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And also doesn't the way she holds it imply a right-handed swing?
The first thing I pictured was her lifting the head of the axe towards us, and then swinging in a diagonal-forward motion.

Congratulations Wyz!

You could just use your photo, then you know you're safe. If anyone ever accuses you of being a murderer, you can just admit that you made the game and everyone's happy.

However, they use the disclaimer on shows like Law and Order, so that's probably ok too.

The year is 1984.

Ollie the Elf is the star of an immensely platform game of the same name on the Atari 2600.

The premise is that one Christmas, the reindeer ate some cookies on the counter that were meant for mummy and daddy, sending them into a vicious rampage, and crashing Santa's sleigh.
Ollie must travel through the north pole and through the cities, collecting all the presents that were thrown about upon the crash, and dodging all the reindeer who are now frothing at the mouth, in order to rescue Santa and save Christmas.


1984 Ollie with enemy (Reindeer) and Power-up (Presents can raise health, make you jump higher or run faster).

Screenshot of Ollie the Elf for the Atari 2600



Twenty five years later, in 2009, Ollie has now teamed up with the beast that once tried to kill him, however, Vladimir, the evil Christmas Goblin, has used a time machine to travel back to 1984 in order to kidnap the young Ollie from the Atari 2600. Ollie and Rudolf must now travel back in time to rescue the more primitive representation of themselves... and perhaps just save Christmas one more time...


Modern day Ollie and Rudolph, With Vladimir and an 'item' box, and the Tile-Based Time Machine.


I took a fairly liberal interpretation for the "Action Platform Adventure" by breaking up the game into separately 'Action-Platform' and 'Adventure' components.

I originally started with the palette for the Atari 2600 but I think some of them might have gone astray in the process.

Peace
Scarab.

p.s. Awesome entries Wyz and Victor!

The game was rated 2 cups by the AGS panel. 

Recount!
Petition!!
Mutiny!!!


Calin, how far are you into the development of number 2? any teasers for us?

In regards to the second last guy, I think his head should be one pixel higher, and the highest row of back muscle pixels should be deleted.

Apart from that, just remember that when you flip the sprites, the light source is reversed, so you may want to re-do the highlights on them.

Peace

I would flip the bridge graphic horizontally ... this would make the bulky part of the bridge more symmetrical with the B (larger part) of Brooklyn and should serve to "balance" the logo!

I agree with this.



I personally think the baseball and the waitress have to go. IMO they seem to make the banner try too hard to be American. (plus the aforementioned issue of clutter).

Damn, this image didn't seem so big when I was editing it.. oh well
EDIT: Made it smaller 

Peace
Scarab

I had a go at my interpretation if these sprites



Changes:

• Added Eyes. I was thinking mostly about in-game usability, and just adding eyes can allow infinitely more expression to a character than blank faces. (No expression, however, can have its benefits also).
  
• Played around with the blonde girl's breasts (heehee). Added a cheeky bit of cleavage. (also part of the reason I added eyes... in an effort to subjectify her a bit).
  
• Moved Blonde's legs one pixel to the right and adjusted skirt to match.
  
• Modified far leg of girl on far right to have more of a subtle knee.
  
• Raised head of 4th from right (she looked to me a bit like she was lifting her shoulders up around her neck) , and made her jacket less puffy. Also Changed the hair a bit.
  
• Added a bit of shine to the 2nd from the right, to try and break up the solid blackness.
  
• Moved buttons a bit on no. 1.
  
  Just trying to throw out some ideas..
  
  Peace
  Scarab

Trolls these days ain't got nothing on the classics.

I AM GROWNUP WATCH AND I WILL SAY WORDS THAT ONLY GORWNUPS USE!!!

TEACUP...

ANTIQUING...

FASCINATING...

lol, so true Terran...

...it's the kind of thing that could help The McCarthy Chronicles surpass the Trilby/Defoe adventures in terms of AGS horror games.

Because I think this series has the potential to do that. I hope you don't mind the criticism, which is meant to help you figure out to improve updated versions of this installment as well as future episodes to fulfill that potential. I'm looking forward to what you'll do next.

I agree with this completely, that's why I was so critical in my post as well.

Furthermore, you can have the trump card over Yahtzee of not being a complete prick...

Aww man, I've got my game concept ans sprites ready, but this tiled foreground object is killing me.  (There's no way I would have been able to do a whole background  )

I will try to get it done by the deadline.

Oh, and ProgZ, did you ever release Bluecup Dreams? It looks good and I couldn't seem to find it in the games database... 

It's also why the clowns gestures are so random.

Heh, well his erratic behaviour reminded me of this guy:
So if it wasn't a MI reference... It looked like one 

Not that I'd fear THAT.
In fact my other sprite was very simple, I made a screenshot of Ben Chandler's "Awakener" and used his character as a reference

Gahhh! The pillow shading returns!

Oh, yes and I slightly edited officer's sprite, lowering saturation a bit and also decreased his forehead height by 1 pixel to give him more "flat" look.

Well this one's got a nice look about it, although it is, as you say, very "flat".
This is mainly due to the fact that he has a fairly 'rectangular' look about him, and isn't shaded. This is especially noticeable when he is standing next to the Officer, a far more round-looking sprite which has significant shading.

Just finished it then, very good, the artwork and animations were top notch (Is it just me, or the talking animations for short words are specifically animated to be mouthing the actual words, like when he answers his phone in the openning sequence?).
There were a few curveballs in the puzzles but the jokes made me laugh, especially the one about people not being objects.
The music was good, and half of the main song reminded me of Art of Theft and the other of RON.
All in all, short game, but very enjoyable. Looking forward to the next one.

What came to mind was the Angry Video Game Nerd, which although he pre-writes it and then acts it out for the camera there's some good footage of him putting on an amusing 'angry' face whilst playing.

Again though, not a kid.

Just one quick thought on the base thing: 25 minutes + 40 minutes are... 1 hour and 5 minutes 

Bases different than 10 (or even something more complex, like day/hour/minute thing) are really just a matter of being used to.

Yeah, I always wondered what it would be like if we used a base-12 counting system. Fractions like 1/3, 1/4, 1/6 and 1/9 would become really nice, clean numbers and mental maths would become just that little bit easier.

Also, for us to develop this system naturally would likely mean six fingers on each hand, which would be interesting...

Yea, that guy has a two button suit and Trilby has a 4 button. Trilby also has a dark grey vest, while that guy wears none. Trilby also has a blue tie and his suit is lighter.

Actually in the ep I watched today he wasn't wearing a jacket, but he had substituted it for a black vest instead.

I would probably compare him more to a "Notes" Trilby (who also wears a darker suit), but I couldn't find a pic without a large background attached.

And of course the storyline is noticeably similar to Trilby joining an FBI-esque agency in order to stay out of jail as well (minus the supernatural elements of course).

Furthermore the character has a somewhat "suave and mysterious" way about him, which also reminded me of Trilby.

[a]

Just finished it, great work Steve, I really enjoyed it. The dialogue puzzles were very logical and I was never walking around wondering what to do. The inventory puzzles were a bit too straightforward if anything such as when

Spoiler

The coat hanger was not long enough to reach the key... and there was a vice just to the left of the screen.
I think this really comes down to the fact that each item is used once and only once, making the decisions made very linear. If, perhaps, some of the items were used a couple of times for different puzzles, this would break the "well I haven't used this yet" mindset.

[close]

I also noticed that the "infinately more dirt roads" typo remains from the demo, although I really like the new driving silhouette.
Atmosphere: Brilliant, the rain and the grain really set the scene.
Dialogue/speech: The voice acting was very good, the groundskeeper reminded me strongly of Jigsaw. I think the in depth, somewhat 'posh' descriptions created the impression of reading a novel, which I think also helped to remind the player that it was not set in the modern day. I think it would be nice to be able to turn off the subtitles and just have the voices.
Animations: Very good. A lot more quality and quantity than one has come to expect from independent games.
As a side note I'd like to add that I think a game that is perfected to such a degree elsewhere would benefit greatly from custom GUIs.

So yeah that's just about it. Oh, and I laughed when

Spoiler

McCarthy was told to stay away from the west wing, all I could think about was beauty and the beast  

[close]

Congrats on finishing, now get to work on part two!

Finally, Bandwith!
Downloading now

I was flicking through the channels on TV this evening and I stumbled upon this very interesting show. It's called White Collar and it is effectively about a conman who was caught by the FBI but then cracks a deal with them to work for the FBI if he is released from prison. I don't know why but while I was watching it, I had a rather strong sense that I'd seen this somewhere before, which I couldn't quite put my finger on...
Oh, and he wears a grey suit and a trilby...

Any of this seem somewhat familiar to anyone else?