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Now, the trick would be cluing this. The print lifting wouldn't be too difficult to pull off - a discarded CD or something would do it. But getting the player to realize that melting candy will make a readable finger? That's tough.

"Hmm..  now if only I could find something squishy and fleshy like that pudgy bastard's fingers"

Something like that?

Only more perfect that he's got an empty bag of Gummi Bears with one of the candies wedged in the keyboard.

Most of those options fall under the major categories though.. I was just categorizing too broadly I think.  If you make killing = incapacitating and the walkie-talkie = distraction, that only makes stealth and the last one different.  Stealth is either no challenge to the player or can be quite frustrating.  A blending of the two with some "*gasp* almost saw me!" moments might give it suspense without it being keyboard-bashing time.  I really like your latter option and it's used so seldom.  Seeing how it could work wonderfully with a dialogue from a previous encounter with an NPC/ally that gives you the information or promises to spring you is inspiring.  Throw in one of the clichés - not meant to bypass the guards but to make it less obvious that you're trying to get arrested and that'd be a pretty convincing, well-designed puzzle.

Three paths for the handprint puzzle: Sorry, was counting in my head and might've shared how I was tallying.  The first is usage of the actual person's hand (voluntarily or otherwise), the second is a facsimile, and the third was something I haven't seen in a game yet but works well for a single-user fingerprint ID for some brands of hardware: cup the peripheral in your hands and breathe out heavily into it, the water-vapor condenses around the previously-left oils and the device accepts it. 

It's even worked on a couple devices that claimed not to be fooled by non-conductive materials (i.e. latex, silly putty, etc.).  Put in a decent close-up animation so the player knows what's happening and give enough clues that it's not a try-everything puzzle and it'd work quite well.

The disguise option could be usable provided that the deus ex machina types that you've listed aren't there.  It'd actually be quite cool to have the PC steal janitorial outfits, perhaps sizing up the cleaning staff for fit first, maybe being rejected by the guards for having an obviously wrong fit.   

Bah, I think I'm nit-picking semantics really.  Your last list was quite complimentary to the first and are valid analyses of overwrought puzzling.

I like the moon placement and perspective corrections of loom's edit, but I still like the coloring of the original better.   I suppose it depends upon the mood you're trying for.  To me, the original had a feeling of quiet, perhaps lonely, waves lapping the shore  but little movement beyond that.

The couple of things I don't like about the new lighting scheme are how harsh the moon is (it draws your attention more than anything else in the scene) and that it's too yellow.  The original felt familiar (I'm normally out & about between 10 PM and 7 AM so I'm pretty used to moonlight) while the bright yellow lighting seems oppresive.   The new placement of the moon and the way shadows are cast, quite frankly, rocks. 

I phrased things poorly but that's because I'm hypnotized by the back & forth animation

Mac v. PC image transfer difficulties? Nope, beyond the scope I feel like dealing with Macs.  If you're willing to toss an e-mail w/ attachment my way (if you don't want to do a real BG from the game, a quick mock-up would be fine) and I'll see what I can do.  I've got access to Windows, Macintosh and Linux PCs so I ought to be able to come up with something.  Even if I can't help make the image useable, I should at least be able to see why.  Email linkage.  Who knows? There are far more capable people than I on these boards, I may just be re-asking your questions again.   

* Another super-cliché puzzle involves a door with a handprint/fingerprint scanner.

I don't need to say anymore, do I? Is this even a puzzle anymore?

I don't know, it can actually be interesting still depending upon the method.  After all, there are several ways of getting past these things in real life.  As a puzzle, there are 3 fairly different paths to choose. 

* If there's a conversation menu in the "Choose an attitude" format, choose very carefully, since you can make bad mistakes. If it's in the "Choose a sentence" format, this is less likely. If it's in the "Choose a subject to ask about" format, you are required by adventure game law not only to be reckless, but to ask about every single topic. It's practically noninteractive.

This one's someone overused, the other half of the problem is laziness or lack of imagination.  After all, who wants to come up with / type / script in dozens of dialogue choices when you only need to get one peice of information from somebody?  (Lucasarts in many of there adventure games, and I still love 'em for it)

* If it's guarding a door and can't be bribed, fooled by disguise, distracted, or killed, it will have a riddle for you.

If it's not liquid, solid or gas, it's probably plasma.  Really, how many other options are there?  I despise the riddle thing unless it doesn't take itself seriously (as in HQ/QFG), but there are only so many ways to bypass a guard.  A better complaint of overuse would be the placing of the guard itself.   If it's in a logical and believeable placement, fine.  When it's guarding an arbitrary door that blocks a room containing a ball of yarn and a cat skeleton, it generates a needless puzzle. 

* People always tear off the top sheet of a memo pad after writing something on it. However, in order to be fair to you, the player, they press really hard with the pencil, so you know what to do.

While not a bad device since it works / is sometimes useful in the real world, it's very over-used.  I don't know what special techniques PCs have, but I can never make out more than a vague guesstimate of the tablet's prior contents. 

Now the screwdriver-type puzzle (hunts for miscellaneous objects in order to obtain an easily-attainable item) are over-used, annoying, and really remove the player from the game.  The game creator felt that I should run these random errands for him?  Great!  If these things must be used, for god's sake make the attaining of said objects entertaining or interesting in and of themselves, and at least make it something somewhat plausible (like a star-head screwdriver, you might not be able to find a jewler's 6-point star screwdriver at your local  hardware store.  You probably could but ~maybe~ not). 

It's bloody hard to come up with creative, imaginative, challenging puzzles by yourself.  That's why a good assortment is more often found in a team-based developing environment.  I think that in order to make a good game, people might have to rely less upon themselves and seek out at least a person or two to divulge their secrets to.  Sure, it'll ruin a potentially great game for a player, but that player might help make a truely mind-stimulating adventure.  Brainstorming often goes both ways, so what would be too coerced for one game, might make sense in another. 

That particular puzzle isn't just over-used, it's essentially useless; it's no longer a puzzle.    They may as well avoid wasting your time and just let you push open the door. 

I had an inkling as soon as you said cliché puzzle.  I was 90% certain after the first, and would've bet my mother's organs after the second.

You keep referencing Chrono-Trigger.  I can't help but agree, the game had a certain draw that the very similar FF games lacked.  Thank goodness for emulators, otherwise I would've missed out. 

There's another cliché plot device that I think relates to your "Forced" topic: Removing your inventory.  Occasionally it serves as a quick way to clean your character's pockets of useless items, but it'd be better to lose them after they've lost their usefulness.  It's similar to the death-of-a-loved-one device - after all, what are you more attached to in an adventure game than your inventory?  I weep everytime I'm thrown in a dungeon without my items and have to resort to using a crust of bread from a prison meal to attract a mouse whom I then train to fetch me the keys (it's more frequent than common sense would have you believe).   

Getting way off topic but Alice had an instance or two where you could bypass an obstacle if you were determined enough but a script or switch wouldn't activate because you hadn't hit the checkpoint.  It also had some level design and/or clipping issues bad enough that you could end up trapped in an area, sometimes seemingly advancing your level completion only to find out that you just saved in limbo.  That said, not saying it was an awful game.  The sets, some of the cutscenes and characters were brilliant.  Very dark and atmospheric..  shame it didn't had less gameplay than MDK.

Unless you're a rapid-fire quickloader, which I can tend to be on fickle platformers, then sometimes the obviously necessary death isn't so obvious. Given that Alice had the equivalent of walking deads and clipping/coordinate issues, I had little desire to replay my progress through some of the glitchier levels.

It really depends upon what you're converting from/to.  Jpeg should generally be avoided since it introduces artifacts (more and more with each recompression) and only provides 8 bits per channel (RGB) for 24 bits.  PNG format saves the color information, it's downside is massive size for more color information.  GIFs are often used for animation but with a max of 256 colors, it can introduce dithering in some programs or banding in others if your pic has more than that.  PCX isn't too bad, just a seldom-used format, basically similar to BMP but with better saving capabilities.  BMPs best avoided, it's lossless but also compressionless (though might be a good option for a BG/Sprite to be imported since you don't have to worry about compression). 

If you're going from a vector-based program (like illustrator or Flash) to raster graphics (bitmaps), it's gotta convert all the lines and fills to pixels.  This is done at a specified Dot-per-inch rating which can turn the image too large for use (requiring downsizing) or too blurred/chunky. 

Instead of blathering on like an imbecile, I should just say: Do you have a specific file/example so someone can see where the key issues might be?

Those types of examples are frustrating.  It's not so bad when you're just running along and something happens (like suddenly falling to the next level).  It's damned horrible when you know what's coming (like an anvil on the head or a pitfall) and you strive to avoid it, only to waste an hour running around when the game just wants you to jump to your "death" to progress.  Horrible, horrible design in those cases, similar to try everything/click everywhere gameplay in an adventure. 

In the same way, if the game continues unabated after an unavoidable death of a character, then at least you're clued in.  If you foresee the tragedy, strive to avoid it, and find out later that you not only can't avoid it, but don't want to (in order to progress) it violates the motivation of the character and knocks the plotline down to hack level.

Not have to pursue hours of therapy years later?

It is an interesting device.  Sometimes it's quite welcome as I've cheered a couple of times when an annoying character bit the dust.  I think it's usually meant to convey a feeling of despair and desire to seek vengeance.  Unfortunately, it falls flat more often than not.  Either it was anticipated from the beginning, it was a character you used/needed and just irritates you when the game decides to take them away, or you're left with the scenario you mentioned: Trying over and over again to avoid the death.  If it's avoidable, then kudos to the designer if neither way makes the game unbeatable. 

The alternative, however, is even worse.  It's difficult to suspend disbelief in a game where lives are on the line when you know that the core cast is invulnerable.  It's the Star Trek red-shirt syndrome all over again.  The only time I'd rather an author avoided forced death is when you're meant to care about the character but their departure has little or no impact.  FFVII managed a traumatic impact (for a game), while many others you just want to shout, "Okay, they're gone, get on with it!"

Vector graphics seem to require a bit of clean-up, so unless you've got experience at doing good 1:1 conversions, I wouldn't recommend Flash or Illustrator.  They can be useful for basic outlining, particularly if you haven't got a scanner for hand-drawn concepts. 

Plan, plan and plan.  Sketch out your background (if you haven't got a scanner, sketch on the computer).  Photoshop's very helpful in this respect: Pixelling capabilities and layers.  Toss your sketch on a layer, lower the opacity until you've got your permanent lines where you want 'em.  Make another layer, set it to multiply and color-in.  Some people prefer different programs (like Pixia, ArtGem, or Deluxe Paint) but any program will work alright if you've just got a decent outline.  Something with layering helps since you can use a lot more trial-and-error options easily.

Check out the tutorials in the Critic's Lounge, looking specifically for background stuff.  Scummbuddy's got a nice, easy to follow Day of the Tentacle-esque room tutorial on his LucasStyle site, check the bottom of the page.  It's also a humbling way to go, but posting backgrounds in the Critic's Lounge can gather some good tips for improvement, just be ready to receive criticism and just implement suggestions you agree with.  Keep in mind that not everyone here is an artist and there've been many games with less-than-superb backgrounds.  They usually manage to make up for it with gameplay (sometimes better than that of the games with artistic merit).

You stickler for bringing things back on topic, for shame.  We were having fun.  Way to piss on the parade.

Yep, it's actually a kickass comic.  It just needs some line consistency and larger, more legible fonts but it has good characters and entertaining dialogue.

Congratulations.  I saw the sprite and immediately liked mine half as much.  Superb work for a great character.  It's got so much personality, I can easily envision it animated (despite the bitch that the dithering would be). 

Many excellent entries, it's been a sprite jam to follow.  Great topic, BB.

That's your right as a customer! The consoles are merely products, the companies merely businesses, why the emotional attachment?

These things are the new millenium's surrogate parents, of course there's gonna be some attachment.  We're seeing a silicon version of my dad can beat up your dad (maybe more applicable to PS v. XBox arguments).

The controller has a lot of potential, provided it's implemented well.  I fear more for the games.  Nintendo's line-up for the GameCube included (generous estimate) 4 games I wanted to play.  It also seems like it could turn into another DS stylus or other gimmicky controller, where it's more of a pain to use the specialized controller than a normal one so the only games that play well with it are tripe. 

I'm trying to have faith in the company that brought us the D-pad.  After all, the joystick people thought it was silly at the time as well.  I'm honestly more intrigued/tempted by the Revolution than the polygonal monsters by MS and Sony (their hype will probably die down a bit after people realize they're along the lines of a mid-to-high PC in real apps).

You get a noodley heaven?  No fair! Actually, I'm not jealous in the least.  I'm an apathist.  When I die, I go to a wonderful place where I don't ever have to do a damned thing.  I get to experience the purest form of utterly apathetic oblivion.  Umm...  so there.

Excellent.  Very clean and well-formed.

If I get picky about it, the diagonal-forward view looks a bit fish-eyed compared to the rest.  The size/shape seems similar to the others but somehow looks less natural and more a blank, fish-like stare.  The robe's trail seems too long in the side view, as compared to the diagonals.  It's not a severe enough perspective/rotation to change diminished length so drastically. 

It shouldn't be harder than many characters to animate, at least you've got vibrant colors and clean lines to work with.  Depending upon your program, you might try something like photoshop to separate his bits onto layers so you can tweak them separately from his body.  If you're working with free programs (this could've been done in ms-paint..  if so, double the admiration), several free alternatives exist. 

Splendid job on keeping personality and consistency throughout the rotation.  I can almost envision it as a freely-rotatable 3D character.