Shadowgate Remake- Game in progress

[skitt2501]

Hello, I am new to AGS and these forums. I just started using AGS and decided my first project should be a remake of the original Shadowgate, but in third person. Meaning an actual player character, and therefore character animations. I know it's kind of ambitious for my first game, but I'm an ambitious kinda guy.

Right now I'm about halfway through the game (done the troll bridge, and everything up to it) , and I really want to get some input from you guys. Here are some screens-







I'm sure some of you guys who have played the original will recognize some of these. I'll also post the game file so you can play the first half- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=SB891IIR

Note- there are some differences from the original in the way this game works, and I've detailed those in the readme file, so give it a look. Also, I admit I've used some of the writing straight from the original, but most of the lines are either variations or my original lines. The music is from the original game. In the final, I'd LIKE to make my own music, but we'll see how that goes.

Now, I've never done much scripting before, or any 3D design at all, so this is all beginner stuff. I know some of the character models are pretty crude, but I'd like to hear how the game as a whole is so far- especially some of the technical scripting and AGS editor aspects. I realize the art and animations can be better and I'm going to work on those. And I apologize if I'm breaking any forum rules in this post- I'm not much of a forum-goer.

[Khris]

Hi there,

if you don't mind I'm going to be brutally honest here (as I think that's the only critique thats useful and because I'm foremost a very harsh critic of myself and know how it feels ).

I wanted to wait until somebody else commented on this so it's a bit more balanced but nobody did yet so here goes:

1. I didn't get far in the original, the sudden deaths and clumsy interface were too off-putting for my taste (I played the Gameboy Color version). So I guess I'd have to question the idea of making a 1:1 remake of a game that's broken gameplay-wise. However I can see how 1:1 is appealing even if it isn't a game one's particularly fond of because all the hard work is sorta done already, at least the non-manual kind.

2. You're using 800 res but (as you've said yourself) the art doesn't live up to it. It's not that bad, I've seen much worse, but it certainly struggles to fill those almost half a million pixels. This results in huge bland areas with generic textures or just one color.
I'm aware that making a remake of a low-res game today pretty much forces you to up the resolution, otherwise what's the point, right? On the other hand, there are several other aspects of this game that could do with an overhaul, so provided these are addressed well, keeping a low resolution won't make this a port rather than a remake.

3. The things you did change, namely making it a 3rd-person game and the Sierra-style interface, are well done and improve the game quite a bit. There's still room for improvement (e.g. showing the name of the hotspot under the mouse) but this is your first game and with that in mind it's a good job.

To conclude this, doing any game is useful and teaches a lot about AGS, so continuing like you started is in no way a waste of time (if that's the impression you got from my critique).
And to put my post into perspective, I'm really picky when it comes to games in general, so producing something I thoroughly like is a very hard job
My opinion certainly doesn't reflect the community here which is really amazing btw.
So regard mine as 2 cents of at least a dollar.

Oh, and welcome to the forums!

[Technocrat]

If I were making it, I wouldn't personally be calling it "Shadowgate Remake" - probably something like "Return to Shadowgate" or "Shadowgate Reborn", something a little more dramatic.

Also, I'm going to agree on the whole "use a lower resolution" thing. When  I first started with AGS (wow, must have been six years now  :o) everything I did was 800x600. Once I learned that resolution doesn't equal quality necessarily, I found it a lot easier to make decent backdrops!

[AnalogGuy]

Ahh... I still remember NES version. It was one of those few games which contained batteries for saving memory! and the wonderful music:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmGp_uMqAoo&fmt=18

[Ryan Timothy B]

Why is Snake on the end of the hallway? 

[theo]

Ambitious project, I wish you the best of luck with it. I agree that the art needs work, but honestly, there's no better way to get better than to just keep on practicing!

I loved the original Shadowgate, it was one of the first adventure games I stumbled upon as a kid.

Good luck!

[skitt2501]

So for those of you who have played through what I've given you:

Which of these art aspects need work- backgrounds, objects, or characters?

I personally think the backgrounds aren't bad... for this type of game I don't see much of a reason to add too many details to the backgrounds.

Most of the objects could use some work, I think. I like some of the item models, but things like doors and bridges and such could be better.

Characters, besides the player character, I think are awful. I'm not very good at drawing concepts for these characters, and it certainly shows when I've finished modeling them. The troll, in particular, I think looks horrendous.

I doubt I'll change from the 800x600 resolution. I've made about all of my 1000's of sprites specifically for 800x600 so it would be a pain to redo them. I think the better solution would be to add more detail to the models (and backgrounds, if you guys don't think those are great) later once I've finished a lot of the content.

Now, the animations I think are pretty good, but tell me if I'm wrong there. Oh, and I know there are quite a few issues with the mirror reflection, and I actually think that's a scripting issue, so I might ask for that in another section of the forums.

Besides that, I'm pretty proud of my work, and I'd love to hear any criticisms of the art, as well as some of the more functional aspects of the game (torch system, ways to compensate for not having like 30 actions, etc). Thanks for your responses so far!

[skitt2501]

I think this is a better character design style-



Good enough for a final game?

Bonus points if you know which character this is. (Just cyclops doesn't count! That's a bit obvious!)