AGS 3.0 Final - it's been a long road

[Pumaman]

As I understand it from your discription, this method will still work due to the backwards compatibility, but is somehow less than optimal? Should I rethink the feature if I want to guarantee compatibility with Vista and/or future versions of AGS? Obviously it wouldn't be possible to read/write settings to the registry from within an AGS game without the use of a plugin.

It should still work ok, it's just that Microsoft have indicated that the compatibility could be withdrawn in a few years time.

What I could look into is adding some sort of $SAVEGAMEDIR$ tag to File.Open so that you could write your own files to the save game folder (which would always be writable).

I don't own Vista, and I don't really intend to get it until absolutely necessary.

So that you can see what the Game Explorer is and what will happen in Vista if you enable it for your game, here are some screenshots.

First, the "Games" option on the start menu is what the user clicks to get to the Game Explorer:


Once your game has been registered with the game explorer, it'll show up like this:


If you supply a "Save games folder name" and turn on Save Game Screenshots and Enhanced Save Games in your game settings, then the player can right-click the game in the Game Explorer, choose "Saved Games", and get taken here:


where they can double-click a saved game to launch it.

[GarageGothic]

Thanks for the super quick reply and the elaborate description of the Vista features, CJ! The enhanced save game feature looks really, really neat. What will the sequence of savegames loaded through this feature be? Will game_start() be run before the savegame is actually loaded?
Also, just to understand how everything works - how does the game get registered in Game Explorer? Is this handled by the game's install program, or is it up to the user? Or does Vista register the game automatically the first time it runs?

What I could look into is adding some sort of $SAVEGAMEDIR$ tag to File.Open so that you could write your own files to the save game folder (which would always be writable).

Oh, that would be an excellent solution since it would also allow multiple users to each have their own game settings.

[Pumaman]

What will the sequence of savegames loaded through this feature be? Will game_start() be run before the savegame is actually loaded?

game_start will not be run, because a new game is not starting -- it will just resume from the save point.

Also, just to understand how everything works - how does the game get registered in Game Explorer? Is this handled by the game's install program, or is it up to the user? Or does Vista register the game automatically the first time it runs?

Look up "Game Explorer" in the manual that comes with beta 7, it's explained there. Basically you need to get your install program to run the game exe with a special parameter that registers it with the game explorer.

[lowesalex]

I thoght I won't see the day when I come back to the AGS community (your a grate bunch !).

Anyway to the topic:
I was searching and searching for the interaction editor?was it obselite or am I not finding it anymore(or did AGS turn only to scripting while I was away ).

Cheers Chris,keep up the good work!

[GarageGothic]

Thanks. The game_start thing can probably be worked around in some way (by adding some extra code to the on_event(eEventRestoreGame) script) - currently I write the RawTime to an external file in game_start to be able to monitor the time of the current play session across restores.

The help file (as always ) clarified things a great deal. I only have one last question - not necessarily to CJ but to any Vista users: Does Game Explorer display the entire content of the save game folder or only the actual save game files?

[SupSuper]

Ohhhh, really like the Enhanced Save Games.

Yeah, the Developer Website (and Game Description) are rather strange, since the Game Explorer asks you for that data, but then doesn't seem to do anything with it. Perhaps they'll use those fields in Vista SP1

Yeah I've read that the Game Description will be added later (probably because the current Games Explorer has no room for it :p) but the Developer Website link should work, since other games use it:

That's a good point. It will still work, but Vista does some "backwards compatibility" stuff involving creating a fake Program Files folder in your User directory and putting the files there instead, which is all rather messy. I'll have to think if there's an easy way to handle the game setup in this context -- perhaps I should move the settings to the registry.

Or you could just store it in ProgramData or AppData (the former for universal settings or the latter for user-based settings) like most games do. The AGS Game Utility could use a redesign anyways (post-AGS2.8 ) since it's become rather lacking and cluttered with time.

I thoght I won't see the day when I come back to the AGS community (your a grate bunch !).

Anyway to the topic:
I was searching and searching for the interaction editor?was it obselite or am I not finding it anymore(or did AGS turn only to scripting while I was away ).

Cheers Chris,keep up the good work!

The interaction editor has been removed in AGS 2.8.

Thanks. The game_start thing can probably be worked around in some way (by adding some extra code to the on_event(eEventRestoreGame) script) - currently I write the RawTime to an external file in game_start to be able to monitor the time of the current play session across restores.

The help file (as always ) clarified things a great deal. I only have one last question - not necessarily to CJ but to any Vista users: Does Game Explorer display the entire content of the save game folder or only the actual save game files?

It'll show whatever you stick in the Save Games folder.

Edit: Forgot image, d'oh!

[lowesalex]

I got that the ine interaction editor is gone in this 2.8 version,but what is the main reason?or(maybe I didn't get it)maybe there is an alterantive way which isn't documented yet.
I don't see a reason way I should use the scripting tab when wanting to make simple click and text newbie games while advanced scripters say grate editor go on.]
But as I said before I might be wrong so correct me if I am wrong .
In other words could thiere be in rooms > "room nubre >event editor 
a drop down columb which gives you the basic interactions ?
for example:I paint a hotspot  and click on events button then we see  three columbs ,one represents the interation name(which exists) the second is the drop down option and clicking the triangle shows me option like writing message ,animation,etx, and the last will be the scripting opton or alternative is the interaction editor  :

Thanks

[GarageGothic]

It'll show whatever you stick in the Save Games folder.

Thanks for clearing that up!

[SupSuper]

I got that the ine interaction editor is gone in this 2.8 version,but what is the main reason?or(maybe I didn't get it)maybe there is an alterantive way which isn't documented yet.
I don't see a reason way I should use the scripting tab when wanting to make simple click and text newbie games while advanced scripters say grate editor go on.]
But as I said before I might be wrong so correct me if I am wrong .
In other words could thiere be in rooms > "room nubre >event editor 
a drop down columb which gives you the basic interactions ?
for example:I paint a hotspot  and click on events button then we see  three columbs ,one represents the interation name(which exists) the second is the drop down option and clicking the triangle shows me option like writing message ,animation,etx, and the last will be the scripting opton or alternative is the interaction editor  :

Thanks

Well simple interactions should become simple lines in scripting.

I think the problem with the Interaction Editor was that it was becoming obsolete and very hard to update, so CJ scrapped it for now. Maybe we'll get a new one later. For now, interactions from 2.72 and former get converted to scripts in 2.8.

[Pumaman]

I was searching and searching for the interaction editor?was it obselite or am I not finding it anymore

Yes, the inteaction editor has been scrapped. I had a long, hard think about this but basically I felt that the Interaction Editor in 2.72 was too simple to really be able to make a game with, and that it gave a false sense of "easiness" of game creation to people who would very quickly come across something that it didn't support, and get frustrated with it.

I think the way forward is to have some sort of auto script-generating tool (maybe as a plugin) that works in a similar way to the interaction editor but it basically creates the script code for you.

the Developer Website link should work, since other games use it

Hmm yes, I see now. Perhaps it's like the parental controls and will only work if you have a digital signature (possible I suppose, to stop people hacking the game to redirect the URL to a porn site or something).

[lowesalex]

Thanks for explaining chris.
So before it becomes an official release change the tutorial only in the part to explain how to make a script.

[lowesalex]

Sorry but I just needed to let it out 
Where are the global messages?could thiere be a link to them,or even better when you click in the scrip lets say...on message 999 it jump strait to it so you can change it.

This is just a request but a frequent action in the game making process is to show text when using an interaction and  go to room.

Couldn't it be possible not having the interaction editor but these two tasks?

It could come in handy when you try to correct spelling mistakes.

[Pumaman]

Without the interaction editor, there's no point having global messages.

It's much quicker to just type:

Display("It looks like a door");

than to open up Global Messages, add a new message, type "It looks like a door", go back to the interaction editor, add a "Display Message" command, type the message number in.

[Recluse]

If you want a global string, you'll need to declare a new string in the top portion of your global script, export and import it.

I'm glad this piece of software is becoming more and more like a REAL programming utility. It's easier for those of us who program, and it introduces newbies to a very new idea.

[Sakkeus]

How hard would it be to add a possibility for 160 x 200 resolution?
I dream of making a AGI type game, with the traditional resolution.
EDIT: Sure I could use AGI studio, but then it wouldn't be an AGS game, and I couldn't live with that.

[Privateer Puddin']

we have the AGI plugin:

http://www.americangirlscouts.org/agsresources/AGS%20resources/plugins/ags_agi.rar

[Sakkeus]

Oh, thank you!

[ciborium]

The problems in my previous post (if you can remember back that far) have been addressed.


Currently, I have only one suggestion: 

Can you make the room editor resizeable? 
I run my desktop at 1280x1024 and the rooms I am creating are 1200x700. 
The current room editor window only shows a small portion of the image with a lot of wasted screen space. 

Example:

(Image was reduced to 750x600 to make it forum friendly.)

It would be nice to be able to expand the viewport to fit the red rectangle.

Edit: Nevermind, the viewport resized itself the next time I started AGS.  I assume that if I closed and re-opened the room editor it would have had the same effect.

Edit: It seems a lot of the tabs don't update until you close and re-open them.

[Pumaman]

Hmm, how did you make that happen? The pane should resize as you resize the main editor window, and it certainly does that for me...

[RickJ]

Is it intended that AGS2.8 will run on Win ME/98?  I got a error creating a default game when I tried the latest beta.   The error message mentions something about some NT thing not being present.  I'm on a linux computer at the moment so I can't quote the error exactly.   If it's supposed to run on ME/98 then I will gladly recreate the error message and post it here.