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This thread reminded me of something that I was thinking about, but have been too lazy to try yet

First, take something like https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/ai-on-rtx/chatrtx/ (or any other locally hostable LLM system, but apparently this is one of the better ones, if you have nvidia).

Create a dataset made up of the AGS manual, open source AGS projects, and solved questions on the forums (this last one perhaps being the most ethically grey, can skip if needed). Load it in, and...hey presto, you've got your own little AGS helper.

We had a pretty awesome MSPaint artist @Opo Terser who would randomly swoop into topics with a beautifully done MSPaint image and then disappear again. Unfortunately, most of the images seem to have gone down as they were hosted on 2dadventure, and I'm not sure what to search in archive to find them (the current forum link format is not the same as back then, probably the URL was different too).

Has anyone tried any of the more popular screen reader softwares? I am sure the topic came up here before (but I can't find where with the current search functionality  ), and it was mentioned that they COULD pick up the text from AGS, and I'm pretty sure this was years ago.

I was always interested in making accessible games, and tried a couple of times to implement a keyboard alternative system like what Snarky mentioned, but laziness and frustrations with AGS (at the time) got in the way.

Still, there are some things we as a community could do that could help.

As I understand it, the way AGS renders text, it is pick-uppable by text-to-speech systems, so that's already a plus. Beyond that, it just rests on the developer to describe everything, maybe in a "Visually impaired" mode. Might also be nice to have the names of hotspots/characters/objects on screen somehow accessible to these systems? So like, tapping a certain key would list them all off.

Would also be nice to implement a dyslexic-friendly text system. There are a couple of open source dyslexic friendly fonts available online, but it takes some effort to optimise them to work in AGS. Beyond that, the difficulty dyslexic people have with reading text isn't just down to the font, so some system that highlighted text on screen would be nice to implement in-engine.

Talking about fonts, I don't know if this changed, or if I misremember how outlines work, but it would be nice if the colour of the outlines was also configurable (instead of just being black?).

It sounds like you would like your combat encounter to be like a dialogue puzzle with only a specific path allowing for victory. And yeah, sure, it could work!

If it is the same person, ChrisRemo used to be a reasonably active member of this forum as well!
https://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/profile/remixor/

P.S. If anyone else is stuck on MORT, just let me know. Happy to provide hints or a walkthrough.

Since you offer, I'm stuck

Spoiler

At the first guard bot, with a steel strip/plate

[close]

Very well put @Rik_Vargard although I would like to add, that just because we can't do anything about change, doesn't mean we have to like it or take it lying down.

I mean, we're all here because we love point and click adventure games, despite time, technology, and tastes having long since moved past the genre.

It might be a futile battle, but life is futile anyway. So if you don't like change, then why not fight it for the sake of fighting it? 
I'd personally prefer to die fighting for what I believe in, then to live in a perpetual state of yielding acceptance. Although I wouldn't want to do either in a blind state of ignorance. But that's just my values.



Also considering you touched upon it, I suppose now would be a good time to go into a philosophical debate about the desire for progression, and whether there is a reason to continually do so.
A topic which is quite vast, although I only have surface level knowledge of.

Why does it sound like an AI wrote your text? 

Extension? Who said anything about an extension?!
I'd like to present to you

The Green & Red

Made by myself and jfrisby in the last week or so of this month. You can download it here

Tough competition!

I was hoping to sweep in with a surprise last-minute entry, but even with the extra day this year, Feb is too short! I pounded away at it into the night with my secret team member, but it's a weekday, and I'm at work now, and can't continue.

I'd appreciate a tiny bit of an extension (maybe 15 more hours?), so I can get back home and not have it be totally barebones, but if that's not possible, do tell, and I'll release as is!

For reference, I'm the user on discord who was having problems. As mentioned, I was using GIMP, but also tried Windows Paint program.

As CrimsonWizard mentioned, I ended up creating a mask in AGS by just randomly placing 15 squares of different colours, exporting that mask, and now I'm pasting my new masks onto that image whenever I need.

Also for reference, the link Snarky shared is either not valid, or contradicts AGS's own error message, which told me that only 256 colour BMPs are permitted. Also, AGS now allows more than 15 hotspots, but the method mentioned in the link would only allow for 15.

If the Excavation of Hobs Barrow worked on your old laptop, probably any AGS game would work. You could go through the award winners of previous years.

And also not pixel art 

So many! In my old age, I seem to have gotten a lot more impatient.

I'd heard of The Last Express for so long (even from an old AGS member who would constantly praise it), so a while back, I got it in gog, and...I just couldn't. I barely played it for a few minutes, but the interface, the time mechanic, it all just didn't work for me.

An example closer to what TheFrighter mentioned would be the original Deus Ex. I got that a couple years ago as well, and I actually got reasonably far into it, but just dropped it for some reason at a point. I might have to return to it now, I hear there are some QoL mods available, and I could start again from scratch.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning is a game I really liked quite a bit- the well done RPG mechanics, the visuals and style, even the story to an extent. I played through it quite a bit, but then at one point after several hours of gameplay you finish up with the foresty area of the game and move on to a desert area, and I got the impression that all that time that I had spent in the forest area, I was likely to have at least as much in this new area. That just felt like too much for me, and I abandoned the game.

Games really should know not to overstay their welcome- it happens a lot with RPGs, but also roguelikes. I noticed in games like Rogue Legacy, Hollow Knight, Hades- I play pretty long while, get to what I'd assume would be a satisfying ending, except it's not, and there is an expectation that I have to do about the same amount of time and effort as I'd already done, but again, to get the "true" ending.

A somewhat different example was Pillars of Eternity. I got it as one of the first in the new wave of RPGs, and while there was a lot to love about it, one of the core aspects just didn't do it for me: the combat. I got a reasonable way into it, but was probably still in the first quarter of the game. It culminated in me having stormed a castle, battling my way through it, finally defeating the big main guy in the castle to realise that I didn't enjoy a moment of the cumbersome, repetitive, battle-of-attrition style of combat it had, so I gave up. People tell me the sequel improved on this, but I'm not sure I trust that now.

How do you do it?!

I'd like to call on the expertise of the more prolific among you, who regularly complete games, mostly on their own (browsing the MAGS wins, I see people like @4KbShort and @Ponch and @ddavey1983 and we miss you slasher!), and ask for your specific process, with actionable steps I can take to follow them and also complete a game, for MAGS or longer term, or shorter term.

My process usually goes like this:

• See a topic or theme or contest that interests me (man, I wish I could go back to my longer term personal projects at some point!), or often doesn't REALLY interest me, but I want to challenge myself and make a game, so I try anyway, often twisting the theme
• Coming up with a game idea that fits the theme- this is usually my first point of failure, or the thing that unreasonably takes up 50% of the time of the competition
• Trying to map out the puzzles/plot progression for the game- this is usually my 2nd point of failure, and probably the most common one, even happening if I progress to steps beyond this one. I guess there could be multiple reasons for this, mostly involving me not wanting to do a simple use tomato on cook->get sandwich->use sandwich on guard->get key->use key on gate->... type of puzzles for due to them being boring, and then as a consequence, often trying to innovate TOO much ("Maybe I can make a match-3 minigame!") or even getting caught up in side-issues ("maybe my interface can be a super accessible only spacebar and nothing else!" "maybe I can implement a state machine!" "maybe I can try an iMUSE type system!")
• While theoretically I'd like to have completed an entire progression of the story/puzzles before this step, that almost never happens, so I figure I'll come up with the basics of the previous step and try to move to this next step- actual implementation: usually involves setting up the game system (how the UI works, the intro and start menu and icons) or doing a couple of the BGs or main character (although I usually start with a placeholder character), while still working on the previous step. I haven't recently progressed far beyond this step.

Help? Please? Step by step, how do you fine people who do it, do it? Do you often feel like you're intentionally implementing or planning something substandard just to "get it done" (or just get deadlocked and not complete because you couldn't do the substandard thing, nor come up with the awesome thing)? How do you limit yourself and prevent your idea from ballooning out of control? Conversely, how do pyt in that one or two "cool", "different" things so that your game is not just another boring checkmark on the list?

Wordle 883 4/6*

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This is hilarious!

[Best Commercial Game]

It's just always made sense to me to say the AGS Awards are open to all AGS games, but commercial games should only be represented by a "Best Commercial Game" category, where commercial games can exclusively compete against each other. Most people might disagree, which is fine, but I've yet to hear an compelling argument against doing this (though I realize the irony of the fact that I may not have presented a compelling argument for doing this either!), beyond it not being a popular opinion

As I mentioned, the argument would be that there wouldn't be enough commercial games nominated for such an award to make it viable as its own category. And then that's essentially excluding commercial games from being recognised by AGS.

I don't think LimpingFish is suggesting excluding commercial games from the awards, when this discussion came up in previous years, the suggestion was usually having them only applicable for a specific "Best Commercial Game" award. This wasn't usually feasible, since there weren't enough commercial games released in a single year, but I get the feeling that's still true today.

Radiant reminded me that I have a key available for his cool game Heroine's Quest: The Herald of Ragnarok on GOG.

Hope you enjoy it, whoever redeems it! 

It grinds my gears when people in public transport in rush hour(trams, trains, subways) slowly hobble their way forward and just stand around in the middle of the isle rather than just go forward, take a seat if there is one, or else try to stand to the side so the other people can.

Seriously, the rush hour tube is NOT the place to stand around lazing about and blocking the way for stressed-out people who just want to get away from the sweaty crowd and get on with their way. And no, the majority of these sloths are NOT frail elderly, pregnant, or handicapped, but perfectly able-bodied young people who inexplicably think that it's fun roleplaying as a zombie where it's the most inconvenient.

Your comment reminded me of lots of nagivation based gears to grind, one of which was what you described, but everywhere: People suddenly deciding to hold up other people's movement in the most inconvenient places: suddenly stopping in the middle of gates or doorways, for example, or standing in your way outside elevators while you're in them.

As an everywhere walker in a place that isn't kind to walkers, I have a whole host of other ground gears too, the one that bugs me most often is while I'm running, especially along an intersection (or somewhere a vehicle can come perpendicular to me), and seeing me going across their path already, instead of turning behind me, the motorbike or bicycle (or small car) speeds up so that it can try to make the gap in front of me instead.