Messages

Welcome Ascovel and Dualnames!  I like the cut of your jibs -you guys will go far around here.

Intrigued and supportive, but timeless.  Wait, that didn't come out right.

The forums will go down half-an-hour after onion-ring happy-hour starts in England and come back up about half-an-hour after a certain onion-ring hangover fades (itself a function of the magnitude of happiness that occurs at onion-ring happy-hour).  Since my bet is variable dependent I submit the following formulae:

                                  = O + 0.5

                                = O + 0.5

This kind of thing has been going on for ages.  I've been using a fake AGS profile for eight years now and nobody has caught m-

Hey Spaniards and Spanish speakers: we've got a Spanish translation now!  Many thanks to Ekeko for his hard work translating -it takes real talent to translate the vibe of all of our bad jokes. 

If you're new to this and trying to access the Spanish translation, run the Winsetup file in the game directory and toggle Spanish under Game Language.

[CJ]

I like the idea of a quaint and benign figurehead who just has to sit up straight and waive slowly to the adoring crowds.  But, as many people have pointed out, the reality is that CJ still exists and surely has enough time to be a mere figurehead?

I propose two fluid committees under the distant supervision of CJ, who is still possessed enough of his faculties and the spirit of what AGS is and should be to remain our lord and sovereign.  Each committee can elect its own chair as required, and should have rough guidelines for membership renewal.  The structure would look like this (in ASCII):

                                                                   CJ
                         (Functions: guardian of the spirit of AGS, sage advisor, dispute resolution)
                                                                    |
                                                                    |
                                                              Viceroy (appointed by CJ to fill in for him, if he sees fit)
                         (Functions: filling in for CJ if he doesn't have time, not necessarily a full-time position)
                                                                    |
                                                                  /  
                                   _______________/     \____________________
                                   |                                                                            |
                 Community Committee                                          Technical Committee
 (Functions: WebPage Design &                 (Functions: Editor/Engine Redesign & Upgrades,
Moderation, Community Events, Awards,             Making AGS more portable (editor and especially games)
Promotion of AGS, Organizing Workshops,          Fixing bugs, Visioning & Actualizing the technical evolution of
Offering Direction for AGS to evolve from             AGS in the future, Coordinating technical expertise and contributions)
a community/user perspective, Meets)

     The committees (or councils, or witans, or things, or [insert sexy term here]) would be composed of equals, with a chairman elected by members only as a means of giving someone the executive recognition to push for progress.  So many constituencies have so much vested in AGS that I think attempting to yoke only one person with the authority to "make it work" like CJ did is asking for trouble and disappointment.  I say spread the load, get multiple enthusiastic minds together and let them work out (in a less messy and public way than in the open forums) the direction to move forward, and the way to actualize this.  Terms should be fixed at one or two years, and members elected at large (in practice it will often be the same people unless they really mess up in the minds of the community).

-----------------
EDIT:

Interessting points all but for the sake of clarity could you please move the discussion to the other topic?
I see I've skipped a few things in my hasty enthusiasm, but this topic is simply meant as an accumulation of data.

Thanks!

Oh.
Community Leader
1. No.
2. No.
Technical Leader
1. No.
2. No.

As there are 3 strong candidates, couldn't they agree to establish some kind of triumvirate that will divide the tasks at hand depending on skill and free time they have?

I vote triumvirate as well.  They can work it out amongst themselves who is the "lead" lead, but in my estimation I think it's a very good idea to have continuity in case some member of the leadership decides they don't want to do it anymore.

[BEST MUSIC 2011]

Please consider the work of some of my Swarm members for Byte of the Draculator


Jack Pumpkinhead is a strong candidate for BEST MUSIC 2011

ShiverMeSideways did a phenomenal job voicing Merrick, the lead vampire, as did the background cast of SpacePirateCaine, Studio3, Hudders, cat, ddq, kconan and Sinitrena.  They deserve BEST VOICE WORK 2011.

Hudders dialog writing could easily qualify for BEST DIALOG WRITING 2011

And why not honour the whole swarm with a BEST SHORT GAME 2011.

EDIT: And, as per swarm lobbying, why not vote for Merrick as BEST PLAYER CHARACTER 2011?


Games Database Entry/Download

I remember Space Taxi from my Commodore 64 days!  But your game reminds me more of Jetpack.  Up until a couple years ago my buddy and I would still send each other levels we'd constructed using the in-game level editor.  Oh, the silliness.....  Anyway, good luck!

Perhaps Jong-un will turn out to be un-Jong?

Atelier's response may sound a bit rash

I wouldn't describe writing a dystopian novel as a rash response.  Ironic though it may sound, I think dystopian novel writing would likely increase the net happiness of mankind by providing a constructive outlet for the talented yet disenchanted.  Let that rage pour out onto the page, brother.  That's right.  Let it all out.....

Become a Republican!  If you sign up now you should still be able to vote in the primaries....  Other than that, keep your Colorado Lows to yourself (you'll understand later this winter  )

How about simply hijacking meeting in an other forum during such a period 

Here are some candidate sites:

The Any Given Saturday (AGS) Forum

The Association of Georgia Surveyors (AGS) Forum (actually, through some sort of parallel irony, this forum is also down at the moment)

The Alagille Syndrome (AGS) Alliance Forum

The Association of Geotechnical & Geoenvironmental Specialists (AGS) Forum

And my personal favourite......

The American Gerbil Association (AGS) Forum

See you there next time BigBlueCup isn't BigBlueUp!

I say we form a secret society of AGSers to raise funds for a new AGS server.  Here me out, friends: reliable up-time, the fuzzy feeling of helping your community, and I'm sure we could throw game-making in there somewhere.  Who's with me?

Spoiler

I can't help but feel that there are better places online to have a human super orgasm

[close]

Btw, great job on the play-through video Baron, I loved it.   Though is it me or is the sound out of sync?

Yeah, the sound starts off pretty close to synchronized, then gets progressively more and more off by the end of the clips.  In retrospect I should have "cut" the video more often so that the offset would never get so severe.  Yet another thing to know for next time.....

On a personal note, what I really liked about the swarming was the easy-come-easy-go approach.

So the swarming as a whole- in my eye- really helps to build a "friendly working atmosphere".

.....But how can we combine easy-come-easy-go with dictatorial powers?!?  Seriously, I'm glad people felt laid back about the whole process.  Game making is supposed to be fun, right?

To help with the post-mordem discussions I've uploaded a Developer's Playthrough which attempts to document how the project was assembled.  I'm sure that I've left out all kinds of contributors in my ramblings, but the gist of the swarming process is there.

EDIT: Part 2

EDIT: Part 3

Sorry to double post, but I thought I'd link to our Developer's Playthrough that attempts to document the contributions and processes behind this game.  This is my first ever playthrough, so I apologize in advance for it being unpolished in places.  Enjoy!


EDIT: Part 2

EDIT: Part 3

Ha, well.... where to start?  Really, if you want to know every detail of how this project came to pass there is a whole thread documenting the process here.  Answering your questions directly....

How did you come up with this idea?

My original plot idea was for a love-lorn bionic vampire to escape a military base, since it would make for a short game with a clear objective.  There were many writers who adapted, altered and fleshed out that original concept to create the final product.

How long did it take you?

The swarm project ran from May to October (five months), but there was a lot of down time in there.  My personal active time on the project (excluding correspondence, recruitment, discussion, etc.) was probably around 80 hours.  This entailed most of the programming, debugging, some animation and drawing, importing assets (and editing them to fit, if necessary), writing interactions and doing the documentation (code comments and readme file).

I want to know all about this game, because I am trying to come up with a good CSI game that has excellent graphics.

Well, I didn't have much to do with drawing a lot of the graphics....  If you're looking for art direction, you should consult with our art director Ali.  If you are looking for how-to tips, you should read the swarm thread and PM anyone who has submitted background art or animation that you admire.  If you are looking to recruit artists then you're going to have to get them enthusiastic about your game and convince them that it will be successful when finished.  To do this it is helpful to have already released a game, thus proving you can follow through on what you propose, so I recommend working on a small project first to hone your skills (perhaps a MAGS entry?).

Also, a Robot Vampire?  That is an interesting character, and you need to fill us in on the background of the story.

All I know is in the readme file, which is basically what appears in the completed game announcement (above).  We didn't really spend a lot of time fleshing out the back story as we felt that it would just weigh down the story in such a short game.

Sorry to double post but this is an important update.  After due consideration of the pros and cons, I finally decided in favour of releasing the source code for the game.  I reckoned that we had a fair number of AGS newbies contribute and many of them are quite familiar with the plot and game mechanics, so why not open up the back-stage component so they can learn how it was done.  I've posted the source in the Swarm post-mordem thread here.  Post over there or PM me if you have any questions.

EDIT: Also, I now have translation files available if anyone is interested.  I've already PMed our volunteer about the Spanish translation, but anything else is open for grabs!