Question regarding artwork used in AGS

[Umbrasoft]

Hello all,

I am going to begin by apologising about the likelyhood of this post being in the wrong place. I have recently begun using AGS and am loving it, but beyond my Microsoft Paint drawings (which seemed to fit the screen perfectly mind you), I do not have good artwork to make a decent game. As a result I have found a studio willing to create my art for a price, several generated scenes have been given to them already, but they would like to know the size and resolution for the images to plan accordingly. Herein lies my dilemma for I am clueless in this area. Thus, my questions are as follows:

1) What size and resolution do the images need to be to comply optimally with the AGS engine?
2) Does anyone know the typical resolution and image size for games created for the Andriod platform? (I dont really even know if AGS is Andriod compatible, I still have much to learn.)

On a side note, if people are really keen to help me out I have one more question also, albeit off-topic. Though, if people are rushed or cannot answer, I will not be too worried.

1) Can a game created with the AGS engine be placed on mobile technology or sold on I-Tunes? (Just curious about this for later to be honest, given the proper credit is afforded to the right people. Perhaps someone could link me to a tutorial or explain briefly? Any help is much appreciated.)

Thankyou again for taking the time to read this. Please do not be too harsh if I posted in the wrong spot. =P Once I have something tangible for the project I will be sure to post in the correct place for people to have a gander. =D

Regards,
Mark

[ThreeOhFour]

With regards to resolution, there are a bunch of different resolutions that AGS supports. Choose one that suits you, I guess. If you're going for iPhone or the like, keep in mind that AGS doesn't support always native resolution (iPhone is, for example, 320x480, which is certainly not supported by AGS, although I think the iPad is 1024x768 which is more promising).

As far as I know, the closest that anyone has gotten to AGS applications running on the iPhone is with XAGE and an iPhone emulator. If you're intent on making apps for mobile devices, AGS probably isn't your best bet at the moment, I'd say.

[Umbrasoft]

Thanks very much, Ben. =)

Would most people agree? 1-2 confirmations should be fine. Any alternative points of view are very welcome. Thanks in advance.

[RickJ]

1.  Resolution of 600x400 is quite common now days.   Players can adjust a game's default resolution using filters but there is a wide variety of opinions about the merits.  Resolution's limiting factor is performance and game size.  The higher the resolution the lower the performance and the larger the game's file size.

2.  I'm not an expert but it seems to vary from device to device.     

3.  The current AGS runtime runs primarily on a windows PC platform.  There are ports for linux and Mac that are a rev or two behind.   I has been recently decided to open source AGS editor and runtime so mobile ports are certainly future possibilities.    As Ben304 says there is currently XAGE, a Silverlight based runtime, currently under development and has been used to port several games.  There is also an HTML5 runtime under development in which you may be interested and is discussed in this thread.   

http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=42594.0

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I would also note that there are some very talented artists here that have experience with AGS and pixel artwork.   If your target is limited resolution mobile platforms (i.e. cell phones) then you will need artists that know how make impressive stuff from a handful of pixels and colors, not as easy as it sounds.   Anyway I'm not one of those people but there are many here that I am sure would be glad to help.

Happy AGSing     

[theo]

If your target is limited resolution mobile platforms (i.e. cell phones) then you will need artists that know how make impressive stuff from a handful of pixels and colors, not as easy as it sounds. 

I was about to nod in agreement, but actually, when I think about it...

The j2me low-res days are more or less over. Handheld devices no longer force artists to work with full games squeezed into 50 kb with 8 color palettes on everything. Your average handheld game now is a big bloated production with real time transformation, 24 bit transparency and high res 30 fps animations.  The skills you refer to have now become obsolete and replaced by the -honestly- even more daunting task of making it look good without these limitations.

As an answer to the original post: Android suffers from having a very wide range of different resolutions. Also, as pointed out: Running AGS on android/iOS now is still highly theoretical. (Though no doubts interesting!)