AGS 3.3 Wishlist

[SuperDre]

How about splitting the gamedata from the exe, and create other runtime versions (for other platforms).. especially since there are more and more other devices out there which are great for playing adventures.. How about a runtime version which let's you select the particular game you want to play (or you can even do an 'Adventure'Store much like the AppStore/android market from within the runtime), have games in their respected subfolders, and even manage stuff like updates.

Starting with Windows/linux for setting up the whole framework would be great ofcourse.

Keep the editor for .NET only ofcourse, but the runtime multiplatform (well you already got a linux port).

Another thing that would be great (and has been mentioned on the board some times) is letting AGS become part of ScummVM (well at least for the older versions so they are playable on windows too instead of dos only)..

[Crimson Wizard]

Pleeeease, add zoom in slider to GUI editor, pleeeeease. I am half-blind from this goddamn computer already, and I have to bring my face close to monitor when aligning tiny controls for low-res games. Pleeeeease, I will be nagging until you implement this, oh Chris Jones. 

[Calin Leafshade]

Stop asking for things that are minor inconviniences!

Alpha channels damnit ALPHA CHANNELS!

[Dualnames]

Pleeeease, add zoom in slider to GUI editor, pleeeeease. I am half-blind from this goddamn computer already, and I have to bring my face close to monitor when aligning tiny controls for low-res games. Pleeeeease, I will be nagging until you implement this, oh Chris Jones. 

HAHAHAHHAHA....great laugh. Now seriously, a zoom would be perfect.

[Matti]

I support the GUI zoom slider!

[kaputtnik]

Just a very simple suggestion that might be easy to implement and probably useful to many people: When adding a new dialog option in the dialog editor, it shouldn't be added at the bottom of the list, but either at the top of the list or at the penultimate position.

Why do I suggest that? Well, when working with dialogs, you will be adding or removing options sometimes, but the last option will (for almost all conventional adventure games) always stay the "Goodbye" option. When you're adding things after it, it will move up and not be the last option anymore, and then you have to copy and paste all the stuff.

Of course, there is a workaround for that (just adding a dozen empty options and making the "Goodbye" the, say, 14th one), but it would be more elegant that way. And what would be even more elegant: Drag and Drop dialog options. But that's probably too much to ask.

[Ryan Timothy B]

Stop asking for things that are minor inconviniences!

Alpha channels damnit ALPHA CHANNELS!

I always get distracted by the shiny thoughts in my mind too.  Ooh how I'd love the alpha channels.  GUI's are half supported and are riddled with issues, they don't work like layers in a paint program whatsoever.  Or I just can't figure the bloody stuff out.

I've used a 32 bit background with alpha channel on the GUI like you're supposed to, and I still can't have a button with a shadow (alpha channel) that works properly.  It would definitely be nice to know if I'm just doing it wrong somehow.

[xenogia]

Here is a big one and hopefully it will be resolved, Calin I think you'll appreciate this.

"TOTAL ERADICATION OF SOUND STUTTERS"

[subspark]

Oh Here Here!! 

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

and I still can't have a button with a shadow (alpha channel) that works properly

You lazy so and so, just draw your own shadow!  Just kidding  .  I think proper implementation of any feature is only reasonable to desire (even if CJ has a massive backlog of fixes and features).  I definitely support getting everything that mostly works to work 100% correctly (alpha channels, d3d vs ddraw visual inconsistencies, etc) and then focus on enhancements to existing editor elements like gui zoom, characters visible in room edit and so on and then totally new features, in that order.

At some point I'd also like to see strings have a user-definable size (perhaps by adding functionality like New) as I recently ran into the 500 character limit no less than 5 times while making entries for a player-readable library utility.  Separating the content into multiple strings, while completely possible and hardly a chore, just isn't as quick and efficient as placing all the pertinent data into one string.  Even when trying to re-create something like a book it's easy to go past the 500 character per page mark, so dynamic sizing is what I'd like to see ultimately applied to most (if not all) of the hardcoded limits that users most frequently dabble with.

[Ryan Timothy B]

You lazy so and so, just draw your own shadow!  Just kidding 

Lol. 
Yeah it's so horrible that I actually make a second GUI just for the shadowed button, since the button moves around.  So yea, I guess there is still a solution but definitely not the most desirable.

[subspark]

I think proper implementation of any feature is only reasonable to desire

Agreed. I only wish alpha was fixed for the 3.2 release. <Sighs>

Sparky.

[xenogia]

For me the only things I want fixed for the next release are as follows:

* V-Sync Full Screen issues in Directx9.
* Sound Stuttering
* Scaling Issues in DirectX5.

If they were resolved and nothing else I would be happy.

[Dualnames]

and I still can't have a button with a shadow (alpha channel) that works properly

At some point I'd also like to see strings have a user-definable size (perhaps by adding functionality like New) as I recently ran into the 500 character limit no less than 5 times while making entries for a player-readable library utility.  Separating the content into multiple strings, while completely possible and hardly a chore, just isn't as quick and efficient as placing all the pertinent data into one string.  Even when trying to re-create something like a book it's easy to go past the 500 character per page mark, so dynamic sizing is what I'd like to see ultimately applied to most (if not all) of the hardcoded limits that users most frequently dabble with.

I've never had hit that limit, but a great number of entries for the guide, where not only 500 words, and if this as a little flexible I'd have less trouble to deal with.

[Peter Bear]

Hello everyone.

I admit I haven't read the 15 precedent pages.

May I ask for a "walk-to point" property for Objects
+ A "EBlock /  ENoBlock" property for the walk-to points ( hotsports and objects )
+ Sprite Editor : expand canevas ( vertical & horizontal size ), the inverse of cropping ... To work on sprite centering,  adjustment from AGS directly ...

+ as a linux user, something to get rid of the .net 2.0 framework ?


I haven't met anything yet, nothing worrying ...

[xenogia]

I would love a linux version of the IDE, it would mean I could get rid of Windows forever.

[Sslaxx]

I would love a linux version of the IDE, it would mean I could get rid of Windows forever.

Ditto.

So what would need to be changed/altered for the .NET IDE to work with Mono? Primarily System.Windows.Forms. I'm not sure if Mono has (yet) a functional-enough clone of this to work; certainly the version of Mono the beta of Ubuntu 10.04 supplies doesn't work with it. And then you'd need to deal with, say, the .NET bindings for Allegro and IrrKlang, maybe the C-script compiler as well. And the editor still uses, most crucially, C/C++ DLLs (AGS.Native.dll). So I'd say there's a fair few issues to be resolved before it'd be even thinkable. Not sure it'd be impossible, though it might easily be not worth the effort.

[xenogia]

I guess you could just continue to VM it under Linux.  For most part the latest development version of WINE plays AGS games perfectly out of the box.

[Sslaxx]

I guess you could just continue to VM it under Linux.  For most part the latest development version of WINE plays AGS games perfectly out of the box.

Yeah, a VM is a nice solution, that's what I do. And no problems with AGS-made games with WINE either (WINE 1.1.42). I'm not sure if installing the Windows version of Mono via WINE would help, but I've not tried it as yet.

[Monsieur OUXX]

Stop asking for things that are minor inconviniences!

Alpha channels damnit ALPHA CHANNELS!

Ooh how I'd love the alpha channels.

ALPHA CHANNELS!
The very last step between AGS and a full-featured, SUPER HIGH quality graphics adventure engine that would overcome Lassie, Wintermute, etc. :-)
(Please forumers don't start a conversation about the pros and cons of those other engines. Focus on the important message : A.L.P.H.A. C.H.A.N.N.E.L.S )