of the top AGS males often mistaken for female based on name, avatar, etc. I think you came in placed just under AprilSkies...

Ponch: I can't believe I'm hosting my first MAGS and such a long-time AGSer as yourself is potentially in the running!!! Your name also came up at Hello Kittens when we found a tiny little cow knick-knack in a store. It had a cute little bobble-head!

vertigoaddict: I cannot wait to see what you come up with! All Gone Soon was one of the most memorable short games I have played. It said so much about relationships in such a brief time. It also taught me that having your characters' backstories fully fleshed out can give them so much more depth even if they are not mentioned directly all that much. I really felt like your characters had full lives outside of the game itself. Please complete AGS2!!! (hahaha only just now realized the acronym....heeeeeey...is that an on-purpose easter egg?!)

WHAM: "I'm on a boat!"....ahhh but for how long I must wonder! Looking amazing! MUST PLAY!!! MUST DROWN IN LOVELY PIXELS!!!

PlayPretend: I've already said it and Ponch also mentioned but...please get your game finished because the art style is something I want to see more of while I'm immersed in your game...

Oh, and I just realised that, given the theme, these could be some of the most immersive AGS games of all-time... (ouch)

[Chicky]

Heh I feel like a celebrity Mandle I've not heard of this 'Hello Kittens' - sounds fun! Count me in if you have another meet up

I don't think the female avatar helps my cause.

Quick update: First puzzle tree is designed and a large portion of the graphics have been completed. Will be putting together the first puzzle in AGS tonight.

[Mandle]

I've not heard of this 'Hello Kittens' - sounds fun! Count me in if you have another meet up

Oh...It was a quick throw-together kinda meet-up where cat and Raeff were coming on a trip to Japan and so myself and Stupot met up with them for a day out in the country...

In fact myself and Stupot are heading out on Thursday on an adventure that might just land us in jail...

Stay posted!

[The Great Underground Empire]

Thanks Mandle and Vertigoaddict!  I'm super excited at how many people are joining too, and all of your art looks awesome!   This is gonna be a great competition!

I work outdoors for a living and I'm sitting inside right now while rain pours down, making the game on my laptop.  Woo creative momentum!

[Mandle]

I work outdoors for a living and I'm sitting inside right now while rain pours down, making the game on my laptop.  Woo creative momentum!

I love being inside my home while it's pouring down rain outside...It's even better if there is thunder and lightning and I don't have to go out anytime soon...

[Mandle]

I don't think the female avatar helps my cause.

OMG don't you ever EVER change that avatar!!!

I have watched that thing for minutes at a time!!!

[Chicky]

Haha Mandle, how can you be sure it's not designed to hypnotise you!

Here's a shot of what i'm working on.

[WHAM]

Ooooh, Chicky, that looks nice! Though, with my recent internet experience, I expect to see an easter-egg dickbutt ascii image there somewhere...
I found a flaw in my map design that forced me to do a bit of a re-design with the placement of a large number of objects and hotspots, so a minor setback and a couple of hours wasted there... Back on track now!

EDIT (to avoid doubleposting): Holy heck! It's been a week! I need to haul ass with this thing! Currently working on the games intro and outro cinematics and related events. Lots of sprites still to add and I haven't even got a single puzzle coded yet.

[Gurok]

Hi,

Not sure where to post this. (Perhaps we should have a thread for administrative MAGS things like this.)

There's a general usability issue with the current mags-competition.info site. It seems for entries after about 2013-05 or so, the PHP to open a popup window generates a "self.close()" in the script inside the window. This has the effect of immediately closing screenshot windows after they're opened.

---

Chicky's entry has me puzzled. I am wondering whether that's dynamic, and if it is, I'm in awe

[Chicky]

Overlay's and alpha channels Gurok, the crt warp and text are baked into the background image, there's a few fun screen glitches that are pre-rendered. There's not much fancy coding going on though

Thanks for the kind words WHAM, i'm excited to see a new release from you

*Edit: Just noticed the competition runs until the 5th September! That's excellent news, I forgot we started late.

[The Great Underground Empire]

Fffffffffffffffffffffffffffffish!  Feeling the clock pressure already.  Saturdays are my one day off and out of nowhere friends have been mobbing me to do stuff on my longest creative free-time days.  Plus my writer-brain is going crazy trying to overcomplicate the plot and see if I can make it "better", i.e. longer.  Off early today, so spending the rest of the day doing nothing but game!

Hope y'all's projects are going awesome, I BELIEVE IN YOU!!!

[Mandle]

I BELIEVE IN YOU!!!

AS DO WE IN YOU!

Best of luck with your writer's-brain. A more involved plot is usually a great thing. Just don't let that brain paint you into a corner time-wise

Of course there is also the option to just release the game at a later date as a non-MAGS, but I think this is also a trap that many people fall into. I know I do. The trap being that once the time limit goes away the game usually just becomes another one of their unfinished projects and never sees the light of day.

Some people do manage to release their "MAGS" games at a later date and in a highly-polished state: Crankosaurus being a great example. But I would imagine that they are in the minority.

So yeah, everyone GO-GO-GO!!!

We are about half-way through the time-limit with still half to go so don't nobody start panicking just yet!

Not until I say so anyways...

[WHAM]

I've been taking the idea of "Ensure that the beginning and the end work, and then fill up the middle-part" to heart.
I've finished the intro cinematic for my game, and am just about done with the endings as well. Next up is some fine-tuning, music picking and then to add as many puzzles and gameplay elements as the deadline will allow!

Making the ending first also has the upside that it ensures I won't start to add more stuff to the story, since I already have a concrete endpoint for it, so I've got that going for me...

Here, have another pic while we're at it:

[Chicky]

Guys it's the 20th! We only have 16 days left to finish our entries!

I leave for Norfolk on Monday so I only have 8 days, eek!

Luckily today I took a day off work to code

[Mandle]

Luckily today I took a day off work to code

Did you call in and tell them in a very nasally-congested voice that you "hadda code"?



I think I may have just won the internets for today!!!

[selmiak]

Luckily today I took a day off work to code

Did you call in and tell them in a very nasally-congested voice that you "hadda code"?



I think I may have just won the internets for today!!!

*signs*

made my day

[Chicky]

Give this man the internets! Haha, Mandle i'm going keep that one in my bag of tricks for next time

[WHAM]

Halfway point, ladies and gentlemen! How's progress?

I had a bit of a realization: I've drawn a bunch of graphics, made cool cutscenes (intros, outros etc) and I've been using a ton of time picking out music and sound effects and making cool, but ultimately pretty useless, details in my game world. I have no game so far... Not a single puzzle, not a single proper game interaction. All I have of the actual GAME is a flowchart mapping out puzzle progression. That's no good! I need to freakin' hustle!

Have a picture anyway. I'll get to coding!

[Chicky]

Well I've finally finished the first big puzzle mechanic, which I plan to reuse twice more with different graphics. I've finished all the audio for the intro section and have got most of the 'server' structures working in AGS. Currently trying to weave in more subtle narrative and make things a little less tedious, oh and I now have full keyboard control - Huzzah! I had a problem with my sprites being huge, but I was being dumb and have now fixed that thanks to Gilbert's help.

Your entry is looking great WHAM, I'm guessing these screenshots are cropped? Good luck with the puzzle implementation

How's everyone else doing? vertigoaddict, PlayPretend, Ponch? C'mon guys, don't give in to OROWC's temptation

*Edit: A couple of screenshots for those who've missed my updates on www.clicknpoint.co.uk



Seems I also crop my screenshots WHAM, LED screendoor looks awesome when I take a close up photo.

[WHAM]

Cheers Chicky!

Yeah, since the game is so small, I prefer to crop the images heavily so you guy's can't see all that I have too early.

Report in, everyone! How are your games progressing?