Adventure Game Studio

Game was released on Juli 1st, 2013. Announcement thread (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=48564).

Initial announcement:
Exactly one month ago I imported my first 2 sprites into AGS and made a character walk over the screen. Wow! Having no scripting or programming experience, I'm surprised, amazed, and proud about what I achieved in the last couple of weeks. Dedication helps. What started out as a simple test game, turned into a project I got completely lost in.

Update June 12th, 2013:
look at my post further down this page. (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=48170.msg636457913#msg636457913)


Story in one sentence
You're playing little Casper (around 5 years old), who's confronted with a dilemma.

(http://www.whalesplash.com/CrossStitchCasper/Announcement/130610/0.png)

As I'm absolutely incapable to draw a single decent looking line, I tried to cheat using cross stitching as a basis. The story/atmosphere is build around what I consider to be cliché attributes when it comes to cross stitching (if any of you love the fine art of cross stitching, I hope you won't be offended ;) ). So the graphic style actually determined the whole story/setup.

I tried to do something original, not going down the road of the usual topics used in Adventures. Don't expect jokes or any funny turns/twists, it's more of a sad/dismal environment.

(http://www.whalesplash.com/CrossStitchCasper/Announcement/130610/1.png)

(http://www.whalesplash.com/CrossStitchCasper/Announcement/130610/2.png)

(http://www.whalesplash.com/CrossStitchCasper/Announcement/130610/3.png)


Progress

Story/Puzzles: 100%
Graphics: 100%
Sound: 100%
Scripting: 99,9%

Looks brilliant san.daniele, a very charming style and totally unique! I look forward to seeing how the story elements blend in, glad to see you're nearing completion :)

now that is a neat style. Looking forward to the game!

WOW!
What a brilliant idea for a unique style!
... and it looks very good - bravo!

               (http://www.smileyvault.com/albums/userpics/12962/cool_thump.gif)

Will you do "real" animation using this style, too?

What a great idea.  All the best with this :)

Quote from: Tabata on Sat 04/05/2013 23:31:40
Will you do "real" animation using this style, too?

while I'm not sure I get 100% what you mean, you probably address the one big issue I decided to let go.
Object animations stick to the grid of the canvas, but characters walk free. You can see on the screenshots that the characters are standing a few pixel outside of where they should stand in a perfect world. I was planning on making them stick to the grid as well, but that involves more scripting than I am willing (and/or able) to do right now. Especially as the canvas isn't following the same pattern all the time (every few grid units it's off by a pixel).
p.s. you might like to hear that there's a mouse in the game at some point ;)

Thanks for all the compliments, really gives me boost to work hard on finishing the game.

Quote from: san.daniele on Sun 05/05/2013 00:18:18
p.s. you might like to hear that there's a mouse in the game at some point ;)

YAY - animated AND mouse included!
Now you can be quite sure - it will be a really cool game! (http://s1.directupload.net/images/user/111225/kbyl39ns.gif)

I'll play it definetely!  :grin:

Unique is the word. Hope you pull it off and complete it!

Perfect. Really looking forward to this!

Cool idea!

WOW! I have no words ... It's a great idea!!!!!

Mesmerizing... very interested to see it and the animations :D Best of luck

This is a clever concept, and it looks great so far!

Looking forward to it!

This is one of the most interesting and original looking games I've seen for a very long time - well done!  I'll have to see if my wife catches the cross-stitching references, she enjoys doing it but personally I find it hard to understand how anyone can enjoy doing something so amazingly fiddly!!  (roll)

This looks totally amazing and original! I'm excited!

Can I ask how you did the art? What's your process?

Quote from: CaptainD on Wed 08/05/2013 10:42:12
[…] personally I find it hard to understand how anyone can enjoy doing something so amazingly fiddly!!  (roll)

you mean like … scripting/programming ;)

Quote from: waheela on Wed 08/05/2013 21:43:43
Can I ask how you did the art? What's your process?

The process isn't actually that big of a deal. I almost don't know what to write about it.
First I draw everything with black pixels onto a 100x50 grid. Then I transfer every pixel onto the canvas using a cross stitch brush. The canvas I did using a simple tutorial I found online.
edit: initially (you know, when the project was supposed to be a tiny and short 2-room game) the plan was to actually cross stitch the whole thing for real and use photographs. well … that's not going to happen! :D

Cool! The images look neat. Looking forward to seeing the final project! (nod)

I just can agree with the others. Great artstyle !!!
I'm looking forward to give it a try.

New Screenshots available (in original post (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=48170.0)).

It's been way too long since the announcement.
When I first announced the game, claiming it could be released in a week or two, I couldn't understand why some answered along the lines of "I hope you manage to finish this."

Well, now I know better. Never assume you're almost finished until you are finished.
Over the last weeks I redid all graphics, as the initial canvas had an uneven grid, which resulted in some graphics not looking how I wanted them to (mostly font-related).
Now everything sticks to the grid, thanks to some input from Selmiak all character animations/movements do as well.

At some point during the process I asked myself if this is how Vaporware comes into existence :)
Now I'm back on track in finalizing the game. There's still tons of small details that need fixing (and tons more will probably come up during beta-testing).
At this point I want to basically finish the game, as this took way too long for what was supposed to be a small first test game. I'm very happy with the overall concept, even though at this point I feel that the puzzles/dialogues lack love/quality. But I guess I have to draw the line somewhere and just ditch all the extra ideas I have for the game (and save the energy/time for the next project).

Wow, I totally missed this one. What an interesting idea, those screenshots look fantastic. I'm curious what your game will look like in motion.

Quote from: san.daniele
As I'm absolutely incapable to draw a single decent looking line, I tried to cheat using cross stitching as a basis.

You aren't cheating. What you are doing is a lot like 2-color pixel art, but even more awesome. :-D

Wow, that looks really authentic! Awesome work!

Game was released on Juli 1st, 2013. Announcement thread (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=48564).

Congrats on finishing!