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[don't even remember my 386]

I don't remember my SNES coming with Spyware preloaded. I don't remember Monkey Island collecting my personal information for Microsoft. I don't remember Monkey Island II handing Bill Gates a remote control for my 386. I don't even remember my 386.

What do you think? Was life better when it was in 256 colours?

Oh. I feel sort of guilty now.

I say Microsoft is the Robin Hood of the computer industry. It steals from the rich to give to the rich.

Also, did you hear about the Print Cartridges Scandel???

OMG I READ THAT PAGE, THE ENTIRE PAGE, AND I'M SCARED.

What's the world gonna be like in 20 years?!?

You have no idea how much this thread compelled me to finish it

Is this what you mean?

LoseInventory(10);
This will make the player lose whatever is number 10 in the inventory.

What brand of coffee do you drink, and what's your favourite chocolate bar?

[SCRIPTS, PUZZLES AND PLOTS]

Ah yes, Christopher... He's so funny ^_^

Mmm, I definately tried to incorporate feelings, emotions and atmosphere in my game, which was great because I had a plot and story and script to start with, so I could read over it again and again to see if it made sense. That's something else, actually

SCRIPTS, PUZZLES AND PLOTS
Get these complete before you start your game. You can get people to review your puzzles for annoyance/difficulty level, add changes or jokes, fix up any plot holes and add scenes. You may write the basic plot, then write it in some kind of an awful story form... write it as though you're writing a walkthrough for your own game.

EG
PUZZLE 1 - Ian has to find a way to fall asleep. Remember Grandpa? He’s knocked out cold. Why? Ian picked up the thing of sleeping pills, but it’s empty. In the kitchen there’s a note on the fridge from the parents to Grandpa, saying they’ve gone out and have left his New Sleeping Pills in the attic where Mia can’t reached them. ---  

Then you might compile a list of items you'll need for this puzzle. When the entire story is finished you can look over it and decide on new cutscenes.  I decided to add a cutscene featuring the villain to introduce him to the player, so that when the player meets him in the game it's not as confusing and doesn't require as much explanation. This is much easier to do in a script than a game

Second, another useful feature is that you can compile a list of rooms you'll need.

Thirdly, you can jot down any ideas you have. Amazingly, everybody has loads of ideas every second (wow) and most of these you'll forget. For instance, early in the writing stage I thought there would be two main playable characters. In the dream world, if you were Aya, you would see Ian as an unrealistic, hunk version of him, whereas if you were Billy, Aya would appear as having an unusually large bust. I scribbled this idea at the bottom of the page to review it later, but cut out the entire idea. Still, loads of ideas come to great things, unlike that particular failure .

Writing the script, puzzles, etc., before you start the game is a major plus. Just take the time to do it. It's actually more fun that way, really.

PS: Doing this with RPGs is f***ing Bullshi*, it takes pages and pages and there are ALWAYS plot holes.

I agree, there are too many wayyy too comical games. Won't mention names, because I think all the games here rock, but if a game is called, "The wacky and zany adventures of Zoopy Zidane!" Then I'm less likely to play it, as Zaniness generally is a collective term for "This has no plot and weak jokes that Barney would not be found dead with".

If a game is called something like, "The Legend of Leitors Edge" (Just a random example... ) then I'll be intrigued and dying to play it from the second I hear the name.

Maybe it would help if people thought of themes for their game before creating it? Like if you think about it, a lot of people might come up with "Humour" as a theme. If they replaced that with maybe some other theme, they might find their game gets depth, and the humour is less forced and so actually funnier.

Look at Toonstruck. That game was loved by loads of people and I don't know why. The graphics where absolutely horrific, they looked like a badger that's gone through a colour wash and then a cheesegrater.  They hurt your eyes with all the bright colours, and didn't fit together nicely. The humour was absolutely crap. Really forced. That game was intended to be funny first and foremost, and it just wasn't.

Whereas MI, a game that is noted for it's good humour among other things, was meant to be a pirate game first and foremost. The humour merely decorated an already fantabulocious game.

Fantabulocious is not a real word.

One day, Bill Gates got a Cream Pie thrown in his face as he was preparing for a meeting outside a large establishment. The pie, he reported, did not taste very good.

He was ridiculed by pictures released by shameless and hilarious newspapers, with frozen frames of his shock seconds before the pie was due to explode on his face.

Afterwards, rival, crappier company, Apple made a last ditch attempt to win back users who were NOT retarded by making an ad campaign featuring a Bill Gates Lookalike getting a pie in the face.

This ad was misinterpreted by the general Public, and the sale of Apple Pies increased worldwide.

Bill Gates continues to be the richest man in the world.

Nobody knows any rich people who work for Apple. If they exist, they shamefully hang their heads in public. Who knows, maybe one day they will work for Microsoft. Everybody is given the chance to repent. Even people who dedicate many hours to typing "BILL GATES SUX0RZ L33T5P33K A55!!!!!" into guestbooks and forums. Those who do not repent will have to work for Apple, which does not suppy swimming pools and playgrounds for staff.

My tea has gone cold and I must make more. Excuse me.

Tim Schafer isn't rich He's just delightfully childish. (great, now I sound like a female peadophile. can't molest kids, so the next best thing is Tim Schafer.)

Bill Gates because he's so misunderstood and sensitive. He needs people to love him. Who wants to hear my story about the Evil Apple Company?

[CONCEPT ART]

I started this thread so people can talk about stuff that bugs them in games, and swap hints and tips on avoiding such problems. You don't have to be a game making whiz kid to notice this stuff. If something feels out of place, then it shouldn't be there. So pleasepleaseplease everybody, submit as many hints/tips/problems as you can!

My biggest problem with games released with AGS is the artwork. It doesn't MATTER what it looks like, it's the fact so many people leave such a clashing gap between the sprite graphics and the BG graphics, or change their style halfway through a game, or when they don't make the background to the same proportions as the hero, so the tables only reach his knees and the doors are twice his height.

Okay here's my contribution to this thread, and my suggestions on how to tackle the above problems:

CONCEPT ART

In Beyond Reality, the very first thing I did was a CRAPLOAD of concept art. This wasn't even nessecarily related to the game. I drew loads of different rooms, different people, different places, used different colours... And then I'd pick out pictures I liked for no particular reason and I'd go, "Hm, this suits the theme." or "This looks like ass, but it suits the style." or "I like this, but it's not the style I'm looking for, unless I like ass."

Then I'd maybe draw using that style a bit more. Basically, getting used to it and getting a feel for it. This also allowed me to start imagining certain in-game situations and how I would style them.

Then I designed the characters that would play a large role in the game, and a few important rooms. I saw them and decided it was definately the style I wanted.

My graphics aren't even particularly good, but the point is I'm keeping a similar theme throughout the entire game and it also allows me to use more creative 'camera' angles and suchlike. It also prevents me from going overboard with the Gradient tool  .

SKETCHING YOUR BACKGROUNDS IN MS PAINT FIRST.

This is something I recently discovered, and I love it so much. It's so so so much fun. For a few boring hours you sketch crap pictures in MS paint, but when you're done you can flick through 50 crap pages and pick any background you want to work on. It makes production faster and also somehow allows you to make more interesting 'camera' angles, etc.,

If you DO do concept art, you might want to create all of the backgrounds together as otherwise you could lose the style, working on them over a long period of time. So something I found insanely useful was to simply sketch out, VERY roughly, every single background I needed in MS paint. It took about an hour to complete crap sketches of over half the games backgrounds. It also made it easier when it came to colouring ETC.,, I could pick a background I wanted to work on and mess with it until I was happy.

This also means it's incredibly easy to import that background into AGS, test the proportions with your main character, and make any alterations, WHILE IT'S STILL JUST A CRAPPY SKETCH.

This is probably one of the most useful things I have ever learned.



I haven't released this game, but I did work on loads of RPGmaker games which I completed but never released due to the insane file size (lowest being 36mb) and the fact I'm on dailup... I do, however, LOVE making HUGE games. And have FINISHED huge games. So this next project will be my first HUGE game that is somewhat under 20mb.

Now you know you're not listening to a homeless hobo.

If words could describe how much I am anticipating this game, and awaiting the final day before its release, then I guess the english langauge would be a wholeee better vernacular.

I have the biggest crush on Tim Schafer. I have the original MI1 Codewheel, and I stroke it every day.


PS: For those that do not know the story of the CodeWheel Warehouse, waayyyy back, in around 1990, they were releasing the first batch of MI games. The warehouse that packaged them wasn't going to have them ready to ship in time, so the entire LucasGames MI team went there in the middle of the night and packaged them themselves. All through the night, so they were ready for shipping tomorrow. So since I got my MI game from the first released batch... and there are approximately 20 people in the original team.... Tim Schafers sweat and blood alone pinned my codewheel and sealed by box, maybe.


PPS: Tim Schafer is HOTTT! So is Bill Gates.

There, I contributed. Now AGS is mine!

Well the only problem I'm having with programming is my complete lack of it....

I started using AGS recently but figured that having used RPGmaker I'd know the basics about variables and suchlike. I also figured that I'd pick little bits and pieces up as I finished the artwork. I wanted to get the Art, Story, Puzzles and Design finished first because then I'd feel more compelled to work on sewing it together, so I figured that I'd have time to work out more complex programming as I finished the graphics. I figured an awful lot.

On the other hand, if my game goes as planned (And it is planned down to every last detail) then it could quite possibly be rather hard to make certain parts work... IE the largest section of the game being non linear in a kind of "MI2 The Three Islands" kinda way... solve either puzzle first.... might be difficult. I can make cutscenes on AGS, but still might find more difficult stuff impossible

So, depending or not on whether everything goes as planned...

I may need somebody to help me sew

EDIT: Hey, which reminds me, I have to proof test my puzzles. Would anybody volunteer to read over em and make sure they're not too hard?

Gorgeous, really gorgeous, styled and unique. I would have only one critisism of the top screenshot, and that is the road looks as though it's dropped off the edge of the world or something. Maybe it's meant to be a hill in which case a bit of shading wouldn't go amiss.

Your art reminds me of Delphine Software. Wow, Delphine Software. They were yonks and yonks ago.

I really love those screens

At the moment I'm making pixel-style backgrounds, so I make an outline in MSPaint which I test in AGS to make sure everything is the right size (IE the table isn't twice the height of Roger) Then I give it those wonderful old crap effects in Dpaint, add effects if I need them in Photoshop and then... voila! De La Crap!

Yeah! And without the presence of females, all the males will crack and go insane so WE can take over the gaming community!

And then I will hypnotise Tim Schafer and Marry Him, provided I'm not already married to Bill Gates.

http://invis.free.anonymizer.com/http://www.geocities.com/yufster/GBS.zip

Here you go, there's a lack of one on the internet so I painstakingly drew every frame out for you, with my own blood and sweat, and signed my name in each individual pixel.

It's Guybrush. He's walking left, right, up and down, and standing facing all directions. It's ready to import straight into AGS in 256 colours.

Guybrush has a distinctive, "I have a large egg stuck in my ass" walk, that is embedded in many peoples minds as THE way for an adventure character to walk. So use his sprite to crack the difficult Up-Down walk pattern or whatever. Notice how he FLOUNCES and BOUNCES as he walks. This shows he is gay.

With love  

Is that woman wearing a bra!???

Okay um, back to topic... this game sounds fun   full of boobs, but in a good way   Wait, uh I mean...