Messages

Those posts from 'Adamski.' were deleted extremely quickly. Bravo!

But is there any way of deleting the new PMs in my inbox (which I presume are spam) without me actually having to read them?

I think including a sample of dialogue in the GiP is a really nice idea, but I'm not certain it should be mandatory. That might just lead to Darth having to lock more threads, and his thread locking-finger must get pretty tired as it is.

I wonder if there would be a way of encouraging people to give a dialogue sample without compelling them to do so.

I just want to know, does the title have anything to do with the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy?

Wow. What happened to the British education system?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_monkeys (see Origins)

[embarrassed]Ah... well I was tought that in school, but I have only just realised that the Hitchiker's Guide was referencing that theory. Looks like monkeys can write Hamlet but I can't put two and two together.[/embarrassed]

Just a thought. Would it be possible to define the availability of verbs based on the objects/hotspots clicked with this template?
As in Return to Zork, where you could look at everything, but could cut string and open containers.

Have you noticed how ludicrous the President's big speech is?

He says something like, "today is our real Independence Day!"

Independence from what? Aliens? They were never dependent upon Aliens. It's just meaningless.

Keeping the same look as the sprite you see. Im trying to silouette him, and keep his figure, while showing who he really is, a bad guy. This, however, is rather difficult for me, but I think I nailed it here. Right now, I'm using Sin City as an inspiration. How does this look?

I really think you have nailed a gumshoe grimace. Taking Sin City as a visual influence is a good idea. However, If you are trying to create a noir narrative I'd look elsewhere.

Noir detectives don't kill their way to the truth. Look to the Maltese Falcon or the Big Sleep. And for more visual inspiration look to German Expressionist prints. There are some examples on THIS page.

This character is coming along really well!

Gilliam's last few films "Brothers Grimm" and "Tideland" were extremely bad.

Tideland hasn't been released in Britain (as far as I know) but Brother's Grimm was poor. The problem was the coupling of Gilliam's rambling genius with a straightforward Hollywood fable. Sadly Robert Zemekis or Christopher Columbus could have told that story better.

Gilliam has the capacity to tell a different kind of story brilliantly. And, true to his brilliance, sometimes he sparkles and sometimes he can be... dull.

Ahem.. so, Transformers...

[Photoshop Biweekly]

Just a couple of thoughts on the existing contests.

Photoshop Biweekly-
Interest has waned somewhat since DGMacphee handed it over to some loser who turned it into a regular winner-hosts-the-next contest. Ahem...

Like some of the less popular contests it often has good challenges, but few entries. Extending its length to a fortnight has helped, but I'd like to see it revitalised a little more.

Perhaps the host should provide at least one image which must be integrated into the entries. Or perhaps we could consider a photoshop-off to choose another regular host.


Coloring Contest-
This has been a bit of a mess, and is at the moment treading on the toes of the sprite jam. If it was renamed the Paintover Contest and didn't require a theme it might be fun. AGSers are always keen to paint-over work in the critics lounge. This would be an opportunity to do the same, but to subversive or comic effect.

I don't think it should be restricted to sprites either, any 2D line art ought to be submissible. I'll admit that this is close to the 'Sketch to Functional Background' contest but that doesn't seem to be running at the moment.

The other advantage of the name Paintover Contest, is that it wouldn't include the US spelling of 'colour'.

This looks nice, but I won't have a chance to play it for a while. I just want to know, does the title have anything to do with the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy?

"Ford, there's an infinite number of monkeys outside..."

You may be right LGM. I just find it frustrating that Gilliam struggles to get films made because of the 'failure' of Munchausen while Bay has "From the director of Pearl Harbor" attatched to his projects as if it wasn't a critical and commercial flop.

Sorry for going a little off-topic.

I won't go and see this film, not because it has an appaling director, but because I'm such an adamant supporter of public transport that the idea of robots transforming into vehicles is abhorrent to me.

[They're grrrreat!]

That advert drives me crazy for more than the obvious reasons.

The slogan is 'They're grrrreat!' or at a pinch 'They taste grrrreat!'.

Who came up with 'They're GONNA taste great.? At what point in the future will they begin tasting great? Surely they currently taste great.

I'm going to Africa to get some answers.

I love the smell of transvesticism in the morning:

The Sugarplum Fairy.

I'd be careful with caustics, they can be overdone. fertoff's caustics are nice to look at, but they're no more 'realistic' than your solid shadow.

Be equally careful with depth of field. Every other render I see is ruined by extreme shallow focus. fertoff's DoF was nicely subtle though.

For incidental glass objects, a semi-transparent shadow would suffice without forcing you to spend a long time tweaking caustics. Without knowing much about mental ray/vray, I suspect that they will be much slower than the scanline render as well.

-Ali

This was a very good game. Nice story, very effective graphics and great sound. For my taste there was a little too much horror where there could have been mystery, but I am pretty wimpy.

I look forward to the next one!

["100 bgs in the style of DOTT, but better!"]

I vote this, even if it could encourage eager beginners to start posting team-requests the minute they join.

True, but they'll do that ANYWAY.Ã,  At least this way they'll be shoved off to a place we can ignore them if we want.

Also, those other forums have very strict rules for posts.Ã,  You need to have a concrete idea, demonstrate what the game will be like, show what other work you've done, etc.Ã,  Whoever moderates the forum could make sure those rules are followed.

To begin with the forum will fill up with posts from people wanting others to make them "100 bgs in the style of DOTT, but better!" After that I think people will begin to realise that more modest requests will get a better response. I think we'd start to see posts asking for three or four backgrounds or one character sprite.

I think a Jobs Wanted/Offered would be good for new members of the community and the community as a whole.

As Gilbot said, I tried to use it to create an SCI font. It crashed about three times in 10 minutes and I gave up on it.

Then I discovered Radiant's font editor and all was well.

I'm not sure it will be possible to get away from quite big file sizes for frame sequences. I'm certainly no expert in compression but If I understand correctly, video compressors use key frames, which are big, and in-between frames, which are smaller. If you're recording a frame sequence the size must always be higher.

On the other hand, PNG screenshots would be considerably smaller than BMPs, so I'd endorse that feature.

The lighting is atmospheric in the first picture, unfortunately it directs our attention away from the desk to the blank wall/floor behind. To achieve a noir look don't use dim lights, use bright back-lights that just pick out the outlines of your composition. Also change the shader on the lamp to make it emit light or glow.

The second image is clearer than the first, but is so bright that the atmposphere is lost. Consider chiaroscuro lighting (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiaroscuro).

Apart from the lighting, the texturing and modelling is pretty strong. The paper looks particularly nice, but I'd consider a narrower pencil.

[Edit:]

It's one of those horrible accordian playing vampires we're always hearing about:



77x106 pixels, 13 colours including transparent.

Edit: I drew this on someone else's monitor, I now realise how dim and dark it is. He's ... uh ... standing in a shadow... yes, a shadow.