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The graphical answer is fairly simple. My artistic skills are extremely limited. When I started work on Dawn of the Daleks in 2007, I was looking for more of a lucasarts indy/monkey island fidelity. The result of this pursuit was that it was taking me approximately a week to produce each background to even a basic level of sophistication. Given the large number of backgrounds I desired, it would have taken me years to finish the first episode.

Whilst a year on an AGS project isn't unheard of, and the FOY team might scoff at me for thinking it could take anything less to produce any work of quality, I came to realise that for my first AGS game (a game of basic interactions given my current scripting level, a game that few people may even play)  that such complexity was acting against me.

When Dawn of the Daleks was unfairly exterminated, excuse the pun, there was absolutely no way I could be bothered to attempt to reproduce the graphics to that level again. The answer? Sierra!

Both my brother and I were massive fans of police quest, but a little too young to cope with the text interface. However, from what I recall, it was the story, and not the graphics that affected us. Well if it's good enough for them, it's good enough for me.

I hold up my hands, here and now, and admit that many of the backgrounds you will encounter at this stage are modified sierra backgrounds. Forgive me Chris Jones, for I have sinned. However, as I am slowly improving my skills, I have become less reliant on the borrowed sprites, and am rapidly churning out my own content. I sincerely hope the two graphical styles don't jar with each other too much. The episodic nature of Doctor Who means that I can hopefully churn out each episode in a couple of months, all the while improving my skills at both scripting and graphics.

I admit, I've strolled almost casually outside of the 16 colour limitations of AGI, but to be honest, I have a quad core monster building this thing, and it's been almost 20 years since police quest, so I'll be damned if I won't take some liberties here and there.

As for the time frame?

I started to sketch out the plot during the Martha Jones series. Whilst by the time I had concluded the basic framework, certain plot elements in the Donna Noble series had, whilst not directly contradicting what I had produced, certainly overlapped. So I simply dropped my own self contained series between the two, and everyone's a winner. It's nothing personal, to be honest, I thought Catherine Tate was surprisingly good in the role, but that's a debate for another thread.

So there you go. I've rambled somewhat more than I had expected to, but this is my thread, and I'll ramble if I want to!
Thank you for all the offers of support so far, and the words of encouragement on this forum.

Salutations fellow adventurers!

Since the collapse of my hard drive, and the irrevocable loss of the work I did on Dawn of the Daleks, I was reluctant to ever return to AGS. However, the itch soon returned, and I dumped the original storyline, returned to the drawing board, and after a seemingly infinite number of post-it notes splashed across my desk, I chose to finally unveil:

Doctor Who: Episode One-Peace and Goodwill

After Martha Jones elected to conclude her adventures with the Doctor, and the briefly wed Donna Noble dropped off at home following a christmas misadventure, the Doctor once again finds himself without a companion.

However, our story does not start with the Doctor, but with a student, looking for identity on a quiet, somewhat Earth-like planet in a distant galaxy. He finds himself rudely dragged from sleep with the news that aliens have pitched up their saucer in the local park. Excited by the news, he drags himself from his bed, and sets off to the landing site.

Can the Doctor and his newest companion discover the secret of the alien visitors? You'd better hope so, otherwise episode two will be somewhat brief.


Boggle at the intellectual capacity of guards!


Experience the horrors of public transport!

As promised, here is the first demo release of Peace And Goodwill. I remind you, this is my first AGS game, so don't expect anything too fancy. However, I hope you enjoy what I have to offer. Feel free to provide constructive criticism and advice where you feel it necessary. I am always open to new ideas.

Doctor Who - Peace And Goodwill (DEMO)

EPISODE 1: Peace and Goodwill
Graphics:95%
Scripting:100%
Dialogue:80%

EPISODE 2: (Name withheld for Spoiler Reasons)
Graphics:50%
Scripting:50%
Dialogue:50%

Hull is much the same, I spent about half an hour digging out the car this morning, popped back inside to get my keys, came back out, and it was covered in snow again. I drove to work pretty much sideways this morning, to find about two other people had managed to make it in.

Still, it makes a change. The cat's loving it.

To answer your question, the UK just doesn't have the infrastructure to cope with such a dramatic snowfall over such a short space of time. Northern European countries probably wouldn't even blink at it, but for us, all this white stuff is utterly confusing.

I vaguelly recall seeing one of those slug things in the critics forum and wondering what on earth an adventure featuring one of them would be like. And now I know. It will look incredibly cutesy.

Part of me is somewhat disappointed to see there is no disgusting slime trail left behind when they slither, but perhaps that's because I'm somewhat disturbed like that.

Other than that, a stunning looking game.

Darth, I bow to your moderatory wisdom, and wave a big hello to the critics forum!

Technocrat, damn right it's a parody. I consider this the 'Children in need' episode to the series as a whole.  The first episode is a little more serious than 'The Curse of Zog', so don't expect quite so much of a laugh and a giggle.

Yes, I am in production with the up-coming release.

No, these are not screenshots from that release.

Darth, I apologise for your confusion. Like I explained,  perhaps not thoroughly enough,  I was not overly sure where to place this little demo, so I placed it in this here forum. If you want to move it, or delete it, then so be it. Like I said, I just had something to release, and thought some people might enjoy it.

Yes, part of me does want to shout from the rooftops regarding the work in progress, but I've lost projects before, and have no intention of letting people down yet again. However, I've amended the original post to include a little more information regarding the upcoming game.

I will make this clear before anyone sulks.
This is a NON-playable demo.

And now, may I humbly present...

Doctor Who, and the Curse of Zog.


COWER in awe at Zog's mighty fortress!


OBSERVE Zog's splendiferous plan!!

DOWNLOAD Zog's public appearance!!!
DoctorWho-TheCurseofZog.zip

This little episode marks an introduction to the Sierra-inspired episodic installments of Doctor Who. Sandwiched neatly between series 3 and 4, following the departure of Martha from the series, the Doctor finds himself once again alone travelling the galaxy. But for how long? What adventures are in store for our low resolution hero? Find out, soon.

Controlled with an innovative 'pointy clicky' interface, guide our intrepid hero through time, space, depth, width and dozens of other dimensions!

Cirius was born an lowly traveller on the Discworld MUD approximately 5 years ago. After a brief stint training to be an assassin, his life was tragically brought to an end by a mutated cabbage.

Revived several months later, Cirius returned as a homocidal wandering personality who had somehow achieved the ability to transfer between host bodies.

Tiring of his life in a stagnant short story, he took the advantage of his creators distracted mind to escape to first Operation Flashpoint, where he followed a successful career as a bullet magnet, and later to such star-flung realms as Homeworld and briefly EVE.

Dwelling more permanently within Second Life, Cirius continues his quest to actually stay alive for more than five minutes without having his life brought to an amusingly short end.

As an aside, through an intense knowledge of Dr Who, and an overwhelming fascination with rubbing two inventory items together, he inevitably found his way onto the AGS forums.

And that, brings us in a rather round about way, to here.

Just a brief heads up to give full permission to the author, and indeed anyone else who has the urge to utilise the spinning tardis animation in any of their works. The original 3d model it's based upon was not made by myself, so it would be hypocritical of me to restrict its usage.

I'd appreciate a brief mention in the credits, as it did constitute an hour or so of work, but I'm just happy to see it being put to some use.

On a related note, when I have the time to, I'll upload the full dalek character set for open usage. I'll let you know once they're on the forums.

CM.

Likewise. Sorry you haven't heard from me in months, I've been out the country, and without the wonders of the internet.

The progress you've made in the few months I've been away is absolutely staggering. I've PAID up to £30 for games that look worse than this.

If you're still in need of the updated daleks, let me know, and I'll dig them out for you, but by the looks of things, you're pretty much well set. My time is still open to any proof-reading/testing you need doing, so let me know if you need anything.

Continuing the bird theme...




"DUCK!"

Looks really interesting.

One criticism: (though i know this isn't the critics lounge,) the distribution of the stars in your background is a little too uniform for my tastes. I wasn't entirely sure if the backdrop to the bedroom was a starscape or very tasteless wallpaper. other than that, I really like the style, as auriond notes it does look very much like 7 days. One wonders if there'll be as many buckets required for the blood...

Speaking as someone incapable of setting himself realistic release dates, best of luck to you for an October release, I shall watch with anticipation.

Your timing is impeccable mr Butcher, I was in the process of touching up my spinning tardis animation,  idly looking over the forum, when lo and behold...

It should be done by the end of the day. Once it's finished, I'l upload it for you.
This is a little taster of what the TARDIS will look like.




I think I copied one of the frames incorrectly, but you get the general gist.

Yeah, as I said before, I suck at colour...

But seriously, when it comes to 1960's science fiction, there really is no other choice in my mind. The original backdrops were actually originally in colour, but it just didn't look right.

New screens uploaded. Demo date pushed back. (as all the best release dates are!)

Today I realised I'd been using the wrong dalek variant...my response was a bout of swearing never before heard. Still, it's only a minor retouching job, so nothing to worry about.

Keep the Reliant, it fits the scene perfectly. Though perhaps you should put Kahn in the bar somewhere, having a short break after his massacre of the Regula I station...

I think the main issue here is the position of the rocket itself. It's sat on top of a mesa-like platform in the valley, which is bringing it up to an altitude almost level with that of the foreground ridge. This, I think, is what's causing all the problems with perspective. I think I can probably solve some of these issues with an element of higher contrast between the foreground and backdrop.

Regarding picture 1:
If this looks like a 1950's B movie, then I'm a decade off, as it's based on a 1960's series.

Regarding picture 2:

The room itself is buried deep in a mountain, and rectangular in shape, so it being flat isn't a problem.

The thing on the left is a table. It's a 'futuristic' table, which means it has an awkward shape to try and reproduce. Looking at it now, there's a lot I could do there with highlights and shadow.

The thing on the right however is a big circular hatch on a large base, large enough to admit a person to the level below. I think I've made a big mistake giving it a flat base, as it seems to make the whole thing appear 2 dimensional.

Oooh, that's much better. Thanks a bunch.

Forgive me, but I'm amused by the statement "you use too much colors in just a single rocket," in a black and white picture.

Christ, that was quick!
How on earth did I forget to give the rocket a shadow? I knew it looked odd...

Sharpening the foreground definitely seems to have done the trick on the landscape, but I think I still have a fair way to go in touching up the back half of the scene. Bohnito, if you could be a little more specific about the rocket shading, it would help me a lot.

I see your point on the second picture. The light sources in the scene are those two orbs above the central console. I should probably make them a little brighter. Bah, shadows again, the bane of my life.