This is the
Curious Dig.It is one of the first AGS experiments that I can recall, and still have lying about. I am fond of it, and I learned a lot. The player is a professor leading a (badly funded) expedition to dig up a lost tomb. You dig up valuables to get score. You analyse and combine them in the workshop to get more score. You break open the main vault, have some sort of final encounter, and you win. It was the general plan, at least.
Of course, it was difficult to make the archaeology-em-up gameplay work, or at least make it work for a tidy little project of this scale. Solving puzzles and finding extra goodies were more fun than sifting through sand and what-not. That, perhaps, is a different experience for a different game.
I am still fond of the idea, mind. Of course, I am wanting for a sort of framework to explain the vagaries, and I have gotten a better idea of how to make the gameplay work. I wanted Time Team rather than Indiana Jones, but the latter simply works for a game in a way that the former cannot.
The Emperor's Cure.I think this was a prospective MAGS entrant. I forget the theme, but it was about the emperor on death's door due to illness, and the hapless junior alchemist summoned to whip up a cure, as the master apothecary suddenly died. It was effectively an alchemy game. Crush, calcinate, mix, and do not die, and do not poison the emperor.
It was quite fun, and this time, I learnt a lot about cut-scenes and GUIs and multiple endings. I also discovered Eric Matyas's excellent music archive!
It was, of course, impossible to finish within a month. It was also far too much framing around what was ultimately a basic colour mix-matching puzzle, despite the vast amounts of ingredients and different states. As with the Curious Dig, I may have tried to simulate alchemy too far at the expense of gameplay. Still – a learning experience. I became rather fond of the Regency-esque fantasy theme, and of Mr Strom, endlessly bumbling himself up the steps. He will be given future opportunities to serve his emperor, I think.
Disposal.A game about bomb disposal, in which you are a technician called to disarm bombs left around the city by a mad bomber.
As always, the problem was in the gameplay. It is difficult to build satisfying puzzles all around bombs – or at least with a reasonably realistic approach to bombs. I came to hear that an Ulster bomb-squad had to 'unlearn' some of their techniques, since the contraptions were a lot less fiendishly clever than the training had supposed. Unplug the detonator, and you are done. Which meant having to invent more and more outrageous types of bombs, and the needs of the gameplay clashed with the style.
Still, an idea with a lot of potential. Bombs could be only part of it. Sabotage in a more general sense would work for more variety in the puzzles. Breaking into a compromised reactor to mend it before it goes critical, for instance. Anything that relies on correctly pointing and clicking.
I like the design for this. The best description is that it is Stålenhagian, a sort of futuristic visit to the past. On the one hand, it is quite satisfying to see someone have an identical vision for something that you have. On the other, it is somewhat distressing that they are vastly better at expressing it, and you know that you will be under that shadow, and be a 'rip-off'. Still, a pleasant walk among memories, most certainly.
One idea I liked was to change the game saving system a bit. Rather than having it available all the time, the player would need to click the panel on the NatTech van to bring up the saving dialogue. Which makes the disposal part a bit more tense, with the right music.
I also wanted it to be timed, but timers in AGS are a bit complicated for me. The next best thing is to have limited actions. Every action that takes time to do deduct some from your time meter. If you run out, the bomb explodes.
I shall have to make a demo of this, some day. Might not hurt with some more perspectives on it.
Emergency.This is a GUI-test, mainly. I wanted to make a sort of unified GUI that made sense within the context of the game, and I was quite happy with how it turned out. Also, I liked the idea of an android on board a starship taken over by space monsters. The usual space horror affair; twisted creatures stalking the hallways, flickering lights, walls being consumed by kebab, crewmen twisted into fleshy polyp aberrations, and so forth. While the android face it all with the indifference of a machine.
Of course, the player's agency makes him go beyond his programming routines in order to complete his mission, which one could call emergent behaviour.
An idea I shall keep working on, I think. I liked the humour, and the GUI learning experience was invaluable – I found a general style I could use.
I say, I like how a pattern begins to come forwards when you put old project pictures side-by-side like this. I really like the Sierra-template, as you can plainly see.
While these games have not been made, I must say that they are still quite valuable to me. All the things I learned, all the ideas they prompted... Time spent well, indeed. Most enriching. Of course, I shall have to make something good enough to release, one of these days.
This thread is most intriguing - and a damned good idea!
