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You aren't the only one. I have IBD and caught the norovirus which has really knocked me back and I've been struggling for the past couple of weeks. A 48 hour extension would make things easier at Dropped Monocle HQ. Poor Sox has been doing much of the polishing solo and ideally we need to get it tested this weekend just to make sure we haven't missed any major bugs. 

Deadline is tomorrow dudes and dudettes! Anyone need an extension? Hopefully see people posting their entries tomorrow

Very nice work Sinitrena! I loved reading about your female artic explorer who went not for the glory, but the experience. A great protagonist and a wonderful setting 😊

I'm glad to see at least one entry from Baron. Just over a week to go, surely you guys can think of a little something to write with this prompt? Would love to see a few more entries!

Sox is a dab hand at needle felting and I have made Woo into a plushie before so a Mess Goblins toy is within the realms of possibility! We at Dropped Monocle love us some plushies!

Nag Sox to share his needle felt goblin in the forums because it is epic! And I really want him to make a mess goblins one too because I think his design is so cute and was exactly what I had in my head when I wrote it.

[Pioneers!]

Pioneers!

Pioneers are people who have broken new ground. They may be folks migrating to pastures new, or people doing dynamic work that we once thought impossible. Your protagonist should be a pioneer of some kind. They could be the inventor of something we once thought impossible, they could be breaking barriers of gender or race, the first female president maybe? They could be people looking for a better life elsewhere. Will your pioneers have the odds stacked against them? Will their triumphs feel hollow or bittersweet? I look forward to reading your stories and finding out.

The voting will be split into these categories that are only slightly altered from last time!:

Best Pioneer: The most believable and well written protagonist
Best Plot: Which scenario was the most well crafted. Maybe it is the most creative or adds something new to a more traditional plot?
Best Atmosphere: Which story gave you the feels? An emotional intensity of some kind.
Best Ending: Which ending satisfied you the most?
Best Background World: You could vividly imagine this place in your minds eye due to the author's talent with the keyboard.
Best Writing Style: Who gets a gold star for their writing ability? It doesn't just mean they used fancy words, but actually put them together in an engaging and readable way.
Most Ruminative: Which story makes you reflect on the deeper themes and meaning? Which one seems especially thought provoking and really draws you in?

Entries in by 30 January unless you really need an extension. Good luck and I look forward to reading the entries!

Thanks you guys! I'm glad you liked my piece, now being put on that watch list feels worth it.

I will hopefully come up with something good for the next writing contest. All who fail to enter on time will be water boarded. Or given an extension. You decide if the risk is worth it...

[Best Non-King Character:]

Best Non-King Character: Sinitrena (The Narrator)
Best King: Monkey424 his boss does sound like a wanker
Best Atmosphere: WHAM - got a great picture of the setting in my minds eye
Best Ending: WHAM
Best Background World: kconan - very descriptive
Best Writing Style: WHAM
Most Substantive: WHAM

I agree with Miguel. I don't think anyone would say there should be no criticism but I think the delivery should be respectful in an ideal world. People work hard on their games. I had no issues with bugs being pointed out on Goat Herd's thread, or the feedback received about the gameplay. It's an important part of the process but no one insulted us so I guess that's why I was happy with it.

Anyway this thread shouldn't really devolve into an etiquette discussion as it's supposed to be about the awesome game, providence! I love it and had no issues with bugs. It was smooth and graphically lovely. I love classical music so greatly enjoyed the soundtrack. Congratulations on the release and good job

That's not really a very good apology. Constructive feedback would point out the bugs but not say it was badly tested. These are people often doing this without pay as a hobby, releasing for free. Volunteer play testers miss bugs sometimes just like paid ones. Look how buggy Skyrim was on release even with all the testing and huge budget but it was still game of the year! These things happen.

You could have just pointed out the bug or sent a PM and im sure the dev would have fixed it ASAP. That's what we do. We don't want to leave our games glitchy. You then additionally insulted him by calling it crude. If you want to be taken seriously here you should be polite and maybe edit out the nasty "crude" comment you wrote. I don't even understand how you can call a game this beautifully rendered crude because of a few bugs. Talk about hyperbole. You don't have to pander to people and being objective is fine but you won't win any friends in this community by being unnecessarily unkind. 

[The Supreme Leader of the People's Taco Bell Franchise]

The Supreme Leader of the People's Taco Bell Franchise


"I'm fired?!"

Mr Reinhardt never went looking for trouble and he hated this part of the job. He was a plain spoken man; unassuming. As the regional franchise manager it almost pained him to shut down fledgling stores. He wanted them to be a success. He didn't relish the failure of these entrepreneurs. It would be like celebrating the collapse of the American Dream.

Regardless he abided by corporate's guidebooks and bylaws to the letter and wouldn't let little infractions slide. He was a God fearing man and he'd do his job as well as if the Lord himself were watching. Sometimes he wondered why these people couldn't just do the same and follow the rules in the manual.

"Mr Pak, we simply can't allow this franchise to continue it's operation. What you've done with it goes completely against the agreement you signed when we issued the licence. We received a number of complaints, you ignored our letters, and frankly after my inspection it's clear things have been getting a little whackadoo in here."

He surveyed the store. Not a speck of dust to be seen but there were definite infractions. He clucked his tongue.

"Whackadoo?" Mr Pak repeated the word with an air of amusement and let it hang in the air. A short, doughy looking man, Pak leaned against the counter, resting lazily on his elbows, his shirt collar straining under the pressure of his neck.

Reinhardt had seen this kind of thing a few times before. There was the boss that stopped wearing pants to work, another who made his underlings run laps or do push ups when they missed target. People who took things to the extreme. It was the kind of stuff you can't see in their interviews. It seemed to him that this kind of crazy was never immediately apparent. It lay in wait until finally some kind of internal dam broke and let all that toxic weirdness flood into their regular hum drum lives.

He walked to the display behind the counter and gestured at the wall. "Well sir, looky here for an example. You got your employee of the month pictures up behind the counter."

"So what?"

"They are all of you. Every single picture is you. They go back for months. Why there must be 20 pictures of you on that wall! But really what makes it odd is that you've only been working here 8 months."

"But Mr Reiner, I am the best employee. My picture belongs on the wall. I am the supreme leader of Taco Bell"

"And that supreme leader stuff, that's another thing." Reinhardt began wagging his finger, ignoring the mispronunciation of his name."I understand you wanting your staff to respect you. They should be calling you Mr Pak if that's your preference. You can tell them there won't be none of this first name stuff, but you can't make them call you their supreme leader. It's excessive."

"Excessive." Pak considered the word. "Excessive." He made a face as he said it, like he was chewing on the word like a piece of gristly steak.

"That's right." He said, not really paying attention to Pak's distaste for his opinions. Reinhardt was engrossed in his analysis of the shop floor, checking for signs of disrepair and code violations. The store was spotless though, aside from the decor violations and inappropriate political literature littering the service counter and formica tables. He shook his head and sighed. What a waste of all the potential this location had.

*Supreme Leader Pak, courageous and strong*

He paused, the music on the tannoy finally reaching his ears. It was like a blurry picture finally coming into focus as his brain unscrambled the lyrics and he realised what he was hearing.

*Supreme Leader Pak can do no wrong!*

"What's this?" He said pointing toward the ceiling.

"What's what?"

"The music. This isn't the authorised track list we sent across."

"No. I changed it."

*We love to serve our ruler! We wish him a long life!*

"Mr Pak are these songs about you?"

"Of course. They inspire employees. They boost morale."

Reinhardt blinked in disbelief. The vainglorious nature of this man was unlike anything he'd ever seen before. He removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. After a few breaths he shook his head and exhaled a faint laugh.

"Oooooh boy, Mr Pak. You really do have something special going on upstairs. This is some textbook gen-u-ine narcissism going on in here let me tell you. I took a psych class in college and I know a thing or two about the human mind. In truth I'm worried for ya. You know I'm gonna have to include this in my write up."

Pak hadn't moved from the counter since Reinhardt started talking. He watched in silence, his dark eyes pursuing the intruder, not once breaking contact. If Reinhardt felt the steely gaze it didn't show.

"It's a shame you can't seem to manage your employees in a more civil manner Mr Pak. Honestly your store is clean as a whistle, you've hit an efficiency I didn't realise was possible." He held up a sheet of paper from his clipboard with some set of numbers on it and seemed genuinely impressed. "But I guess that's you Asians! Always efficient they say. Good at math!" He laughed then quickly grew stone faced and serious again. "If you could have just toned down these eccentricities after the warning letters. "

"I threw them away." Pak said cooly. "They were malapert."

"Malapert?" Reinhardt paused and let out a low whistle. "Malapert? If that means what I think it means then Sir I think we'll have to agree to disagree. The whole reason I'm here today is because we've had staff members call in to complain."

"Who complained?"

"That's not HR policy now Mr Pak. We give total anonymity. Although in this case there was a group letter. All the staff signed it and said they would not be returning to work until you were gone. Hell a few of the kids seemed to think you were going to water board them over some missing ground beef? But you know all that, it's why there's just the two of us here today." He rummaged through his pockets looking for a pen. "Now Mr Pak I have some paperwork I'll be needing your autograph on. We need to get this process going as-"

"Three of us."

"Uh, beg pardon?"

"Three. There are three of us here today." Pak slowly stepped away from the counter and the office door creaked open as a large man with an assault rifle in his hands entered the room. 

Reinhardt felt the blood drain from his face and he could feel pins and needles in his finger tips. "Now... Uh... Does he have a permit for that thing? We... Uh... Frown upon that kinda thing... Is it really necessary for that to be on the floor?"

Pak smiled "Where are your manners? You're not going to ask me who my friend is?"

Reinhardt tried not to panic as he felt his knees buckle. "What do you want from me? I don't want any trouble. I'm just doing my job."

"We are just doing our job too, Mr Raynard. But you are getting in the way." The man with the rifle walked towards Reinhardt who  stumbled into one of the hard, plastic seats.

"L-Listen! Maybe this is how they do things down in China but this is America, friend. Let's just settle down now and work something out. Maybe I don't revoke your license and you just let me leave? I won't tell anyone about this I swear!"

The man with the gun looked at Mr Pak, who nodded and pulled out a packet of Yves Saint Laurent cigarettes. He took a slim white stick from the gold foil and delicately placed it between his lips as he lit the end.

"Korea." He walked towards Reinhardt as he took a long drag.

"What?!"

Pak stooped down close to Reinhardt and exhaled. Smokey tendrils crept across his face. "Korea." He repeated. "This is how we do things in Korea." He began to laugh as he turned and walked towards the office door, his lackey advancing towards the wretched figure in the chair.

"Mr Pak-" Reinhardt choked on the cigarette fumes and his eyes watered.

"It's not Pak, it's Kim." The supreme leader corrected. "And now, Mr Reinhardt, it's my turn to fire you."

----------------------------------------------------------

So that is my entry. In case you couldn't tell the franchise manager is Kim Jong Un. My thinking for the story was he's hiding in the states in plain sight after pissing everyone off and fearing an assassination attempt. While not totally bumbling he's definitely not fit to run a Taco Bell.

Ahaha nice one dude

We have a couple of videos of that particular "bug" on YouTube. It really tickled us for some reason. We were just learning to animate stuff and I think we like it because it shows how far we have come. Also everything about it is ridiculous, like the sound effect! Since when would it make that much noise?! We debated taking it out but decided to leave it in as an Easter Egg because it made us laugh as Sox said.

You can see the footage im talking about here.

The video playback can be hit and miss with the engine. My current laptop is pretty high spec and it sometimes runs perfectly and other days goes very slow mo. I think we might be pushing it to it's limit a bit as we are aiming to get HD quality where possible.

The bug was not the fault of the testers, we added new menus and a splash screen based on feedback and just wanted to get the game released before the end of the year so we can start working on our first full length title, Witchy Woo 2! It was our over eagerness not the wonderful testers who did a superb job!

Thank you all for the wonderful comments though! Glad to hear people are enjoying it

I'll keep this short as that's what I'm known for now.

Thanks!

[Goodbye]

I don't mind a bit of a zombie challenge as I rarely write anything relating to the horror genre. Never entered one of these before either but decided to give it a bash

Goodbye

The batteries in the radio are almost dead. When they finally give out the crackling white noise of empty airwaves will be replaced with dull thuds and nails against wood, gnashing teeth and raspy groans. I'm not sure if I can stand it. I know it's over but I am struggling to extinguish the flickering hope that I might find a way out.

I don't mean to romanticise, I mean there isn't anyone left here to make it worthwhile. I guess I'm writing this out for myself in the hope that maybe one day someone might read it and somehow this won't have all been in vain.

Right now all I have left is a shotgun and a single bullet. I am desperate to MacGyver my way out of this but whenever I try to think of an alternative a voice inside tells me no. What is the point of shooting the window? Why would I put a bullet in the cassette deck of the radio? What the hell am I thinking?! Shutting it and throwing it into the horde won't miraculously turn it into a powerful bomb! I'm just clutching at straws to do anything! Anything but... "that".

It hurts to know that I can't fight this anymore. I'm so angry I failed, but I have to make my peace with it now.

If you do find this note please don't try to unlock the basement. I can't promise I was brave enough to pull the trigger. Just know I spent my final hours thinking of my loved ones, and if my sister is out there and is still searching for me let her know that I only made it as far as I did searching for her too.

I love you Sarah.

I think as Cassiebsg has said the walkcycle probably needs a bit more bending in the legs. You've improved it considerably already, but her legs are very straight when she walks so she looks like she's doing a little baby goose step. I think bending her knees and raising the feet off the floor a bit more as she walks would help.

They eye placement is definitely off in the last picture. It's almost far back enough to sit where her ear should be. It needs to be a bit highers and closer to the nose, under the fringe a bit.

Thought this might be of interest to people. I enjoyed the first Kaptain Brawe, and I thought the art in particular was beautiful. Was quite a short game if I remember rightly so hopefully this one would be a bit longer.

Kaptain Brawe Kickstarter Page

I needed the hints to work out the Tabula. There were very weird, adventure game logic puzzles in part 2 I totally agree, but the Tabula was genuinely hard and honestly didn't make any sense to me at the time. Not my favourite kind of puzzle. I dont mind cracking codes, but that one was particularly hard for me.