Adventure Game Studio

v1.1
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- Added gamma correction slider (press the [G] key anytime in game)

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HOW TO PLAY
Interact - Left Mouse Button
Examine - Right Mouse Button

FEATURES
- A month of actual development crunched down in 72 hours
- Needlessly big chunky pixels
- Debatable science
- Randomly generated soundtrack*
- Some John Conway's Game of Life inspired graphics
- Videogames and Jazz Standard Quotes!

INTRODUCING
- First story conceived along with my brother Dr. Wh 8-)

*Very "prototypish": some audio files randomly selected and played at random times. Needs to be fixed.

Awesome game so far!

But I think I hit a game-breaking bug (EDITED to be more accurate)

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I clicked on the X on the terminal display and turned it off, but then when I went back to the terminal (left-clicked it) all the room's hotspots disappeared but the terminal window did not reappear. So I was trapped.

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Quote from: Mandle on Fri 02/01/2015 03:11:09
But I think I hit a game-breaking bug (EDITED to be more accurate)

You're right! In the last development sprint I think I messed up some room functions. :-\
I've uploaded a fix right now :) Hope that it works!

Thanks a lot for your feedback! I didn't have the chance to playtest it thoroughly because I had very few time to work on it.

Glad you liked it so far! :)

Good to hear it!

I just finished the game and it was great! I love the chunky graphics vs the subtle gradient of the moonlight. I don't think I've ever seen that done before...

Story was simple but also quite sweet:

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I expected the organism to rip through the floor and eat me. I guess I've seen The Thing too many times...

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Thanks a lot, Mandle! :D

I made all the graphics with Hexels Pro (http://hexraystudios.com/hexels/) that recently started to make it possible to apply this gradient on selected layers of the scene (if I'm not wrong, it was not possible before). I thought it would be fun to see how the result would be :) Next time I'll try to blend it better, for sure!

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Hahaha! (laugh) Probably it's because the organism is actually A SPACESHIP (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life#mediaviewer/File:Game_of_life_animated_LWSS.gif) 8-0

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This game is EXCELLENT!!!!!!
I enjoyed it a lot!!!!
and great graphic in the ending:

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The green sunrise!!!

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Love it! :)
Thanks, and if I have any nitpicking is the fact that it' very dark... adding the possibility to correct the gamma in game would be a great plus. I gave up on first try, cause I couldn't see anything else but the bright blue.

Anyway, very well done and great atmosphere! (laugh)

Thanks a lot for the feedback, folks! :)

Quote from: AprilSkies on Fri 02/01/2015 10:34:10
and great graphic in the ending:

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Thanks :D It was a bare attempt to create something similar to an aurora borealis... Definitely too green! (laugh)

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Quote from: Cassiebsg on Fri 02/01/2015 16:01:14
adding the possibility to correct the gamma in game would be a great plus. I gave up on first try, cause I couldn't see anything else but the bright blue.

You're right and sorry about that!
I should check that out, because I'm not so sure how it would work. The thing is: I had some issues when importing the sprites that I didn't figure out yet. Basically it seems that AGS doesn't remove the background color off the sprites (mostly when dealing with the black color) completely, but leaves a pixel-thin outline every time. So, I have to test if and how a higher gamma "exposes" these outlines.

Thanks again for your feedback and I hope to figure out a solution soon :D

Quote from: LostTrainDude on Fri 02/01/2015 22:18:32
Basically it seems that AGS doesn't remove the background color off the sprites (mostly when dealing with the black color) completely, but leaves a pixel-thin outline every time. So, I have to test if and how a higher gamma "exposes" these outlines.

Sounds like the problem I had before I learned what anti-alias was... :-[

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Turn if off, and make sure your "transparent" color is unique. Don't be afraid of using "magic" pink as background, if you do it right all the pink will turn transparent. :)
Also make sure you save your pictures as .png and not .jpg.

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Quote from: LostTrainDude on Fri 02/01/2015 22:18:32

Quote from: AprilSkies on Fri 02/01/2015 10:34:10
and great graphic in the ending:

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Thanks :D It was a bare attempt to create something similar to an aurora borealis... Definitely too green! (laugh)

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Oh, hahaha, I actually felt it was supposed to be a twist ending meaning that:

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You were on a different planet all along, which I started to think when the radio operator's call-sign was "Earthling"...

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Another nice little game; pseudo-pixels were large though, and sometimes I could not understand what I am looking at.

The game has a melancholy air ... and manages to create a grim and lonely environment.

Play it was not tense and not believe that was the intention, except perhaps at the time of feeding the creature (I feared that some shit could happen). The game is a very pleasant sensory experience, the sound of the sea, the wind, the moon shine gently clearing the darkness contributed to my immersion in the game. I'm hoping that this work will be a seed for an even larger project. Thanks Dude!  :)

Congrats on releasing the game! It's simple and short, but very charming and atmospheric. It's the kind of story and setting that leaves you wondering about what else is going on in that world. The color choices were spot on for me and since I'm also a big fan of minimalistic graphics, I really enjoyed it.

Thanks to each and everyone of you for your feedback and for your nice and supporting comments! I really appreciate it! :)

It all started from the very first screen you see in the game. I chose that palette because I thought it would have been both cold and dark, but still be somehow pleasant and not scary or eerie :D

Also, along with our Adeel S. Ahmed, I'm trying to sort out a way to let players adjust Gamma, in order to see things as clear as they please!

And finally, thanks to Adeel S. Ahmed, we managed to have a Gamma Correction slider working in-game!
Just press the [g] key when in game and the slider will appear!

For all those who had problems with the brightness, please download the game again (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/games/game/1874/download/) and test if this is working for you :) This, however, may not work on Windows 8.1.

Of course, any further feedback about this fix is welcome!

really fun little game, the graphics are very nice

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got stuck with the hatch for a little bit :)

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I also missed the hatch for a while :)

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Great short game with a lovely concept, you did a cracking job with the writing and managed to establish a very convincing scenario with a super low resolution! Congrats on the release LostTrainDude :)

I loved this game - great little story, nice puzzles and simple but very effective visual style. All together it works fantastically well.

The atmosphere is great, and the style is interesting, a really lovely game.

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finding out what to do with the lunar panels is a bit of a (chunky) pixelhunt but the clue is helpful!

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Quote from: selmiak on Mon 19/01/2015 00:05:51

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finding out what to do with the lunar panels is a bit of a (chunky) pixelhunt but the clue is helpful!

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That's one of the great things about this game:

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You can go pixel-hunting with an elephant gun...

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Thanks A LOT for all your comments, folks! I really, really appreciate your feedback!

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Yep, unfortunately the hatch was something that lots of people seemed to miss. I should have made a wider hotspot for that.

Also sorry for the pixel hunting in the lunar panels' puzzle: as Mandle said, I thought that pixels were chunky enough to make the hotspots "comfy" (laugh).

My bad indeed, anyway: I had almost no time for proper testing :(

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Great little game, LTD & team!
Thanx for making this, really enjoyed it.

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I also missed that hatch hotspot.
But had no pixel hunting issue whatsoever with the lunar panels' puzzle, as being mentioned.

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Congrats to the team. Cool little game.

I just played this and enjoyed it. As with everybody else, I had trouble finding that one hotspot, I think making the colour you used for it would have fixed the issue, really. It's always hard to know if a hotspot is easy to see or not when you already know it's there as a designer, so it's understandable.

Cute game, nice work, and I especially liked the little palette change at the end. :smiley:

Quote from: ThreeOhFour on Sat 14/03/2015 03:36:50
I think making the colour you used for it brighter would have fixed the issue, really.

Did you mean this? :)

Anyway, I grew more and more aware of that as people were playing and commenting. Unfortunately I had absolutely no time for a proper playtest during the development, which I had to rush in 72-ish hours before the deadline.

Still, thanks a million for your feedback, Ben! Happy that you liked the game! :D