Messages

A resolution of 640x480 is kindof excessive for a game. As long as it's not super-compressed, 320x240 should be fine. That's what most web video is sized to. Everything on YouTube is that size. If you bumped down, you would certainly save some space.

Depending on the game's resolution I'd have to dispute this. 320x240 is adequate, but far from desirable.

Does anyone have any tips for reducing overall size, whether it be through video compression or otherwise? (sorry, but I refuse to budge on the resolution )

One way you could shrink your filesize is to use a widescreen aspect ratio, that way the image would be smaller AND would look more cinematic. I'd try 640x360. If you're using Windows Movie Maker however, I'm not sure this is possible.

The other thing I'd suggest is uploading two versions of your game, one with full-size wmvs and one with half-size wmvs.

[Topic:]

Topic: Pets

Create a pet that could belong to a familiar character. The character can be from a game, a film, a book or whatever you want.

The pet doesn't have to be an animal but it does have to be your invention - don't draw Harry Potter's owl, draw Sherlock Holmes's badger.

Max Size: 100x100
Colours: 20

Thanks very much, I'm surprised!

I'll start a new competition some time tomorrow.

There seems to be a few details missing from the plot summary:

The unitÃ,  detroyed the village and all the inhabitants except for two boys, Sylim and Victor his best friend.

What about Sylim's so called mother?

When finally out Sylim see's his so called mother who tells him about his past

Why would a raid on the village prompt her to tell him about his parentage? Is she dying?

Sylim is devistated and dedicates his life to joining the army to avenge his parents

Surely he can only avenge one of his adopted parents. Unless his mother did die.

Other than that, it sounds like a lot of fun!

Skyfire1, Helm's post was not stupid, your was mildly insulting, and your insult was directed at Helm.

There is no parallel between the name 'JimtBrit' and the name you suggested, it's a false analogy. The term 'Brit' is not an inherently derogatory term simply because it is used in a derogatory manner by Irish nationalists.

And on topic, I don't find the name to be offensive at all. I do wonder about the 't' in the middle. Are we to read the name as 'Jim t'Brit', a Yorkshire take on 'Jim the Brit'?

I've only played the demo, but since watching the movie I don't feel the need to play the full game anymore.

That's horrific! Is that someting LucasArts released or something that has been stitched together?

Also..... sorry for my ignorance. How can I know which part of the picture used more colours than needed? And how can I reduce it?

I think many of the extra colours would be in the noise texture you had on the path. Gilbot's edit got rid of that because it didn't really fit with the rest of the image.

One way to avoid unnecessary colours is to choose every colour you use and stay away from smudge, lighten, darken, dodge and burn tools. This will give you more precise control over the look of the image.

As for reducing the colours, that depends. Packages like the Gimp and Photoshop are able to reduce colours optimally, but MS Paint will do a very clumsy job. I don't think it's really essential for you to limit the number of colours you use, unless you're working on a 256 colour game. The important thing is that you choose your colours with care. As Gilbot observes though, there's no reason to have many colours that are virtually indistinguishable from one another.

if I am right, I must draw the animates/sprites to fit in with a module.

I know nothing about the authorship of modules, but I thought I'd mention Akayumo's Particle Engine. It's written in such a way that the user can specify a range of sprite slots to determine how their particles will look. If you wanted to make sure your module was adaptable you could do something similar.

I hope that's remotely helpful. If not, sorry!

A more lighthearted approach would be to use a different font for each languange. They used that technique occasionally in the Asterix comics.

This would mean that the player would understand all the game's 'languages', but wouldn't be able to 'speak' them until they'd listened enough to ask a viking for a "Swørd" rather than a "Sword".

I suppose this could work rather like Anym's suggestion - and it would work better if you could use multiple fonts in a single line of dialogue. I don't know if that's possible at the moment.

In spite of the fact that I spent a fortnight kicking that wall, I did find the game to be a little short. I wasn't remotely disappointed though!

The story and puzzles may have been relatively short and simple, but the atmosphere was deeply involving. and characters were striking and memorable. I can't think of many games that have left me wondering what happens to the protagonists after the end of the story.

EDIT: Like Nacho, the caravan music is also one of my favourite bits.

Mme Souza, from Belleville Rendezvous.
(12 colours + transparent).

I wouldn't worry about it looking plain. It's a clean style and I'd stay away from textures for the most part.

The problem is that the scene's composition is weak. It's nicely drawn, but the focus is off. My eyes are drawn towards the tree (which is very small) while the house is sliding out of vision. You introduced the image as a picture of a house, but I'm paying attention to the tree, the river and the roof.

You could try:

* Adjusting the image so that we can see the bottom of the front door.

* Adding aerial interference (tinting pale blue a little) to the landscape to make parts of it appear distant.

* Consider making the tree larger / the house smaller relative to one another.

* Use items in the foreground (bushes, trees,walls) to frame the scene and direct attention to the areas of interest.

* To make the grass look less flat, you could add the occasional cluster of small verticle lines. Check out the grass in Big Brother's style guide for the Sphynx.

It looks unusually entertaining for a graveyard,. but that's fine by me!

The composition might work better if it wasn't for the dead-area of sky in the top left. You could liven it up by adding a cloud, but I would make the tree on the left much taller. It could look much nicer if it reached nearer the top of the screen, framing the image. As it is, it's a very small and dumpy tree when compared with the tombstones.

["A Vampire's Quest"]

I'm glad this is coming along, and I'm very pleased you're enjoying it. I feel compelled to point out that the title needs an apostrophe. It should be, "A Vampire's Quest".

I hope you don't mind me pointing that out!

A messy entry:



Think of the carbon dioxide emissions!

[Lure of the Temptress]

I'm not sure whether a catalogue helping people to avoid adventure games is too good an idea - but I suppose it would be nice to know if a game has a design philosophy you absolutely hate.

I don't believe I experienced any walking deads in Lure of the Temptress, but I think it is possible to die. I don't remember the deaths being unreasonable, however. It also had dynamic timed challenges, but nothing like an action sequence. This is from memory, so I could be mistaken.

[Pleurgburg]

I'm no skilled fantasy artist, but I think I might be able to make a few useful suggestionsthat would help you achieve a consistent and effective style.

Draw all your own backdrops and characters. Try to develop a style that creates the right atmosphere and that you can maintain from bg to bg. Look at Pleurgburg and Duty and Beyond for examples of simple and effective graphics.

Create a template for yourself, so that the bgs have a consistent viewpoint (and characters won't lean back like Guybrush does). Use techniques like one point pespective to make your life easier.

If you don't feel you can create the right atmosphere through your artwork, build it up through music, writing and puzzles. Adventure gamers are good at suspending disbelief.

Use a limited pallete (not necessarily 256). Make a choice about what colours suit your game, or suit particular areas of your game. If you pick a handful of colours that work well together it will mean you can work more quickly and that your bgs will be more consistent.

Use 320 x 200. It would be easier for you to develop a style you can maintain with fewer pixels flying around.

It's a pity that Escape From Monkey Island and the 3D adventure debate are always so closely tied. The weakness of MI 4 has little to do with 3D graphics.

I believe the game was weak because of poor design, charmless graphics and, most importantly, Elaine not being English. Oh, and Murray being very irritating and spinning around in mid air.

I'm glad this thread has been useful to at least one person. That means it's aaaaahll been worthwhile!

I'd probably go for a more 'you' like 'u' sound than 'Thool', I'd also happily hear it pronounced with a 't' sound rather than a 'th'. That might be a little odd, but wouldn't jar.

EDIT: I din't see the wiki, and didn't realise that Thule was a 'real' place. I thought you were asking for suggestions on how an invented word might be pronounced. Never mind!