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That's a great clarification so thank you for that. I'll include these details in the tutorial. (As it's shaping up the tutorial is somewhat of a rewrite of parts of the manual, too. So I might pop up here and there with more of these questions, but I'm trying to do as much looking myself as I can before posting.)

I just want to confirm this before I write it up as part of my tutorial. First, some context: I'm using AGS Editor .NET (Build 3.0.2.44) v3.0.2, June 2008. I'm running AGS on Windows Vista.

The manual at one point states that if you don't want the debugger options in your game (and you want to run full screen) you should use "Run without debugger" or CTRL+F5. However, when I do that I still have all the debugging options (and the game doesn't run in full screen). That clearly seems to be broken unless I'm missing something.

Further, when I build for release (i.e., F7 or "Build EXE") all of the debugging commands are still in place in the executable in my Compiled directory. The manual doesn't say if this should be the case or not but it does indicate that you would use F7 when you want to distribute your game, which would imply you want to distribute a game without debugging commands.

I am aware of the "Enable debug mode" in the General Settings and I know setting that to 'false' removes the debugging commands from the game, which seems to work.

What I'm trying to clarify, however, is if the behavior as I described it here is valid. I would think not since "Run without debugger" should presumably run without the debugging commands, which is not what happens. But also I would think the "compile for release" ("Build EXE", F7) should also remove the debugging commands by default. If the latter is not the case, I'll make sure the tutorial says that you should specifically set the "Enable debug mode" option to false, which I don't see mentioned elsewhere unless I'm missing it.

matti: Thank you for the response. I am covering the aspect of using the right-click to remove areas so I think I'll just stick with that and somewhat gloss over the ID 0. I don't think it's really clear to new users on how they should use ID 0 and since it doesn't sound like they have to, there's probably little harm leaving it out.

Thanks again.

Greetings all.

I searched the forum for an answer to this question but I can't find one and I don't see it in the manual either. I notice that when you go to set the walkable area or walk-behind area of a room, it defaults to starting you on walkbehind or walkable area with ID 1. I also notice that there is an ID 0 for both.

Does ID 0 do something special? Is it not something that should be overridden or messed with?

(Part of the reason I'm asking is I'm going to be giving a class on AGS development next year and I'm in the process of writing a tutorial for it and trying to anticipate questions I know will come up.)

Thanks for any assistance.

Greetings all.

I'm trying the Beta 8 version of AGS and I consistently get an error message on two Windows XP machines (both are at Service Pack 2), one a laptop, the other a desktop. Both have .NET 2.0 (the SDK and the runtime). Both have all current critical updates installed from the Windows Update site. This error (which I reproduce at the end of this message) happens with the following steps:

(1) On the Welcome to AGS dialog, select the "Start a New Game" radio button. Click the "Continue" button.
(2) Click the "Next" button on the first "Start New Game" dialog.
(3) Click the "Default Game" option in the list view and click the "Next" button on the second "Start New Game" dialog.
(4) On the third "Start New Game" dialog, enter 'RogerAdventure' in the first text field and 'Roger's Adventure' in the second text field. (Without single quotes in both cases.)
(5) Click the "Finish" button.

Expected: I should be taken, presumably, to the AGS Editor with my default game.

Actual: The following error occurs:

There was an error creating your game. The error was: String was not recognized as a valid DateTime.
Error details: System.FormatException: String was not recognized as a valid DateTime.
   at System.DateTimeParse.Parse(String s, DateTimeFormatInfo dtfi, DateTimeStyles styles)
   at System.DateTime.Parse(String s, IFormatProvider provider)
   at System.Convert.ToDateTime(String value)
   at AGS.Types.SerializeUtils.DeserializeFromXML(Object obj, XmlNode node)
   at AGS.Types.Settings.FromXml(XmlNode node)
   at AGS.Types.Game.FromXml(XmlNode node)
   at AGS.Editor.AGSEditor.LoadGameFile(String fileName)
   at AGS.Editor.Tasks.LoadGameFromDisk(String gameToLoad, Boolean interactive)
   at AGS.Editor.GUIController.ShowNewGameWizard()


- Jeff