A Hard Day's Knight - Alpha download available! (28/5/13)

[KodiakBehr]

How have I missed this title?  I'm really excited to see how the story emerges on this one.  Adding it to the growing list of most-awaited titles.

[Jimbob]

So, five months on from the last post, and two months shy of this being a three-year project... it really shouldn't be, the game takes about 15 minutes if you know exactly what to do, but I prefer to just laugh at my own jokes and take my time... and it still doesn't feel *that* close to completion.

You can however almost play through from beginning to end without any bugs that throw you out, and there's only really one awkward coding thing left to do.  The rest is just spit and polish, dribble and time-wasting.  So, as some sort of inevitable deadline-failing gesture, I'm going to ask whether people want to endure listening to what is effectively myself taking the piss out of myself in the form of a point-and-click adventure that is about chess people, but rarely about chess.

Tomorrow, at noon (BST) because I have the day off, I will unleash it on here, an effective alpha test of the game that will take you from the beginning to the very last scene... which I will shroud in secrecy and not let you complete (not just because it isn't finished/designed/coded/panicpanicpanic)... it involves winning the game, and we all know how that works in chess... well, at least in principle.

I may also forget to turn debug off. But hopefully I will remember...

EDIT:
Alpha build here(~1Mb)

Half an hour early, and I've managed to beat a deadline!
Okay, really, why I've posted this, is because I've not let anybody play it really for a long time, and I feel I should.
I've left a few of the key bits out (the chess challenge, and the ending) as they are quite self-contained and (not coded yet).
Post here, or PM or e-mail, and you can get your name in the extended close credits sequence...

[waheela]

Hey Jimbob, just played your game and thought it was really cute! I loved the art style and concept!

I think I found one bug while playing:

• I got the love letter and went back to the other side. After watching the bishop go by on the stretcher, I went back to the chessboard and found I couldn't go back to the Westside no matter how much I clicked on it.

A couple thoughts/questions/issues that came up while playing. Disregard if you don't think they're relevant...

• It took me a very long time to figure out that I wasn't supposed to actually land on any squares of the chessboard as a knight/bishop/rook. I kept on thinking I actually had to play the game to get across the board instead of moving completely across. Kinda wish I could've played some chess and used some strategy.


• The bishop's hat blended in so much with the background that it was very hard to find. Had me stuck for a long time and kind of frustrated me when I found it. (Could've just been me being stupid though.)


• Are you planning on adding more frames to the walk cycle of the knight? I think it would look even more awesome with two more frames spliced in.

Overall, really enjoyed the game! Really looking forward to playing the ending!

[san.daniele]

love it! was great fun to play.

I got stuck as well, I assume it's the same bug waheela mentioned. Standing next to the battlefield, I have Knight and Rook dresses but no valid moves for either of them … and not able to go back to the tent.

Up till now I think it was very well balanced. had no problems with the puzzles (and I usually do). enjoyed all dialouges and the artstyle is great. I have to disagree with waheela about the walking animation as I think the somewhat 'choppy' movement really fits the military parody style.

Looking forward to play the rest of it!

[Jimbob]

Thanks!

The lack of actual chess puzzles is a bit of a cop out on my part, for lack of a reasonable programming solution (that and the desire to simplify parts in order to get the game finished) to implement a working chess system. I hope to have something interesting for the challenge but it may also not be a conventional chess puzzle... :-)

I'm still tweaking the graphics here and there so I'll try and sort out the hat issue.  The walk cycle has bugged me a little, sometimes I feel like waheela, sometimes like san.daniele.  I may try an extra frame and see how it looks.

Thanks for playing.  I'll try to make the wait for the full thing not too long!

[Freidenker01]

Haha so fine! Looks cool. I like the look of the characters very much.