Messages

This is a common problem, and one I could rant about easily if I let myself.  My only advise is to keep trying.  Now that you can recognize the signs of flaking out, you can deal with them faster.  Eventually, you'll find people that are loyal.  I burnt through about 10-15 artists before I ended up with a nice core group of people.  I'd also suggest searching away from the AGS community.  The folks here are mostly hobbyists, so hardcore loyalty is hard to find here.  Also, if you can pay a little bit by-the-job (i.e., per background or animation or whatever) it gives you a little bit more clout.

Thanks everyone!  GDC has been cool so far.  Now as wild and party-crazy as last year, but still amazing in its own way.  I'm blogging about it again at www.davelgil.com if anyone is interested.

The reasons why we make games may vary, but I think fame/money/sex wouldn't be very high on the list.

I can't speak for everyone, but I totally got into game development to pick up chicks.

Loving 3.0 so far!  Just made the switch.

I do miss being able to right-click on the room editor to copy x/y coordinates to the clipboard, so you can paste them into the code.  Is there a reason why that was removed?

-Dave

What makes a game commercial is if you charge for it. 

What makes a game sellable/marketable is entirely subjective.

I can put in my two cents here, since I did this exact same thing about two years ago.  The Shivah was originally freeware, and when I decided to sell it commercially (after getting folks to improve the graphics, music and adding voice acting). I planned to leave both versions up. 

What ended up happening was that the free version got downloaded a lot more, while very few people bought the commercial version.  Even though it was a much improved game, many people couldn't justify paying for a game they'd already played for free.  In the end, I removed the free version. This angered a vocal minority, but was a better move in the long run.  Two years later, very few people remember that it was ever free in the first place.

In your case, I guess it depends on what your motives/goals are.  If you are using this as a stepping stone to selling your own games, I'd strongly suggest NOT releasing a freeware version.  If you want to test the waters to see if you're able to market and sell a game, giving it away for free won't teach you anything.  But if you are just doing it for fun, why not?

-Dave

a self-contained story

Is that like the demo to SQ6? Like a mini-game, a situation that won't happen in the real game?

Sooorta.  The scene is more of a "tutorial level", which introduces all the gameplay concepts at the very beginning of the game.  In TV shows you often get a "lead-in" scene, something that takes place right before the opening credits that has nothing to do with the rest of the story.  That's what this demo is.  It'll be in the game, but it'll be seperate from the main story.

And Cino: buh?  Yeesh I've had 10 testers go over this demo for a few weeks now and none of them ever encountered that bug.  I think I know what causes it though.

-Dave

[So check it out.]

Hello hello! 

A stand-alone demo of Blackwell Convergence is now available.  It's a bit on the short side, but has a self-contained story, 500+ lines of voiced dialog, and four ways to get to the end. 

So check it out. Yar.

Oh yeah, and to add another to the significant other bandwagon, my gf might join up for a while.  She's in the game industry herself and has already met a few AGSers, so she'd fit right in.  If space is an issue we can grab a hotel.

What Mark said.  I'm definitely up for going, as I'll probably be in Europe anyway.

-Dave

Went to the UK to visit my girlfriend for the xmas/New Year's holiday, where I...


Hung out in quaint little pubs


Had curry with Steve Ince


Failed to become King of England


Discovered Welly Boots


Met up with Disco and Magintz (who were good and didn't scare my girlfriend away)

AGD2 nailed it!    Thanks so much.  This was driving me nuts.

The change in voiceover actresses was unavoidable, alas.  The original actress (Sande Chen) is way too busy nowadays to commit to doing the voiceovers for this, in addition to living too far away. Rebecca is in for the duration, and as a bonus she's worked with Abe before.

[Coming June 30th, 2009, from Wadjet Eye Games!A new film opens to rave reviews, despite its bloody history. A beautiful uptown office remains unoccupied, despite its prime location. A downtown artist berates himself for selling out, while a Wall Street investor congratulates himself on a job well done. Just normal life in the big city? Or is somthing more sinister binding these events together? Bizarre connections are a dime a dozen for the Blackwell family, but just how far back do they go? Medium Rosangela Blackwell and her spirit guide Joey Mallone are about to find out.]

(I'm going to send out the official announcement tomorrow, but you guys get it first)

Coming June 30th, 2009, from Wadjet Eye Games!

A new film opens to rave reviews, despite its bloody history.  A beautiful uptown office remains unoccupied, despite its prime location.  A downtown artist berates himself for selling out, while a Wall Street investor congratulates himself on a job well done.  Just normal life in the big city?  Or is somthing more sinister binding these events together?

Bizarre connections are a dime a dozen for the Blackwell family, but just how far back do they go? Medium Rosangela Blackwell and her spirit guide Joey Mallone are about to find out.

Screenshots:

Remember this room from Legacy?  It looks different now.


Rosa's apartment has also gotten a facelift.


Tracing a ghost's life history.


Nishanthi is back, and she's gossiping about Rosa.


Joey gets asked a difficult question.




Team:
Writer/designer/coder: Dave Gilbert
Background sketches: Chris Femo (Joker)
Background artist: Luminous Arts
Portrait artist: Ian Schlaepfer (Big Brother)
Sprite/animation artist: Shane Stevens (ProgZMax)
Music: Thomas Regin
Poster art: Dan Lee

Confirmed voice cast:
Rebecca Whittaker (Rosangela)
Abe Goldfarb (Joey)
Brian Silliman (Allen)
Francisco Gonzalez (Frank)
Among others!

Some voice samples:
- Rosangela
- Joey
- Rosangela and Joey

Demo:
Get it HERE

Release date:
Early-mid 2008

Price:
$19.99

For more details on the game (like character info, concept sketches, and other goodies),  please mosey over to the Wadjet Eye Games website.

Alas, no joy.  The issue is with ambient sound, and not music, so changing that variable didn't change.  The ambient sound doesn't drop in volume, it disappears altogether.

I have an ambient sound playing on channel 1 (as per the manual), but when I imported the speech files I noticed that the ambient sound disappears when the speech plays.  The manual doesn't tell me anything about voice speech channels.  I tried changing the ambient sound channel with the same result.   

I'm sure I'm missing something obvious and I am risking a stern RTFM, but I am hazarding a go anyway. Any advice?

edit: to clarify, the ambient sound comes back on when the voice speech finishes playing.

Here's another chance to win some free games.  On CD, no less!

Check the main site for details, but it's basically a dialog-writing contest.  To enter, email me (admin AT wadjeteyegames.com) and write a line or two of conversation dialog for Rosangela Blackwell, Joey Mallone, or both! 

The main prize is a CD version of both Unbound and Legacy, or if you already own the games, you can choose a print of the Blackwell Legacy poster! 

In addition to the prizes, I will attempt to place the winners' dialogs within the next game.

The contest will end on Dec 19th.

-Dave

Yes.

He's four years old and my cousin's son.

Just to throw in my two cents, as a commercial developer I can definitely see the upsides of an open source engine.  The lack of portability has always been a problem for me, and would be the primary reason for me switching to another engine if I ever wanted to expand.  The benefits of being able to port (and sell!) my games on other platforms would be a huge boon, and would far outweigh the downsides. 

Thanks CJ!