Messages

Really cool art style - reminds me of the works of the author of Cedric and the Revolution.

Nah, it lacks a certain amount of green tint for that.
Anyway, looks great and promising!

I'm just like Vince and most other lefties here:
I write with the left hand, but use the right hand for the mouse, or for knives, scissors, while playing badminton...

I guess it would make sense for the nail and plank to fit together, but wild clicking didn't result in anything.
Actually, I already tried out every single item combination.

Oh, okay. Nail and plank - doesn't work.
Plank and nail, does?
Sounds like that needs a fix! *grumbl*

Okay, I hope the game doesn't continue to be so bugged.
As it turns out, it didn't have the chance to be.

Okay, I got

Spoiler

the nail, plank and flashlight, but the battery is dead.

[close]

Apparently, I don't have to enter the cave, as the creator said that there might be another way around the monster. My suspicion is that the boulder blocks a hole in the ground, but I can't interact with it! I think I already tried everything on this screen, but nothing happens!

I actually took notes while playing this game and the one thing I wrote over and over again in ever increasing size was "ANNOYING MUSIC!".
The track is nice to hear the first time around, but as it looped I already didn't feel like listening to it again. And since it doesn't change regardless of what's happening it's pretty...annoying.

Otherwise, fun little game! Good, logical puzzles, liked the riddles especially. I usually suck at them, but I managed to solve them on my own, yay! I'm not even sure if they're well known ones. The rest of the puzzles were rather easy, maybe made a bit harder by the one slot inventory. Cute graphics, liked the side view.
It's interesting though, the game relied solely on its puzzles and dialogues, there was no story to keep you hooked. Still, it worked.

I'm just as stuck as bicilotti. Since there's not much to interact with, I'm not sure how to progress. The boulder on the monster screen is very prominently placed, but there's no way to interact with it. On the other hand, some commands don't provoke any response, which makes it even more unclear what a hotspot is and what not.
I understand why the graphics are as crappy as they are and I think nothing needs to be said more about them, but the interface is, maybe as a side effect, just as terrible. The mouse cursor icons are huge and therefore very imprecise. You can't see what the centre of the icon is that triggers the detection of the hotspot. They also don't have outlines, so it happened that the "use" icon got invisible when I pointed it over the cave entrance.
When I tried to talk to the monster again I realized that the conversation state was reset, like it was before I talked to him the first time, which made the game feel more mechanical.

Okay, I criticized the game a lot now, but I actually liked it so far! The voice acting is wonderful, the comments and dialogues amusing and well written, the music atmospheric. That there was absolutely no intro was a great choice, too. Just throwing the player into the game without any prior introduction, I love that. Overlong intro and tuturial sequences are the things that put me off sometimes from trying out new games.
I'd love to play "Lance the Penguin" further, if I'd find a way!

I don't know why, but I have difficulty downloading the game from Megaupload. It always cancels the file transfer after only a few kilobytes. :-/

That was indeed a sweet little game. The puzzles were alright for me, which probably means that they were far too easy for everyone else.
I also like the interface! I think context sensitive verbs are the way to go, and I'm also toying around with an interface that makes use of them. If I only knew how to implement it...
What's more to say? Logical puzzles, sweet graphics, fitting music. Certainly an appetizer for a longer game of this kind!

Just played the demo a bit and was put off. The writing seems so broken, like someone wrote it who doesn't have the best grasp of the English language, it didn't appear correct or natural to me.
Hrm, I seem to be the only person so far who has this reaction, so I wonder if I'm just imagining things. Maybe it's because English isn't my mother tongue anyway.

The graphic style did remind me a bit of the Barn Runner series.
Anyways, while I didn't expect the game to be on a professional standard, it certainly would help if it didn't feel so sloppily put together.
I managed to crash the game on the first screen, just by using the gun on the door. The following error message popped up:

An internal error has occurred. Please note down the following information.
If the problem persists, post the details on the AGS Technical Forum.
(ACI version 3.12.1074)

Error: prepare_script: error -18 (no such function in script) trying to run 'hHotspot1_UseInv'   (Room 3)

On the main menu, if I point the cursor to the top of the screen, a menu bar pops up with the options "Save", "Load" and "Exit". It really only makes sense for it to appear in-game and it's rather superfluous and annoying in the main menu.
There are multiple problems with the text: First, it's hard to read in the dialog menu. Also, it's rarely in the place it should be, always slipping outside certain borders and boxes it should remain in.
The walkable areas aren't as well defined as they should be. Just in the first screen I was able to walk on top of one of the arcade cabinets.

On one hand, I like the amateurish charme of the game. But on the other, it would benefit if it wouldn't be so crash prone and sloppily made.
I haven't played farther than after the crash, so I can't say much more, but really, it'd be cool if you consider fixing this stuff!

What? No answers so far in this thread?
Anyway, congrats to you and your brother on finishing the game!
Graphics look nice, seems to be worth a try, will download later.

Well, Quandaryland was also quite a quality site, and Adventure Europe tried hard to be one too, maybe too hard, but I can't say I miss Just Adventure. Their reviews lauded, praised the most terrible adventures.

Maybe Activision required the registration in the contract? I have no idea, but it annoyed me too.

Or how about people ask here in the forum, when they want to kill a character, if anyone has a problem with it?
I mean, if no one develops a game where the character is needed, or if there's no conflict with the timeline, then what the heck?
Davy Jones permanent death might not have been to bad I think, since he got so overused. I say this while I probably will still use Davy Jones myself in a game I plan, though not really him. Hard to explain.

Yep, that was an anticlimactic ending alright.
And I'm not sure if I'm fond of the trial and error that's necessary to get through the room with the bottom plates. Otherwise, just great. Okay, the piano tunes really didn't work so well. It just sounded like a terrible performance, not broken enough even. But gladly we only heard those during the intro and outro and not during the play time.

Fun game.
The graphics are quite nice, though maybe a bit too shiny and plastic-y. Also, the grass outside looks more like an oddly coloured carpet, especially with its rounded edges towards the water. But still, the graphics look consistent and are functional.
What I really liked was the interface. As far as I saw now pixelhunting was required, all the items you needed were big and easy to see. I like the effect that appeared when you picked up an item. There was a nagging issue though: the inventory doesn't just pop up when you moved the mouse all the way up to the top side of the screen, it already appears quite a bit beneath. As a consequence it might constantly pop up when you try to examine certain objects, like the dart board in the bar.
I liked that you tried to mix the puzzles up a bit, offered some variation and not only inventory puzzles.
The music is good, the sombre variation on the battlefield was a nice touch, but it can get a bit repetitive.

Just to say it again, overall, it's a fun little game!

The graphics are truly amazing, the final cutscene was quite unexpected in its length and well done execution! But I agree, higher res would do the art more justice!
Also liked the soundtrack very much, was quite relaxing.
My only quibbles are directed towards the controls. It would have been nice to be able to leave locations instantly with a double-click on the exit. Instead, when you double-click, the game makes you wait until the character walked to the exit, which can be annoying when you just thought of something to take another look at. Also, Bwana walks really slow.

But anyway, the game was good entertainment, thanks!

Well, of course it's short since it only consists of one room. But you have to look for a hotspot that isn't you, the rat or the woman.

That was a sweet game!
I like those gesture magic system, like the one Arx Fatalis, even if this implementation is very basic.
Some elements of the graphics look like untextured polygons or vectors were used, the rocks for example. I really liked the simplicity and the colors of it.
The puzzles weren't any trouble of course since the magic system was so basic, but overall this was sweet and in no way a "waste of time". I think this rat should shut its mouth.

Really sounds like you finished some ambitious project here, so congrats!
Just played it a bit and I have to say that I really love the graphics and animations. They look clean, lively and colourful, and the animations are well done and a joy to look at. Love the intro sequence for that matter!

Otherwise the game is not my cup of tea, though. I think I heard all variations of fourth wall breaking jokes before, but anyway, this game seems to have all of them in one place, which may be in an overdose for some.
The premise is not the most original, but who cares, the execution matters anyway. Yet, our protagonist is just "Oh well, what do we do now?", with the immediate goal  being to get out of this mess. The main character doesn't seem to surprised by the situation, and shows just a lack of interest. I don't know if the premise of a real world character being teleported into a fairytale world is used inventively later on, for that I didn't play nearly long enough.
The descriptions are a bit demoralizing. Like "That's a stupid idea" when I try to pick some berries from a bush or all the variations of "Just another tree/rock/bush". I dunno, locations are meant to be explored, so when I hear that, the fun of exploring wanes a bit.
Yet, I liked the idea of searching for spots to dig with the shovel. Strictly speaking, this is just pixel hunting. But on the other hand, when you know what you're looking for it can be a fun mechanic, like all those hidden object games prove.

Well, that was a lot of criticism, but for the price it was alright I guess. Just kidding.
I would love to see such art in another game, maybe you might make another one?