Messages

Helm doesn't like AGS-references
Helm made SOL
Ergo Helm is inconsistent

Goats can be inconsistent
Ergo Helm can be a goat

The drums, according to his avatar. Or, he fancies the drummer and is actually the female singer.

Don't use our forums for personal advertisement.
There is a sticky thread in the chat forum which is intended for team requests. But don't bother posting there until you have:
1. Made a small project of your own to showcase. Or at least been around long enough for people to know about you and what you can do.
2. Learnt to write a post without an excess of smileys, caps, strange interpunctions and weird chauvinist jokes.

I agree. Sorry if I rubbed it in your face, Ionias (even if you said you agreed with me )

Fatman was still a very professionally carried out project, and if the commercial aspect of it has discouraged you, we're all sad to miss the prospect of more released Socko-titles.

In my vision, registration is done with no regards to the categories.

The chief point in my vision is that a small board of dedicated people decide on five of the registered games for each category. This will somewhat reduce the chances of people omni-voting for games they like personally, without considering what the categories actually mean.

I don't really have any opinions on the categories, but I guess the ones we've used in the past work well.

However, I think we should just wait until SSH comes back, if he's the one who'll handle it.

PS:
And Becky is just a not very active member. DS's girlfriend, by the way.

I agree that the screenshot area should be longer. Maybe there could be a script that makes sure at least a small portion in the middle of the banner would remain blue, even in very small resolution?

Also, I think it would be good with a greater variety of graphics styles. Your new banner seems to include only low-res/cartoonistic shots. Maybe a few shots from games with more realistic graphics, just for the variation?

Hm, I'm not sure there is a point in arguing this anymore, especially since it seems to get increasingly hostile.

Maybe it is better if the moderators just decide on the rules, and SSH can get it rolling as he comes back?

CoveredInSludge/Squinky:
Naturally, a certain increase in commercial products wouldn't inherently make the community an evil place. It is simply my personal idea that if you can avoid money, things will run more smoothly and people will be friendlier.

Just as the AGS community is a forum for discussing underground gaming, it is also a training ground. Just as we create finished titles, we also develop together, learn together, help eachother etc.

The technical forum is supported around the clock by techies who can help you with every possibly query. They don't get paid.
Thousands and thousands of aspiring artists have had their works assessed and improved by the resident critics of the critics lounge. They all do it for free.
We beta-test for free, we compose soundtracks, we animate eachothers' sprites, and we never charge for it.

If everybody started to demand money for their games, chances are others would be less inclined to unconditionally assist them. Game creators wouldn't want to share their codes, they wouldn't want share their tips and tricks. They would be more focused on marketing their games.

Ionas wasn't evil because he charged for his game. But he did receive mixed reviews (at least one very discouraging and hurting) because in the commercial world people are less forgiving. Gratis, his game wouldn't have had to stand such critcism. He did receive complaints from people who had let him play their games for free. And when he finally released the game for freeware, people who had previously paid for the game complained about that.

Money isn't evil, but it makes things very complicated. And of all evil things that happen in the world, not counting natural disasters, I can't see any situation which isn't directly or indirectly caused by money, and the desire to obtain it. Sorry for being melo-dramatic, but I tend to always put things into huge political proportions.

Great, Eric, who's gonna update the engine now? And who's gonna prepare my tea?

People obviously have little to do in their spare time.

Thanks for your huge efforts, Jet, but we have just decided to give Becky all the awards this year.

This saved a lot of time, didn't it?

What time is it? It's Lock O'Clock

I think it's too full of pompous and archaic words, and the whole thing makes me think of Poe.
Not that I don't love Poe, but he was active a long time ago. As contemporary youth poetry, this doesn't strike me as very honest, more like you're trying to impress on someone.

When you go for this old-fashioned Poe-ish stuff, people will start to scrutinize the rhymes and verse-meter, and in this case there are too many flaws, simply.
If you had gone for free verse and more mundane language, people would focus on the message instead.

Jesus Christ.

Now think for yourself, and be honest. Do you really need an internet community to tell you that:
* Rooms have stuff in them
* Pictures don't need to have 1169x748 pixels, especially when they don't have anything in them
* Even if you try to achieve some sort of comedy game, it's a still a room, not a freaking jig-saw puzzle.

No sire, you have to do a lot better than this.

I might add, in case CoveredInSludge misinterpreted my intentions, that I don't want to defend AGS against any other engines or communities or whatever; my defensiveness was totally non-competitive. I have nothing against SLUDGE, in fact I know absolutely nothing about it, and I'm sure it's a great community. If it so happens that you charged for your game  - which by the way looked really cool when I skimmed through some screenshots somewhere - I have nothing against that either. So don't take anything personally.

I just wanted to say that AGS has a very friendly community, and I like to think that the general absence of monetary interests is partly the reason. If you want me to explain why, I'd gladly ramble on in my next post.

I don't quite follow your reasoning here. Are you implying that all people who want to make money are unfriendly greedy bastards?

Yes I am, very good observation. I'm just that narrow-minded and rude.

Or, I could imply partly what I said, that games which are made with no intentions to yield a profit will certainly be different, often for worse, but sometimes for the better, which is the case with some of my personal favourites.

When you intend to make money on your games, you need to make them perfect. No glitches, no inconsistency. Some people prefer the artistic touch of non-perfection.

For clarification (to prevent any more suggestions as to what I imply) I could mention games like Mom's Quest and Aaron's epic journey. Those are games which I love to death, I just adore them, yet they would never stand up in a professional arena, because they simply lack what people in generally would consider paying money for.

AGS wouldn't have a shadow of the good atmosphere and spirit we have now if it was all based on money. I'm not saying that Ionas & company did wrong by charging for their games, but in my heart I believe that if everybody would charge for their games, the community would be a less friendly place to be. I'm just glad that this community is full of people who are willing to make great efforts to create something they expect no reward from, apart from the satisfaction of having created something they're proud of.

My personal favourite games would never recieve good reviews under professional circumstances. The average game-consumer would probably not consider them good purchases, and hence I would likely have avoided them.

I think you have to take it for what it is; a children's story in a fantasy setting.
The plot itself is rather thin, and the whole deal with twelve year old kids acting like sword-weilding heroes is just a little hard to accept, in my opinion.
Then again, the smallest girl's splended acting and just heart-breaking cuteness made up for the other kids' being just annoying and obnoxious.

Awesome, Neil. Truly great!

I think your last pic there is as dynamic as it gets