The Granville Chronicles, not so much anymore

[Matt Brown]

well, I have good news and I have bad news.  The bad news is that ol' James Bob is going to be delayed a bit. Mark my words, it will be completed, but...its going to take a little bit more time then I hoped. (art problems)

because of this, I've decided I need to become more independant. I've also decided to dig up an ol' idea of mine that I've had since I went into game creation. The Granville Chronicles.

I have looked at the games I've written, (both finished and unfinished) and found 2 glaring flaws. One, my art sucks. Really bad. I dont do my own stuff sometimes, and the rest is half-assed. TGC will be an oppertunity to show the world that I'm improving a little bit. I've been working on doing my own chac. animations. Now, right now, i'm going a bit of the robert redford style, that is to say, partly using a digital camera. Oh well. Its still my own, and its still an improment. Camera shots also might be a part of the BGs, I dont know yet. All photography will be my own however.

The other huge flaw is chacter development and storytelling. in BQ, plot and chacters were often sacraficed for the sake of bad gags. In TGC, this is not the case. TGC is based on the town that I live in, and people I know. and the playible chacater is...me! Narsasistic, prehaps, but basing a game of real people and real events I think will help me. I hope to show people thru this game what things are like here.

I haven't really decided if this game will be a comedy or a sierous game...prob. some of both. My friends and people here are pretty funny, but I can tackle some other issues in the game.

I WILL post screenies, and a demo shortly. I've been working on this for about a month, so I can guarantee it will be finished.

The music will be done mostly by me, or preformace groups in which I am a part of.

This game, (at least the first one) I figure will be a little bit bigger then Bob's Quest, that is to say, about 25 playible rooms. Not too big. i want to finish this,and do it right.

Also, I know that interest in this game may not be that high. Thats okay. I am writing this mostly for me and my friends, and hope to learn a lot about storytelling, writing, and others in doing it. I hope you enjoy it when I finish it though, if you decide to play it. I'll put forth something worth your trouble.

BTW, once I am finished with chac. animations, and somebody feels so inclined to spiff them up a bit, or after I post something somebody wants to make it better, by all means. I want to improve, and someday, crank out a classic


EDIT: okay, cranked out a small demo for you to enjoy.
http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/Compiled.zip


I think there might be a little bug at the end of the game, not sure. its still playible, and its only a little typo I think. please play

[Snake]

The title alone makes the series sound sweet. But WHAT IS IT ABOUT!?




--Snake

[wOoDz]

my first attempted at a game was around people and events that where funny but i found the funny things where only funny if you knew them and where there at the time. and believe me thety did some weird things! i did a cartoon strip in the 90's around my friends they went down well, they made tee shirts of the toon characters and framed pictures but the cartoon fell flat on its face when i tryed to get stuff pulished.
i hope you can pull it off, its a great idea, if you need some stories i can give you some!

woodz

[Matt Brown]

haha, right, plot and such. After mush delibertaing, here is what I thought about doing for the first game...

okay. Times are dark for the Granville High school band. The marching band was cut and replaced witha steel drum band. The old director who just left was an evil man, who left a bad taste in everyones mouth. Terrorist attacks have been carried out my other schools, and other people in the community. to make matters worse, the band's mojo, their lifeblood, the sheetmusic for the song "the time warp" (from the rocky horror picture show) was stolen by the old director. times are bad.

You and your friends have had enough of these attacks. They form a group called "the blue steel gestapo". a group devoted on geting revenge, securing the music department's saftey, and most important, getting their stuff back.

You need to work with your pals, sneak into places, not get caught, and put the evildoers to justice. A few subplots are also sprinkled along the way, which lead into a much more serious conflict in the next chapter....


(note: the term gestapo is not ment to offend. it means "sceret police", not jew killers. thats just whats its called in real life. In fact, one of the members of the BSG is a jewish kid. if it really would offend people, I guess I could change it, but I'd rather not.)

edit: okay, main char animations are 50Z% done today! w00tage. Also, almost finished drawing first room, and first two rooms on intro. I figure demo before school is out.

EDIT 5/24/03----okay, I finished the main char. animations today!!! W00T! Those are my first hand-done animations. I did a bit more picture-taking, but also redrew some storyboard. I really doubt I'll hit my first deadline, which was demo by school's out, since there will exams and final projects coming up...but maybe. I'm taking time and fixing mistakes. It takes longer, but I feel better about my work.

[Jimi]

yes, basing it on real people will help. It helped me alot when I was drawing Rodney McNab for the first time in Enlish on my 3rd week at high school..my first detention...anyway, it helps develop history of the character. Rodney McNab is actually based on me.

[Snake]

This sounds awesome, PandaMan!! I love the sneaking arouns part!1

Can't wait for screenies!


--Snake

[Matt Brown]

sort of a screenie is in the cricitics lounge...possible main char. sprite. check it out, offer C and C, whatver

[Gonzo]

This is one of the most interesting premises for an adventure game I've read on this forum, I really mean that. Recently people have been posting so many great ideas that make me excited about what's to come - I just hope they all get made.

The various things that need to be put right sounds like a good healthy multi-sided main quest, and I love the idea of 'life blood', the sheet music, getting stolen.

[Matt Brown]

thanks gonzo

just for you, I re-drew a possible first room. check out teh critic's lounge for a looksie. even better if you can offer suggestions. I think I'm improving a little bit

[Matt Brown]

well folks, I've been sick these past few days, so that means I haven't been at school. However, that means I've had alllll day to work on TGC. I've showed what I've had to far to a few buddies at granville, and then to LGM. i think most of my friends are still in shock that I'm making a game, and some of them might be in it, and so they didnt give me much help, other then spoting a bug or too. LGM helped me a lot more.

sooo, I would say I am about 4 rooms and 4 more GUI spirtes away from showing a demo to you all. How quick that may be depends on...

a) how finals (or studying for finals) turns out
b) how quickly I can do my makeup work for being sick
c) How quickly I am able to draw the last few rooms, as this is the only thing that is hard for me. if somebody wants to help after I draw up som sketches, that would be great, if not, thats cool, i'll plug on through. I'm not in a big hurry.

thanks for the interest guys!


ps. If anybody actually wants a  new-updated (you haven't seen it yet lgm) MINI-DEMO, PM me...I can work it out.

also, edit: I'm thinking that this first game will more then likely end up on the funny side, rather then being so serious, but not killing the story or chacaters for the sake of a gag. The next chapter I have planed for this series is much more sierous

UPDATE JUNE 8TH--- hey, good news! Instead of studying...I've been working on this! I've made a pretty cool puzzle (at least I think so anyways) for the demo, and found somebody to touch my up artwork. I think that a completete demo (5 rooms, complete puzzle, and sound) will be done in less then 10 days. I'm waiting for one room to come back, and I need to relearn a script command. I am very very excited!

[Matt Brown]

check out the demo!

[Bob The Hun]

Goody!
Downloading...
I'll get back to you tommorow.

[Matt Brown]

crap, I found a somewhat major bug a the end of the game, where the game tells you you finished when you really didnt. I'll fix it soon, and have a different download


in the meantime, you know you did everything you can do when you get 97 points!

[Matt Brown]

okay, fixed the demo. sorry folks.

http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/TGC_DEMO_V1.5.zip

as for me using neole's service, im having the first one removed as to not take up too much room, and this is only temp, as im going on vacation for a week, and dont have time to hunt around for webspace, and want peoples to play the game. there are 100 points, and this time, I am sure, there are no bugs.


thanks everybody!

[Matt Brown]

Okay, I'm back from my weeklong break, and was a little disapointed that there wern't any comments about my demo. Thats not a big deal however, i'll just work more on the actual game

which in fact, is what I've been doing. Its back to teh chacater drawing board, since I get my photos back on monday, and I can import them, and have a few NPCs now. (dialog!) The full game prob. wont be out until late fall, (my artitst isnt coming back until mid-august!) but I have lots of stuff to do until she gets back. I might throw another screenie or too or some music, between then if there is interest.


okay, thanks guys. Play teh demo!!11!

[Matt Brown]

Hmm...good news bad news...

Good News: Every Member of the team is back in the States. Most of the music has been recorded. The storyboard is in place. 6 backgrounds are done. Things are looking up.

Bad News: had to format the computer...lost some game files...have to rescript. Not too big of a problem, I didnt have anything really complicated.

Just brought this back to up to show Im still working on the game, and I hope to show some more soon.

In the meantime, continue to enjoy the demo...which can be found at my website...and a link to it is in the info

[evilspacefart]

good luck, and stay at it. sometimes its hard with school, work, and some regular life catching you. my own release is taking a lot longer than i would figured.

[Matt Brown]

uh..about that still working on the game...

yah. Prob not going to anymore. Cause..the idea is kind sh!t. Most of you guys wouldnt get the jokes and stuff, cause its mostly inside jokes. The Graphics were'nt getting made...yeah. Not a good idea, and I think, due to complete and total lack of interest, which = no motivation + a bad idea, Im putting this bad boy on hold.

I might dig it up again, but I want to work on something else first. Im not going to say anything about that until I have at LEAST a five room demo. I'm going to try something completly different.

There will be no more band jokes
There will be no roger
It will be long
It will be funny
It will be good

Ok. So...thanks for supporting me thru this, enjoy the brief game that I did make. I think I'll clean that up, and release another, bug free version of the demo.

Thanks guys

Matt