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How’s it going? Anyone else working on anything?

To get the wrong end of the stick is to completely misunderstand a situation.

I might have had the wrong end of the stick my whole life.  I always understood the metaphor to mean you got the bad side of a deal, perhaps through misunderstanding but also possibly due to a power imbalance.  Is this theme open to broader interpretation, or must it involve hopeless naïveté? 

Hmm that’s not how I understand it. It could be a regional thing, but what you describe is closer to what I would call to draw the short straw, or get the raw end of the deal.

Did it come back?

To get the wrong end of the stick is to completely misunderstand a situation.

It’s not a concept I’m very familiar with, being that I’m always right. So I need some examples. Tell me some stories, anecdotes, poems or scenes which illustrate one or more people totally getting the wrong end of the stick about something, and the ramifications, implications and aftermath thereof.

Deadline is February 17th 20th
(Valentine’s theme optional)

Okay. Thanks for the entries guys.

I've included yours, too PJ Sam. I wasn't sure if you posted it as an official entry, but it looks like fun and it doesn't matter that it was after the deadline (basically the true deadline is when I get around to sorting out the voting).

Please vote using the poll above.

	Little Leonardo by Racoon
	Signal Loss by Brewton
	Get the Picture by Pajama Sam

Wow. Thanks guys. I didn’t expect to win. I’m chuffed my story was well-received.

I do plan to post my own bit of feedback soon. I’m just in the process of drafting it up.

[It’s About Time]

Topic: It’s About Time
Set by: OneDollar

The winner this month was Saturday Night is the Loneliest Night of the Week by newwaveburritos.

	Prep Time by heltonjon
	Saturday Night is the Loneliest Night of the Week by Newwaveburritos
	Castle Escape: Chapter 2 by Fernewelten

This month the goal is to make a game that uses 'time' in some way. How you interpret this is up to you, but 'time' must be an important part of your game.

Some ideas to get you started...[/i]

• You're running late and have to find a way to make up time
• You play a superhero with time bending powers
• You're stuck in a Groundhog Day loop, looking for a way out
• A time machine sends you to the distant past or far-flung future
• There's an in-game timer, and the player's against the clock
• You visit the same location but at different times

Get your entries in quick, because time's running out...




What is MAGS?
Started in 2001, MAGS is a competition for amateur adventure game makers. The idea is to create a game in under a month, following the guidelines set by the previous winner. It aims to help you work to a deadline, improve your skills, and provide a kick-start into making adventure games. Regardless of skill, MAGS is for everyone. Voting is based on "favourite" games, and not the most artistic, or the best coded. If you have bad art skills, use it as a chance to do some graphic work. If you're sub-standard at coding, use it as a chance to give scripting a go. Ultimately, people will vote for the most enjoyable entry.

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.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Thanks for the entries guys. They look very interesting.
I’ll set up the voting very soon.

I personally prefer this proposed system to the current one. Splitting 10 points between entries allows for zero nuance.

Allowing to simply score each piece out of ten allows us to more finely express whether we preferred one story a little more than another or a lot more. This is currently very difficult, and would be impossible we’re we to get a few more entries one round. I’m not sure why you think this doesn’t count as a method of comparison.


I say we try Mandle’s idea this round and discuss it afterwards. If we really must stick to the point-sharing system then I suggest at least increasing the pool of points to be shared. (This is why I allowed half points when I last hosted - though no one took the opportunity).

[The Beggarman of Blackbridge]

The Beggarman of Blackbridge

Blackbridge was a shithole.

Once a thriving seaside resort town, it had become the kind of place where old people go to die and young people stay to die. When I was fifteen, my father moved us to Blackbridge. His parents had died when he was young, so there had been no reason to ever visit.

I'd survived my first week at the new school relatively unscathed but hadn't really made any friends yet. One kid had spoken to me - Simon Heman (so-called because his mother had let him choose their surname after his dad had walked out on them when he was five). At the end of school on Friday, Simon was waiting at the gate with another kid I knew to be called Peter Biggs, and they called me over.

"Hey, Craig. You know Peter."

"Yeah. Well, no. Hi Peter."

"Alright mate." Peter was not wearing his uniform and it looked as though he hadn't actually been in the school grounds. I would later find out he'd been expelled for selling pills and weed to the other kids.

"Craig's good people." Simon told Peter of me. It was the first time I'd ever heard an individual person referred to as "people" and it sounded cool.

I called my dad from a payphone and told him I wouldn't be coming straight home. We walked up the hill, through the town and down the main street. I couldn't help noticing something curious. At one point, Simon put his hands in his trouser pockets. It wasn't some casual thing; he seemed to be making a point of it.

Seconds later, Peter did the same thing. Well, almost. He put his hands tightly against the outside of his sweatpant pockets and took a nervous glance into the doorway of the shop we were passing; an old, shuttered, long-disused laundrette.

After some time we got to Peter's house and went up to his room. The house itself was unremarkable. Furniture in all the right places; off-white woodchip wallpaper, a wide-screen TV, which not everybody had at the time.

Peter's bedroom was another story. He had clearly gone out of his way to make it look like something out of Trainspotting. A dirty sheet was draped over the window, passing for a curtain of sorts, and the filthy sofa in front of the window was not fit for fleas. A coffee table had been nailed together from an old pallet. It actually looked pretty cool but he would have to do something about the splinters. Atop the pallet sat an old plastic milk bottle that had been clumsily converted into a makeshift bong.

"You smoke?" said Peter.

"Nah."

"Good on you. Want a cup of tea?" He said as he left the room and zipped downstairs to make some without waiting for my answer.

Simon plonked himself on the sofa and seemed to be watching me as I awkwardly perched on a milk crate which I assumed was supposed to be a seat. Several minutes passed and he didn't offer any conversation, so finally I asked him about the pockets.

"What was that back at that laundrette?"

"What?"

"You both held onto your pockets in a weird way."

"The Beggarman." The voice had come from Peter, standing in the doorway with the teas. I was aware of Simon and Peter exchanging glances. I knew something strange was happening.

After a moment, Simon said to Peter, "Show him."

"Show me what?" The mood had darkened.

Peter sighed and put the mugs down. Then pushed aside a bead curtain, reached in and pulled out an old school ring binder filled to bursting with papers. He handed it to me and said "The Beggarman,"

As he said the words, I saw Simon cringe in the corner.

I didn't speak as I flicked through the first few pages. I couldn't. Contained within that folder were some of the most disturbing images I have ever seen, before and since. Pages and pages of sketches and paintings, all apparently of the same man. A dishevelled, bearded man with a huge tattered coat and rage in his eyes. In some pictures he's holding a large kitchen knife, dripping with blood. In others, he is standing in a pile of dismembered limbs and entrails. Yet another page showed just his bearded demonic face. Sketchy though they were, something about these pictures disturbed me on such a deep level that I closed the book without needing seeing the rest.

"These are... good." I said, for lack of a word that would better describe how I actually felt about them.

Peter took the file from me. "My brother drew them... before he..."

Another pause. Simon squirmed in his seat.

Peter sat down and took a drink of his tea. Simon and I followed suit. It didn't taste very good, but now didn't seem like the time to mention it, so I took another sip as Simon stood up and took a deep breath. He was about to tell me a story.

"Years ago, there was this homeless guy. Ordinary dude at first. Just ran into hard times, you know? Young guy too, but you wouldn't know to look at him.

"He used to beg for money, well, all over town, but his regular spot was outside that laundrette, when it was still open. They didn't use to mind him being there.

Like I say, he was a good dude. My mum said he used to be a good dude, anyway. Very polite, never expected nuffing, you know? But grateful if you gave him sumfink.

"But he had drug problems, innit? And people started realizing where their money was going, so they stopped giving it him.

"He started getting all eggy with the passers by. And you know what drove him really crazy?"

"What?" I said without taking my eyes off of Simon.

"Whenever people said 'sorry, no change' but he could clearly hear their pockets jangling with money. He didn't mind if you couldn't give him no money, but he hated being lied to.

"Anyway, one day, this out-of-towner comes past, pockets ringing like Christmas bells, and the Beggarman says to him 'spare any change?' and the out-of-towner goes 'sorry mate, got nuffing on me' and the Beggarman absolutely loses his shit. He stalks this guy all the way to this B&B, the other side of Blackbridge, stabs him 48 times with a kitchen knife and empties his pockets all over the porchway of the B&B."

"Jesus," was all I could muster.

"Then some of the neighbours come outside to see what's going on. They see the Beggarman crouched over this guy, picking up the coins one by one as if nothing had happened. Some of the local men start laying into the Beggarman, kicking him, smacking him, one guy gets hold of the knife and the others hold him down while another guy pushes the knife into his chest."

"They all got away with it too. The police covered up both deaths. Because the guy was an out-of-towner, it just went down as a missing person. And they were glad to be rid of the Beggarman because he was being a real nuisance. Some people reckon the bodies were cremated in secret, but no one really knows... except the police."

I took another gulp of tea. Peter and Simon exchanged another look. I guessed that wasn't the end of the story.

"Since then," Simon continued "They say if you walk past that laundrette doorway with change in your pockets, you'd better hold your pockets down. Coz if he hears that money jangling, he'll follow you home and kill you."

"But didn't you just say the man was dead?"

"Unfortunately, Craig, that hasn't stopped him."

After a moment I came to the obvious conclusion: "A ghost."

"Ghost, spirit, demon, curse. Fuck knows what it is but we know this: he ain't gone and he's pissed off.”

It was a hell of a story, but being skeptical by nature, I couldn't help ask the obvious question. "How do you know all that?"

Peter had been silent throughout Simon's monologue, but he spoke up to answer my question. "My brother, Gary. He was killed by the Beggarman, two years ago."

"Really?"

"Not convinced? Look at these drawings again," he said, tapping the folder of gruesome sketches. "He drew them in the months before he died. He'd been obsessed wiv the Beggarman story. Him and his friends used to dare each other to walk past the laundrette wiv pockets full of money. None of them actually had the balls to do it though... until my big brother did.

"My mum came home later that night. Found Gary hanging from the curtain rail in the bathroom, coins spilt all over the tiles and in the bath."

"Jesus, mate. I'm sorry," I offered.

"S'alright. He was a dick anyway. It's because of him, I'm so fucked up." But I could see the sadness and loss in Peter's eyes even as he said it.

I finished my tea and realised it was getting dark outside, so I thanked them for inviting me up and left the house. As soon as I got outside, a strange sense of unease started to simmer in my gut.

I was still a little unfamiliar with the town but I knew that if I went toward the main road, I'd easily be able to find my way back to the flat. I rounded the corner past the off-license and crossed the road. I couldn't get Peter and Simon's story out of my head. I wasn't sure I believed in ghosts but if Peter's brother really died that way? Surely that was proof that something had happened?

The butterflies in my stomache grew more intense and I felt an increasing sense of dread coming over me. It was then that I realised that, in my reverie, I had already passed the disused laundrette. I stopped and looked back. I knew I'd had change in my pocket. But hadn't I passed the same shop earlier on the way to Peter's? If the story was true then why didn't they warn me then?

And anyway, I’d definitely been up this road a few times already this week. Part of my brain was trying to tell me this was a stupid urban legend. If it were true, someone would have told me about it before today. But I just could not shake off the blanket of dread threatening to overwhelm me.

I took a few steps forward. My pockets were definitely jangling. Was it too late to go back and walk past again?

I tried to shrug off the fear. "Come off it, Craig, this is stupid." And made an effort to control my breathing. I continued walking and took the side road that led to my new apartment. It was darker than I expected but I tried to remain calm.

Then, a tap on my shoulder. I span around involuntarily and froze, but nobody was behind me. I turned and ran towards the apartment building and my chest was heaving and my heart was throbbing as I flew through the entrance and up to the third floor. Nearly home. Dad will be waiting. I turned the corner, but he was there. The Beggarman, sitting in front of my apartment door. I recognised him instantly from Gary Biggs' drawings.

"Spare any change?" He sounded almost vulnerable. I wasted no time in emptying the entire contents of my pockets onto the floor in front of the demon.

“Here. T-t-take it. It’s all yours. Please don’t hurt me.”

I ran back towards the staircase and climbed up two, three steps at a time. My heart was thumping but I kept going, creating as much distance between myself and the ghost as I could.

Another tap on the shoulder. I kept climbing the stairs until I found myself on the seventh floor with nowhere else to go. I ran across the building banging on doors, screaming for help. One door opened, and a head emerged, but it was the Beggarman. Other doors opened and suddenly there were four of him, then five, all holding the dripping knife. I ran to the stairwell at the other end of the building, but when I got there, the stairs were flooded with a rising tide of blood and limbs and entrails. I couldn’t go that way, so I went the only way I could. I climbed over the railing and took one last look behind me as a hand grabbed my shoulder. Another hand tried to grab me from under my arms, but I was able to shake free and leapt, allowing gravity to take me far away from the swarm of demons above.

â€"â€"

When I awoke, three days had passed. I was told by a nurse that some netting had broken my fall, but I had still fractured my skull and broken several ribs and an arm. As soon as I was deemed well enough to speak, I was introduced to a police officer, a detective who called herself Lam. She listened intently to my story, without interruption, only taking a few short notes in a small jotting pad.

“First of all,” she said, admonishingly once I had finished recounting my version of events, “the Beggarman is not real. At least, not in the way you’re talking about. He’s not some curse or demon. He was a normal bloke. A good bloke by all accounts. He hit hard times, got himself a bad habit and ended up on the streets. It happens.”

She waited for me to say “but”, but I held the silence until she continued.

“The stuff about him losing his rag when people had change in their pockets? That’s true. It did wind him up. It would wind me up. And he did become notorious for shouting at people…”

I started to nod, but it made my head and neck hurt, so I stopped.

“But he never killed anyone, Craig. And he wasn't killed either.”

I suddenly remembered the part of Simon’s story about the police covering up the deaths. Was detective Lam telling the truth or was this, too, part of the cover up. I forced myself to speak, despite the pain.

“Where is he now, then?”

“He cleaned up his act and got the hell out of town. That happens, too. Then, when people realised he was no longer a permanent fixture on the street, they began making up stories about where he'd disappeared to."
It made sense, but I still had a couple of questions.

"What about Peter's brother?"

"The Bigg's boy? That was a suicide, all day long. He was on a highly lethal cocktail of drink and drugs. He had been going crazy about the Beggarman story for weeks. One bad trip was all it took to take him over the edge." She looked me in the eye and said "Which brings me to my next point. I had the doctors run a few tests on you while you were under."

"Okay..."

"You had a very high amount of psilocybin in your system"

"Psilo..."

"Magic mushrooms. Basically, Craig, you were tripping balls, just like Gary Briggs."

"The tea." I exhaled

"Excuse me?" said Lam.

"Peter made some tea before they told me about the Beggarman."

"You'd do well to stay away from those boys, Craig."

"But... I saw the Beggarman with my own eyes. On the top floor."

Lam shook her head and took a more sympathetic tack.

"The seventh-floor residents said you were knocking on their doors screaming for help, but when they came out, you ran from them. They watched you climb over the railing, and tried to stop you, but you wriggled free and jumped.

Lam said her goodbyes and I must have drifted off to sleep. My dad came and sat with me most of the time and after a few more days I was discharged. I was able to walk but my dad insisted we take a taxi, even though the hospital was just a couple of miles from the flat.

To my surprise, the taxi dropped us off outside the old laundrette on the main street.

"What are we doing here dad?"

"I wanna show you something." He led me to the doorway of the shop and pointed down to the weathered wooden window frame. "What do you see?"

I looked down and surveyed the crumbling wood. And then I noticed, etched into the flaking green paint were the words "For Craig".

"That was the last time I ever sat in this doorway." He said as I looked up at him silently. "I didn't even know your mother was pregnant. She had left me and moved to the Isle of Wight, where her parents lived. But one day she turned up in this doorway with a baby. She told me 'This is your son. His name is Craig. This is the only time you're ever going to see him' and walked away." He was fighting back tears. So was I.

"I decided to kick the drugs there and then. I scrounged enough money to get me to the Isle of Wight. And begged your mum to give me one last chance. Her parents, your Nanny and Grandad. They took me in, but let it be known that if I ever slipped up again, they would kick me out. I got a job at the gift shop and we were doing alright."

"Then Nanny and Grandad died, and your mum joined them last year. You hated school. There was nothing left for us there, and Blackbridge is the only other place I’ve ever known"

I embraced my father and we both cried for good minute, not caring about the passers by. Then I thought I heard his pocket jangling.

"What was that?" I said, and stepped back.

"Well, there was one other reason I wanted to come back here." He dug his hands into his pockets and pulled out a set of keys.

"Is that?"

"We're going to turn this place into a cafe, and offer free meals to the homeless. I thought we could both use the change."

Could I possibly scrounge one day extension?
I’ve written the story with pen and paper but haven’t finished typing it up. And today is a write-off in terms of spare time.

It sounds like they’ve rebranded Cheerios.

Are MAGS competitions in any way 'advertised' on AGS Discord channel? Maybe this could drum up more interest? Just a thought

I occasionally post the new topic in the Discord and Twitter but it goes largely unnoticed, so I don’t do it so often any more. I know the IRC folks usually keep a link to the latest topic stickied so you see it when you enter the chat.

This might make me sound really old but one thing that’s been grinding my gears lately is this.



Once respectable brands such as Daedalic seem to be handing the keys to the social media accounts to any 12-year-old with access to a meme generator. Their page is full of this kind of thing. This is actually an example of one of the not-so-terrible ones.

https://m.facebook.com/daedalic/

Yeah, it’s an unfortunate combination of the forum poll system and low voter turnout.

But I think everybody here is mature enough to understand that getting 0 votes doesn’t mean their game was disliked by everybody. It just means the voters all preferred at least one of the other options.

That sounds like a whole lot of fun, Sam. Keep going. If you have to cut the number of levels for time, that’s fine. You can always add more after the contest.

Looking good Racoon. Keep up the good work.
Is anyone else in? How’s your Idea coming along Pajama Sam?

[Santa Claus in A Flight to Remember]

The winner of MAGS December is:
Santa Claus in A Flight to Remember
by OneDollar.

Well done OD. I’ll be in touch soon about choosing a topic for February.

I gotta say, all the entries look amazing. Well done to everyone who entered. I hope you will all join us for February. Look out for the new topic.

I've recently noticed embedded YouTube videos will play automatically as I'm scrolling down the page. I swear they didn't always to this.

Is there a way to turn this off or make it optional?

Damn, I hope your 2022 gets better soon, Limpingfish.

How are you feeling now?