METRO CITY: Night Shift

[Rik_Vargard]

[Enter Name] has grown up in the orphanage of Metro City, capital of planet Antoryos, and thus has been given a role to participate in society by becoming a police officer.
with police academy friend Darcy they choose to patrol at night because of the ambient created by the lights of the city.

DOWNLOADS :

AGS DATABASE

ITCH.IO

[RootBound]

Congratulations on the release! Finishing a game is always a great achievement no matter if it's your first game or if you're a veteran developer. I'll definitely download and try it out sometime soon! Don't forget to add it to the AGS database as well!

https://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/add/

[AndreasBlack]

Fantastic! I'm gonna try it as soon as possible! Great job, now work on my game so i can finish it, kidding 

[Rik_Vargard]

Congratulations on the release! Finishing a game is always a great achievement no matter if it's your first game or if you're a veteran developer. I'll definitely download and try it out sometime soon! Don't forget to add it to the AGS database as well!

https://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/add/

Hey thanks @RootBound, it is something indeed ! 

I tried to add my game to the AGS database but for some reason it doesn't seem to work, I started a post about it HERE

Fantastic! I'm gonna try it as soon as possible! Great job, now work on my game so i can finish it, kidding 

Haha hey thanks @AndreasBlack I hope you'll have fun! 

[Rik_Vargard]

A download link to the AGS Database has been added > AGS DATABASE

(Thanks RootBound)

[heltenjon]

Congratulations on the release! I was impressed by the demo, looking forward to playing the full game. 

[Rik_Vargard]

Congratulations on the release! I was impressed by the demo, looking forward to playing the full game. 

Hey thanks @heltenjon ! I really hope you'll have fun playing it 

[MIGGO]

Hello Rik!

First of all congratulations on the release!

I love the city lights and the nocturnal technopolis atmosphere. You've got me intrigued by the story by giving me bits and pieces of the still obscured whole. The transition animations are very cool! I've enjoyed the puzzles so far very nicely. I think the first combat sequence was a bit overwhelming with the moving camera and John joining the fight. I felt like the time that I was actually playing was just a fragment of the overall sequence. The hacking minigame on the other hand is pretty neat, it's fast paced but clear.

I've encountered two bugs:

First:

Spoiler

After the first combat I walked to the end of the alley behind the hospital and the player character went down to the boiler room where the first fight takes place. There were John and a Secubot in battle stance ready to rumble and I could walk around them. This would have been a minor bug, but when I climbed the ladder back up the player character would immediately turn around and go back again, so I was trapped down there. Good thing I had a save just before I made the mistake.

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Second:

Spoiler

The second bug happened when I was on my way to Alexander's house the second time and I got stuck on handling the SecuBot going to and fro in front of the house. Without taking care of the bot I just started hacking the front door and managed to get in, but when I go to the TV room there's no John or cutscene or anything. And I was trapped again 'cause I couldn't leave the house either.

[close]

[Rik_Vargard]

@MIGGO

Hey MIGGO, thank you for playing my game.

Also thanks a lot for your feedback, I understand that you just didn't get to that important moment because you made a run for it, at the house. 
I'm sorry for that and I uploaded the new version with both bugs fixed.

BUG Feedback:


BUG 1:

Spoiler

This one is a weird and tricky one. That's a bug I had back then when working on it. And then I fixed it. Because I tested that alley behind the hospital a lot, just because of that. So, the bug that you have shouldn't happen.
I downloaded the game as if I was a player, you know, and again and again I tested it but never had this bug again.
Makes me wonder if there's some other data saved when you save the game. 
So while I can't really test it, I disabled that "region" where one would be that would cause that problem. Technically a blind bug fix   

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BUG 2:

Spoiler

I didn't think of someone who would go for the front door with the HACKit tool as active inventory, so now it's not possible any more.
You now have to get rid of the SecuBot before you can hack the door. This will trigger the variables that will allow you to continue the game as intended, and let you get to "that moment" 

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[RootBound]

Started playing it and am enjoying it so far!

One bug:

Spoiler

After you get the safe open and take out the items, if you leave the room and come back you can get the items a second time. For example, I gave the phone to Inspector Ludd, then went back and opened the safe and got the phone back. I now have two of Alex's keycard and two of the potions as well.

[close]

Also, I might need a hint:

Spoiler

I opened the safe but can't find a battery or wires for the SecuBot. I found the InstaCharger but nothing else. Am I forgetting to look somewhere? None of the other inventory items seem useful, either...

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[Rik_Vargard]

Hey @RootBound Thank you for playing my game, I'm happy you're enjoying it so far.

Too late today here to get into that bug report but thank you very much !! (Also, why would someone do what you did?! )

But I can give you that hint :

Spoiler

If, in the house, you go to the room that's down left (with the wardrobe), next to the wardrobe, on the ground (when hovering with your mouse), you will find some scratches on the ground that you will have to "Look At".

[close]

[MIGGO]

Thank you for making it!

I forgot to mention about BUG 1 that I...

Spoiler

left the alley and acquired the hacking tool and when I came back I encountered the bug. Not immediately after the encounters.

[close]

Now that I think of it, this might be important in trying reproduce the bug. Though it seems you already took action. 

[RootBound]

Thanks for the hint! I had seen the right detail but had neglected to do the right interaction with the hotspot for some reason.

Two bugs:

First, if you try to save while the inventory window is open, the save window appears behind the inventory window, so you can't choose which save file to use.

Second: In the police station parking garage, the walk-behind does not seem to cover the whole police car, so you can walk in front of it even though you're behind it (see below):

Spoiler

[close]

[Rik_Vargard]

Alright all the bugs have been fixed & files are uploaded!

Thanks guys again for the feedback, much appreciated

Cheers!

[Ian Aloser]

Sorry Rik for replying so late.
I really appreciate this little jewel, but have found
2 more bugs/flaws :

Spoiler

You can open the safe as many times as you want and therefore improve your score :-)
Same thing with the box behind the storage room...
Nothing gamebreakin, though, I suppose.
And as a sign of gratitude you could give me a hint where I can find the wires,
I hovered the mouse over every pixel :-))

[close]

Very nice game, indeed !

[Rik_Vargard]

Hey @Ian Aloser, thank you for the feedback. I'm really happy you had a good time playing the game! 

Spoiler

I already fixed the safe, but now I have to go check that box! Yeah, nothing breaking the game, thx for that

For the wires, it depends where you are in the game.
Are you at the first investigation at the house, looking for Alexander who's missing?
If so, take the elevator (where you found the box) and then interact with the panel to find the wires.

If you are further in the game (and the panel is already open from earlier), let me know; I don't want to spoil if you're at the beginning

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[Ian Aloser]

Hi Rik:
I really like this game and I deleted my old save games
and downloaded the latest patch. I am afraid I have discovered
a severe bug in the latest version after starting from scratch:

Spoiler

When I am in Alexander's house for the first time,I tried to open
the safe, but didn't enter the correct password.
When I return to the bedroom,there is no way to interact with the safe anymore.
So I have to ask Ludd for help, therefore losing Scorepoint(s).
I guess it has to do with looking at all labels of the pictures, I did that,
but now I cannot proceed because Ludd needs more infos.
No way to interact with the safe anymore, strange....
EDIT:
And maybe another flaw: When I am at Alexander's house for the second time and I don't have the mine,
there is no way of returning to the hospital area to open the door with the room that contains the mine....
And I was sure the mine would help me to get rid of the bot, but I cannot use it on the bot.
However, when I click on the bot with the hand symbol, I get the message : " The mine did the job" and yet I get arrested...
I finally did figure out though how to get rid of the bot,....
And one more thing: I have a lot of saved games, but only the last 9 are visible in tne load screen,
can't find out how to scroll down, maybe it has to do with the resolution, i don't know...

Sorry for bothering you, but this nice game is worth it !

[close]

[Rik_Vargard]

Hey @Ian Aloser, you're not bothering me, on the contrary.
You're feedback is very important to me and makes my game better.
So thank you for that.
It is I who am sorry for the inconvinience 

About the save games, yeah, that's how big I did draw the panel; I didn't think that one would use that many saves. 
Best I could do right now is arrange the things a little, which should give you places for three or so more saves.

Fixed the bugs, latest version now online:

Spoiler

Damnit, fix one bug and two appear! 

Well those have been fixed now.
- If you arrive for the second time at the house and don't have the mine, you can now take the car back to look for it.
- Fixed the "interact" problem with the bot.
- If you put the wrong code for the save and exit and then come back, the safe will work now.

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And I'm very happy you like my game, it's a great feeling, thanks for sharing that.

[Ian Aloser]

Hey Rik,
Nice to know that these were flaws, not me being stupid :-)
At the moment I am totally stuck with

Spoiler

Hacking the door code at Alex's house, I just don't get the logic behind it

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And : Can you tell me how you created the animation sequences of the car in the city?

[Rik_Vargard]

At the moment I am totally stuck with

Spoiler

Hacking the door code at Alex's house, I just don't get the logic behind it

[close]

Spoiler

That's a strange question for me, because:

- If you're trying to hack Alex's door it means
- You got rid of the Secubot which means
- You got rid of it thanks to the mine which means
- You hacked the door that led to the room where you can find the mine.

It's the same minigame for both doors, but with a different difficulty.

I just want to be sure we're talking about the same thing here?

[close]

And everything car animations I created with Blender 

[Ian Aloser]

Thanks for the info, Rik !
I solved the previous hacks by trial and error :-)
But this one leaves me helpless....

[Rik_Vargard]

I solved the previous hacks by trial and error :-)
But this one leaves me helpless....

Spoiler

OK so:

You're trying to hack a security system.
The system will defend and counterattack.

On the left :
The red part is the system (moving down) coming at you to stop you.
The green part is you (moving up) to hack it.

On the right:
- Four random signs appear on the top
- You have to click on the similar signs below to make them disappear, move up, and have a new set of signs
- Whenever you click on a wrong sign, you'll move back down
- The hand icon, when you can click on it (when "ON"), will make the system go back one move (up) and save you time.

HINT: Whatever you're trying to click, when the hand icon turns on, click on it first.

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[Ian Aloser]

Thanks Rik,
I get the picture ....
EDIT: My problem was the high game speed I had adjusted :-))

[Rik_Vargard]

Thanks Rik,
I get the picture ....
EDIT: My problem was the high game speed I had adjusted :-))

Haha!    Well i'm glad you got through it 

[RootBound]

Finished!

I have to say, I enjoyed a few aspects very much - I thought the 3d pre-rendered backgrounds and 3d video cutscenes were great, and that they really did a lot of work to make the setting of the game world feel bigger and like there was a city surrounding these events, even though we don't get a lot of locations.

The puzzles were challenging and even at times frustrating but in retrospect the solutions seem straightforward and logical, and so I can't complain. I just wasn't patient enough to figure it out without hints. 

I enjoyed the hacking games, too. They added a nice variety to the gameplay, and figuring out how the games work is a necessary piece of it, which adds complexity.

My one quibble is probably with the battle system, but mostly that's with the graphic design of it, I think. The movements feel jerky, like the game is getting stuck, but I think it's just that each battle "position" is a mostly static image instead of an animation. For some reason it's more difficult to know what to pay attention to. Maybe the interface is more crowded? Even so, I was able to survive the battle scenes without too much difficulty (though I think one bug that gave me an extra medshot may have helped  ).

Overall good game!

Spoiler

I did want to finish the story, though, so ending on a cliffhanger left me feeling unsatisfied. Perhaps that's to make me play the next episode. 

[close]

Also, I found one more bug:

Spoiler

After taking the elevator down with Alexander, you can walk behind the elevator buttons as well as disappear behind the elevator doors.

[close]

[Ian Aloser]

Hey RootBound,

Spoiler

How did you proceed in the basement with Alexander?
I can see the wire's spot, but no item in my inventory
can be used with it. Also, looking at the door gives me the message:
"Good thing I got Alex's keycard" and interacting with it "I need a keycard"
My problem is: I got only my own keycard and don't have any wires....

[close]

Seems like I have run into a dead end ...
EDIT : Nevermind, I figured it out

[Rik_Vargard]

@Ian Aloser

EDIT : Nevermind, I figured it out

So where're you at at this point?


@RootBound
Thank you for playing and thank you for your precious feedback!
And I'm really happy you enjoyed the game.

About the "elevator bug" (a minor bug that doesn't change anything about the gameplay) :

Spoiler

That's one minor bug I couldn't fix and forgot to mention in the technical forums (I will do that ASAP- I forgot because of the rocky release-)
Thing is that in that particular room, for some reason, when you use "WalkTo" at that place, the player walks out of the walkable area!
Yep. So, I don't know how it's even possible but there it is.

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About the "Overall good game"

Spoiler

Wich is about the ending but didn't want to spoil.
At my beginner level I had no choice at this point of AGS learning + releasing a game experience + the importance of beta testing..
I had to "learn and move on." because I wanted to test and add new stuff, still adventure, puzzles, the story the characters etc.
But with new stuff to see how it can be done in AGS.
So yeah, that was a real question for me. But I think I had to split this in two parts because some room scripts became very epic (you know, based on the bugs) so it's not "calculated" to make you want to play the next one, but I felt I had to finish this one this way...   

[close]

About the battle system:

Spoiler

I understand the quibble is visual and I knew this one was coming. And I agree.
Thing is, I had to buy a new PC, made two massive backups. But somehow the characters' files didn't make it. The folders did. Not he files. In both backups. And of all of the files, just and only the character files went missing. Go figure.
As I was getting at the end of the game, I would've had to recreate the characters from scratch and redo all animations etc.
Because at the same time I had discovered a better way to create them thus.... "learn and move on".

All of that made me split the whole thing in two parts. 

[close]

[RootBound]

@Rik Vargard sorry to hear about your lost files! That must have been frustrating to say the least. I look forward to the next game. 

[Ian Aloser]

Hello Rik,
I finished it, too.
You created a great game and besides the few flaws I was highly motivated to complete it.
I really liked the soundtrack, the story and most of all the video sequences
which gave the game a great atmosphere.
Thank you very much for your work and I really hope to see more !
Cheers to Belgium !

[Rik_Vargard]

@Ian Aloser

Thank you very much for playing the game and for sticking along during the rocky release.
And also for your game experience feedback and the bugs you encountered.
It's very encoureaging

[AndreasBlack]

I haven't finished yet, i noticed now you've done some bug fix updates, i'm not sure i had the latest cause i managed to bug it out. I took up three or four medkits and keys/phone duplicates  Also i managed to put back the wires cause i thought i had to do that to get the door to open again, then i couldn't take them back  But apart from those bugs it's funny to play. I will finish it someday, hopefully. I went to buy some hans unt hans nuddles and then... Will have to try again tommorrow!

[Rik_Vargard]

I haven't finished yet, i noticed now you've done some bug fix updates, i'm not sure i had the latest cause i managed to bug it out. I took up three or four medkits and keys/phone duplicates  Also i managed to put back the wires cause i thought i had to do that to get the door to open again, then i couldn't take them back  But apart from those bugs it's funny to play. I will finish it someday, hopefully. I went to by some hans unt hans nuddles and then... Will have to try again tommorrow!

Haha 
Well no worries all those bugs are also fixed now 

[AndreasBlack]

Uh-oh, we have a game breaking bug! I tried to climb a ladder

Spoiler

after the first robo fight, trying to climb the ladder bugs the character out completely. He started his climbing animation on the left wall and missed the ladder completely! The game then crashed and complained you have no frames in loop 2 (i've done these type of mistakes myself so...). To avoid this from happening in the future make sure the character is faced the direction where you have the climbing frames before calling the animation. Which i guess is loop3 = up, but since i turned him a different way it tried to get it from loop2 where you have no climbing animation. Just go player.FaceDirection(eDirectionUp); before changing to the loop animation. That way you are guaranteed it will run the loop you want afterwards. Or just copy paste the climbing frames on all the directional loops which is 0,1,2,3 and it wouldn't matter which loop he was on previously. Got damn it, i just want to finish the game! When i finally beat the robot it crashed on me, gaaaah!!!       

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[Rik_Vargard]

@AndreasBlack

First, thank you for your message!

Second, damn it! I just wanted people to have fun, not being frustrated all the time! 

Well I guess it's an experience to learn from a first release. But Im' very sorry you had this one bug! 

Because, how did you manage to do that?!

I spent the last 15 minutes trying to crash the game in various ways with the ladder thing and it always works perfectly.
I have no idea on how this went wrong for you.
But it obviously did...

So I took your advice to make those kind of rare moments even more impossible, thx!

The newly patched version is now online and you can play the game as it's supposed to be.

[AndreasBlack]

I guess you have your official bugtester for the next release right here
Very frustrating with coding at times. I had so many bugs in my first little game release aswell, but now i've gotten the grasp of things, but it's a lot of work using the nine verb interface (!) so at least you made the right choice there not to use that advanced template

Before the Robo stuff (a suggestion) i think you should have a autosave feature, cause that turns you off to have to re-play everything. In fact you should do like i do in my game that you haven't played yet. The player just re-spawns at the robot sorta like a 'auto-save before a epic moment'.

That's better! But yeah you have to code a bit more then, perhaps you're not into that and just want to move onto other projects! On the positive side you still want to keep playing the game. That's more then you can say about my first game 

Just ask 'Khris' on the forum he doesn't know it yet, but his comment about "I didn't get beeping nowhere" is actually in the "hard mode" as a fourthwall joke But i've since then made it more obvious what you should do at the start of the game, so i think it would be less troublesome for new players! 

 

[Rik_Vargard]

Haha I'll take that offer for bugtester anytime! 

Yeah scripting can be damn frustrating at times, like very! It's learning a new language with it's logic.
And then it also feels like magic. You write those lines and then *poof*, the thing unfolds in front of you!
And then it doesn't work.
And there starts the learning again.
And then it works.
And then you feel like you have written down that one powerfull spell that comes to life perfectly.
And that's a great feeling.

About the autosave, I have to say I didn't think of it (well perhaps one evening).
Thing is, since one can save anytime during the game, if I were a player and see something new I would save every step.
Right now I don't know how to create an autosave in AGS, but I could create some "message" that would propose the player to save the game at some points.
Good idea, thank you 

It's also good to have moved from bug reports to suggestions 

Cheers!

Rik

[CaptainD]

I think the most astonishing thing about this game is that, after playing AGS-made games for... I dunno, over two decades now I think! - this genuinely feels like nothing I've every played before.

The animations and music are superb, and there's a real Bladerunner-esque atmosphere through the whole game.

Not sure if the version I've played so far has quite a few missing interactions that have now been fixed, but even so they didn't really impact the game too badly. The mini-games were challenging - sometimes very challenging - but fun enough (and felt "fair" enough) to persevere.

Haven't finished it yet but really enjoyed the game so far, congrats on an impressive and unique game!

[Rik_Vargard]

Hey @CaptainD , thank you so much for your review, it's very inspiring and motivating for many reasons!

[Rik_Vargard]

FAST WALKTHROUGH REALEASED!

So this is a fast walthrough where I skip through the dialogues to get to the point of what one has to do to finish the game.
It's not an immersive exprience but a to-the-point one, for players who just want to know how to get to the next step.
Now I think of it, it's almost a speedrun of some sorts... 

[heltenjon]

I revisited this one to see if I could finish it before the AGS award voting, and after much trial and retrial, I finally beat that last door hacking mini-game and made it to the end. That was hard!

I'll repeat my praise from the GIP thread: the graphics and animation are stunning, and the city now feels alive and vibrant. All those background animations and ambient sounds pay off big time, making this a highly atmospheric piece. If anything, I regret not nominating it for best audio/music as well as the two categories I did nominate it for. Did you make the music yourself, too? It's a great fit for the mood!

I think the most astonishing thing about this game is that, after playing AGS-made games for... I dunno, over two decades now I think! - this genuinely feels like nothing I've every played before.

Couldn't agree more. It stands out like that. (Does feel like Blade Runner, though, which is intentional.)

The mini-games are very cool. I am not very good with those, and needed a lot of attempts to prevail at the hacking games. The fights went all right, even though I just barely survived every time. I'm thankful they weren't harder!

I think the decision to split the game in two parts made sense, even though that meant that

Spoiler

the next interaction with the quarreling brothers

[close]

will have to wait for the next game. I'm really impressed by your game. Congratulations, and best of luck in the upcoming awards. I'll eagerly await the next chapter in this story. I'm on board for the ride.

[Rik_Vargard]

Hey @heltenjon thank you so much for your review! It's very motivating and I'm so happy you liked my game.

About the hacking puzzle, Im sorry it was so hard! It should've been a fun challenge not a stressing one.
But heh, you did beat it, right? I'm grateful for the effort and bow before your courage. Also, I wish I was there to see your reaction.
The thing is that I tested it so many times that at one moment I was used to where the symbols are and almost didn't have to really look anymore.
I made that "this is too easy" error, see?  So I'm keeping that in mind for the next game. 

Thank you for playing,

Cheers!

[heltenjon]

The hacking puzzle was hard, not too hard.  I don't think you should consider that an error of judgment on your part, the creators will know the ins and outs and will become pros of their own games.  I mean, @Tomags can beat his game Mr Tijerakis at hard levels, for crying out loud. In fact, I think the progression was very nicely balanced.

I tried different strategies (in spoilers, as it may not be all that interesting, or people may want to  figure it out themselves).

Spoiler

At first, I tried to click the icons in the order they appeared. After a while, I discovered what the hand did, and even later that the icons could be clicked in any order. Still, I wasn't fast enough. So I tried simply clicking in a circle as fast as I could without even looking at the code, then discovered that I was penalized for doing multiple errors, but not until I had tried a lot of times. In the end, I guess it came down to learning where some of the icons were in order to be fast enough.

[close]

[Tomags]

I don't think you should consider that an error of judgment on your part, the creators will know the ins and outs and will become pros of their own games.  I mean, Tomags can beat his game Mr Tijerakis at hard levels, for crying out loud. In fact, I think the progression was very nicely balanced.

Haha, yes, my game was worse balanced than I thought for new players. And believe it or not it was going to be much harder; I was lucky that I saw my uncle (that is not very skilled in computers) testing it, and could see that it was not as evident as I thought it would be.

Great thread by the way. I'll contribute for sure when I've made some memory on examples of satisfying puzzles, for sure.

And @Rik_Vargard, great game by the way. I'm waiting to have more time to get back to it and hopefully finish it, and will give some feedback.

Tomags

Tomags

[Rik_Vargard]

Spoiler

At first, I tried to click the icons in the order they appeared. After a while, I discovered what the hand did, and even later that the icons could be clicked in any order. Still, I wasn't fast enough. So I tried simply clicking in a circle as fast as I could without even looking at the code, then discovered that I was penalized for doing multiple errors, but not until I had tried a lot of times. In the end, I guess it came down to learning where some of the icons were in order to be fast enough.

[close]

Yes you're right, and also the hand: 

Spoiler

Whatever you're doing, when the hand appears, click on it. Don't try to finish the sequence, just click on it right away.
Since it's on a timer, the sooner you click on it the sooner it will get back

[close]

And @Rik_Vargard, great game by the way. I'm waiting to have more time to get back to it and hopefully finish it, and will give some feedback.

Tomags

Hey thanks, I hope you'll have fun 

Cheers!