Commercial AGS Boot Camp - 5 common issues

[Anian]

Maybe an almost unimportant question, but it sometimes really bugs me - is it better to go 16:10 or 16:9? Or is not really that important between those two? I really have no idea what the majority of people have/prefer.

3d games basically don't have this problem at all because they do whatever you set the camera to do, but is there like a trend amongst gamers?

[Crimson Wizard]

Maybe an almost unimportant question, but it sometimes really bugs me - is it better to go 16:10 or 16:9? Or is not really that important between those two? I really have no idea what the majority of people have/prefer.

I found that apart from 4:3/widescreen holywars there are also 16:10/16:9 holywars in the Web

Personally I do not see any advantage of 16:9 over 16:10, but it seems that 16:9 monitors are more popular (I may be mistaken). 16:10 provides a bit more vertical space.

[Tenacious Stu]

Really Awesome post Dave. Some useful pointers there. Also some nice insight into the steam submission process. Your next submission letter to should just start with:

WE ALREADY HAVE 8 GAMES ON STEAM, CAN YOU ACTUALLY READ THIS EMAIL PLEASE!

[Anian]

First of all, how rude of me to forget, thanks mr. Gilbert, informative and useful as always.

Personally I do not see any advantage of 16:9 over 16:10, but it seems that 16:9 monitors are more popular (I may be mistaken). 16:10 provides a bit more vertical space.

Yes, I do realize that, but if I already have a 16:9 monitor (or if I had the other), there's not really that much for me to do about it now. Web pretty much figured it out with putting huge areas on either side of the screen and everything else being pretty much adaptive.

[DBoyWheeler]

Yeah, about that no Sierra-style GUI rule...

Perhaps a possible exception to the rule here could be in the style of Space Quest VI, where the Walk, Talk, Interact, etc. buttons are not hidden but in plain sight along with the inventory thing.

[Fitz]

Wow, there's definitely some food for thought. Some things I had doubts about -- and some I never even knew.

I'm wondering about wide-screen vs. 4:3, though... AGS 3.2.1.11, which is what I'm using, has the 16:10 wide-screen resolutions for 320 and 640 -- but the next available resolutions, 800 x 600 and 1024 x 768, are both 4:3. For the project I'm planning/preparing for right now, I'd prefer a high resolution, at least 800 x 600. Should I reconsider and settle for something less?

Also, as far as the GUI is concerned, I think the interface in Primordia -- left for walking and interacting, right for looking - works perfectly. The only gripe I had with the overall interface is there aren't -- or don't seem to be -- any key shortcuts, and you have to wait for the drop-down menu to slide down each time and theeeen choose map/inventory/etc. It goes against the simplicity of the cursor GUI's.

Primordia also made me realize that you're totally right about episodic games. I have this idea for a story consisting of three parts. I was thinking about dividing the whole thing into three episodes, because each part takes place in a completely different setting AND employs different game mechanics. BUT it'd still make sense to make it one big game divided into acts instead.

As for intros, I don't think lenghty introductions are such a bad thing, especially if there's a good balance between the talking and visuals without the narrative, where you can just sit back and watch. I might've over-done it with the dialogues in Gray's intro -- but there's still plenty of non-stop action, and you gotta love that music Aaaanyway... letting the player PLAY from the get-go -- and revealing the story bit by bit, instead -- is definitely a good idea. A model example of that is "Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis" - see for yourselves here. That's also the way I've decided to go about it this time, it feels natural with the story that I have in mind, with the player's own actions setting everything in motion. Also, I don't think I can do another five-minute intro

[qptain Nemo]

Primordia also made me realize that you're totally right about episodic games.

And Cognition and Kentucky Route Zero make me doubt the absoluteness of it. I know it's problematic and there are people who lack faith in that, but I don't think it should be labelled as a path of doom.

[Armageddon]

Kentucky Route Zero did it right though, you buy the whole series, not each episode. There are also no deadlines because he's doing it in hiss spare time, he just releases them when they are done.

[Lewis]

A really great thread, and I would echo all of Dave's points. I was thinking of doing something similar so decided to add my own to the mix - hope that's okay, Dave!

***

Grow a thick skin
When you decide to sell a creative work instead of giving it away for free, that apparently means you're saying it's okay for people to be really nasty to you. Get ready for horrible comments about your game, your graphics, your sound, your puzzles, your mother - no matter how awesome your game is. Richard & Alice has a Metascore in the 70s, but we've still seen people say they think it's disgusting that we dared to charge money for something so appalling. You quickly learn to ignore the outliers, and do the sensible thing, which is...

Listen to people whose opinions you respect
Do you have a keen gamer friend? Give your game to them, ask them to play it and give you some honest feedback. Is there a journalist who tends to agree with you about most games? Send them a preview build and pay attention to what they write. If these people have criticisms - the people you've selected because you think they're right about things - then for heaven's sake do something about it.

If you're using plugins, test on loads of machines as early as possible
Half-way through Richard & Alice's development, we realised that a plugin we were using made the game not work properly on some machines. It was too late to stop using this plugin, so we had to find a workaround. It was really annoying. If you're using a plugin, test it on all the graphics modes and all the setups you can possibly get hold of before you make the call to use it.

Kill every element of your GUI that isn't 100 percent necessary
Kind of echoing Dave's point about the old-school Sierra interface here, but I'd take it a step further and advise stripping it back as much as humanly possible. Get rid of everything you feel comfortable getting rid of, then keep getting rid of more stuff. Where possible, allow the player to do everything they might possibly want to do in no more than two clicks. Most things should only take one. Put the inventory on the game screen, and make it unintrusive. Create simple, easy-to-navigate menus that make logical sense and don't bury options unnecessarily. Limit the number of interaction buttons to two at the most. It's easy to think of complex interfaces as being indicative of complex games. They're not. They just distract people from the lovely things you've made. Strip it back, wherever possible.

Test early, test often
Yes, everyone's heard this one before, but it really is true. Have people read your design document. Have people look at your script and offer feedback. As soon as you have a working puzzle in-game, get someone to sit down and play it. Watch them in silence. Even better, stick them in a room on their own and film them playing it (Splash Damage's Ed Stern gave me this fantastic piece of advice). People will try to do what you want them to do if they feel they're being guided too much. Give people the game, and let them play it naturally, and see what happens. It will be agonising. But it will show you exactly where the problems with your game lie. Fix them, and give it to a new tester. Repeat the process. Keep doing this throughout the project. Your game will be better for it.

On a related note...

Testers almost always know when something doesn't work. Testers almost never know what to do to fix it.
When working with a larger number of testers, you'll start to notice some patterns. Some people just report on glaringly obvious bugs. Other people report on everything, from game design to dialogue to the exact shape of a character's nose. Whatever the level of detail, it's worth remembering that, if more than a couple of people point out the same flaw, you should probably do something about it. But be very wary of taking testers' advice on what exactly to change and what would work better. Fresh pairs of eyes are invaluable in spotting problems, but in my experience someone close to the project usually needs to pose the solution.

Make a team member responsible for managing your project
Possibly the lead designer / director, but if that's you, and you don't have much experience coordinating a project, do consider getting someone else to do it. This person will be responsible for nagging everyone else. They'll shout at you for trying to add new features or content at the eleventh hour, they'll set deadlines, and they'll generally get on people's nerves a good few times. But having a single person responsible for pulling everything together is, in my experience, vital if there are more than two of you working on a game. Someone needs to have the primary responsiblity of making sure this thing gets released. Try to do that democratically and you can end up with lots of things falling apart.

Start marketing immediately
This is particularly true if it's your first game. The benefit of having a solid group of people who are real evangelists for your game is extraordinary - but building up to that point took us multiple times as long as we expected. When we made Richard & Alice, we were both going into it as relatively well-known games journalists in the UK. We thought that would be enough. But - as I said at AdventureX last year - it isn't, because while people might like our writing, for all they know our game might be shit.

Start a dev blog the second you open the AGS editor. Make Facebook and Twitter accounts and add people ruthlessly. Keep talking about what you're doing and, hopefully, by the time release rolls around, you'll have a handful of people itching to play it and recommending it to others.

Learn how to do business
A sad but true one for my final point. When money becomes involved - whether you're selling your game for £30 or 30p - people will try to take advantage of you, and people will mess you around. You need to become savvy to this. You need to learn how to negotiate, and how to push back without putting people off. When you've poured every ounce of creative energy into a project for years, only to have a partner try to rip you off or a distributor try to impose ridiculous restrictions on when/where/for how much you can sell your game, it can be incredibly demoralising. Remember it's nothing personal, let it wash off you, and try your best to come out of the conversation getting what you need for your game to do well.

[qptain Nemo]

Very interesting advice, Lewis. I really should get around to playing R&A. 

[CaptainD]

Thanks Lewis, some real food for thought there.

[DazJ]

Excellent points all around but Direct3D causes nothing but problems in terms of object walk-behinds etc, making it completely unusable.

[Dave Gilbert]

Excellent points all around but Direct3D causes nothing but problems in terms of object walk-behinds etc, making it completely unusable.

Really? How so? I use object walk-behinds all the time.

[DazJ]

Excellent points all around but Direct3D causes nothing but problems in terms of object walk-behinds etc, making it completely unusable.

Really? How so? I use object walk-behinds all the time.

It's always been like that for me, even on different machines with different setups. DirectDraw works flawlessly but Direct3D is a different story. A search on the forums brings up similar problems. I'm guessing it must be down to hardware.

[Andail]

Does it have to do with the default driver setting?
I never have problems with my own game - it has direct3d as default driver and I never get objects appearing in front of characters, but recently I played a game where I had to change driver to direct3d (default was directdraw) and I got just that problem.

I really hope people won't have that problem when they play my game, because it looks disastrous and is an immediate game breaker.

[DazJ]

Does it have to do with the default driver setting?
I never have problems with my own game - it has direct3d as default driver and I never get objects appearing in front of characters, but recently I played a game where I had to change driver to direct3d (default was directdraw) and I got just that problem.

I really hope people won't have that problem when they play my game, because it looks disastrous and is an immediate game breaker.

It seems like something's not quite right with the driver then :/

[StillInThe90s]

Thanks a lot Gilbert & Lewis & folks! Very interesting read.
@Andail: It appears that baselines and  things like IgnoreWalkbehind works differently in direct3d & directdraw. So a game designed and buggtracked with one driver may have issues if running with the other. At least that is my experience and is probably also what happened to that game you played.

[Dave Gilbert]

Regarding the DirectDraw vs Direct3D thing. It's not a matter of what the developer finds easier/better to use, it's what the end user will experience.

The game won't even run on a significant percentage of PCs if it is distributed in DirectDraw mode.  What will happen is the game will launch and freeze on the very first screen. Sound will play and the mouse may-or-may-not move (it varies) and the user won't be able to do anything.  DirectDraw is so antiquated that a number of computers don't bother supporting it properly. It happened most often on laptops running Windows 7, but desktop users reported the issue as well. There are various ways of troubleshooting the problem, but they vary from computer to computer.

This was a huge problem with Gemini Rue, since the game could only run in DirectDraw mode thanks to its use of the snow/rain plugin.  We got several complaints about this, but it wasn't until the game launched on Steam that the complaints turned into a tidal wave. Every day they came, and there was very little I could do about it.  After months and months of wrecking our brains trying to sort out why the game wouldn't run (and logging swaths of complaints in the interim) we eventually just bit the bullet and re-wrote the snow/rain plugin to work with Direct3D.  There have been no complaints since.

While it IS true that the player can just switch to D3D mode, it is difficult to explain that to them in a concise and simple manner (opening up the game's folder and clicking on setup is NOT intuitive). And be prepared to do so several times every day!  Even if you include the info in a readme or a technical FAQ or something, I know from experience that nobody ever reads those. Instead, here's what will happen: they will download the demo, get the freeze, and then go "meh." Then they will either delete it and forget about it, or go onto their favorite game forum complaining that the game doesn't run (and getting agreements from everybody else who had the same problem). I know this will happen, because it happened to Gemini Rue. A LOT.

So believe me when I say that it's not totally arbitrary when I insist that a commercial game be created with Direct3D mode in mind.

[m0ds]

This has been my week so far. Yesterday I located your "switch to high performance" solve for laptops, but is there a specific resolve for Win 7 games freezing up on a desktop machine (for a game that does not have the option to switch between directdraw & direct3d in winsetup). Re: Downfall, so you've probably had some of these questions over time too Dave?

It's still pretty important (and a sad fact about AGS IMO) that it's necessary to get everything right before release. If you distribute with game breaking errors, or can't add something on easily enough in the future, you're going to gain some wrinkles soon enough... Something really needs to exist to help patch AGS games, EXE files in particular - because replacing an entire game (re-distributing a large game to many people for example) is just clunky and not great for (small) commercial enterprises. Yet customers expect it because they've seen gigantic VG corporations do it. Mind you I know nothing of the 'patching' world and quite how those things actually work. All I know is that I'm faced with logistical nightmares because there is no known way of patching a game at this point. And when a game needs to be fixed and is available across multiple stores...well, may as well just get the shotgun out now TBH

[Knox]

For me Im a bit worried about the "no sierra-style interface". I really like that interface, and really hate the 2-click one. I find it a lot more satisifying personally to be able to choose different kinds of interactions instead of 1 click for move and one for all interactions.

As a work-around, it is a good idea to offer 2 or more different interfaces and let the player choose?