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In Al-Quest 1 you have to make a "cigarette" out of rolling papers and a magic mushroom that shrinks people (a la Alice in Wonderland).  The inventory picture definitely looks like a joint, though....

I always thought it would be really cool to make a small game where the locations stay the same, but your perception of them and powers changed depending on what drug you took.  So for example to solve one puzzle you'd have to "float" up over an obstacle, or for another you'd have to hallucinate that it was alive -that kind of thing.  But such a project would spoil my clean-cut image, so I'm throwing the idea out to the general public.

Simple but effective.
  My impression of Latin American generals/dictators is that they go over the top with the medals and badges -I mean, they look positively gaudy.  Perhaps you could add more?
  And.... well, this is nothing really, but it looks like his bigger eye ball is weighing him down, causing him to tilt to his right.  Maybe if you switched the big and small eye around....

Alright, PMs should have been sent to all the Beta Testers.  Have fun -I mean, work hard!
Something I forgot in the form letter: if you could send me your thoughts on possible copyright violations, that'd be awesome.  I put my own twist on everything, but I'm not sure if it's enough of a twist in some cases.

Thanks again,

BaRoN

                 THIS PROJECT IS IN BETA TESTING MODE!

Effective 11:23pm EDT I finished the rough version of this game -  This means it's fully playable with all interactions and animations!  What it lacks is music, sounds & credits, and a bit of polish around the edges, but I intend to work on that while the nuts and bolts of the game are being beta tested. 

WHAT I NEED:  BETA TESTERS (Preferably 3 or 4).

JOB DESCRIPTION: Try everything -EVERYTHING!  This is a big job, since the game is full length (60 rooms).  I need fresh eyes to look for game crashes, walking deads, missing inventory items, stuck players, animation glitches and spelling errors.  I hope to break the task down into segments so as not to overload individuals, but this could easily take 3-4 hours of your time.

WHAT YOU GET: First crack at the game, full credit as a beta tester in the game's documentation, and the eternal gratitude of myself and every future player of the game who won't be frustrated by avoidable bugs.

QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED: Previous Beta Testing is an asset. 

HOW TO SIGN UP: PM me or post here. 

                                         Preemptive thanks to all those willing to help out!
                                                                                      BaRoN


 

I've wanted to finish My Ideal Game for about a year now.  It's been a long slog, but..... well, one day.

Yes, it is Theatrx's prerogative to start a new Animation competition.  And the theme is brilliant!  I'll PM him to start a new Animation Competition thread.

I wanted to do flower monsters but that idea got taken.... anyway, this is how it turned out.

The cost will be around $100 per person for the trip to Bayfield and back to T.O. (or wherever en route) + day trips.  I can guarantee that rental will be less, hopefully significantly less, but there'll probably be several hundred dollars worth of gas to account for.
I'll reinstate the Yorkdale pickup for Renegade Implementor and recommend it to Disco and The Ivy (the subway is just so much easier than crossing municipal boundaries on the bus).

[please post or PM if this affects you!]

AGS Bus Update:
       So far it looks like everybody is coming through Pearson, so we might be able to cut Munroe -and two hours of extra driving -out of the route (please post or PM if this affects you!).    The tentative ridership list to date:

Mittens Attendee                          Pick up
BaRoN                                             Orangeville
Ivy                                                   Pearson
AGA                                                  Pearson
Pumaman                                        Pearson
Quintaros                                        Pearson
Mattglobe                                        Pearson
Disco                                               Pearson/Yorkdale (?)
Renegade Implementor                  Yorkdale

Unless there is a surge in demand I'll look into renting a moderately sized van (10 seats so there's room for swag).
Speak up if you feel I've misrepresented your itinerary or you want on (or off) the bus.

The Castle of Dr. Brain!  I think he had an Island too -THOSE were fun games, and we were allowed to play them in my grade 6 class if we were done all of our work (i.e. keep the nerds busy so the teacher stays sane).
   The problem is with puzzle type games is that they are appealing only to those who like solving them.  One of the best ways to enhance your English vocabulary is to do crossword puzzles, but I've never met a struggling student yet who could stand the sight of them.  Same thing with computer games: at the tutoring centre I work at the kids who need to work on phonics most will only randomly click at the phonics game we have on the computer until it gets them -eventually- to the "game" section.  Self-motivated learners will solve mysteries, but passive learners will either be intimidated or attempt to cope without learning anything (even expending 10 times the effort learning the content would have required).
   .....unless you trick them.
     Don't get me wrong, there's no substitute for human-on-human instruction, but there must be a thousand parables out there of wise men teaching valuable lessons to everyone from impetuous youths to self-involved kings through trickery.  For example, I was thinking the other day of designing a "Shooter" game for struggling pre-teen male readers where the bad guys all had words across their shirts and you could only shoot the guy who finished your sentence correctly.  Young boys -at least the ones I work with- seem addicted to shooting games but will do back-flips not to read.  Would they be motivated to read if they could shoot things in the process?  I wonder....

Charlie Foxtrot : April 2007.

Public transit, eh?

    Well, getting to Bayfield seems to be a bit.....difficult via public transit.  My suggestion is to take the bus or train to Stratford upon Avon (Ontario), and I'll pick you up.  You catch the train at Union Station in downtown Toronto and it goes via Guelph & Kitchener to Stratford (about 2.5 hours, normally, but it will easily take you an hour to make it from the airport to downtown).  There is a train that is leaving Toronto at 5:40pm on July 21st and will cost you $37.10 CND each.  The train also stops temptingly close to Pearson airport in Brampton at 6:14pm and would only cost you $29.68 CND each to Stratford, saving you time and money, but I'm not sure how easy it is to get to.  The three of you could probably split a cab for $30 and get to the Brampton station in -estimating- half an hour or so.
  Apparently you can catch the greyhound bus at Pearson Int'l airport but it looks like you'd have to take it downtown and then from there to Stratford via Guelph & Kitchener (probably about 2.5 hours as well, from downtown).  I can't seem to get a quote from the website, but I'm guessing it'll cost about $40 and run at inconvenient times.
  We can make a day trip to Stratford on Saturday so it won't be out of our way.  I hear there's a summer Shakespeare festival there.....

Dang!  A little research of incoming flights does suggest that most European flights arrive in the late afternoon.  Bugger.
OK - Revised plan:

          Leave Yorkdale at 3pm, Friday July 20th
          Arrive at Pearson Int'l at approx. 4pm.
          Gather people up between 4-7pm (while making shuttle runs to a nearby bar/restaurant?)
          Hit Munroe Int'l up by 8-8:30pm (if necessary)
          Get to Bayfield around midnight.

          Fortunately dropping people off at airports is much more predicatable:
          Leave Bayfield by 10am Friday July 27th
          Get to Munroe (Hamilton) by 2pm
          Get to Pearson (Toronto) by 3:30pm

Greetings Mittensers,
      It has been brought to my attention that I should firm up the AGS Bus schedule so that people can plan flights, etc., accordingly.  This isn't set in stone, and if there are any big problems let me know, but the plan so far is:

                  Depart Yorkdale Mall (Toronto) 12:00 noon on Friday July 20th
                  Arrive Pearson Int'l Airport (Toronto) 12:30 pm (going to arrival levels of various terminals)
                  Depart Pearson Int'l Airport (Toronto) 1:30 pm
                  **Arrive Munroe Int'l Airport (Hamilton) 2:30 pm
                  **Depart Munroe Int'l Airport (Hamilton) 3:00 pm (it's only one terminal)
                  Drive through Woodstock, Ontario, approximately 5pm
                  Hit Bayfield by 7pm, a little later if we stop for grub.

                **Note, if no one's going to Munroe than we'll get to Bayfield about two hours earlier.

                  Depart Bayfield approx. 10am on Friday July 27th
                  Reverse directions and times above
                  Meaning you could be at Munroe by 2pm for sure (but we'll skip this if no one is flying out that day)
                  Pearson (Toronto) by 4pm (gotta allow for rush hour)
                  Yorkdale by 6pm (if necessary)

               -Most flights to Europe fly overnight, so you should be good for check-in times, etc.

Unless anyone will miss the bus and/or flight due to this schedule that'll be how we run it.  If you fall into the boat just mentioned just give a shout and we'll see what we can do.

Cheers!

I think he was thinking time-travel in terms of creating fanciful worlds, more than being literal.....  since otherwise Da Elf is clearly in the right.

Anyhow, you're.... you're actually going to make a game [somewhat] based on the input you recieve in this thread?  It's like the reverse of all those threads where bossy noobs try to get people to make their game for them -awesome!  I'd like to see a......er, a......  a Caveman kidnapped by Aliens!  What does he see?  How does he interpret things?  How does he escape in the end?  Tell me!

We're getting better at toponymy (the naming of places):  Toronto used to be called York, and Kitchener used to be called Berlin.  Having said that, Cambridge is just an amalgam of Galt, Preston & Hespeller, two of which were fairly original names, so I guess there's been some backsliding.... :   Swastika Ontario is sticking to their guns though: they figure they had the name first so Hitler can go blow himself.  Awesome.  Just awesome.

John C. Munroe =Hamilton Int'l Airport.  It's feasible to pick folks up there, and recommendable to fly into due to marginal airport taxes (which were $50 at Pearson per ticket vs. $10 at Hamilton the last time I flew).  It is kind of in the middle of nowhere if you're coming early though....

Real London.  Not London, England.

Awesome.  Any other takers?

I think, since there's a strong probability that people will be arriving different dates that we'll swing by a couple of Toronto locations for convenience's sake.  I think Yorkdale mall is a forsure, because it has easy parking, easy access to the freeway, and most important of all it's on a subway route.  So if folks are in Toronto a day or two early they can tour the town and still hook up with us pretty easily.  Then we can swing by the airport (again?) on the way out to Bayfield.

[do]

I've just been checking up on coach options. Any of the Canadians in the London(ish) area? I am interested in carpooling if anyone is coming from there or nearby. I only want to go as far as I have to on the coach, since I will have passed the exit to Bayfield nearly halfway to Toronto . My route also calls at Brantford and Hamilton along the way if that crosses anyone's path. I promise fuel $$ and upbeat shenanigans for any takers.

Well, I expect I'll be renting a car for the week, or possibly something bigger if a lot of people are interested in carpooling.  As I live about half an hour from the Pearson Int'l Airport (Toronto) I figured it would be really convenient to pick up a contingent of overseas folks and then drive out via Kitchener-Stratford (Hwy 401/Hwy 8 ).  But if a lot of people are flying into Hamilton then Toronto-Hamilton-Brantford-Woodstock-St.Mary's (Hwy 403/County Rds) makes more sense.  I checked with a rental agency and it looks like, adding gas, any size vehicle I rent for a week will cost about $100 CND per seat (possibly less if we get a really big vehicle and split it more ways), which I'll bet is about the price of a round-trip ticket on a greyhound-type bus (I say greyhound-type since greyhound apparently doesn't go anywhere near Bayfield).

So, the pros of an AGS Bus: 
-Jolly conductor 
-doorstep to doorstep service
-peebreaks and sidetrips on demand
-convenient mass-transport for Toronto/London/Goderich/Stratford/Countryside daytrips
-competive pricing
-you'll have the driver's cell-phone number so you'll know exactly when & where the bus will arrive.

Cons of the AGS Bus:
-It's got a pretty lame name.
-Constitutionally all of the AGS elite can't ride at the same time

I can rent the vehicle straight up so don't worry about deposits -we'll settle up at the meet.  I do[/b] have to have an idea of how many people would be interested so I know whether to rent a Smart car or a bus.  Conditional interest is fine (i.e. I'm in if you go through Brantford, etc.).