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Well, just so I can blame someone else for unpopular picks-of-the-month, the new poll on my blog is: what should be December's Pick of the Month?

Obviously, the options I've given you won't include your favourite, so why not gripe about it here?

Once upon a time, Ug and Og, two cavemen, are getting somewhat bored of their game "Rock, Rock, Rock" as it always seems to end in a draw. If only someone could invent paper and scissors, the game would take on a whole new lease of life!



Download here (8Mb)

Thanks to IndieBoy and Dualnames for their significant efforts!

As it gets near the end of the year, perhaps it is time to have the old AGS Awards debate:

1. Is the nomination system OK?
2. Is the final voting system OK?
3. Are there any categories missing?
4. Any any of the existing awards mis-named or confusing, etc.

For reference, here's the 2007 awards Wiki page and the thoughts I posted on my blog about the 2007 awards at the time

My answers to the above questions are as follows:

1. Yes, although a better nomination page would help
2. Yes, although a better voting page might help
3. Yes: Best Voice Acting for sure and maybe Best Remake or Parody
4. Yes: Best Use of Sound should be Best Sound Effects to distinguish it from above new Voice Acting award...

And one final question:

5. Was the AGS-made presentation ceremony a good thing?

Just downloaded it and so far it looks good! 

Many n00bs say "oh, i need higher limits" for games that never materialise, but QFG2's stats were postted by Erpy on the agdi forums the other day:

Total sprites: 12859/30000
Sprite folders: 163/500
Total views: 428/600
Total GUI's: 50/50
GUI buttons: 226
GUI labels: 156
GUI sliders: 9
GUI textboxes: 13
GUI listboxes: 6
Inventory items: 103/300
Characters: 119/300
Dialog topics: 376/500
Dialog messages: 924/3000

Well, CJ may fix this in AGS 3.03 or somesuch, but meanwhile, GUIs appear on top of Sierra-tyle speaking view portraits, but behind the text, which can look odd. This module works around the problem by using a GUI to display your Speech View.

Thanks to Dave Gilbert for raising the issue.

The GuiPortrait module


Let me know if you need any additional features!

I am shocked to realise this. But if a baby is born before the legal abortion date (24 weeks gestation in the UK) then doctors are not allowed to help it. The reasoning goes that  it would be unfair to treat a child or otherwise based on whether the parent wants it. Therefore since it is legal to let aborted babies die at this age, it would be unfair to try and save a wanted premature baby at the same age.

THAT IS NUTS. But it happens.

Seems like this point completely skipped the UK House of Commons yesterday when they decided not to lower the date to 20 or 22 weeks. Its a moot point in other countries in Europe where the limit is 12 weeks and therefore any baby born at that age is unviable.

I still think that abortion completely walks over the right to life of the unborn child and so viability is irrelevant, but pragmatically speaking backstreet abortions (or simply going to another country) are worse for everyone, so banning it isn't a good idea, either.

You all know how much I hate to promote my blog but I thought people would appreciate to know that the first reviews of some AGS games, done by super-walthrough-maker Leon are now heading up on the AGS blog. Head over and check out his opinion.

Something in the stats is going a wee bit wrong. I think SMF can't count...



EDIT: Oh, I see, its listing by user ID number rather than by threads started. It never used to do that...

[Download ChangeRoomFixed hereFull ChangeRoomFixed documentation here]

In AGS 3.0 if you use player.ChangeRoom with the optional x and y arguments, then it is broken, becuase the player moves to the new positions BEFORE the current room fades out and the game changes room. No doubt, CJ will fix this in 3.01 soon, but meanwhile, you can use this module: just import it and change all your player.ChangeRoom(room, x, y) to player.ChangeRoomFixed(room, x, y)...

Download ChangeRoomFixed here
Full ChangeRoomFixed documentation here

Yes, another blog. Control your excitement.

http://ags-ssh.blogspot.com/

Voting is now open
The closing date/time for voting is actually wrong on this page, CJ is going to adjust it to 10:00GMT on Saturday 16th shortly, but votes will still count.

Nominations are announced here!

The Awards for the best games of 2007 are getting underway. Write-in nomination is about to start (you can specify any game you like, although only games added to the games database in 2007 are eligible). However, with so many possibilities you may lose the wood for the trees, so please can game authors suggest possible nomination categories for their games in this thread, along with a forum-signature-size banner if they like. Please, no more than one post per game, don't be silly with your posts and lets all be nice! Probably better to PM me with questions than clutter up this thread.

So, read the adverts in this thread and then go and vote here

Some have criticised the quality of story and graphics in my games in the past, and another notable lack has been that voice-acting has been missing. Well, the eleventh game in the Princess Marian series rectifies these problems...

Princess Marian XI Light Re-leaf

Plot and graphics and sound by Alba and Sara, the youngest game-makers in the wooooorld!

Oversized download here

How about:

Being able to have two tabs side-by side in the editor, in case you are referring back and forth between them

Having a context menu option in the editor to pick a Sprite (or View or Character) from that pane and insert its number into the script, kinda like when you select a s[prite in the view editor.

Get the AGS Awards Ceremony download!

Find out who won!

If you're boring, or can't run the game, first try changing the game to use a window ratehr than full-screen, then try changing between DirectX5 and DirectX9 drivers. Then finally, try the list of winners on the Wiki

Perusing the forum stats, I notice that there's a steady decline in the number of posts and new topics each month. Also, I find myself usually entirely uninterested in anything that comes up except in Tech forum and Completed Games. Is it me, or are the forums on a slow decline?

Discuss.

I thought I'd post this now with plenty of warning: if anyone wants their game to be considered eligible for the 2007 AGS Awards, they must make sure it is in the AGS games database before the end of December. Nominations will begin 1st of January for all games in the DB between 1 Jan 2007 and 31 Dec 2007. Posting in the completed games forum is not enough. If there is a game released that the author has not submitted then you can put it the the database for them. If you're too late, then your game will still be eligible for any future awards years.

I thought I'd post this now with plenty of warning: if anyone wants their game to be considered eligible for the 2007 AGS Awards, they must make sure it is in the AGS games database before the end of December. Nominations will begin 1st of January for all games in the DB between 1 Jan 2007 and 31 Dec 2007. Posting in the completed games forum is not enough. If there is a game released that the author has not submitted then you can put it the the database for them. If you're too late, then your game will still be eligible for any future awards years.

Some people like to write out dialogues or even scripts in MS Word. Also, if you use Outlook, it may use Word as your email editor, if you email anyone any scripts. By default, Word very helpfully changes all your quote to smartquotes, hyphens to m-dashes, etc. which is great and looks nice until you paste it into an AGS script, where it causes havoc. You can turn of this feature under Tools->AutoCorrect options but it can be useful sometimes.

What to do?

Well, dump your AGS script to a file, download mswordfix.exe and then drag-and-drop the dumped file onto the exe. It will rename the old file as .bak and create a new one with the same name with the funny chars (mainly - no guarantee!) fixed. Reimport the dump file and Bob's your uncle's special friend.

Thanks to DeMoronizer and Perl2Exe for their help!