Messages

Hey guys, I'm justifying this bump because the request for art help contains a new screenshot!

We're looking for a new artist to help out!  Email me!

http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=36479.msg498208#msg498208

Hey everybody, the Resonance team is looking for another artist to help out with some closeup screens.  Basically, the main background artist knocks out all these great backgrounds, but sometimes I'd like to flesh them out more with additional closeups of the items in the screen.  These closeup screens are almost always interactive, like zooming in on a security panel to enter a passcode, or zooming in on a valve to turn a crank.

I'd rather have the artist spend the time he has available on the remaining backgrounds and get someone else to work on these closeups.  Currently, I've been kind of filling some of them with programmer art just as placeholders so I can get the interactivity in place.  But I'd like to have someone make them real purdy.

Requirements: you must be able to make the closeups match the existing style of the backgrounds.

Examples:  Two released screenshots show one of the closeups:

The room background:


Closeup on the chest's lock:


Here's another example with my crap programmer art.  The room background:


Closeup on the computer on the desk:


I need someone to fix those up.  Are you up to the task?  Send me an email at vince.twelve@gmail.com hopefully with some examples of your work.

Haha!  I knew old man ProgZ would hate it!

I thought it was entertaining.  The best thing I can say about it was that they got together a really fantastic cast.  The worst thing I could say would be to bitch about the same piece of OMG!coincidence that Darth was complaining about, which really bugged the shit out of me.

Overall, I enjoyed it though, and think it will shape up to be a pretty great new film series.

We liked it too.

Good point Khris, I didn't notice that he said one char was following the other.  I assumed we were talking about multiple playable characters.  If so, it shouldn't trigger unless the current player walks on it.

That is, if he's using regions and not hotspots as he said.

Just use

Code: ags

if(player==cCharsName){
  //do stuff
}

in the code for the region's walk onto event.

- Tries to load IE every 2 minutes
- Disables you from accessing "Folder options"
- Disables you from selecting "Show hidden files and system files" and keeps resetting it

Yes, I've had this.  Unfortunately, it might also be the same virus I had that blocks you from going to any virus checking websites, which happened to me.  If so, you may have to do some of what I'm going to suggest on another computer and copy files and programs over via usb.  I even had to rename some files, because the virus would detect any file named combofix.exe, for example, and delete it before I could run it.  Really nasty bugger.

I had to use combofix to clean it all the way off.  But combofix should not be used unless as instructed by experts.

Your first step should be getting Malwarebytes and run a full scan while booted into safe mode.  Run it until it's clean.  Then run a full scan while booted in normal mode to make sure.

If you still have problems, it's time to use the help of experts.  I used the Kaspersky forums and they were really helpful.  Just read the stickies at the top of the page and run the diagnostic tools they suggest.  Then, you'll post a diagnostic report and one of the experts will tell you the proper proceedure for cleaning your infection.  You might have to be patient for the solution, though.

I'm not a big believer in anti-virus software either, but yeah I guess it's AVG time again!

Might want to rethink that.  Especially if you have important files on your computer and access the internet at all.

Just put everything inside the RepEx function that you want to stop inside an if statement.

Code: ags

bool repExEnabled=true;

function room_RepExec()
{
  if(repExEnabled){
    int ran;


     // MOVE - Character is has finished animating, start him on his journey
     if (GnomeState==MOVE) {
          GnomeState = MOVING;
    //...
    //...more stuff here
    //...
  }

  //...more stuff here that you don't want to disable...

}

Then, when you want to stop running those statements.  Change repExEnabled to false.

I didn't read closely through your code, but this is one quick and easy way to do what you're looking for.

And I mine.

Now that we've cleared that up, how much of the games database now need to be moved to the "Non-Adventure" category?

I don't really see Anna as similar to Myst because the protagonist can interact in many ways with his environment instead of being limited to solving strange puzzles.

I would disagree with that.  Even though I'm arguing my own game down...  The protagonist only had one interaction button, the space bar, and it was only used to interact with six screens, each of which (or at least four of which) were strange (or cliche) puzzles which must be solved in a specific order which the player must discover.

In Myst, you have only one interaction button, the left mouse button, and it's used to to navigate through and interact with countless screens, filled with strange puzzles which must sometimes be solved in a specific order, and may sometimes be solved in any order (giving more of a feeling of non-linearity), which the player must discover.

Anna's story is more direct and laid out for the player.  The main character, Hero, actually talks back to Anna.  While, in Myst you have to piece together the story from fragments -- notes, journals, recordings, and people talking directly to you, rather than through your proxy on-screen character -- scattered around several worlds.  But neither game really tells you what to do, you just have to explore and discover for yourself.  The difference is really in scale.

I just have to throw out a dark secret: I love the first three Myst games (four and five didn't do it for me), especially Riven which is easily in my top 5 games.  I even like a bunch of Myst clones, including games like Safecracker which are purely puzzles from a Myst perspective without even a pretense of story beyond the introduction: "You are going into this mansion to crack a bunch of safes, ready, go!" 

My game Anna is really just a mini Myst game with a character thrown in front of the camera...

To me, adventure games are characterized mostly by non-emergent (heavily-scripted) gameplay that relies more on thought than reflexes, though clearly some adventures mix in emergence and twitch gameplay to varying degrees of success.  I used the word "characterized" rather than "defined" because I think the adventure genre can reach beyond those limits (plus it's hard to draw a line where enough emergent behavior makes it no longer an adventure) and I prefer not to get hung up too much on definitions and semantics.

The future game concept that Snarky linked to wouldn't be an adventure game by that definition, since it would be largely emergent, but I would still think of it as an adventure game, because on the surface the player would still see what he would see if it were a pre-programmed game, it's just that the computer, rather than the designer/programmer directly, is deciding the outcome of the player's decisions.  The player simply has more options (an infinite number actually) than a game relying on the scripting of each outcome due to the procedural nature of the game.  But the interaction still is more cerebral than physical and more resembles the interaction found in today's adventure games than it does any other genre.

Ha. Fun.

Here's how I did the art for Linus Bruckman: http://xiigames.com/2006/12/21/wlbswheac-post-mortem-part-two-art-production/

I quite enjoy using Twitter.  I want to give more frequent updates on the development of Resonance, but don't think most of the small "I'm working on a fun minigame!" updates are worth blog posts.  Twitter nicely fills that gap.  So, I've integrated it quite prominently into my new website design:

http://www.xiigames.com

My Twitter is

http://www.twitter.com/vincetwelve

AGS uses the exact center of the sprite to decide where to draw the character.  For example, if the character is standing on the spot x=100 y=150, and the sprite is 40 pixels wide, then it will draw the sprite centered on x=100 with the bottom of it at y=150.  This means that the left of the sprite will be drawn at x=100-(40/2)=80.

If you then change to an animation that is 150 pixels wide, those frames are going to be drawn with their lefts at x=100-(150/2)=25.  So if the character wasn't centered in the same way in the two different-width animations, then he will appear to jump around.

Here's your characters with lines drawn down the center of the sprites.  This center line will determine where the character is "drawn" on the screen.  So if we overlay them, you'll see how they will look if you switch between them.  Obviously, they're going to jump around.

This is easy to see if we center the images you've shown us on the screen:

The center point of your walking animation's standing frame is on his head.


But the center point of the talking animation is on the middle of his body.  (which is probably where it should be)


Laying them on top of each other, aligning the center points shows how they would jump around if you switch between the views.

In my opinion, you need to add a bunch of pixels to the left side of that walking animation to move that center point over to the left to match the talking animation.

To avoid this, figure out what you want the center (pivot point) of the standing frames should be (such that if you switch between them it looks like the character is turning around).  Then for all other animations keep the character centered in the same way (if the head is in the middle, it should always be in the middle, if the middle of the snakes back is in the middle of the frame, it should always be in the middle). 

The easiest way is just to center your standing pose how you want it and then draw all the character's animations off of the same standing pose, making sure that if you add pixels to one side of any frame, that you add the same number of pixels to the other side, even if they're blank pixels.  This is necessary to make sure that the center point remains the same.

Side Note: With really wide characters like this, you're going to have to be careful with walkable areas, since he's going to reach way beyond the walkable area.  The center point will go all the way to the edge of a walkable area, the rest of his body will stretch beyond it.  So, if he's the playable char, you'll need to adjust the walkable areas accordingly by making them reach not quite all the way to the edge of the room.  Otherwise, it'll look like he's walking through a wall.

[Ocean's]

Wow congrats Vince. Now for your sleep cycle's sake I hope he lives up to his name!

Yeah, I hope he busts all those ghosts so I can sleep.  Oh, you meant "Zen." I get it now!

I'm still guessing that your wife has no idea 'bout Hollywood culture and she allows you to use such middle names, right? Cause, honestly, if I kid was named Robocop, or Ghostbuster in Greece she would get swallen by laughter and all that.

See, in my head, a kid named Robocop or Ghostbusters would be the coolest kid in school.

You should seriously consider naming one of your children Ocean's.

I don't get it. 

Congratulations! But make them middle names a bit more adventure-related for Pete's sake! 

All right, next kid: Anna Kings Quest Three Twelve

You wake up in a bright, cold room. You can hear different persons.

Awesome! I LOLed.

But! You shouldn't be putting your energy into these side projects. It's Resonance the people wants! 

Yes, all the people except my parents.  They want more grandkids.  Pffft.


Thanks everybody for the warm comments!  I threw some more pics into the first post for whoever is into that kind of thing, and I'll now quit angling for attention!  On with your regularly scheduled foruming.

Thanks for the big blue love everybody!

[Zen Ghostbusters Twelve]

I'm a daddy some more.  Emi Robocop Twelve is now a big sister.  Here's my new son, Zen Ghostbusters Twelve.





(forgive the crappy picture quality.  I just snapped these on my phone.  Haven't had time to import the pics off my real camera. I'll post more later.)

A lot easier this go around.  About half the time as the first.  I'm still exhausted though.  Going to try and sleep now.


Update 5/1/09:

We're home now.  Here's a couple more pics:


A few seconds old.


Sleeping.  One of the three things he's good at so far.


With his big sister Emi and his aunt Hannah


The whole Twelve family.

I love these groovy graphics.  Good luck with this!

An excellent article. Nice find, Stu!