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It would be nice for those who have ordered, to know when the game will come to them. I never got an e-mail saying when the game will arrive, although I got confirmation that I bought it and that I was charged for it. And I couldn't find any such information in the website as well (the shop)

Orders started shipping today. Since we had quite a large number of pre-orders, however, It may take several days for the fulfillment house to send them all out.

We're estimating that customers who pre-ordered will have their copies shipped by Friday.Ã,  The game will most likely begin arriving sometime next week for US customers. And at the end of next week/the beginning of the following week for International customers.

Can you believe I got 2 relevant hits? 2 "Al Emmo and Lost Dutchman's Mine crack.zip" files!

You know, those files have been on Peer to Peer filesharing networks for months.Ã,  Such files posing as Al Emmo cracks and keygens were on Emule even before we released the demo!Ã,  They are usually common viruses or worms in zipped form, which bare the same name of whatever file description you typed. And this fools more people into downloading it.

You can actually test this by typing any name into the search bar and pressing search with a program like Shareza. If you type something random like "AGS and the blue cup of death" and waited long enough, chances are you'd eventually see search results like "AGS and the blue cup of death(FULL VERSION!!!).zip" or "AGS and the blue cup of death--working crack.zip". The network somehow generates fake filenames based on your search criteria which are really viruses.

Incidentally, Al Emmo doesn't use any copy protection that would require the use of a crack or keygen. It'll work straight out of the box.

By the way, thanks for the positive comments, guys. Here's hoping the game's release will also gain some more attention for AGS and all the superb work done by Chris Jones!

[Update: May 9th, 2014 - Now Available on Steam]

Update: May 9th, 2014 - Now Available on Steam



Price: $9.99 USD

Update: July 9th, 2015:
Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman's Mine has finally been ported to iPad/iPhone and is now available in the App Store! The iOS version features a new verb-coin style interface with large icons for touch-screen devices, and is optimized for single finger taps. Text size has also been increased for easier readability on smaller screens.

Buy the iOS Version Here

Thanks to Janet Gilbert for her extensive work on making the AGS port compatible with iOS8 and to Tiny Red Studio for their assistance with porting the game and helping with its release.

Please note that Apple doesn't permit us to distribute free game copies to existing owners of the PC version. You would need to purchase it again if you wish to play the iOS version.


Update: May 9th, 2014:
Al Emmo is now available to buy on Steam. (Thanks to monkey_05_06 for helping out with the process!) The game is available for both Windows and Linux.


Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman's Mine version v4.1 has been released! The new version has several major improvements based on player feedback we've received over the years. If you've never played the game before, now is the perfect opportunity to give this enhanced edition a try!

SCREENSHOTS


KEY FEATURES
* A new Al Emmo (protagonist) voice actor
* Improved 2D Cutscene movies
* Scoring system with 500 points
* Achievement system with 20 achievements
* Tooltip bar that shows mouse-over hotspots
* Much more! (See full list at bottom of post)

WHERE TO BUY THE GAME

Himalaya Store - Unlockable trial version (Free 60 Minute Trial)
Buy from Desura


UPGRADING TO v4.1
Upgrading to version 4.1 is free for customers who purchased the game directly from Himalaya Studios. If you purchased the Digital Download version, simply uninstall your old version, then re-install version 4.1. The same serial key number you were allocated will work.

CHANGES TO VERSION 4.1
A full list of additions, features, improvements, and bug fixes is below.
WARNING: GAME SPOILERS BELOW

Spoiler

- Added: Integration with Steam API
- Added: Steam Achievements, Trading Cards, and Badges
- Fixed: Removed the distortion from Al Emmo's speech lines
- Fixed: Audio bug which caused speech to lag behind in the cutscene movies
- Fixed: Fixed Emo Al achievement
- Fixed: Fixed SpeedRun achievement (now allows for 2 hours)
- Fixed: Fixed Hoarder achievement
- Fixed: Several minor spelling/grammar errors
- Fixed: Repositioned the hotspot dot on the map inventory item
- Changed: Pressing Esc at the very start of the game no longer skips Al's initial speech
- Changed: Small adjustments to some character speech lines
- Changed: Moved advanced features under a new "Advanced" button in the setup program
- Changed: "Force letterbox mode" setting to "Enable top & bottom borders" in the setup program

[close]

CHANGES TO VERSION 4.0
A full list of additions, features, improvements, and bug fixes is below.
WARNING: GAME SPOILERS AHEAD

Spoiler

- Added: New voice actor for Al Emmo
- Added: New voice actor for Everette the Exterminator
- Added: Improved 2D, hand-animated cutscenes to replace older 3D versions
- Added: New Himalaya Studios logo animation
- Added: New scoring system with a total of 500 points
- Added: Achievements system with 20 achievements to unlock
- Added: Tooltip GUI which shows mouse-over hotspot names
- Added: The [ and ] keys will cycle backwards and forwards through inventory items
- Added: Back-end functionality for touch-screen devices
- Added: Some newly recorded speech for Rita
- Added: Animated light glints to several small, obtainable objects to make them more visible
- Added: Max Nearest Neighbour filter to the setup program
- Fixed: Music and audio stuttering bug
- Fixed: Pressing Enter on Quit & Restart GUIs now acts like clicking the "yes" button
- Fixed: Esc key will now cancel the map of Anozira
- Fixed: Esc will no longer skip the entire tequila sequence in the saloon
- Fixed: Al can now run inside Koko's store
- Fixed: Improved Al's mule dismounting animation at Rita's house
- Fixed: Improved Bubba's flag animation
- Fixed: Updated the PDF manual with the latest graphics and information
- Fixed: Koko's greeting to Al in Act 6 if Al already visited him since the raid
- Fixed: Made it so you must talk to Everette before you can give him the termites
- Fixed: More legible font is used in the journals
- Fixed: Moved the mine cart's starting position further right on the tracks
- Fixed: Bug where the same desert music could play twice in succession
- Fixed: Bug where the top left and right menus would not animate in the mine cliff screen
- Fixed: Bug where you could burn the gallows ropes with the matchbook more than once
- Fixed: several minor spelling/grammar errors
- Fixed: other small glitches and bugs
- Changed: Interface improvements (such as tweening GUIs)
- Changed: Made many items and objects easier to click on to reduce pixel-hunting
- Changed: Rita's speaking portrait
- Changed: Rita's song cutscene has been replaced with a new in-game scene
- Changed: Increased the odds of seeing the fishing Easter Eggs at the oasis
- Changed: Improved the visual appearance of Kevin's fire extinguisher spray
- Changed: Retouched several characters' dialog portraits
- Changed: The half-map rubbing inventory item now includes a piece of charcoal
- Changed: Al now looks at the half-map rubbing after acquiring it (close-up)
- Changed: Made it easier to walk off the screen edges when leaving a room
- Changed: Various dialogue and text tweaks
- Changed: Tweaked the way save/replace game GUIs are handled

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Thanks for adding the parody line and the warning that this is not the real game. While I'm a little disapointed that the forum can be used as a safe-haven for publishing this kind of material against a copyright holder's wishes, I'm satisfied that the changes made will no longer result in any confusion about the two projects.

I did! Nobody's replied yet.

... by appearing arrogant and hypocritical, although that may worry Himalaya's creditors...

Ah, yes. The good old "arrogance" line. That's always a favourite, eh? (Although I find it odd that the majority accusers often don't see the irony contained in their own statements. ) Ã, 

Look, I think no matter how politely you word something, someone's always going to be there to call you arrogant. If you try to defend yourself/your work against a general consensus that possibility exists. Ã, Hence, it's to be taken with a grain of salt. Like I said, I'm not here to get involved in endless debates or to act like a showman propping up some fake image. I'm simply putting in an honest request to the mods, and that's all.

If I didn't think this could potentially affect us, I wouldn't have bothered mentioning it -- especially considering the inevitable reaction these threads always seem to generate.

Actually, Himalaya uses the copyright issue simply as a reason to support their dislike of a project with an almost identical name before the release.

If the game used its own assets, and a non-confusing name. I couldn't care less about the parody. As I mentioned, I don't have any issue at all with the parody aspect. Ã, The primary issue is the specific timing of its release. The creator planned and intended the release for this exact time because he knew that we'd react in such a manner to protect our work if it was 'ripped' in this way. And he knew that posting it on the very public AGS forums would garner this kind of controversial response.

There are no two ways about it, this is intended as sabotage and has elicited the exact type of response the poster was hoping for prior to our launch date.

Well, I'm not sure what all this talk about critique or threatening lawsuits is coming from. I never mentioned any such things. I specifically said that the game uses our artwork and that I'm respectfully requesting the thread's removal to avoid confusion.

Look, honestly, it doesn't matter what we type. Some intellectual will always be there to try to twist it around and this is to be expected when posting on adventure game-related forums.  All I can say to that is that I'm not trying to maintain any image. I don't play the appeasement game. If you like our game, then that's great and you can buy it!  If not, then don't. But the game itself and the legal issues in this thread have absolutely nothing to do with one another.

What I am doing here, is asking that the thread be removed for the afore-mentioned reasons. It's a matter between the mods here and ourselves, so until a mod replies, I'll leave it at that.

Oh gawd... here we go again!  :

Not to get into a debate about this, but I think I've made our position clear. Ã, Ironically, the afore-mentioned things are all legal issues which we had to contend with when dealing with VU and the reason why we had to change our name "Tierra" to "AGDI". The same story behind "KQ9" having to be changed to "The Silver Lining".

Legalities aside, I'm asking politely that the thread be removed simply out of respect for the work that many people have been put into it and for the same reasons why anybody else would request the same thing. Whether the screens are from the demo or not is beside the point. The fact remains that we did not give permission for these materials to be used in this way, and that in itself violates the user agreement of both the full game and the demo.

If this is who we suspect it to be from, then this isn't merely a flattering joke. Trust me on that.

I don't have any problem with parodies. Al Emmo itself is made of many parodied characters and scenes, so, yes, we're aware of how parody law works since we had to check into whether we could include such things ourselves. Ã, 

The issue here isn't that this is a parody, it's the fact that material has been taken directly from our game and used without our permission. The title is also confusingly similar in a way that intentionally tries to confuse between this and the real product. Ã, So again, I'm requesting that the thread please be deleted

Thanks.

We're not going to demand this thread to be closed yet, but when our own game is gonna be released, the LEAST thing I'll do is ask the mods here to rename this thread to get rid of any more confusion.

Actually, that's exactly what I'm going to request.  I'd appreciate if a moderator or admin could remove this thread/game from the AGS forums/site. We're going to be releasing Al Emmo this week and this seems suspiciuously like a deliberate attempt to cause confusion.

Furthermore, whoever made this did not get approval or permission to use any of our game's material. So I'm requesting that this thread and the content relating to the game please be removed from the AGS site. Thanks.

Working on your own concepts is good.  No vehement fanboys of the original to claim you've done a terrible job!

Nope, none whatsoever. Then you'll find that you're dealing with the anti-fanboy crowd who claim you've done a terrible job because your original games are derivative of everything else (well, duh). Or because you've received 'too many positive comments in the past' and they feel the need to 'level the playing field'. A pissed off fanboy is just funny. But a pissed-off anti-fanboy is not only funny, but also like a rabid pitbull. Suffice it to say that the former is, by far, the more 'pleasant' to deal with!

As for the remake craze: Remaking an existing game is a good way to learn how things fit together and to learn how an established game-designer approached certain puzzle solutions and obstacles. Say what you will about remakes being unoriginal, but it's still an excellent way to learn about the structure of adventure games from scratch. Almost like a tutorial of sorts. If people want to make remakes, and they're getting something valuable out of the experience -- let them. It can only be a good thing. There are enough people making both original adventures and remakes with AGS to cater to everyone's tastes.

SSH:Ã,  We are actually using the services of such a CD duplication company, but we can't actually start using their system till we have the product ready to ship. So in the meantime, we have to take the pre-orders via a different shopping cart.

no concrete plot direction - I can't believe I'm really supposed to be chasing after some woman, or mixing a drink to get my room key, or wandering randomly until I get some better idea what to do

It's somewhat inferred from the title what the ultimate goal of the game is. As for the beginning stages, think of it somewhat like QFG4's premise. A stranger in a foreign land has to find their bearings in a hostile environment with hostile locals.

why does the Irish guy sound like a Geordie?

He's based on a real-life person that one of the developers knew (a guy who owned a coffee shop). This guy was Irish, but spoke with an English accent.

I haven't worked out whether it's supposed to be 19th century with a lot of anachronisms, or an old-timey oasis in the 21st century. That may be intentional, I don't know. Perhaps it's like The Village.

Yeah, it's intentional. There are a lot of modern pop culture references scattered throughout the game, so the exact time period is kind of left up to the player's own imagination. We didn't want to state "this is set in the 1880's" since then we'd have non-sequitar items and references all over the place. For all intents and purposes, it could even be set in a modern gold rush town.

Oh ho ho... fiction can be fun! But I find the reference section much more enlightening.  Your points are based on speculation and assumptions. You haven't even clarifed the previous stuff I asked you, other than to quote "blah, blah, blah" and fire of a string of personal attacks. In fact, it seems suspiciously like some kind of personal grudge rather than anything to do with the game.

Suffice it to say, if you want to be taken seriously, then quit trolling. I can't justify answering stuff if you don't even bothering reading what I type.

It might be too late at this point but it sure would be nice if you could use the wheel of the mouse like in King's Quest 2.

Good suggestion, but the only problem with this approach is that is that the mousewheel currently cycles through all the inventory items you're carrying. Meaning that when it reaches the "inv item" icon, it'd have to scroll through ALL items you're carrying before going to the next icon (which would kind of defeat the intended purpose!) Otherwise, I would implement this.

Also, do you think you might have had some skewed results from your poll because the people who frequent your websites are already big fans of your work and perhaps are willing to pay a lot more than the average person?

Well, the poll was really intended to get feedback from the target audience. We always planned to take their suggested price and then lower the cost a further $10-$20 so that it would appeal not only to them, but also people who might not otherwise play the game. Despite looking like and emulating a Sierra game, the game design is probably more similar to a LucasArts title in execution.

I don't mind the $29.99; but I think in the long run, with some good advertising, a $19.99 price tag would push a lot more units out.  Although, it really all depends on your fixed and variable cost…

If we offer a download option, it would likely go for this price. At the moment, things are still expensive for us with setting up shop, getting inventory, and figuring out how to minimize shipping costs. There have been a few teething problems, but we're working through them and hopefully will soon make enough money from pre-orders to have a "buffer" of money to fund other options like a downloadable version.

Anyway, good luck!!!

Thanks a lot!

I've been around the development side of the adventure community since 1999, and the one thing that's always held true is that it's bitchier than the fashion industry. Seriously. Don't let the criticisms get you down, guys. Stay in the game and keep doing what you enjoy doing.  With time, you'll get a sense of which criticisms are valid enough to take into account, and which ones are posted just to get a rise out of you.

You'll also get a plethora of suggestions, some of which are real gems  -- not because they're any good, but just because they're so abstract that they make you wonder "What the hell was that person smoking?" (i.e. "You should make Alexander's tongue come out of his ear and lick his nose as an Easter Egg"; or "you should have made this as a 3D FPS to keep with the times.") Some of those comments are priceless enough to keep as trophies.

Still haven't had a chance to play the remake yet, but I'm looking forward to giving it a spin. Good work again on the release!

[commercial]

what? you mean there are no other games being worked on anywhere at all? man that sucks. that means I'm surrounded by lies.   luckily agd have this wonderful unique ability to actually make a game! we are saved.

Read it in context of the reply to the previous post. The comment isn't directed at all creators of AGS games. Merely at people who assume it's easy to create a commercial game if you have X, Y, and Z at your disposal. What I'm saying to those people is: put yourself in the exactly same boat.  Raise the funds you need and create a commercial game how you think it should be done. Practice what you preach, and at the end of the process if you can honestly claim that it was as easy as it sounds (and you don't have your own share of naysayers; which I guarantee you will) then I'd like to hear your secrets!

Looks great, could be a lot of fun! Your web-page suggests you have a very high profile team which is exciting! Sadly I will probably never play this game unless it goes freeware, or somewhere in the region of $9.99. Congrats on your release though

Thanks, mods. We're looking into a cheaper download option as a possibility in the future.  Or you could enter the contest and try to win a free copy!  8)

I hate to be the be he guy that kicks the living crap out of the fan boy squad. (Its pays the bills and hell it feels so damn good)

Now, why is it that every self-proclaimed devil's advocate seems to think they're the only one there?Ã,  Ah, well, *cracks knuckles* here we go again...

The 2d Bg's are well inconsistant IMO

How so? They've all been drawn and colored using the exact same techniques (painted with acrylics and then touched up in Photoshop) by the same artist.

I am concerned that a team 12+ people?
with how much funding ?
developing for three years?

There were actually onlyÃ,  2-3 full-time members actively working on the team for the duration of the entire project. One programmer doubling as an animator, one artist, and one assistant programmer to clean code up and work on odd-jobs as required.Ã,  All other workers were contractors, usually paid by the hour, or interns. In fact, most of the game's funding was spent on entirely on contractors (a few were very unreliable and a total waste of money). But the core of the game was worked on non-stop by us 2-3 regulars with barely a cent of the funding going towards our own needs. Essentially, the funding made very little difference in the grand scheme of things.

Is designing a game using the AGS engine. I have seen far better in accordance to man power WAY better productions here by single man power IAGD's.

What's wrong with using AGS to make a commercial game? Particularly an old-school one which is intended to maintain that nostalgic style? I'm afraid I don't see the point you're making.Ã,  You're also forgetting the fact that we've been simultaneously working on a free remake of Quest for Glory 2 alongside Al Emmo. If you've ever played the original version of this game before, then you're probably aware of how complex it is given it's RPG elements and stats, even when compared to a relatively simplistic adventure game like Al Emmo.

First of all, no. Second of all...Ã,  This is what retail games from established game companies are going for...

Our game's intended primarily for Sierra fans. We ran a poll on our AGDI forums and most people stated they'd be willing to pay between $40-$50 for a game created in the style of the old Sierra classics. This is our target audience's direct feedback. We decided to lower the price further to $29.99 in order to give some additional appeal to non-Sierra fans. Most (if not all) retail games come out at $50 USD these days. Our initial price is well below that. At the end of the day, we simply have to make enough profit to make this whole project viable.Ã,  Man, you can't give a few thousand dollars to a group of people and expect them to churn out GTA: San Andreas as their first commercial game!Ã,  This kind of level has to be built up to by having a supportive fan-base. If people don't want to support the game or pay for it, then that's fine. We're not forcing you to. But such attitudes towards indie developers tend to say a lot about the current state of commercial adventure games.

You are charging way too much, for something I wouldnt pay for. I would rather make a donation to Herculean , Clanworks or Yathzee. Getting funding to the guys that need it.

That's a matter of personal opinion. We can't dictate to any given individual how much is above the personal limit they should be willing to pay for any particular game. But keep in mind also that offering our game for too low a price also devalues it in our own eyes. We're proud of the work that's been put into this game; it took a lot of time and effort, and we think the asking price is justified for what your money buys. So feel free to make a donation to one of those other groups if that's what you want to do. More power to you!

Though, I'd like to invite you to gather the funding required, and create a better game if you'd like to demonstrate to us exactly how it should be done. I'll even cut you some slack by not insisting that you create another free game alongside it.Ã,  I wonder if you'll be the one who take's up the challenge this time... nobody else seems to want to put similar words into actions.Ã, 

For something like the patching option, you should check out ClickTeam's freeware version of Patchmaker:

http://www.clickteam.com/English/patch_maker.htm

Basically, you point the program to the directory containing your old compiled game files. In the other box, you point it to the folder containing the latest compiled version of your game with all the bug fixes included. You can then make tweaks to various settings and exclude files you do not wish to update etc. When you're done, it'll compile an .exe patch using only the data that has changed between versions of your game to keep filesize to a minimum.

PatchMaker might work well on smaller AGS games; but as CJ once said, AGS compiles its resource files in an arbitrary manner. This being the case, PatchMaker may still compile a lot of redundant data.  Although, you might get smaller patch file sizes from if you compile your AGS game into a single executable file without any resource files.

I think a built-in AGS patch utility would be a great addition, but likely a lot of work for CJ.  A suitable alternative for minor room-related bugs might be to allow the user to password protect their .crm files, so that new versions could be placed in the game directory if needed, without the worry that anybody else can open them up and view/change them in the editor?

Thanks for the comments, guys!Ã,  It's taken a long time and a lot of effort by many people (over 20) to put it all together, so hopefully the results will be worth it. Here's hoping!Ã,  (BTW, Kinoko, your RPG is looking great too, reminds me of Secret of Mana on the SNES!)

As for the issue with the email address, it turned out that there was not enough disk space on the server. I deleted some files and the problem has been resolved;Ã,  but even if you sumbitted an application and received the error message, rest assured that your email still came through. We've been receiving them all.

Right, I think it's about time for another update.

Here's a few screenshots from the game which have been polished over the course of the year:








This is a screengrab from one of the cutscenes:




And here's an example of a dialogue picture. (Note that the in-game lipsynched versions are much smaller):




Finally, I wanted to mention that Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman's Mine is scheduled to go into beta testing very soon. If you're interested in applying, please keep an eye on this thread as well our the website over at www.himalayastudios.com.Ã,  An announcement will be made when we're ready to start accept applications. Cheers!