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Yup, and you're all screwed.  I heard that Erin hired Clinton Curtis to help SSH program the voting page.

What can I say? I hate democracy.

...but seriously, vote for Spooks. Otherwise the afterlife might not be too pleasant for you.

Yep, the dates sound A-OK to me.

This is all that remains of my first game project. Like most first game attempts, it succumbed to ambitiousness and an ill-timed hard drive crash.



Supersaturated, like the sugar in my coffee.



A would-be player character. She was born without a forehead.



Look at all those frames.



The other would-be player character. I still kinda like the design.

I like this! It reminds me a bit of the band Orgy, which is a very good thing. Nicely done ManicMatt! And cool idea for the video too.

I'm hearing a lot of support for this trade language idea, which would be a neat way to get the whole trade thing rolling. Maybe at some point I could have a "passage of time" cutscene, after which the main character starts hearing things in broken english (or subtitles; if it's text I guess it really doesn't matter ). Eventually you could get to the point where you'd be conversing with everyone in their native tongue.

The Final Fantasy X method was good, but I don't think it'll work if I want to give the impression of several different languages.

TerranRich, your idea is interesting, but it has a certain degree of subtlety and concentration that I don't think would work well in a game. It would be very time consuming for both me and the player to deal with an entirely original language. Or several. 

Anyway, this idea is still in its fairly early stages, so hopefully with some thought I'll be able to create something that works intuitively. I'll keep you posted.

I like it! It's a huge improvement from the original. I think the entire thing looks more cohesive since you decided to ditch the black outlines.  Right now the only suggestion I'd make is to move the table a bit forward. Right now it lines up with the bottom of the cupboard and the chair legs, which I think makes it look too small. Good luck!

I've been toying with the idea of having a few different civilizations in my next game that the player character could interact with. I'd like the player to be able to easily trade, share information, and form political ties, but that would require some kind of common
communication.

It would be more "realistic" to have each civilization speak their own language, with the player learning a bit as they go, but that would time-consuming and probably unexciting.

So, in the interests of balancing realism and good gameplay, here are the options I've come up with for this "language problem."

1) Have everyone speak English and don't even address the issue. I'm sure it's been done, but I feel like I can be more creative than that.

2) Have the character use a simplified kind of "pidgin" language that could be universal for trading. For example, simple phrases for "Would you like to trade?" "That's too expensive/not enough" "Do you sell food?" could be an interesting touch.  However, for more complex conversations, it wouldn't really be enough.

3) Suggest there's something about the player character that makes him very good with languages. That doesn't fit strictly within the plot, although it would add a bit of intrigue to the character.

4) Use some kind of "magic" to translate everything the player hears. I'm not really a fan of magic for magic's sake, so I'll say that's out.

5) Have another character act as a translator for various interactions. An interesting idea, but again wouldn't fit strictly within the plot of the game (i.e. the player character is an outsider wherever he goes).

That's all I've come up with for now. To be honest I don't play a lot of video games, so I don't really know how the language problem has been handled in the past. On a hunch, though, I figured the AGS community might have played its share of civilization and trade games.

Any suggestions?

Hey Wakeman, I really liked your idea about the old Chinese hermit, so I tried to redo the room in a more Asian style.Ã,  I kept the painting as it was, it's neat.





Aw, it looks so lonely with tea for one.

You can see how I just used a repeating pattern for the bamboo walls.Ã,  The furniture I did with about four shades of dark red.Ã,  I tried to make the floor look more like a woven mat, although I'm not sure if I succeeded.Ã,  I still think the doorways would look neat with a dark bead curtain or something.Ã, 

The gold record in the cabinet is from back when he did his single "Tea (You Are too Sweet for Me)."Ã,  I don't think it was released in the States.

I am so in on this.  Yay, this is already sounding exciting! 

P.S. I live in Ontario, so feel free to consult me about things to do in the area (there are many). 

More games like Spooks! , where you can play as a ghost / ghoul. ( boy or girl , doesn't matter...in fact I'd like to see at least one game where you can play as a male ghost and since you get to play as a female ghost in Spooks! I wouldn't mind at all if another female ghost story wasn't made...it would just be cool to see another one... )

Uncanny.

Spoiler

Heh, just a work in progress, but still.

[close]

Hm, certainly an interesting idea, Kara.  Did you have any specific ideas for a project?  I'd be willing to collaborate on something fairly small. 

P.S. Thanks for the mention, ManicMatt and voh.

This is looking very good!  I'm really looking forward to playing this.  Will you encounter any other characters in the game?

Haha, that was amazing.  Top notch!

Wow, it's like fantasy football but infinitely nerdier.Ã,  Thanks for the thought, calacver, I'll remember this the next time I write dialog.Ã,  Oh, and you'll give me a hundred dollars to mention your name, right?

I'm not sure if this is what you're going for, but the bright horizon makes it look almost like sunrise to me.  I'm afraid I don't have any advice on changing it, but maybe Google images has something.

Great job otherwise, I love your attention to detail.

Yay, thanks Vince!Ã, 

And I haven't forgotten about my game...although progress is somewhere between slow and very slow .

Hey Darth, thanks for the tip.Ã,  I'll definitely look into that documentary.Ã,  I'm such a sucker for those History/Discovery Channel specials about ancient civilizations.

It is interesting to think how history could have turned if the ancient Greeks had an understanding of the scientific method.Ã,  It's quite possible that we would have been worse off environmentally than we are now.Ã,  From gears they could have developed steam power, which requires the burning of fuel (probably from wood).Ã,  It could have lead to mass deforestation, especially if they couldn't find another energy source.

However, centuries later when steam power was developed, we also had electricity and coal.Ã,  Anyway, I'll stop now before I hurt my head too much.Ã,  But don't be surprised if there's a bronze age civilization with gear technology in my next game .

Since this is about the coolest thing I've read about all year, I thought I'd share. 

In the year 1900, a sponge diver in Greece discovered the wreck of an ancient cargo ship of the coast of Antikythera island.  Archaeologists soon began exploring the wreck, and on May 17, 1902, they discovered what appeared to be a rock with a metal star embedded into it.  Further inspection revealed that the "rock" was actually a corroded mechanism, and the star was a toothed metal gear.  It dated from approximately 100 years B.C.



Since its discovery, mathematicians have attempted to uncover its purpose, and create a working reconstruction of the mechanism.  For over 70 years, though, all they were able to deduce was that it was probably a device for calculating the movements of the stars and planets.

In the 1970s, X-Ray technology allowed scientists to peer inside the device, and what they found revealed a level of technological complexity that no one thought possible.  The device once included over 30 interlocking bronze gears, and uses a differential gear technology that wasn't thought to be invented until the 1600s.  Further examination revealed that this was not a simple orrery (moving diagram of the planets), but that it actually had an input device (a crank handle).  The current belief is that one could enter in a date, and the Antikythera Device would calculate the positions of the stars and planets for that date.  This would make it the world's oldest analog computer.



A few working reconstructions have been made, although they exclude the nearly 2000 characters of text found on the device's exterior. 





The translation is around 95% complete, but has not yet been published.

Add me to the list of people who can't wait to see what it says. 

Check out the Wikipedia article here.

Read up on the ongoing Antikythera Mechanism Research Project here.

Hooray for Ontario!  I'd be unable to do any sort of hosting, I'm afraid, but I'd be happy to suggest things to do in the area. 

Yarr:





Meet kid pirate Sonia Swiftboat, terror of the playground.  Also meet her seaworthy sidekick Christopher "Wheels" Turtleton.  And then run for it.