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So, that's why apes picked up things to use as weapons...

One can fantasize about anything, not a crime.

But active one, like one touching a child, well...
...I'd just shoot the fuckers. No court, no warnings, no imprisonment. A bullet.

Music for Henri: DD&D! has reached track 14...

I feel like I'm improving, but I'm not sure if this (hear below) is the way to go.
My previous tracks have been mostly found suitable for adventure game. By community here, I mean.

http://www.increator.pri.ee/muz/Henri/Henri%20-%20track14.mp3

How about this one? It's more ambient, uses breakbeat and is somewhat depressive.
Compared to all others, it's alot harder and maybe more painful.

Also, what to improve here? I know that there's no bassline, and I don't know if I should add it.

My tiny suggestions & crits:

* Striped background, even though it's professional-looking and simple, is way too overused and... boring.
And it's gray! Can't think of better combination of making something boring as hell.

* Infamous rotating banner project didn't work out, or so it seems. Current banners are, well -- crappy. We have so much good-looking games, in production and completed too... why does this heavily pixelated dog has to cover most of the banner I don't know. Why is Ben Jordan facing away from the banner?
Not that it's very bad, but isn't very attractive neither. I don't think that anything scaled up should be on banner. Instead, we should pick screens from games with high amount of detail and use those. Like maniac mansion screenie on second banner...  Also, screens from most-famous and -awarded AGS games would maybe work better for a banner, since advertising works better this way and that's what banners were invented for. I bet many people know Ben Jordan, Apprentice, etc games (because of general publicity (see AGS in media) and oldware/indie communities), but don't know AGS yet. Seeing these loved ones could bring them to engine instantly. Also, show AGS power overall to anyone other coming to site. AGS should claim some fame from these games... Point was: To use decent screenies (not rushed ones) and famous games.

* "Resources" title should be changed to "Getting started". If I'm looking at a website of a new game engine, "getting started" is what my eyes seek. "Resources" doesn't say much.
OR, "tutorials" actually leads to faqs, help, tutorials (duh) and so on. Maybe even leave "resources" intact but change "tutorials" instead into "getting started"

* Do we really need world map and member's websites? Both are quite expired parts of the site.

* Bug? "Tutorials" and "Downloads" are exactly the same link.

** Increator breaches walls!

Ahh, finally a chance to make something I really like.
Hope you have a subwoofer.

http://www.box.net/shared/z76n1ulxg5

Digital headache, come on!

I suggest visible trunk texture on frontmost tree. It's so close that we should see more details on it. Maybe also add tiny crippled branches or something.

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/1/1a/Olive-tree-trunk-0.jpg

I like the statue. All I can recommend is making statue shading colors more contrasty.

* Reduce saturation on blues
* Make some stars smaller, they're way too huge
* Add some more trees to the left

- Lacks sharpness and saturation
- The background mountains look a bit unreal
- Not usable as a game background (the frozen spaceships?), but might be nice wallpaper indeed

? The tree needs a bit sharper trunk texture
? The land in front ends weirdly. Fade it out or something, make it lighter as it gets closer to horizon
? Too empty yet. Add bushes and rocks... especially rocks, since background suggests mountainous and therefore rocky terrain
? Grass could be sharper too and blend less into no-grass patches

+ Looks nice overall
+ I like the foggy atmosphere

AGS: After Good Sex!
AGS: Ancient Geek Society
AGS: Make your own world (I kind of like this one, cheesy enough?)
AGS: Always great sprites (huh?)

So... why did you ignore cobra's advice? He definetly made you nicest example how to draw a tree.

NEXT: Sexiest game character in the world!

It's quite cool and somewhat realistic BG but...

* Too much lines!
I mean, the light window casts makes whole thing look too striped.
Also, dark cabinet is too dark and overall lack of ambient light is too heavy.

Suggestion:

Make whole thing brighter, blur everything a tiny bit (contrasts on textures are tooooo strong),
decrease line width for corpse outline and add a bit of tone to the light. Clearly white light is very rare in real world. Also, things behind window could be brighter and have more contrast.

Ah, the (in)famous ping-pong movie?

Watching now!

EDIT: Done. Admired camerawork and technique, but I was eventually bored as hell. Sorry.

"Free human organs"?
Emm... okay.

Next time, cut down on punctuation and add extra spaces to the words.

But sadly, this thread looks authentic enough to be one of numerous real ones.
Who gives birth to true n00bs?

I like new version but--
how can one browse what one cannot see?

I mean, the records are in darkness, and it's supposed to be a store. Or is it simply closed?

You went overboard with smoothing. Look at the beard and hair where it divides (top of the head)!

It doesn't look like hair/beard anymore, but more like dried toothpaste. Add some noise to the beard. Just don't make it as contrasty as it was on first picture.

Highlight color is very intense, and this is not very good on human skin: It gives plastic feel. But I still love how well face looks like and you shouldn't change anything much, so you wouldn't spoil it.

This! Is! Absolutely! Awesome!

* What I do suggest, is colors. This image doesn't have much pure red or blue in it. Add tiny books or similar thingies that are colorful, this fakes detail nicely and distracts attention from large empty areas. Be careful though.
* The corners of upper level where floor meets staircase wall and other side too, are a bit too sharp for my taste. Try to blend staircase wall and upper floor somehow, maybe shade some dust into corner.
Or even better, shade 1-pixel wide horisontal line of upper level floor a bit darker (the bottommost horisontal line of upper floor wall)
I say this because it looks unnatural. Old stone architecture has very rarely totally sharp and polished corners.
Darkening (or brightening, try both!) all stone edges a tiny bit would easen whole picture to the eyes.
* Don't simply shade everything smoothly, I'd use stronger textures in some places.

Maybe I'll do an edit later.

EDIT: edit!



* Brightened/darkened corners of walls
* Adjusted contrast/brightness a tiny bit

Following is more of an experiment, but--


* Added transclusent black layer with cutout lights
* Added glow to lights

I don't like background. I mean, I like it, but I wouldn't do it like this.

I think that with such characters, clean and straight lines are an enemy.
If I'd do that background, I'd use Adobe Flash for drawing, and Freehand tool for everything. It gives nice curved and cartoony look.

Take a look at this game and you'll see what I mean. Pay attention to how randomly everything is drawn and how do lines look - getting thicker and thinner in places, etc.

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/59593

I suggest a healthy mix of both.

First: Good -- the lines are clean, colors distinguishable and you can easily say what is what. Bad -- too much contrast and black outlines ain't best choice.
Second: Good -- Nice colors! Bad - Too much blur and anti-aliasing.

So, try to stay simple, but nice colors aren't bad thing. I'd personally prefer first version, but with normal (normal = same color as thing, but darker, and NOT simply black)outlines and third shade color to everything.

Finished and liked it! Here's my sort of review:

The Strong:

* You're using same drawing style as I: brighten/darken over plain colors, and you really used it well!
* Music is so well chosen... not that the tracks are good (they ARE, but--), but main power lies in that they were well chosen and really fitted with game.
* Puzzles weren't too hard and some felt really classical
* Interface is simple and loveable. I especially liked double-click exit thingy, I discovered it seconds after I started to feel that main character walks too slowly
*Locations looked interesting and made me want to explore further
* Dialogs are simple and functional
* The game has really classic feel, just like playing any LucasArts' games
* Main menu screen is hardcore, so are most of intro animations!

The Weak:

* Dialogs are too simple and short. It's two-sided thing, it's not bad, but a bit of spice could made them even better. Like some character construction. People with feelings, etc
* The story is a mess. I can't help about it, but it felt like playing one of latest Yathzee's games: too much unanswered questions and hard to get into story. Whole intro was about Delegians and suddenly it's all about Earthlings...? well, messy. I never understood story enough until very end, which also came as surprise. I think that it's my own personal opinion, and doesn't apply to other players
* Characters look poor compared to backgrounds. Let me simply say it: characters lack our top character artist's influence! You should have spent some time in Critics Lounge with them... This is especially hard with player character, he doesn't look nearly as cool as any characters from the Dig, for example (I say Dig because your game is full of Dig ). But they're functionable alright.
* Character closeups... well, most of them... suck. Sorry to say this, I bet they took a load of time to draw. Next time, get some photos and trace, to get face anatomy right. Then modify to a look you want.
* The detail of various backgrounds varies too much. For example, jungle bg's are really detailed, but ship/ice backgrounds feel a bit empty and rushed.
* The game (1.01) is still full of translation/grammar errors, and some words doesn't exist in English.

And main thing, the only thing that felt REALLY wrong with your game:

* Characters have no soul. Really, they don't. Probably most interesting character was the janitor and even he had so few lines that it was near zero. Next time, add some moods, personalities, drama and you'll get alot more atmosphere so you don't have to work your ass off picking music and drawing for hours. Interesting characters could do alot of impressing for you.

Well, that's what I think of this game, and in conclusion, I'd say this is surely one of best AGS games over a long time, but lacks a tiny bit of polish to be really perfect. I hope I wasn't too harsh on you, and you'll take this as constructive criticism, but I'm also sure you will make your next game twice as good.