Messages

Just wanted to say that I love the title!  Congrats on getting it done!

Good stuff Cam!  You know I like it, and my wife just said again that she really loves the track!

I did this same thing in Linus Bruckman.  The top half of the screen had a film grain effect and the bottom half has an analog TV effect.

I used a GUI and animated it just as every one else suggests.  For the film grain, if I remember correctly, I had six frames.  Then, I also had a vertical line that would move and dance around the screen randomly, and a couple different hairs and scratches that would appear at random places for random amounts of time.

I think it wound up looking rather nice.  You can download the game for a look (see sig).

(I did find that it impacted the frame rate on some slower computers, though.  So I included the option to turn it off.)

[Oran's Awakening]

And the final results are in for the Fantasy stories, and the winner is...

Oran's Awakening!

Writers were:
TheJBurger
tzachs
Vince Twelve
Trihan
LGM
Akatosh
DanielH
Andorxor
Akatosh (again)
LGM (again)

Congratuflations, the winners get the last signature trophy:
The Golden Fantasy Quill

Code: ags

[img]http://img23.imageshack.us/img23/4481/51559960.png[/img]

Aaaand... we're all done!  Thanks again to everyone for taking part!

If I can give myself a little mini review: I'd like to think that, despite taking a few hours here or there to pass the story on to the next person in line, I saved time overall by being able to deal quickly with people who were not responding, or were taking too long for whatever reason.  I did my best to PM everyone when I sent them the story and then would send 12 hour warnings and 5 hour warnings when possible.  I definitely wouldn't take on this role again, as it takes a lot of time!!!  But it was a lot of fun...

I would suggest the next time we do this activity to maybe have each person mail the story to the next person in the list themselves, like we did in previous chain story activities, but to also CC someone who is acting as an organizer to keep everyone on track.  It would take a lot of the pressure off the organizer, but also allow him to get the jump on people who went AWOL.

Anyways, hopefully we'll do another one of these in a few months, and hopefully it can be organized in a completely different way to keep things fresh!  Looking forward to it!

Thanks and congratulations to everybody!

Are you sure that the cMercantti_Talk() function is linked to the actual "Talk to" function in the character editor?

I almost guarantee it's this one.  Especially if the function is in the room's script.  Character interaction functions must be in the global script.  Open up the character's screen, switch to the interactions, and make sure that the function listed next to "Talk to" matches a function in the global script. 

Happy Birthday The Ivy!  (Even though you're not on the birthday calendar)

If you want help for scripting you need to tell us exactly what you want to do!

For starters, is it an interactive fight scene, or just a cutscene?

If it's a cutscene, then you can just make the animation and then play the animation on a character or room object.

If it's interactive, then you need to give us some idea of how you want the fight to work.  Is it turn based, like an RPG?  Do you click repeatedly on the character to punch him?  Do you control the character using the keyboard?

Help us help you please! 

Welcome to the forums by the way.

[Be Quiet]

Very nice subliminal messaging monkey!
I tend to highlight things as I read them on screen!

OK!  I'd better get in my votes before I close these.

I definitely was sucked into Be Quiet from the very beginning.  It has such a great opening passage, which is not to demean the start of The Mission; Be Quiet's start was just so evocative and quickly built this great image of the world.  And a gondola at the center of a sci fi story?  Got to be a first!

Both stories had some inconsistencies.  But Be Quiet worked together really well overall, I thought.  So it gets my vote.

As for the Parodies, they were both pretty good and both had great twist endings!  Great job to both of the finishers!  It's kind of a toss up to me here, so I'm going to give it to A "Hero's" Tale, since that makes it a tie!






SO!  Here are the final results:

Congratulations to the winners of the Science Fiction catagory: Be Quiet

Writers were:
Andail
Akatosh
Vince Twelve
The Ivy
Wyz
LGM
DanielH
TheJBurger
Bulbapuck
Wyz (again)

Congratulations, you all get to stick the trophy (graciously made by Atelier Games) in your signatures.
The Golden SciFi Quill:

Code: ags

[img]http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/5373/33296702.png[/img]

And Congratulations to the winners of the Adventure Parody category: Everyone!

Yay!  It was a tie!  So everyone gets to add the trophy to their sigs!
The Golden Parody Quill:

Code: ags

[img]http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/8905/98545321.png[/img]

Also, everyone can add the silver participation quill to their sigs:

Code: ags

[img]http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/2544/29561018.png[/img ]

I've added names to all the stories here, so you can see who wrote what: (let me know if I messed up on anybody's)

Science Fiction 1: The Mission
Science Fiction 2: Be Quiet

Adventure Game Parody 1: Shpritz 2000
Adventure Game Parody 2: A "Hero's" Tale


But voting on the Fantasy stories is still open!  So please vote and give feedback!

Pretty sure Monkey was joking there, as monkeys are prone to do.  These votes are just for fun, so nobody really gets bent out of shape (I hope!) if the story they worked on doesn't win.

Thanks to a super fast return by the final writer (12 minutes.  Fastest. Ever), Fantasy 2 is finally done and the two stories are ready to judge.  So this thread is officially useless and can be locked (as can the signup thread).

Please direct yourself to the voting thread (linked above) to read, enjoy, laugh, and then vote and discuss!  Yay!

Thanks for your votes so far.  Sci Fi and Parody will be closed for voting in 12 hours or so.  And Fantasy has just been opened for voting!  So, read the newly released two stories and vote for your favorite!

How do I vote. Do I just pm you vince?

Just post your votes right here!  It's all very informal!

The person who has it now (person number 9) asked for a few hour extension because he was busy.  I hope to have it fairly soon here so I can pass it on to the last person.  The other fantasy story is done.

[Un-Believers]

Un-Believers
Wouldn't you agree, now and all throughout history, for whatever reason(s), humanity, has had spiritual needs?     For example, most religions provide a basis for comforting the sick and dying, of how we should behave and treat each other, and how to live a happy, and fulfilled life (which brings us back to the sick and dying part).

I wouldn't call them "needs" but I would say that religions around the world have done some good for some people throughout history.  Such as, in the example you gave, helping comfort people near death with the promise of eternal life in heaven or reincarnation, or whatever.  Also, some people who might not have been able to be good people for the sake of being good people have found guidance in the codes and rules of a religion.  I do think, however, that such comfort and moral guidance can be come by through other non-spiritual means, such as the love of your family and friends, and introspection, respectively.  Though, some people may not be able to find such things on their own, and for them, I'm happy if religion can point them in the right direction. 

Also, religious groups do perform a lot of charitable acts around the world.  I would just prefer that those acts didn't usually also come with a bible lesson.  But hey, can't complain about people building a school or a hospital in Africa or whatever.

On the flip side of the good religion has done, however, I think that a lot of bad has been done either for or through religions.  Scientology is a pretty plain example of how one can use religion to bend the will of many to serve the few.  Throughout history there have been wars causing millions of deaths in the name of religion.  Even now, religion serves to fuel hatred in some against certain groups of people. 

Note, though, that I'm not being so arrogant as to make any judgement about whether or not the world would have been better if religions like Christianity or Islam had never existed.  Just saying that there's good (which I believe can be found through other means) and bad that comes from religions.

Would you find the benefits that Christianity or other religions have to offer more accessible if there weren't "literal believers" running around saying "The Earth is 10000 years old and God put fish fossils on mountain tops to confuse dopey scientists!"?

I don't care what an individual believes.  If you want to believe that man and dinosaurs walked together and that gays are evil and lawn gnomes come to life at night to do the bidding of Dionysus, I could care less.  What bothers me is when that effects other people's lives who didn't ask for it, such as:

-Polluting education (Intelligent Design, I'm looking at you.  Teach that stuff in church, not in public schools)
-Polluting law (Separation of Church and State is there for a reason.  Now explain to me why Jimmy can't marry Bobby.)
-Mentally or Physically harming others (If you believe that "the gays" are the reason our military people are dying in Iraq, let's keep that to ourselves, shall we?  And put away those pointy white hats, while you're at it.)
-Polluting your kids (I know, people can raise their own kids however they want, but in some cases I can't help but feel angry at the poison some parents pour into their kids' ears.)

Jealous much guys? 

Terribly! Congratulations, guys!

Hell, I'm putting my game on Steam when I finished it (the commercial game, that is).

Much harder than you think!  Those Steam dudes are picky!

Bam!  Voting has begun on SciFi and Parody categories, which both finished at about the same time!

READ AND ENJOY:
http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=38663.0

Fantasy voting will start when the last story is completed.

Thanks to all who participated, it was a lot of fun!

[Science Fiction]

Science Fiction

Runner Up! Science Fiction 1: The Mission
Trihan
AtelierGames
Andorxor
[Cameron]
Phemar
Ultra Magnus
monkey_05_06
Babar
tzachs
monkey_05_06 (again)

Winner!  Science Fiction 2: Be Quiet
Andail
Akatosh
Vince Twelve
The Ivy
Wyz
LGM
DanielH
TheJBurger
Bulbapuck
Wyz (again)

Adventure Game Parody

Tie!  Adventure Game Parody 1: Shpritz 2000
Vince Twelve
[Cameron]
uncle-mum
tzachs
TheJBurger
AtelierGames
LGM
The Ivy
Andorxor
TheJBurger

Tie!  Adventure Game Parody 2: A "Hero's" Tale
DanielH
monkey_05_06
Bulbapuck
Wyz
Akatosh
Phemar
Ultra Magnus
Trihan
Andail
Babar

Medieval Fantasy

Runner Up! Medieval Fantasy 1: Charming Forest
AtelierGames
Andail
Ultra Magnus
Babar
Wyz
Bulbapuck
The Ivy
Phemar
monkey_05_06
[Cameron]

Winner! Medieval Fantasy 2: Oran's Awakening
TheJBurger
tzachs
Vince Twelve
Trihan
LGM
Akatosh
DanielH
Andorxor
Akatosh (again)
LGM (again)

Voting procedure:  Voting is closed!

• Cast your vote for which of the two in each category that you think is the overall better story.
• Feel free to include reasoning behind your pick or mini-reviews of each story. (But try not to reveal which story you worked on!)
• Remember, it was a group activity so try to grade them as a whole.
• Anyone who wants to vote, whether they participated or not can vote
• You can vote for the story you worked on, but please try to be objective
• Voting for each category will last 48 hours from the time the stories are posted.
• After voting is over, I'll reveal the writers of each part!
• Remember, it's just for fun!

I haven't tested this (I also have never used Sierra speech style), but could you just have

Code: ags

cChar.Say("                                                              ");

with a ton of spaces in there?

I heard an interview with this guy on NPR yesterday, actually.  He gave all his students assignments to pick various diseases and model their spread or whatever, and one of his students asked if he could do Zombie, expecting to get turned down.  But I suppose that when your professor has a question mark in his name, you have a better chance of such things getting accepted.  So the student did the modeling with the professor's help, and it eventually got wrapped into this paper as kind of a quirky post script.  Pretty cool story.

And the Professor Smith? legally had his name changed so it would be easier to find him in the phone book.  I guess.  Whatever.  :

The last pieces of SciFi 2 and Parody 2 are both due today.  So hopefully, I can release them for voting soon.  (I'll reveal all the writers after voting has completed). 

I'll probably start up a new thread for voting, so keep an eye out for that!  I'll leave voting open for 48 hours so everyone has a chance to read and give feedback, then we can have a laugh about all the inconsistencies and all the brilliant bits!

Fantasy is still a bit behind, but still moving.

Oh!  And in case I haven't mentioned it, Atelier Games has been kind enough to make some signature trophies for the winning teams as well as a consolation prize for people who aren't on a winning team!  So, we can hand those out when the voting is done too!  Thanks Atelier!