Messages

Umm... why?
Do you have lawyers reading contracts in there?

Here's my recommendation.
Forget about polishing the graphics for now.
Use temporary graphics for a game.
When you have a game strung together and nearly complete, that will give you the incentive to polish the graphics.
And if you're having trouble, post some backdrops to Critics' Lounge.
There are a bunch of people there who can give you suggestions.

Don't give up!
Sounds like you really want to produce a masterpiece, and I'd sure like to play that!

Steve

It's certainly captured the style! It looks great!
I think I preferred the sky and clouds of the original, but the new sky is good too.
Two things:
1. the school is much smaller - it looks like a primary school now - but maybe that's not a problem?
2. I don't like the texture on the path leading up to the doors.

But the fence, the hedges, the bricks, the pavement, the grass... they're all perfect!
(Did you use a colour picker on a DOTT background?)
Great job!
I hope you can keep this style up for the rest of your project!

Steve

Go for it!
More RoN!

I think it gets easier to make a RoN game with every released game - the library of characters (I didn't help there) and backstory keeps on growing.

Steve

Or make a widescreen game. 320x200 on a 320x240 screen.

You sound upset that you finished the game...
It's over! You won!
There's just the one ending, so that's it I'm afraid.

Cheers,
Steve

Are any of them Stickboy?
http://www.comicartcollective.com/worden/S
Scroll down to the Stickboy pages. Classic stuff.

Another RON game!

Nice work so far.
There's a lot of subtle humour in there, and some nice reactions. I was impressed when

Spoiler

I picked up the antigrav unit, then looked at the computer, and he said, "oh it's just the antigrav unit I got from behind those barrels".

[close]

Really adds to the atmosphere.

Why is Ron's portrait not smoothed, and why does he not have a background?

Also, how did you do that "loading" screen?

Cheers,
Steve

*Steve starts dancing*

I loved the first one.
Hopefully the sequel will have similar originality (if you see what I mean).

Hurrah! FREE!
I look forward to it!
And hopefully, no hard feelings?

Cheers,
Steve

Thanks a lot Scorpy!
I made a DLL with GetTextExtentX() and GetTextExtentY() in it and it works fine.
Cheers!
Steve

Like I said, if it was free, I'd play it.
I certainly appreciate the work that went into it.
I just don't think you can say that the graphical style justifies the graphical quality.

Oh, and I've finished DotT, Loom, FoA. Those had style and quality. (Somehow I missed out on the Sierra games first time around.) And I haven't played Myst.

I'm really looking forward to FoY!

SSH: As for III Spy, it doesn't have much graphical quality, but then again, it's free.

Cheers,
Steve

PS "The Adventures of Henry Smythe"... I like the sound of that

Yeah, basically it looks like this:

I think I'll nag Chris for the function. Seems a bit crap to lose cross platform compatibility...

function scribble_line(string line, int texty) {
 string part;
 StrCopy(part, line);
 int i = 0;
 while (i < StrLen(part)) {
   StrSetCharAt(part, i, ' ');
   i++;
 }
 // object 0 is the pen, object 1 is the shadow
 int y0 = GetObjectY(0);
 int y1 = GetObjectY(1);
 int ry = 0;
 i = 0;
 RawSaveScreen();
 while (i < StrLen(line)) {
   StrSetCharAt(part, i, StrGetCharAt(line, i));
   SetNormalFont(3);
   RawRestoreScreen();
   RawPrint(120, texty, part);
   SetNormalFont(0);
   int j = 0;
   while (j < 2) {
     ry = ry + Random(4) - 2;
     if (ry > 6) ry = 6;
     if (ry < -3) ry = -3;
     SetObjectPosition(0, GetObjectX(0)+3, y0+ry);
     SetObjectPosition(1, GetObjectX(1)+3, y1+ry);
     Wait(1);
     j++;
   }
   i++;
 }
 SetObjectPosition(0, GetObjectX(0), y0);
 SetObjectPosition(1, GetObjectX(1), y1);
}

Yes, in pixels.

I want to move the nib of the pen to the currently printed letter.
It would also be useful for formatting the text so I can automatically print a paragraph, and make it easy to edit the text later.

Thanks,
Steve

I haven't played Fatman Adventures, and I don't know if anyone here was involved with it, apart from m0ds, but...

1. It's $14.95. That makes it commercial, so commercial standards apply.
2. Calling a game Fatman seems very uninspired.
3. The artwork is blatantly MUCH WORSE than commercial Lucasarts and Sierra games from ten years ago. Just look at
http://www.socko-entertainment.com/screenshots.htm
Sorry if I offended anyone here - but that's the harsh reality of it.

If it was free, I'd play it for sure. But if I'm going to pay for a game, it needs to have the whole package - good plot, good script, good editing, good sound, good art.

Steve

What does she say when you suggest launching the rocket?
Why do *you* want to launch the rocket?

Spoiler 1

Spoiler

If she says "I'm sure I'm forgetting something" and Mika says "Me too", then there's something you need to do to the little metal ball (the payload) outside the truck. See spoiler 2.
If she says "I'm still tweaking the flight plan" and Mika says "Me too", then you need to redirect the rocket to the moon. When you do that, she's still tweaking the plan, so how are you going to stop her tweaking it? See Spoiler 3.

[close]

Spoiler 2

Spoiler

You need to make the moon full.
What do you have that could do that?
Put the paint from Yahtzeebrand in the payload.

[close]

Spoiler 3

Spoiler

You need to disable the flight plan monitor.
Kick the computer.
DO NOT fiddle with the rotary knob afterwards, or you reset the flight plan!

[close]

Hope that helps!

Steve

1. First, put "run-script 5" in your dialog.
Then, go to the "Script" menu and select "Edit global script".
Then, find the dialog_request function and type this code into it:

if (xvalue == 5) {
 // replace this code with whatever you want to do in the dialog
 FaceCharacter(EGO, NARRATOR);
 DisplaySpeech(EGO, "I can hear you breathing.");
}

If you can't find the dialog_request function, maybe you don't have one yet - and if you started the game from scratch, that will be the case - so in the global script, right at the bottom, type this in

function dialog_request (int xvalue) {
 if (xvalue == 5) {
   // replace this code with whatever you want to do in the dialog
   FaceCharacter(EGO, NARRATOR);
   DisplaySpeech(EGO, "I can hear you breathing.");
 }
}

< edit - I seem to be following TK around >

2. If you mean how long can a timer run for, it's an int, so I think its maximum value is about 2,000,000,000 game ticks, which is 50,000,000 seconds, or about 580 days. That should be enough for most games

Gilbot - he said it was a perspective view. <edit - like TK said >
Superman95 - presumably, you're going to have an array of x positions and an array of y positions for the pieces?

For example:
int StrWidth(string str, int font_num)
or
int StrWidth(string str)
(which assumes the current display font)

I'm trying to animate a hand that's writing text, but the nib drifts away from the last letter.
Also, if I use AA fonts, the text gets heavier and heavier. To get around that I use RawScreenSave() and RawScreenRestore() every frame, but that's probably quite slow.

I'm contemplating using an array of character widths that I have to manually measure, but I'd rather avoid that - does the game kern TT fonts?

Thanks,
Steve

Those are all pretty cool.
How about a selection screen at the start?
I think the central one has slightly more character, but at that size, it might be difficult to get all the detail you want into some of the characters and objects.
If you have the time (you seem to have the skill) I say go VGA.

Steve