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Not quite sure how to say this, but for some reason, the cow doesn't move. It'll change direction when I press the arrow keys, but it won't actually move...

So... what exactly is the policy on items created before this month? Are we allowed to use old stuff to continue work or just drop everything?

What's the policy on demos or games in parts for this round? I can think of one idea that's incomplete, but it's not completely doable in a month.

Whew... that game was hard and not in the intuitive sense.

Not to offend the creator, but it has a lot of unfriendly design, including such annoyances as:

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The main character thinking everything is so obvious as a default response to my clicking 'look' on things.

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There are some really awkward pieces of dialogue in this game. I don't imagine they were intentional either. When I think about this game I will never forget about the term "Homosexual Necrophilia" and how hiding in a freezer is somehow "a good idea as the door can only open from one side." The character is either sarcastic or mind-numbingly stupid, and I honestly can't tell which was intended.

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Having to 'walk' up a box, or 'walk' down a ladder, when both things really require hands to do in reality. This is actually more severe of an issue than you'd think because the 'walk' action in AGS is really sensitive about where you have to click in order to get to where you want to be.

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Which leads me to another issue:

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The serial killer baddie that follows you is both too fast and too stupid at times when the intention was the opposite. Character following in AGS is a little awkward and is a bit unpredictable and uncontrollable from the designer's end. This sort've leads to dumb events such as getting killed mid-sentence because the killer walked up to you and is waiting for you to finish talking (in this game), or the fact that I managed to escape getting killed by staring into the mirror (in this game)

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These really cripple this game and need a fixing. Without these issues, the game itself isn't hard and is a little fun (though short). I will address one more issue though, I can't get anything BUT the good ending, and I can't seem to find two of the rooms shown in the screen shots. They seem to be completely missing from this game.

Before I leave, there is one feature I have to give kudos for:

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This game is really good at surprising you. I did not predict the mirror to actually kill me. At first, I thought something was going to happen, but the moment the main character said "how disappointing" I let my guard completely down, only to be stabbed in the face. Personally, I think that was a great touch.

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Thanks for that!

While the idea of simulating a chatroom was really appealing to me, I was actually a little shocked that it had a plot to go with it (more because I wanted to test the AI rather than try to 'solve' it and get to the end).

Without going into much detail, the ending was...

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really good and ironic on many hilarious levels

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but I felt that the fact that it ended that way led to a lot of plot holes in the dialogue, the biggest one being...

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I discovered Luke was actually a bot after he answered with THE SAME RESPONSE THREE TIMES despite whether it related to my questions about food or not:

What's your favorite food?
I've got enough food to last me for six months

Is that food good?
I've got enough food to last me for six months

What is food?
I've got enough food to last me for six months

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It's a really good attempt at AI, but I kinda wish I'd have known there was a story attached, so I didn't go balls first into calling Roger nasty names to get him riled up.

[The Everyday Adventures of the EVIL Dr Zoo]

Hooray! I'm actually surprised to get it done!
Finished in 9 days because that's when I noticed the contest

The Everyday Adventures of the EVIL Dr Zoo


Plot
You are the Evil Dr. Zoo, a mad scientist set on conquering the world (or something) or at least humanity! However, due to a someone ratting out your location, the Guild of Heroes (creatively named) has sent forth a hero to... um... stop you. Choose the hero and use your defenses to protect your base from him/her!

Do it now!

Gameplay
The basic gameplay involves dialogue between you and your head minion, with you choosing orders to issue based on the hero you're fighting and the location they're at. If worse comes to worse and you don't know what to do, you have a 1 in 27 chance of getting the best ending.

There are two heroes to face and three possible endings per hero. Collect them all!

The game is fairly short, so there's no need to save or load at any time. Ctrl-Q to quit or click the 'exit' button at the lower right if you're at the main screen.

Other Notes
- This game contains an entire TWO sounds because I was running short on time. Enjoy them both!


http://rapidshare.com/files/125031592/drzoo.zip.html

I present to you at the last minute: SERUM

Features:

-a character that isn't a pirate, archeologist, or whatever else the contest demanded.
-a unique setting in each room (from black to completely poor perspective, which isn't done enough), or an under construction breakroom.
-dynamic NPCs with changing attitudes towards the player based upon your interaction with them.
-randomized game elements to provide a different game experience each time it's played.
-two types of enemies with different strategies for attacking the player and other civilians.
-a weapon to defend yourself with (or for other purposes).
-a highscore table that saves automatically, so you never lose your status.
-several ways to end the game (including purposeful suicide).

(Warning: Violence and Some Swearing)

Download Now! (Please...?)
http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/serum_2.zip

Link to Thread:
http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=32503

I present to you, for no good reason, my FIRST posted AGS game. For MAGS 09/07!






Story:
You are Mark Harlan, Medical Technician at SE (Scientific Electronics). It was a normal day at work, visitors coming and going, while relaxing in the still under construction break room, when suddenly a virus leaks, forcing a whole section of SE to go under immediate automatic quarantine. Trapped with 5 sometimes reluctant people, you have to find a way to cure everybody without getting yourself killed or worse: infected.

Features:
-a character that isn't a pirate, archeologist, or whatever else the contest demanded.
-a unique setting in each room (from black to completely poor perspective, which isn't done enough), or an under construction breakroom.
-dynamic NPCs with changing attitudes towards the player based upon your interaction with them.
-randomized game elements to provide a different game experience each time it's played.
-two types of enemies with different strategies for attacking the player and other civilians.
-a weapon to defend yourself with (or for other purposes).
-a highscore table that saves automatically, so you never lose your status.
-several ways to end the game (including purposeful suicide).


(Warning: Violence and Some Swearing)
Download Now:

http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/serum_2.zip

Known Bugs/Issues (keeping at v0.9)
-lack of animations due to time constraints; working on it
-somewhat dumb AI
-high score table sometimes gives incorrect values, and won't register "Most People Killed" value.

Once again, good game, but I don't really have to say that. People know they've got a good game here if it's all the way up to a part 6. The puzzles in this were well placed, well explained, with easy to find inventory, and most importantly: the puzzles were logical. My biggest complaint with the puzzles is that I usually picked up the items without any knowledge of needing them whatsoever or what they were needed for. Often times, this would lead to the game putting two and two together LONG before I would.

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Such as using the seaweed with the rock to make a sling, but finding Ben covered it completely for some reason.

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I also found the minotaur's maze to be disappointing as well. It was, once again, logical, but I thought it to be too logical (with all the rooms being four-walled at the exact same angle). I could basically visualize it in my head very quickly because of it's small size. I may be limiting myself to comparisons, but it's very much dwarfed by the one from King's Quest VI

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Unfortunately, because every puzzle was very well explained, so was every threat beforehand, which took away a GREAT amount of the suspense. My best example of this is...

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The Siren's Song, as the boatsman explained the exact horror that was supposedly there. The first thing I did was save, so I was basically invincible and unafraid, then went to kill Ben, expecting it completely.

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Without the suspense, almost all of the plot was predictable to me (because it was once again, VERY WELL explained each scene happened). Especially when...

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Simon went to stand right at the edge of the beach, after two drunks did so beforehand and "disappeared", and after Ben had a dream about the same thing. The one thing that could've been avoided was showing the exact form of the sea monster during Ben's dream. That could've saved a lot of suspense, if the title screen didn't show the outline of the creature anyways.

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Those notes aside, the graphics were wonderful and the animations smooth. The puzzles were very logical and not too confusing (I didn't need any hints for this one) If the game sticks to those good points and works on making a more suspenseful and unpredictable plot line, Ben Jordan 7 could prove to be a GREAT game in general for me.

Also:

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Are there correct responses to the professor's questions during the restaurant conversation? And is there a way to make Simon drunk at the drinking contest?

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I admit, I complain a lot, and without releasing any form of entertainment with the use of AGS, what right do I have to complain? I have no honest idea, really.

Intriguing idea...

One question: do mannequins and robots count as inanimate objects?

I was reaaaaally bored...

Being a complete AGS nobody here, I feel tempted to say my thoughts.

I might be going against most conventions and even the general purpose of an adventure game when I say that I hate solving puzzles. I hate having to find a specific item of inventory to use on some specific, obscure object to have it miraculously reveal the next development of the plot. It's silly, and generally feels like a waste of time.

My ideal adventure game would be one that I could beat in one sitting (given, it can be a 3 hour sitting). It needs to be straightforward enough that I don't get frustrated after a while because my logic doesn't work in some instance. I don't need to know the overall goal of the game first, I need to know how to get past the first door first. If I'm missing the key to a door and I'm supposed to find it, the game needs to tell me that. It shouldn't just tell me that it's locked so that I give up and go elsewhere.

I'm often times sick and tired of the term 'logical'. It's not very logical to me if I didn't think to do it ever. I just want my game to be straightforward and helpful. Give me 100 ways to do the same thing so 100 people can get a different experience instead of 99 being frustrated and the 1 giving up and telling everyone else what to do.

That worked perfectly.

Sorry, I tried searching the forums, but because I didn't know anything of that command, my search was very unsuccessful. All I can say is that I looked heavily in the Help FAQ and found nothing on the subject, so I came here.

Thanks

I'm not sure how best to ask this. Is there a way to place decals, such as bullet holes, into the wall of a room on mouseclick with it's x,y position based upon the position of the mouse, and is there a way to make this simply room dependant. I've seen this in a demo of a war game made with AGS.

Specifically, when I say 'decal,' I mean that I want to be able to see multiple bullet holes when I click the mouse multiple times, not just one moving around. I was considering making bullet holes by using game characters, but there has to be a simpler way.

Thanks.

Well, for a learning experiment, it was quite fun. Veeery 5DAS inspired, but if I might say some things:

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The perspective of the rooms is quite funky throughout the game (top-down, yet not really)
Not being allowed to pick up an object because you don't need it yet isn't fun (especially when it tells you that a cabinet is empty when it has something later on :/).
The game had a lot of rooms for how many were really used in the end.

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Other than that, it was alright

But then:

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Where does Somerset stand in the hierarchy of this story? If Chzo has final say, how would "The Caretaker" be able to defy its will by killing the Trilby clone (which also makes no sense) and um.. re-animating Trilby Classic? (I think during this time, Somerset hadn't actually died). Then, in death, he becomes a slave to fate in which he serves Chzo by delivering the main character... And then there's original Trilby defying Chzo by dying 'or whatever' before the 'ritual' (which I don't understand) is completed in TN. If two humans were to be able to defy Chzo's will, does that mean that the main character here should have some kind of loophole in which he could escape as well?

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That seemed to be the most unnecessary argument written now that I've written it. This game is very confusing.

There was also one more thing I wanted to talk about that I actually liked in this game: the puzzles. I've read a lot of people's posts talking about how overly easy the puzzles were (and how no one needed the walkthrough, blah blah blah), but to me that seems to be a WELL fulfilled goal in adventure gaming.

In many cases, it felt like Yahtzee KNEW where I was going and formed the story in that direction. An example:

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Toward the beginning of the game when you first made it into the bunkers, notice how the journalist gave you the guns and kicked you out (giving you NO oppurtunity to explore the doorway to the right in the bunker). Then when you talked to the two characters, you had to go to sleep before you were allowed to explore the room (or the doorway to the right of the bunker). When you woke up the first time, what was the first thing you did? I know I went straight for that doorway to the right, and THAT's where the action happened. Also note that there was no post-it on the locker or a journal while you were 'in the dream' to distract you from going in that direction.

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It's things like that, where the author KNOWS what you're going to try, and pushes you in his/her intended direction. Those elements make a game fun.

However, one thing puzzles me in playing this game. Despite all the horrible things going on and all the deadly situations

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Your main character does not and cannot die. Every time you are 'killed,' you just wake up somewhere else.

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I can understand the reasoning in terms of plot (such as fate and destiny guiding someone), but it's something that I still ask 'why?'

After playing it and beating it last night, I think I relatively enjoyed it. Though it isn't my favorite in the FDAS series, it was still an adventure game that I didn't decide to give up on, and that's important.

However, in my opinion, there were a lot of plot elements that seemed both unnecessary and purposefully confusing:

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-The caretaker

-Any and all timelines in which characters went into the future and past of events for absolutely no reason.

-Somerset's decent into the caretaker

-Playing as Somerset whatsoever, even though the current events aren't in the same timeframe (meanwhile, 196 years later)

- If you couldn't tell, I didn't care for the whole caretaker/Somerset thing

- Trilby clones, what the hell?

- Trilby clone's soul/energy.... what?

- Snuffing the awesome (Dracula-like) prince for a mummified building inspector (in the next sequel, I'm forseeing a zombie farmer to take the place as the new prince)

-This list continues as I get more and more confuzzled

All in all, this game seems to serve as a series of unrelated (yet awesome) scenes taking place in different periods of time as several characters go insane and get snuffed (this is known as a good game). The only downside is that Yahtzee eventually had to put a plot in to prevent people from calling this "illogical" (which... it still is)

Where Trilby's Notes helped to tie all the loose ends and entertain as well, this managed to hack all the things I understood and puree them until my brain hurt at 7:00 AM (the time I finally beat the game)

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All in all, it still beats other games because it made no sense.

My head hurts...

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http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=29491.0

From this board's rules: DO NOT ask for hints for a game in its release thread. There is a separate forum for that purpose. Release threads are for comments and criticism only.

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Sorry bout that, but some of the videos seem a little frivelous in the game:

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particularly the one of the three men of low moral fiber waking up

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It resized itself in my screen, so the magic of the animation was kinda lost :/

Also, shouldn't a game company logo NOT contain scenes from a game that the company didn't make? (or entirely made up of scenes from said game....?)

Well... I'm stuck:

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I have a book of matches, a knife, a heavy drink, and a straw. I can't get out of the town because I have "things" to do, so I don't know how to get to the voodoo lady to get Wally's LOVE bag.

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Can we get a screenshot or something? I want to trust that it's not a virus.