Background Blitz Suggestion List

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Anyone have any ideas for interesting backgrounds they care to share?  

I'm going to add the (modified) rules for the blitz here since they arent posted every time:

This is going to differ from the sprite jam in two ways. I think it would be better if we voted for the winner instead of someone bring picked out by just one person. So we'll have a voting period after the end of the period so people can vote on the thread.

And two, we'll have an ongoing list of topics on a thread that people can just post thier ideas on and we'll just pick one out of there. This gives people who don't always win or participate but have good ideas a chance to contribute.

The winner gets the satisfaction of winning by vote and we'll make a gallery of the winners backgrounds.

Mmm tracing over photos not allowed, this isnt enforceable but you'll live with your conscience if you do it.   Comp ends every other midnight Friday UK time, voting until friday night. New comp begins friday evening simultanously with votes. Votes tallied saturday morning. That allows about two weeks for getting stuff done and I hope more than enough time for voting.

[AlphaMole]

A hermit guru's mountantop villa

[Matt Frith]

A cheese factory with lots of cheese....and monkeys...lots of teh monkeys  

[Miez]

(a waiting room in) Heaven and/or hell

[Archangel (aka SoupDragon)]

A virtual reality world

[Rincewind]

A scene form a rock concert... Hehe...

[Squinky]

The home of the teenage mutant ninja turtles...

[AndersM]

a non-symetric room drawn in cartoon-style, but you still got to see that it's non-symetric, and not just an usual non-symetric cartoon-styled room...

[Jimi]

A Nazi war camp, with one rambo like guy in the background shooting theSHIT out of 'em!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

*Happy Now???* By the way thanx

[Squinky]

Gah! I think you could have gotten your point across with a few hundred less !'s....please edit it...

[earwigz]

I would like to see a cafe run by a herd of midgets.  Kind of like a midget social club, with all kinds of weird midgetty objects.  

[Barcik]

Only problem is that from this perspective everything will seem normal....

[|Alky|]

A Late-show style TV set.. :
Alright, this is a shameless attempt to get people to help out with the pilot program AGS TV show I'm making..
But it would mean the background blitz winner gets the added bonus of seeing their background used..

[Miez]

A rubber blowup doll factory gone haywire.

[Yellow is a Flavor]

A bathroom overrun with monkeys. A confused, skinny person's house. Maybe a gigantic empty room, with no purpose but to waste space.  A death scene taunting the player is always good, and I've always wanted to see Chris Jones' name spraypainted on the overpass of a highway in some obscure AGS game.

[Scummbuddy]

You dont see CJ Saves!  all over where you live in real life?

.......or was that JC Saves!....  

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Heh guys, can we stick to just the topics in this thread please? And I'm kind of hoping we don't get too many bizzare or sax and violins themes because IMO that isn't nearly as good as an unusual background idea, being as common as it is.

Some nice ideas here so far.

For those who don't get what sax and violins is, say it out loud a few times.

[Shattered Sponge]

I love miez's idea - would require creativity, but woudn't be to challenging for the no-talents among us in terms of actaully being able to draw.

I would like to suggest the studio of a musician who plays both the saxophone and the violin.

[MadReizka]

A server room, you know, lot's of computer server machines and cabels and other stuff. Could be nice.

[Shattered Sponge]

I think both I and Sylpher would have a very good idea of how to make that look...  BUT WHY?!?

[TheYak]

A worship site/altar for people who worship kitchen appliances.  

A house made out of your favorite lunchmeat.

What if the moon were made out of _______.

An asylum for rodents (hamsters in straight-jackets, that sort of thing).

The end of the world (in a dimensional sense or a 4th dimensional sense).

A landmark, city, famous person, etc. representing approximately where the particular AGS'er lives.

See?  No violence.. not too much sex (depending upon what the person draws, I suppose).  I have to grant that those topics are well covered throughout the forum by the overwhelming majority of males but really, I must wonder if you're in an on-line convent or whatnot with your steady opposition to both.  Not a personal attack here, just following the guideline of "everything in moderation."

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Hey, I really like those!

Reason for asking for not too much sex and violence is they are recurring themes and overdone, not to mention there isn't much you can do with them anyway. Its the Spingerization of art.

I'm not opposed to them, but I think people will come up with more interesting topics given the call for moderation(thats the word) in those two areas. I'm not looking for pink bunnies, but I'm not looking for BDSM either. I hope no one really has a problem with that.

[TheYak]

Any one of my topics can be readily adapted for Pink Bunnies AND BDSM.  

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Heh I really like the appliances thing. Lets do that unless someone objects.

[AlphaMole]

*idea*
A film nor amusment park
(ride the Bogart-a-tron!)

[Esseb]

I suggest using other resolutions some times plus colour restrictions when applicable to keep it varied.

E.g 320*200, 640*480 (instead of 640*400, yarr. Stupid resolution) or whatever old agi games had. We're old school anyway so why not go with the flow?

Still, we don't wanna keep miez out so a 1024*768 32bit colour restriction one of the months to please him (and us when he shows his entry) .

Edit: I vote for AlphaMoles Film-Noir amusement park idea!

[Miez]

I'm all for the Altar of Home Aplliances - sounds way cool. And I don't mind (read: like) doing lo-res, lo-colour

Edit: I like the film noir amusement park theme a lot as well! ("Inside the Casablanca house of horrors"). A bit like Grim Fandango...

[AlphaMole]

I agree with Esseb, I've never liked 640*400 personally. and I think it would be fun if there are some really weird restrictions in one.. like only purple tones.. or something odd like that

[scotch]

Well everyone would like to do something wierd, but there doesn't seem to be anything wierd that everyone wants to do.  By all means do it in purple if you like, but usually enforcing more rules just makes less people enter.

I'm fine with doing low res sometimes, but for me this is an ags game bg practice, so I'd rather practice withing AGS's limits than any random rules.

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Weird is not the keyword. Interesting is the keyword.

How about a bar after its been invaded by a group of rampant Alcohol Anon'ers?
or an ice cream parlour after its been invaded by a group of rampany Weight Warchers?  :o

[Miez]

And I thought no violins?

[evil(other pc)]

what if the "FRIENDS" coffee shop was run by carnies

What pessi's desk looks like

What m0ds would be mod of if cj hadnt made ags

sceens from mods last move (hence he dies)

G rated Porn (that will be hard)

What cj's bathroom looks like

What RON would look like if Tim Burton owned it

Just a few from me... what is this for again?

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

And I thought no violins?

Moderate violence.

How about a restaurant in space? Or  a mountain top restaurant is Tibet.

[Rincewind]

- The hideout for the worlds worst Superhero.
- A smiley playground.
- Hannibal Lecters kitchen.

Just some scenes that popped into my head...  

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Hm, would people be up for the film noir thingy?  

While I'm here, I might as well add some topics :

A pawn shop.
What the inside of your fridge looks like when the light goes out.
A haunted house.
The kitchen at pizza hut.
A school cafeteria just after lunchtime is over.

[Rincewind]

I'm certainly up for it. Film Noir-amusement park is a great idea.

[cpage]

It would be cool if,
After every 2 we zipped all the backgrounds up and gave em to the AGD Zine as a background package.
So people can use them in games if they like

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

In my opinion, there is already inta-game for that. The authors of the backgrounds are free to do whatever they wish with them, including submitting it to insta-game. Maybe not everyone would like to donate thier backgrounds, that's fine too. I don't think we can decide for them.

If you'd like to donate them to insta-game, or just mark them for free use by anyone while posting them, I think that might work better.

If anyone else has any thoughts tho...

[cpage]

"A landmark, city, famous person, etc. representing approximately where the particular AGS'er lives."

I like this one
It could be alot of fun

I vote for it


and about the agdzine idea

It just seems to me that the zine doesnt get any new stuff EVER
I still say its a good idea
if the the creater doesnt want it there they can say so when they post

[scotch]

I think I think the landmark thing is good because if people do want to use these backgrounds in a game then they're more likely to find something they want rather than if we all do an appliance worship site like now.. I think it should be more of a theme than an exact subject matter.

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Heh thats two votes for landmark and two for film noir. Although one of the film noir ones is a non-participating vote. Anyone else?

AGDZine, I'll talk to m0ds and see.

[TheYak]

Landmark for all the reasons stated above.

[AlphaMole]

heh.. as much as I like the absurdness of a film noir theatre.. I'd go with the landmark, for the same reasons ^__^

oh, and I really like the 'zine idea

[Miez]

Film noir, film noir, film noir! That probably didn't count as three votes, did it?

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Well, we've got till Friday to decide...but so far looks like landmark is winning.

I talked to m0ds and he says he would love to put up the backgrounds, so when you submit the backgrounds please explicitly state that you would not mind your backs being used in this manner. Just add the line (Permission granted to submit to AGDzine) below the background.

If you don't wish to submit it, you needn't state anything at all.
It is perfectly acceptable to say no to this, and I don't think it will detract from the entry in any way.

[cpage]

here are new suggestions for a blitz

A hawiian paradise
An underwater scene
any thing 2 colored (EVIL )
old school Sierra (low res)
Your (the persons) backyard
Your (the persons) Room
Your (the persons) house
Your (the persons) favorite room in monkey island
Inside a hippy's house
Your (the persons) dream vacation

[Soft, Gooey, Delicious.]

I suggest a scene with something that makes you actually feel sick. Or to be more clear, you should be _Very_ uncomfortable looking at it.

[JD]

how about something with an odd size, like 800x200.. oh and 16 colors

btw I like the haunted house idea.. or the inside of a fridge when the light goes out!

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

A turkey farm(turkeys allowed :p)

An Amish Town

An abandoned ghost town like in the westerns.

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Glargh why did no one vote for a suggestion this time?

I'll go with haunted house unless someone objects in the next 2 hours.

[scotch]

I'd do a turkey farm, but I doubt gore is allowed and I'm sure you don't want my annoying vegetarian whine pictures anyway

So yeah, haunted house is fine with me.

[cpage]

just a question do you kinda think that 2 weeks is too long?

I think one would be enough

[veryweirdguy]

I'd like to see people try their favourite room from Monkey Island 1 or 2 (cpage's idea).

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

I put it at two weeks because most people can't find time to enter if its just a week. And also since backgrounds are larger than sprites, it takes more time to get them done.   The voting process also takes up some times, so a week would be kinda short.

The purpose is not to just get a bunch of entries in and decide and get it over with. Its to see the range of styles we have here, and how different people interpret things. It also helps you learn when you look at several variations on the same theme.


Is a haunted house exterior okay with you people  for next time? Gore is allowed since it goes with the theme.

[SSH]

My idea for a theme:

Any room with a window or hole in the ceiling which cannot be seen directly, but the shaft of light from it can be and someone's head is just visible in the shadow, peeking in on whatever is going on in the room....

[Vel]

A college campus.

[Evil]

this may be hectic but just listen for a second. how about we have each one 2 weeks long. after the first week of one we start another while the second one is finishing. i find that sometimes i have trubble with one and waiting two weeks is a long time. sometimes i get ancy to start the next one. it also give somepeople a longer time to finish. i dont know, maybe we could try it to see how it goes?  

[remixor]

I like the college campus idea, mainly because it would mean all I'd have to do is finish the one I started but never completed for the landmarks one  

I also like evil's two-week dual contests idea.

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

I think it would be confusing for there to be two of the same competition running simultaneously. I WAS thinking of starting a compo with just art, not necessarily a background or sprite or any part of a game, but just drawing in general, since the current ones are pretty restrictive in style as well as content.  It'll sometimes be locations, sometimes people, and you can mix the two.

If anyone's interested in that, I can start that this weekend.

[scotch]

I'd love that.. I hadn't done any 2d art for ages until I got AGS.. it'd be nice to do some general not necessarily adventure game related stuff now.

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Hm it neednt even be a compo. Just a theme that runs for one or two weeks then we switch to another.

[scotch]

k.. some kind of art group then, we can criticise and learn and make pretty pictures .-.

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

Yesh but on a set theme ._. k

On doll forums, we sometimes have an interpretation of a photo or a doll on a particular theme like gothic. Stuff like that.

[scotch]

Doll forums ^_^
ok, start whenever you like  I'll definately take part.

[Archangel (aka SoupDragon)]

Here's a suggestion... but it may have been suggested before, I just cba to read back over the thread.

THE INTERNET

Except all styalised, like that ancient kids' CG show Reboot; or however else you want to portray it

[SLaMgRInDeR]

Reboot, i used to like that, i have vidios of it somewhere
(   (   ( <( -_-)> )   )   )

[n3tgraph]

how about an underwater castle?

[Jimi]

how about people living inside a TV. I always thought that could happen.  

[Bluke4x4]

The remains of the Giant Pigs vs Giant cows war..... and people are celebrating with a Hot-dog/Cheeseburger feast.

[evilspacefart]

space station (exterior)

space station (interior)

AGS olympics

hell freezes over

disco inferno

just some ideas.

[Necro]

A death star!!

[Devlonas]

How about Martha Stewart's cell?

hmm


A dentist office

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

hehe nice ideas devonlas - specially martha's cell. I wonder if she'd redecorate it.

[OneThinkingGal and ._.]

double post ._. oh well

The inside of a whale while you're in it.

Don't know if this has been suggested yet: A pub or a bar.

Top down view backgrounds might be interesting too.  

[Anym]

Igloo - interor
Igloo - exterior
Execution site (gallows, guillotine,...)
Torture Chamber - friendly (the comfy chair, soft cushions,...)
Torture Chamber - unfriendly (thumbscrews, chains,...)

[CMonkey]

A driveway with a line down the centre

[evenwolf]

Backstage of a medieval play

[Moox]

The inside of a high tech coffin

A house with a really leaky roof, and a broken pipe

[Olzn]

How about making an ancient egyptian tomb filled with traps which actually is filled with high tech equipment deep inside. The hero discovers a new civilization and goes to it through using a telekenetik portal.(or something similiar).
So both ancient egyptian tombs filled with dust and high tech equipment
AND an alien civilization with REALLY funny looking houses....

[..]

Maybe somekind of cross between game styles like a CMI-Broken Sword- Demo Quest Hybrid

[[Cameron]]

The Lab of an evil genius or maybe the inside of a spleen.

[Andail]

It was pretty darn long since people posted something in this thread. Is there any point to keep it stickyfied here much longer?