Author Topic: Adventure: Welcome to the Genre (Read 5438 times)

Akril15 · « **on:** 23 Jan 2018, 18:17 »

Thalia James' job in the Computer Game Maintenance Squad is seldom an easy one. After one of her assignments nearly ends in disaster, she is asked to track down five characters believed to be responsible for a series of criminal activities throughout the 2D adventure genre. With that to grapple with as well the mysterious condition from her past that has inexplicably resurfaced, the first annual Adventure Game Awards and the grand opening of something called the Mega-Game, this adventure is bound to be anything but mundane.

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Unlike its predecessors, the majority of art, sound and music in AWTTG is original (that is, free online resources as opposed to assets mtaken from other games). You will still be seeing a number of familiar locales and characters, but there will be a lot of new places and faces as well (plus a few characters that will be familiar to you if you have played Adventure: The Inside Job and Adventure: All in the Game).

There will be puzzles, there will be inventory items, there will be dialog trees...

...and there will also be wardrobe changes.

Download the game here!

Adventure: Welcome to the Genre's AGS entry

Adventure: Welcome to the Genre's website (includes a walkthrough, behind-the-scenes info and other extra goodies)

Frodo · « **Reply #1 on:** 23 Jan 2018, 18:41 »

Congrats on releasing the game, Akril

Very happy to see this one. Downloading it now.

arj0n · « **Reply #2 on:** 23 Jan 2018, 19:14 »

Congratz, Akril!

Thalia's back!
This game is really big gameworld-wise, has a great story, lot's
of characters, amazing animations and clever puzzles.
Love the diversity of rooms ranging from low-res to vga style.
One of my favorites of 2018 already!

CaptainD · « **Reply #3 on:** 23 Jan 2018, 22:34 »

Woo-hoo!!

Congrats on the release. Looking forward to giving this one a spin

Creamy · « **Reply #4 on:** 23 Jan 2018, 23:25 »

After spending a couple of hours in this glorious patchwork, I can already confirm that this game is another massive love letter to the genre

I've selected "adequate knowledge of adventure games" since I knew that this series use some advanced references. No problem so far. Thalia is always keen to fill me on everything anyway.

I was afraid I wouldn't remember all that Maintenance Squad jazz since I've played the other episodes a long time ago but the concepts are reintroduced in a pleasant way - lots of animations and cutscenes!
It hasn't been very challenging yet but I don't really care since I'm entertained and intrigued by the story.

More later!

Akril15 · « **Reply #5 on:** 24 Jan 2018, 03:01 »

Quote from: Frodo on 23 Jan 2018, 18:41

Congrats on releasing the game, Akril
Very happy to see this one. Downloading it now.

Thank you! Making this game was a long process made even longer by some unfortunate personal issues, but I'm glad it's finally out now.

Quote from: arj0n on 23 Jan 2018, 19:14

Congratz, Akril!

Thalia's back!
This game is really big gameworld-wise, has a great story, lot's
of characters, amazing animations and clever puzzles.
Love the diversity of rooms ranging from low-res to vga style.
One of my favorites of 2018 already!

Thanks! I'm very flattered that you consider this game a favorite.

Quote from: CaptainD on 23 Jan 2018, 22:34

Woo-hoo!!

Congrats on the release. Looking forward to giving this one a spin

Thank you! I hope you enjoy it.

Quote from: Creamy on 23 Jan 2018, 23:25

I was afraid I wouldn't remember all that Maintenance Squad jazz since I've played the other episodes a long time ago but the concepts are reintroduced in a pleasant way - lots of animations and cutscenes!
It's not very challenging yet but I don't really care since I'm entertained and intrigued by the story.

Yeah, I tried to provide as much backstory as I could at the start without it coming across as a massive info dump. There were a few particular puzzles in the game that more or less all of my beta-testers needed help with, so I'm interested to see if they trip you up as well.

Mandle · « **Reply #6 on:** 24 Jan 2018, 14:10 »

Playing as soon as possible. Loved the first two and by the sound of it this one lives up to what they delivered!

Akril15 · « **Reply #7 on:** 26 Jan 2018, 23:22 »

Quote from: Mandle on 24 Jan 2018, 14:10

Playing as soon as possible. Loved the first two and by the sound of it this one lives up to what they delivered!

I certainly hope so. Thank you!

Tabata · « **Reply #8 on:** 27 Jan 2018, 17:08 »

Just wanted to jump in to congratulate for the release

and to confess that I already dived into your game, having lots of fun playing

... and to report about a little oopsy/crash when I used the ...

Spoiler: Show

Akril15 · « **Reply #9 on:** 27 Jan 2018, 22:17 »

Quote from: Tabata on 27 Jan 2018, 17:08

Just wanted to jump in to congratulate for the release

and to confess that I already dived into your game, having lots of fun playing

... and to report about a little oopsy/crash when I used the ...
Spoiler: Show Hide

... mirror on the lit torch in the cave

(sorry, I can't stop trying stupid things )

Thanks for catching that. I'll be sure to fix it when I get the chance. For some reason, I've been getting a lot of unhandled_event errors with this game, and I'm not sure why.

DBoyWheeler · « **Reply #10 on:** 27 Jan 2018, 23:51 »

Wow! Long time no see, Akril! And really kick@$$ new game here!

m0ds · « **Reply #11 on:** 28 Jan 2018, 22:40 »

well done! curious, what was the "one track" of mine you used? I hope to get a bunch more into my (ancient) free section. for now tho it's nice to find out you grabbed one and used it! unless you used the original nelly cootalot theme, in which case, law suit pending. just kidding

Akril15 · « **Reply #12 on:** 29 Jan 2018, 02:23 »

Quote from: DBoyWheeler on 27 Jan 2018, 23:51

Wow! Long time no see, Akril! And really kick@$$ new game here!

Thank you.

Quote from: MJL on 28 Jan 2018, 22:40

well done! curious, what was the "one track" of mine you used? I hope to get a bunch more into my (ancient) free section. for now tho it's nice to find out you grabbed one and used it! unless you used the original nelly cootalot theme, in which case, law suit pending. just kidding

Thank you! The track was "Test 2", and it appears in the game's finale.

Akril15 · « **Reply #13 on:** 30 Jan 2018, 06:43 »

If anyone who has finished the game is wondering what the "Questions" section in the credits refers to, they are featured in an Easter Egg in the later part of the game that may be a little hard to find...but hopefully it isn't too out of this world.

*hint hint*

Mandle · « **Reply #14 on:** 30 Jan 2018, 17:16 »

I just finished the game and I'm quite proud to say that I played the entire game through OLDSCHOOL style without a single hint from any source...

Just me and the game...

It took me three days and about 20 hours of playtime I would say...

The game is HARD!!!

It's REALLY hard to complete on your own, but very rewarding and I'm glad I played it through on my lonesome and resisted any hints.

I've been looking for an oldschool full-length adventure game for some time that could hold my jaded interest and make me want to beat my head against when I was stuck and when I saw this one come out I resevered it for a RL time period where I could just turn off the internet and play it as it had been intended: As a love letter to hard-to-solve adventure games from the '90's back when when you were stuck you were stuck.

Man, some of the puzzles had me beating my head against the wall for 4+ hours but it was SOOOO satisfying to experience those pre-internet moments where I solved them on my own and progressed...

I perservered because I had played the previous 2 games and knew that I was in good hands and knew that Akril15 would not let me down and that the puzzles would not have left me feeling cheated when I finally figured them out.

I'm not going to go into spoilers at all here but several times I almost felt the game must be bugged or at a dead-end state because some of the puzzles were beautifully minimalistic and yet soul-crushingly tough to solve:

I'm looking at YOU Gus!!! (But the magical moments when I solved them was pure 1990's wonderment and reminded me why I fell in love with adventure games to begin with)

The art and animation that goes into the storytelling and cutscenes is jawdropping...Like seriously this game could have just done the puzzles and story and it would have been fine but we get serious cinematic full-on cutscenes with Tarantino-style camera angles and pacing...

I would fully recommend this game to hard-core adventure game fans and also advise to play it without hints...

You will go through hell and back if you do so...

But when you finish the game you will be in heaven...

Trust me...

Akril15 · « **Reply #15 on:** 30 Jan 2018, 18:33 »

Wow, thanks for the glowing appraisal, Mandle! I wanted to make this game longer and more difficult than the previous two games without making it ridiculously unfair and frustrating, and judging by what you're saying, it sounds like I hit that sweet spot.

Mandle · « **Reply #16 on:** 31 Jan 2018, 02:56 »

Quote from: Akril15 on 30 Jan 2018, 18:33

Wow, thanks for the glowing appraisal, Mandle!

You're more than welcome. Thank you for the amazingly fun time! May I ask how long it took you to make the game?

It does quite a few things that seem outside the normal capabilities of AGS as well:

Spoiler: Show

For a product that you obviously can never legally make a single cent from without getting hit by a million C&Ds it's top professional level in all regards.

You must be nuts!

Akril15 · « **Reply #17 on:** 31 Jan 2018, 05:03 »

Quote from: Mandle on 31 Jan 2018, 02:56

You're more than welcome. Thank you for the amazingly fun time! May I ask how long it took you to make the game?

Even though it's been about six years since I officially started working on this game, there were long stretches that I didn't get any work done. I added up the days where I recorded I worked, and the actual number of days I spent working on this game was a lot lower than I thought it would be: approximately 484.

Quote

Spoiler: Show Hide
The 3D maze section blew me away! I suspect it was kind of "simulated" 3D in the maze section but it was super well done! Did you create that effect yourself or was it a module?

Spoiler: Show

Quote

For a product that you obviously can never legally make a single cent from without getting hit by a million C&Ds it's top professional level in all regards.

You must be nuts!

Yep.

I definitely want to make a 100% original game now that I've got a good handle on AGS. It'll definitely take a while to get started, though.

SarahLiz · « **Reply #18 on:** 05 Feb 2018, 22:10 »

Ok, at the risk of sounding like a cheater, I'm going to bite the bullet and ask the question: any plans for a walkthrough? (Please?) Loving this game, but I'm not even able to get as far as the folks asking questions in the hints & tips section. I don't want to give up on it, I really like this game! Quirky and lots of fun!

Thanks in advance...just try not to scold me!

Akril15 · « **Reply #19 on:** 06 Feb 2018, 00:34 »

Quote from: SarahLiz on 05 Feb 2018, 22:10

Ok, at the risk of sounding like a cheater, I'm going to bite the bullet and ask the question: any plans for a walkthrough? (Please?) Loving this game, but I'm not even able to get as far as the folks asking questions in the hints & tips section. I don't want to give up on it, I really like this game! Quirky and lots of fun!

Thanks in advance...just try not to scold me!

I'm glad you're enjoying it so far! There is a walkthrough available on the game's site.

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Author Topic: Adventure: Welcome to the Genre (Read 5438 times)

m0ds