Messages

[Masquerade]

Topic: Masquerade
Chosen by: glurex

	The Will by lapsking
	AGS Werwolf by Kastchey
	Masqerade at the Con by heltenjon

A masquerade could be both a behaviour that is intended to prevent the truth about something; or a party/dance where people wear masks or other disguises.

For example, but non-exclusive, your main character could "prevent the truth" about something not wanted from becoming known. Or your game could be settled in a misterious, or even joyful, ball in Venice carnival. Or both: the people at the party could be hiding something or pretending to be something they are not.






Rules
Entering MAGS is simple. First, conceptualize your game following the month's criteria (see above). Second, create your game fuelled only by coffee. Finally, post your game in this thread, including:

* A working download link
* The title of your game
* A suitable in-game screenshot

At the end of the month, voting will begin, usually lasting for fourteen days, and the winner chooses the next month's theme.

Remember that this is a challenge to see what you can do in a month, so any tinkering you do after that, including fixing minor glitches, is against the spirit of the competition. The exception to this is that you may go in and fix major, game-breaking bugs only during voting. We want you to have a game that voters can actually play and that runs on their machines.

So to reiterate, during the voting period fixing major, game-breaking bugs is okay, fixing minor glitches or making cosmetic changes is cheating.

Tips
Here are some ways to make sure you have a game to submit at the end of the month:
* Make a tiny game. Plan small, then cut it in half. Find shortcuts (e.g. if making walkcycles is time-consuming, make the characters static or have it in the first person).
* Plan to have your game playable and submittable with a week to spare. This way you have a week to fix bugs, add some flourishes and maybe even get someone to test it.
* Plan to submit it a day or so early. This way, if there are any technical issues with uploading, they can be sorted out in time.[/size]

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Need a little help with graphics? Perhaps The AGS Trove has something you can use.
Don't want to go it alone? Try the Recruitment board.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I highly doubt we'll ever get an Episode X, because there's nowhere else to go;

My money is on an MCU crossover.

Wait am moment. Let me look in my pockets, I'm sure I saw some extra time in there somewhere... Where is it... Hm, ideas for games... Stories I never finished... Things I still have to do (no, that one can go in the trash)... Oh, here it is, three days! No idea where they come from but here they are and I don't know what to do with them.
Do you want them?
Don't answer, just take them.

Deadline extended: 5. July.

Haha. I had just "finished" my story and was about to call it a day and post it before picking my kid up, when I saw this message.

I think I will instead take your kind offer. It will give me a chance to have a proper proofread and also to sort out any formatting issues that I normally have when I post a story here.

Word count (barring any subsequent edits): 4085

Just to let everyone know I am working on a piece, but it has turned into quite a large beast. I should be alright for the deadline as I have an ending in mind and just need to type up the remainder of the journey.

[update]Oh dang. It keeps getting longer and I still haven’t ended it.

I’m under no illusion that none of my takes are bad takes. I’m no doubt full of them. As is most this thread. I thought this was supposed to be a place to dump our stupid little grumpy peeves, no matter how irrational. I agree I could have dialed it down with language like “childish”, but I’m playing along with the grumpy Grindy-Geary tone of the thread. I’m certainly not intending to attack anyone.

That said, I still stand by the point I was (apparently badly) trying to make.

To refer to Snarky’s spicy food analogy. My beef is not so much with “I don’t like spicy food”. (That is a preference, and I already went to pains in my previous post to clarify that I’m not against people having different preferences.) It’s more the people who say “I don’t like curry *because it’s hot*”. The fact that curry is generally designed to be somewhat hot does not mean people who don’t want to eat hot food should dismiss an entire cuisine. There are some great dishes with little to no hotness that won’t burn your head off, but that still fall under the category of curry, and I feel like those people are missing out on some interesting flavours.

How’s that for a bad take-away?

Today’s was a bitch. Just scraped through:

Wordle 375 6/6*

⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛⬛🟨⬛
⬛⬛🟨⬛⬛
🟩🟩⬛⬛⬛
🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Spoiler

⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ RUINS (because I’d just watched ‘The Ruins’ and it contains two vowels)
⬛⬛⬛🟨⬛ BLOAT (because it was the first word to mind that contains different vowels)
⬛⬛🟨⬛⬛ CHAFE (because it contains an A and the last vowel, E. No luck)
🟩🟩⬛⬛⬛ GAMMA (I had become convinced the word would have two As. I was wrong)
🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩 GAPPY (I nearly went for GAWKY here but talked myself out of it as it’s not a common word)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 GAWKY (I was about ready to accept defeat but it was the only word left I could think of, and it worked)

[close]

It grinds my gears a little when people say they don't watch horror "because it's scary". I mean there's so much wrong with that excuse. Firstly, not all horror is actually that scary. There are so many films in the genre which I would not say particularly scared me but which I still loved because they were very interesting (Hereditary, for example) or just fun. Secondly, is being scared so bad? I'm in my late-thirties and I still sometimes get a bit nervous flushing the toilet at night after watching a horror film. That's great, that means the film did its job. To avoid a good film because "it's scary" is childish. In fact its worse than childish because even children have the guts to mess about with seances and stuff before they're old enough to know ghosts aren't real.

(I'm aware my complaint doesn't take into account grown adults who still think ghosts are real and avoid horror out of genuine spiritual fear. I think these people are missing out. I'm sometimes jealous of these people because horror films - especially ghost stories and exorcism horrors - must be that much more effective on them, if they allow themselves to watch them.)

The only group I can forgive are people who have genuine trauma that can be triggered by the themes often found in horror movies. I wouldn't want to force anyone to watch something that could trigger PTSD or something. Having said that, I'm pretty sure a lot of us horror-lovers have traumas of our own that actually drew us to the genre in the first place. Also, I get that some people with weak hearts might have to avoid films that might startle them

I also understand that people are squeamish of blood and gore, and I can fully get why some people don't want to watch (e.g.) the Saw franchise. But that's not a reason to avoid the entire horror genre. And again, the Saw films aren't really scary, they're just gross (and fun).

Like I said about the pineapple pizza, everyone's entitled to their preferences, and I'm not trying to tell people what to watch.  It's just the "...because it's scary" part that I have beef with. That is not a good excuse.

I honestly can’t remember that kind of thing. I’m pretty sure I played Broken Sword 2 with no hint, but I’m not 100% sure of that.

Another early game I’m pretty sure I finished with no hints was The City of Lost Children (great game no one talks about). But that might just be that it was a relatively easier game.

Today was quite tricky, actually. It took me 5 guesses

Spoiler

my 4th being DRINK, so almost there.

[close]

Ditto to this exact experience. It was a little frustrating.

The current one,371, I got in 3 guesses and was pleased with how I arrived at it.

How are we getting on, folks?

How ridiculous. I never got why the ‘pineapple on pizza’ thing became such a debate. People either like a thing or they don’t. People only have such strong opinions about it because it somehow arbitrarily became a ‘the thing everyone has to broadcast their opinion about’. There’s another universe somewhere exactly like this one except everybody debates whether or not you should be allowed put cinnamon in a latte (something I hate but enough people seem to enjoy).

Additionally, it was sending editor crash reports, which also included screenshot of the AGS window at the time of crash.

Thank Christ I didn’t make that interactive voyeurism sim I was thinking about.

Thanks Baron. It was an interesting topic and gave me a lot to think about.

I would, however, feel a little cheeky accepting that win. Points aside, Mandle and I both voted Sinitrena’s as best, so I think she deserves the accolades and to choose the next theme.

Over to you, ‘Trena.

Congratulations on the release! I wish you all the success. I’ll be buying a copy.

Ahh damn. Unlucky, man. Hope you get well quickly.

Congratulations on the release. This game looks very weird, in the best way possible.

.

I don’t think I can commit this time around but I look forward to lurking.

My sister introduced me to Jake Bugg years ago but I never properly gave him a chance. This song came up today and I think it's great.

https://youtu.be/_est5zPL6eo

Congratulations, glurex. A convincing win. You’ll be contacted soon about setting the theme for July.

Unlucky ddavey, and thanks to everyone who voted and to those who participated but were unable to enter. Keep trying.

3rd guess today, I’ve actually been having a good run of mostly 3’s lately, after my earlier dismal spell.

I just calculated my average from the 63 games since the cache-deleting incident (when I also stopped calculating my average), and I’m on 3.95. Happy with that.