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What gives, I distinctly remember this game having keyboard controls the last time I played it. Imho Lucas GUIs are rather annoying without that, and it's like ten lines of code tops, so why did you take that out?

I've pressured every programmer to include mouse options but no-one would care to implement it, until Jan. That is the primary fighting method I used when playing FoA and wanted to keep that true to FoY. You'll be able to use the keypad in the full-game.

No, you got it backwards. I want to be able to use the keyboard to select verbs and inventory items, like in every LucasArts game.

Cruise for a Corpse is good.
You might want to try Shadow of the Comet.
Laura Bow is simply awful.

Covert Action (mystery) and Elvira (horror-ish) come to mind although they aren't strictly adventure.

What gives, I distinctly remember this game having keyboard controls the last time I played it. Imho Lucas GUIs are rather annoying without that, and it's like ten lines of code tops, so why did you take that out?

Good point. Selling remakes of classic games is rather more likely to get you C&D'ed than putting out freeware remakes.

Ok, thanks for all the posts. I guess it's hard to find anything not copyrighted but then again, laws are there to be broken...right?

Not really. (1) there are some free midis in the AGS resource set; (2) a google for "free midis" will likely turn up a lot BUT also read the disclaimer because people have varying definitions of "free"; (3) http://search.creativecommons.org/ offers a lot of stuff that is truly free, and (4) in my experience many internet music artists are very agreeable if you ask them politely if you can use their music in your freeware game.

Using copyrighted music is something you will likely get away with, but in the event (estimated 10% chance) that you do not, lawyers can force you to stop distributing it, which is likely not what you want. Be forewarned, this has happened at least half a dozen times already.

What can be done to stop him selling it? 

What you do is contact the eBay admins. They are rather strict about this sort of thing, and will likely cancel the auction and ban the auctioneer.

Easy.

Code: ags

function repeatedly_execute_always () {
  SetCharacterScaling (EGO, (character[EGO].X / 3) + 50);
}

Check your computer for malware, worms and viruses. That might help.

From LOOM... (1) the protagonist.

... I look just like him BTW.

You mean you are two luminescent eyes under a dark hood?
(and remember what happens when Cob removes said hood...)


Oh and yes, by protagonist I mean the main hero of the game.

Alignment in AGS is done on a 320x200 or 320x240 grid. Needless to say an 800x600 grid has positions that fall 'in between'.

So what you do is take tha part of the image where the lamp is turned on, transpose it one pixel to the right (or, add a column of blank pixels on the left) and import that to AGS. You should be able to position this perfectly. (if not, try transposing two pixels and you're set, since 800/320 < 3)

Oh that's simple, you can just take the plane to money land, and then you'll have enough cash to make it to Spain and back.

Definitely agree with you there. I mean, sure we all remember Guybrush Threepwood, but how many times does he say "I'm Guybrush Threepwood, mighty pirate!" in the series?

Presenting... Name: the Quizzening!

But what about other characters? Can you remember the name of the guy you free from jail in the first MI?

His name is Otis. But this is only mentioned once or twice in the game.

Or that Erasmus is the name of the wizard in Quest for Glory 1.

Interestingly, Sierra itself has problems remembering the name of his pet rat. At least, the rat has a different name in QFGV than it does in the earlier games 1, 2 and 4 (they don't appear in 3 afair).

However I can't tell you who the main character of Cirque de Zale is, despite having loved the game.

Er, his name is Zale That's why it's called Cirque de Zale.

[WHAT is your name...]

As mentioned in another thread, many people don't know many of the names used in adventure gaming. Hence, this pop quiz. Please wrap your answers in [ hide ] tags so as not to spoil it for others (or, if you want, PM them to me). And note that while I can't stop you, replaying the games now to get the names is cheating. If you think this isn't possible, hey, I'm working from memory too

Be as precise as possible. I won't argue over spelling errors (well, except for one, maybe), but if a character has a last name please include it as well or the answer won't count. Several characters have a nickname, but we're looking for their real names!

Prize? Ah, I'll think of something. Btw moderators, feel free to move this to the 'activities' forum if you want (but if you do, I'll create a new quiz in a week or two )

WHAT is your name...
From Maniac Mansion... (1) the female singer. (2) the publisher from the infomercial. And (3) the car.

From Zak McKracken... (1) the phone company. (2) the coeds. (3) the evil aliens.

From LOOM... (1) the protagonist. (2) the guildmaster of the glassblowers. (3) the young blacksmith.

From Monkey Island... (1) the sword master. (2) the sheriff of Melee town. (3) the cartographer of Scabb.

From Indiana Jones... (1) the protagonist. (2) the nazi professor. (3) the last king of Atlantis.

From King's Quest... (1) the previous king of Daventry. (2) the shopkeeper's dog. (3) Crown Isle's captain of the guard.

From Space Quest... (1) the Sarien battleship. (2) the owner of ScumSoft. (3) the planet with the female battlebot.

From Police Quest... (1) the guy with a flower tattooed on his nipple. (2) your first partner in the homicide division. (3) the sleazy cafe next to the coffee house.

From Larry... (1) the girl at the elevator. (2) the evil professor. (3) your divorce lawyer.

From Quest for Glory... (1) the centaur girl. (2) the Shapeir apothecary. (3) the Simbani's chief's son.

And if it wasn't obscure enough yet, a few bonus questions... (1) the bad guys from Future Wars. (2) Hugo's girlfriend. (3) the blue gobliin. (4) the prophetic pig. And (5) the priestess that gets turned to stone.

Enjoy!

I'm going to see it with her for her Mother's Day treat.

Er, wasn't Mother's Day a week ago?

To me this book ranks similar to the works of Michael Chrichton. His writing style doesn't necessarily do anything for me, and I consider it weak. But he makes the book suspensful enough for me to keep going through. The only difference between the authors is that Chrichton seems to have more accurate research.

I'd say that Crighton's suspense is more character-driven or story driven, and you actually get the answers you're looking for, as opposed to Brown's implausible mysteries. But ymmv.

[genre]

With over seven hundred AGS games uploaded to the games page, it is not particularly easy for people to find the kind of games they love to play. Not everybody has the time to download dozens of games and see which they like best. Hence, I would suggest a couple of additions. Feedback is welcome, please!

At the top, add a field for genre. A pull-down box lets the game author select e.g. fantasy, contemporary, science fiction, mystery, parody, and some other options. This can (obviously) be searched on.

The user ratings have the problem that they're often comparing apples to oranges. For instance, you can't plausibly compare the graphics used in Larry Vales to those used in Cirque de Zale. Hence, I would suggest a few extra fields that the author can set (but only once). These can also be searched on.

The graphics are (simple / cartoonish / realistic) (set by author) and within that style are (abysmal / poor/ average / good / excellent) (set by voters, like they are now).
The plot and immersion are (serious / humoristic / n/a) (set by author) and within that style are (abysmal / poor/ average / good / excellent) (set by voters, like they are now).
The puzzles are (easy / difficult / n/a) (set by author) and within that style are (abysmal / poor/ average / good / excellent) (set by voters, like they are now).

Overall enjoyment is still a regular vote. Comments work as before. For older games, I'm sure the AGS community has a couple of oldbies who can decide which categories they fall in (it's generally pretty obvious).

Additional voting option #1: the game's originality is (cliche or strict remake / poor / average / original / one-of-a-kind)

Additional voting option #2: You would enjoy this game if you liked... (insert name of game). Each voter can add one game, and the three most-chosen options are listed. Home of the Underdogs also does this, and it works great.

Additional voting option #3: per Chris's earlier comments of abuse, any vote of 100% or 0% is summarily ignored. Nobody who has a carefully weighed opinion should consider any game that bad or that good.

Additional searching option #1: some people are more interested in hearing an expert opinion than an average of every random n00b who happened to come in and vote. Hence, people viewing the page should be able to choose between "average opinion" or "expert opinion", the latter being the average of only expert users. A reasonable definition of 'expert' in this context would be "anyone who voted on 50+ games"

Additional searching option #2: it seems reasonable that if there are people who voted on a lot of games, a viewer will find one whose opinion he generally relies on. Thus, for any expert user (as defined above), viewers can also see a list of all ratings by that person.


Example (new things in italic]):

Game: Monkey Island II
Genre: Pirate
Author:   Ron Gilbert
Resolution:   320x200 at 8-bit (256 col)
Downloaded:   0 times (buy it from ebay, you pirate!)
Download size:   n/a
Category:   Full length games
   
User ratings:   (select: AVERAGE ratings - expert ratings)
The graphics are realistic and within that style are rated 85%
The plot is humorous and within that style is rated 70%
The puzzles are difficult and within that style are rated 90%
Originality: 60%
Overall enjoyment: 95%

You would probably enjoy this game if you liked... Monkey Island I, FOTAQ, Cirque de Zale

Given the sheer amount of games on the site, and the fact that the rating system is neither very accurate nor very comprehensive, it is worthwhile to consider other ways of classifying the games. Of course that would require the input of people who have played more games than I have.

Well what's the big deal about it? No one here has said it's some kind of 'bestseller' so what's so great about it? And what, really, is "The Da Vinci Code' that the book's about?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Da_Vinci_Code.

Basically, the story's about a centuries-old conspiracy within the Catholic Church to hide certain (alleged) truths from the public, most notably that Jesus was married to Mary (no, not his mother, one of the other Maries). The book asserts to be a true account, but the author asserts it to be fiction. Several people strongly believe either way, and the church is not amused.

At any rate, thanks for this thread, I believe it saved me from spending cash and some precious free time on seeing a terminally boring movie.

Perhaps serious publishers don't know everything. Why must your game be commercial? How much money is there in the commercial adventure game trade any way?

Currently pretty much near zero. But these days, it's way more fun being Indie than being commercial.

So instead, I'll be arriving at 16:45 on the 16th

if you arrive in alicante on the 15th, I'm not sure who or how many will be there...

No, I'm still arriving 16th. And still in Alicante.

If you don't want your change, can I have it? Alms for the poor!