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The very first essay I wrote at university was the one I had the most fun with, and I got full marks on it, too. It was entitled "The Athenians: Hypocrites, or Just Plain Liars?".

It was wonderful. Nothing like this one, but wonderful just the same.

Now, all you have to do is make a Weezer game. Go on! You KNOW you want to make Rivers proud. YOU KNOW YOU DO!! 

A Quick edit of tanker's walkthrough, for those having trouble understanding it:

Spoiler

Click on the small rock door thingy to open it. Click on the UP/ yellow arrow to bring out the stickman. Open both windows and tell the cannon to shoot at the bell (click cannon to aim, click cannon stickman to shoot). Shoot the next projectile at the bridge. Shoot the each grenade (the next two projectiles) at the bridge but bat them by clicking on the bridge before they kill the other stickman at the bottom, in the cave. Now, shoot the blue keycard at the bridge, sending it to the bottom stcikman. Click on the blue keycard so the stickman can open the door with it. Click on the stickman by the cannon, loading him into the empty canon. Click the yellow arrow again, spawning another stickman. Shoot the stick in the cannon at the bell but bend the spear by clicking on it as the man flies through the air so doesn't get impaled and lands safely. Click the stickman that's under the bell so he moves the bell tower. Click the bell until it falls, catapulting the projectile on the spear to blow up the mine. Click the red arrow, then on the openned door. Now this is the hard part. Click on the stick in the cave just before the other stick enters the room to kill the dog. Congratulations you just complete.... oh never mind.

[close]

This was pretty cool.

I've been thinking about this some more... Amazing how I can get excited by such a small idea, but man, I totally can't WAIT to put on a paper bag hat.

NICE!!

Jeff Smith's "Bone" has GOT to be one of the best, sweetest, funnest (and a lot of other good adjectives, I'm sure) little comic book series ever. Simply put, it's a wonderful, cartoony delight.

As to whether or not it'll translate well to adventure form, I'm not sure. It definitly has the potential to.... I guess I'm just worried that it won't be as fun to play after having read the series, given that it would appear that they intend to follow the series' events. Hopefully they'll show us "missing" parts of the books and fill in details of things that went on "off panel". If they mix THAT sort of thing up with the material that's already there, whoo-WEE this might just be a whole boatload of fun to play.

... stupid, stupid rat creatures ...

EDIT: Regardless of whatthe game might turn out like, I can WHOLEHEARTEDLY reccomend the whole, 1340 pages worth of the "Bone: One Volume Edition" which collects the whole series. It's not super easy to find on store shelves right now, but you can probably get a copy online for under $50. And considering the sheer SIZE of that mofo, and how darn good it is, it's well worth your dollars, IMO (I got mine at a great sale price, and you can't have it  ).

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?userid=Hg3GGE1BnA&isbn=188896314X&itm=2

I didn't do much DOOM editing back in the day, but we did do a sound edit that was a TON of fun to play. We replaced all (or, at least, almost all) sounds with ones we recorded on our own. Most of the new sounds were voice overs. It was HILARIOUS to play.

Gun: Pow! Pow!
Shotgun: Cha-chick. BOOM!
Chainsaw: Blub, bulub, blub, blub, blub-- GNNINININNINININNINININ!

etc.

Oddly, iI've never had this with adventure games. I HAVE had repeated stressful dreams about stacking pills in Dr. Mario, though, and I've looked at real-wrold objects thinking "I could SO grind that" after I played too much Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2.

On the other hand, I am a voracious packrat, and maybe adventure games are to blame.

Hm. The image isn't showing up for me anymore... Bugger.
EDIT: Nevermind. Seems to be that nothing from 2dadventure.com is showing up for me at the moment...

For the past few days, though, I was wondering about this technique of yours. I'm not quite following your explanation (I'm a bit stupid sometimes), and I'm wondering what all it is exactly you're doing that's apparently working. I don't suppose that you could post a few pictures of the process that leads up to the image you have there (and what the big difference is if you don't use "even sized cut"). I, for one, would really appreciate it.

For the record, I think that the first Pee Wee movie was great.  This new Chocolate Factory thing though, I'm not so sure. I guess I'll just have to wait for the Corpse Bride or whatever.

As far as other movies he's made, I think his stuff is pretty hit and miss.

•    Big Fish (2003): Haven't seen it yet.
•    Planet of the Apes (2001): Crap. What was he thinking?...
•    Sleepy Hollow (1999): Not great, IMO. Some liked it, though.
•    Mars Attacks! (1996): Loved it. Silly and a lot of fun.
•    Ed Wood (1994): Haven't seen it.
•    The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993): Was he REALLY only the producer and not the director of this? Anyway, it was fantastic.
•    Batman Returns (1992): Didn't like the Penguin so much, but it was okay.
•    Edward Scissorhands (1990): Very interesting, stylish little movie.
•    Batman (1989): Loved it. Keaton was the best Batman ever.
•    Beetlejuice (1988): Loved it. Keaton was AWESOME as Beetlejuice.
•    Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (1985): As I said, I thought it was great.
•    Vincent: A short piece, but being a fan of Vincent Price, I adored this one.
•    Frankenweenie (1984): Ho hum.

So anyway, I think that at least 2 of his 3 last films weren't great. But he has had some good stuff in there. I'll be giving his Chocolate Factory a try with my fingers crossed, but I don't have very high expectations.

[ass]

Well, the first thing that strikes my ass wrong  (sorry -- couldn't resist) is that that it's not easy to tell what's going on with the character. There's a lot of ambiguity there.

First off, I assume that it either has shoulder length hair and a cape/ cloak kind of thing or that it's wearing a hooded cloak with the hood up. Still, I'm not sure. Adding some shade and highlights to the cloak, as well as some shading from the cloak to the face (if it is, in fact, a hood) might help.

I'm also not sure what that light coloured pixel near the eye is. And it's not easy to tell what that greyish thing around the collarbone area is. And what's going on with the lighter areas beside the neck?

Furthermore, it's not very easy to tell whether this is a male or female character. It's not a big deal, but your players may want to know and be able to tell more easily.

Finally, you might want to have a better consideration of the person underneat and how the cloak (or whatever) drapes off of them.

As much as I hate to say so, I've not been able to finish something good enough for release in time (not even next week). I've had a touch of the flu, which hasn't helped.  Sorry. It'll get out it eventually, though.

Maybe consider brightening up the moon a bit, too.

I'm big on milk (though I drink the stuff like there's no tomorrow, I'm beginning to believe I may be lactose intolerant) and water. I also like iced tea (lemon) and I'm a big fan of Green Apple flavoured Jones Soda (or Green Apple flavoured President's Choice pop... they're pretty much the same).

WARNING: THIS POST INCLUDES RECOUNTS OF EXPLICIT ACTS OF VIOLENCE AND IS NOT FOR MINORS OR THE "WEAK OF HEART". EXTREME DISCRESSION IS ADVISED. I'M 100% SERIOUS.

(and if you are too stubborn to not read if you're young or squeamish, then at least don't read the paragraphs with a * beside them)

I had a similar discussion to this one with a friend just about a week ago. I tend to lean toward the side of video games being a lot less harmful than some people believe.

Having reviewed some of the psychology papers published about the subject of violence in video games leading to violent behaviour, one of the major problems I have withtem is what they qualify as "violent". A lot of the behaviour that they're observing and recording in people, is, I think, not so much violent as it is "aggressive". And though the line there may be blurry for some people, to me it's not all that hard to see the distinction.

I remember watching "ninja movies" when I was a kid. For the next half hour or more, I was more amped up than one might think possible, chopping through the air, kicking at things, and making "wa!" and "hiYA!" noises; if I had friends around to play fight with, we probably would after such a movie event. I play Soul Calibur or something or watch wrestling now and in my mind, I'm thinking "woah! What a cool move!". However, I never, now then and not now, went up to people and engaged in an actual, non-consentual fight with them. I didn't whack someone with a chair or a stick. I didn't attack anyone. Sure, I got in the occasional fight, but it was usually when my back was against the wall and in a situation where I (or someone I cared about) was going to get creamed otherwise.

Am I desensitized to what "violence" is, then? I'm not so sure. Though I've not yet played any of the modern GTA games (and please, here, remember that no one's talking about the old, overhead perspective ones anymore... and keep in mind that THEY were the source of all kinds of controversy when they first came out), I can say without hyperbole that "Def Jam: Fight for New York" is one of the most brutal, violent games out there today. Why? Because it's one of the few games I've see that seems legitimately VIOLENT.

*Now, I've played a lot of the Mortal Kombat games, tearing out hearts, spines and limbs in the process. I've impaled characters on spikes and torn their heads off. And in a Looney Tunes game or two, I've dropped anvils on characters, if I recall right (I might not -- it's been awhile). But not before Def Jam: FFNY did I take a guy by the rear waist of his pants, bend him over and brutally ram his face into a brick pillar (or better yet, a pool table), then stomp it again from behind. I actually found myself cringing at the degree of violence in that game more than any other.

*But surely having your face smashed is NOTHING compared to getting your whole HEAD punched off your shoulders, right? Wrong. While one is something that's half-likely to happen in a brutal fight in the real world, the OTHER is nothing less than cartoon violence (I'll leave it up to you to figure out which is which). And people can make that distinction. It's like all the craziness in Kill Bill. The violence in that movie seemed TAME to me, because it was so foolishly cartoony that it was almost laughable. Comare someone getthing their arm cut off in Kill Bill: Vol 1 to one of the helpless Jews from Shindler's List getting coldly shot in the skull at point blank range and having what looks like teddybear stuffing fly out of the "exit wound" side of the head, and I'm betting the audience flinches at Shindler's List EACH AND EVERY TIME. And it's not because it was based on real events. It's because it was shot in a way that made you believe and realize the brutal possibility of it all.

*The most hideous act I've seen in a  movie latley was in a scene in a film called "Irreversable" (it was a foreign language film, but I forget what language, or what the original title is... Also, keep in mind that I didn't watch the whole thing): there was this scene at a club. In it, there was this group of guys pestering some of the drunken gay people at the club. Eventually, one of the guys lost it and started beating one of the gay guys up. It was a bit hard to watch, but nothing crazy yet. THEN, when it seemed like it was all going to be over and the fight was "won" by the aggressor (the gay guy was semi conscious on his back, on the floor), he proceeded to grab a fire extinguisher and bash the guy's face in with the butt of it. You saw the gritty details of the face being cut up by the blows, followed by the eventual slight deformation of bone structure, follwed by the whole head being turned into a pulp. And it was all shot in a way that YOU might have been one of the nightclub onlookers, too fixated on the "car wreck" nature of the whole scene to pull your gaze away. I was shocked. I was stunned. My pulse was racing and I felt like I'd seen the whole thing happen myself. I didn't know what else to do, so I changed channel and tried to calm meyself down. What I'd watched wasn't the over-the top kind of violence I'd seen so many times before -- it FELT REAL. And it was insane.

And still, it didn't make me want to go out and hurt anyone. It made me want to curl up in a ball and whimper.

Finally, I'll use the example of my watching pro wrestling (scripted and choreographed) vs. watching the Ultimate Fighting Championship (a "real" 1 on 1 fighting event). If Ric Flair gets cut open again in his latest match, it's just a part of the whole show for me, but when someone in the UFC gets busted wide open or dropped on their head or kicked hard in the leg, I feel a bit of it and cringe, knowing "that must have hurt a lot". Watching the UFC may be a bit harder, but unlike "Irreversible", I don't get compelled to change channel: the people fighting are, after all, doing it for a living and are in there consentually. The fighters, though intending to HURT each other, very rarely seem intent on doing any permanent damage to mame an opponent. It's an unwritten code of respect, I guess, and that helps take it more from violence (where there would be some sort of truly unwanted violation of one a person's being) to physical aggression (where they're fighting, but they're both aware of how things are supposed to work), in my mind. When a figther breaks the rules, and say, elbows the other fighter in the back of the head or deliberately delivers a kick to the groin, the line is crossed.

Anyway, I'm not so sure that I'm being very focused in what I'm trying to say here, so I'll try to finish this all up. The large majority of the "violence" out there in today's games (and movies and TV) is over-the-top enough that it feels cartoony and unrealistic. Most all of us can see that it's "make-believe" violence (at least partly due to a more or less "3rd person omnicient" kind of view of the scene) or as consentual aggression (in the case of "legitimate" full-contact sports), and we treat it accordingly. Furthermore, the media is rarely ambiguous about repeatedly reinforcing the roles of the sides of "good vs. bad" when it comes to violence (1-on-1 fighting games being the most frequent exception). With all of this, I think that normal people are able to easily make the right decisions when it comes to violence and whether or not to act in a violent manner. And while "violence" in media like film and video games probably does increase agression and aggressive/ violent thoughts, too few of us are likely to act on them in a very real way to start BANNING video games.

(On a side note, though, I really do think that MATURE ratings should really be enfored more at stores selling games. A lot of games out there simply shouldn't be played by kids who lack the full maturity to make a lot of the distinctions I'm talking about here.)

I leave you with a final thought: violence is more likley to occur in the average Western home moreso than anywhere else outside of it, and it's most likely to be directed toward women or children, by men. This has been going on for AGES, well before video games or movies or rock music or gangsta' rap or even the popularity of books. And today, a man is probably still more likely to get violent with his wife and/or kid(s) after seeing his favorite sports team lose (even with lax sports like baseball) than he is to do so after playing Manhunt, or Doom 3, or GTA or whatever. Anger's probably still more likely a culprit to violence than is virtually shooting up or beating up whoever, and the predominant "cartoony" violence in games and film isn't likely to be that which is modelled by the violators.

EDIT: As far as how this relates to adventure games and whether or not they'll be back... I dunno. I can see their potential and their use as educational tools... but I'm not so sure that it'll be a reaction to violence so much as it's a good medium/ format to learn different things in. A lot of other genres have, well, a bit too much in the "walking around" department, which is why I'd not see them being as obvious a choice to a developper of educational software (don't get me wrong -- I'd wager pretty much any game engine has a lot of learning potetial. You could have a whole scince/ physics fair with a game done with the HalfLife 2 engine, for example). I see the Adventure genre makeing a comeback in newer engines, disguised as other genres (think Deus Ex, Arx Fatalis, Metroid Prime, Planescape: Torment and even Half-Life 1&2 and Doom 3) or as web-based things (keeping with the trend of the many "retro" style flash games that crop up everywhere, only less action-oriented than most).  I really do feel that the major downfall of adventure games, beyond anything else, is the lack of action in them, which a lot of the game companies think audiences might think of as boring. Once the storytelling/ puzzle-solving of adventure games starts getting mixed into the action of more, quality games, it'll start becomming more and more common, I figure, even if these games don't ever get labelled as being of the "adventure" genre by anyone at all.

They do ineed look marvellous. The one thing I'll mention is that the green girl and the goggled guy's feet are a facing opposite directions a bit too much, maybe. Pointing them more toward their fronts will help them look a bit more natural.

LOOK BEHIND YOU! A THREE HEAD MONKEY!

Oh. And I don't believe that was an AGS game... http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/Image_oz.png

Since you've not been around for a bit, you may also want to take a peek at or post in this thread:

http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=16926.0

If you know the specific names of the games you're looking for, you'll maybe be able to find them with someone's help in there. As for me, I have no idea which game you're talking about.

The very saddest thing about the Street Fighter movie was that it was Raul Julia's last film before he died. Talk about going out on a sour note.

Do any of you have a good idea of how far into the series the Hitchhiker movie goes? If it's the whole thing, how LONG is this thing going to be? And if it's not, have they been working on a sequel yet?

What I'm liking least about your new version is that bis body's looking very thin, ESPECIALLY when compared to his arms. Put both of his arms together and they're easily wider than his torso, which seems pretty odd.

The new working title "The Uncle's Lost Treasures" is an improvement, IMO.  However, I'd suggest trimming it to "Lost Treasures". Has better flow and doesn't seem so long-winded. Plus, it's more mysterious -- you can reveal whose lost treasures are involved in the game. Why reveal such a detail that has juicy story potential right off the bat?