Messages

Is it Popeye?

Once you mentioned it, I am pretty sure this must be right. Never seen it, but have seen the poster. Perhaps I bought the soundtrack back in my vinyl collection days.

I played Tony's Spaghetti, which is also an AGS title. While not quite in the class of the games I wrote about in the post above, this is still an enjoyable shortie. The player is an undercover cop, trying to eavesdrop on the mafia in a restaurant. You just have to get rid of the waiter, the goons and the health inspector first.  There are at least one game-breaking bug, so save using F5 every now and then.

@Creamy, yes, there is something more to do. I was exactly where you are now.

[The Delivery]

The Delivery

Spoiler

I found five ways to die. Even though this was all text, it fit the theme very well, and the descriptions were much to my liking. Funny, although naturally limited.

[close]

Lost & Found

Spoiler

This should be all accounts be a stressful click exercise, but somehow it wasn't. Perhaps is was the calm music and the beauty of the art that made it a relaxing, almost meditative experience? The connection to the theme may be somewhat thin.

[close]

I voted for

Spoiler

Lost & Found. Beautiful, fun and more of a challenge than the other game.

[close]

Thanks for the games, guys!

What a dream team! Excellent game on all points!

I kind of stumbled over this game before I was intended to, and I picked the worst ending first (like I try to do most of the time). It's true that you have a characteristic style in your illustrations. The way you included the disguise mechanics from Facemaker in the game felt really natural. I hope we will see it in the future, too! (You know, you could use the same mechanics with, say, torn up letter parts, to make a way for the player to puzzle them together.)

(I half expected a portal opening up in the background and a Saturday person run across the screen.)  Thanks for a fun short game.

Edit: Don't forget to add your other games to the database.

I liked this game. It's pleasant to look at, and maintains a cheery atmosphere throughout. I was sold on the banter bentween the alien and his AI from the moment he camoflaged his space ship as a outdoor toilet. 

Is it just me, or was this jam unusually strong from the ags users? 

Whoo! That was pretty nightmarish! A content warning well deserved.

Congratulations on the release! You succeeded in creating a horror atmosphere with pleasant unpleasantness.

I would also like to see more of the three kobolds! Or even a follow-up starring the princess.    Thanks for a fun game with great puzzle mechanics!

This game grew on me. The first impression may not be all that much, but it is clearly a work of love, and the author has put a lot of work into this, especially the puzzle design.

The game has two parts. In the first part, we are treated to single screen challenges and puzzles while the story develops. The puzzles in this part are generally quite good, and there are also hints available, even when you play in difficult mode. There is a sort of color-based maze, which I found very original and fun to play (a bit hard for the colour-blind, though). However, I had some problems with the way the story was told in this part. I think the game would have benefited from being told from a different POV in the first chapter. Noone will think "I need three items to cheer me up" or "Two of three were correct". But this will work if the POV is set outside the player character: "Find three items to cheer him up!" This first chapter plays like a puzzle game with a background story more than a traditional adventure game. It could easily have been a separate download and labeled chapter one.

In the second half, we play the part of the man-now-turned-fox in a more traditional point and click, inventory based gameplay. In this part, the POV works fine. The advantage of having this as a separate download would be that players who only want the point and click parts, could get that. This is where the main difference lays - easy mode will be easy or moderate, while difficult mode is not only hard, but at times almost impossible. Luckily, I played at the same time as @Wiggy , so we could exchange hints, and the author also provided solutions if needed. Search for the hint thread if you are reading this after some time has gone by. 

Graphics and sound: The main graphics won't win any prizes. But my main gripe with them is that I wished they could be somewhat bigger. Some objects are hard to find, and it is a pixel hunt sometimes. Luckily, the author has provided hints. For instance, the fox may smell something, giving us the idea that we have to search the screen. There is a bit of music, but most of the time, the game is silent. (It wasn't my style of music, so I didn't mind.) There are also lots of shortcuts. Many characters and actions are not shown, but only described in captions. The game is definitely guilty of telling, not showing. This could have been solved by making stills, which would still save the animation work. But I would rather have the game this way than not having it at all, so I find it hard to really be annoyed by this.

The story is odd, there is no way around that. There is a mix of very serious undertones and a kind of redemption story, and hilarious oh-no-newspaper front pages that kind of clashes. But okay, if I can play a kid who want to be a pirate, I can certainly play a fox that wants to be his son's pet. Most of the time, I knew what goals I had and what I needed to try to do.

Puzzles: This is the game's strong suit and its weak suit. Many of the puzzles are quite original and different from other games. There are fetch quests, poems to unscramble, riddles to solve, items to combine (though never in the inventory window) and position-based puzzles. The variety is huge, and I liked many of them. In easy mode, the puzzles are fewer or involve fewer steps. There are also more comments from the fox along the way that ease the player experience. In difficult mode...well, congratulations to anyone who manages to solve this alone without hints! The final code - well, I do not think I under any circumstances could have solved that without brute forcing it, trying out all 40000 combinations...

Some suggestions for improvement: I think there could have been more feedback to the player in some places. When gathering items for the kids' pirate game, the boy could have told me how many items were missing when I talked to him, for instance. The tug of war puzzle

Spoiler

was perplexing to me because the floor didn't respond to any other interaction. I had no way of suspecting there was a hotspot there. I had tried using the cup of water directly on the boy, but not right beside him. If looking at the floor was possible, then this would be signalled to the player. One could argue that the puzzle is easier if the hotspot is visible, but I don't think concealing it is the correct way of making it harder for the player. (Even though I did something similar in Getting the Picture.)

[close]

The locked box puzzle is fine in easy mode. In difficult mode

Spoiler

I don't think it makes sense. If the fox could puzzle out that he needs to break off some teeth from the comb in order to open the box, he could bite them off, or he could search for a hard object to break them with. As it is now, the fox breaks the comb, and then it fits the holes completely by accident. There is a hint from the narrator, but the way this is told, it is not logical problem solving, as the fox has no reason to use the comb on the rock. The narrator gives the player a hint, but the fox doesn't know that.

[close]

The poachers:

Spoiler

I would have liked if we got a picture of the fox giving the evidence to the shop clerk, who in turn could get hold of a ranger. As it is, we are simply told that the fox gets hold of a ranger. How would he do that?

[close]

The owl puzzle:

Spoiler

This has a hint, and indeed, this may be solved by accident or pure luck. I almost feel bad for suggesting something that's hard to code, but I would have liked a visual clue here - like the eyes of the owl actually following the fox's movements. (I'm impressed that the author has coded it the way it is, already!) I have to admit that the twisting technique was a bit lost on me, and I just kept trying it on stuff to see if it had any effect.

[close]

In conclusion I'd say that people can give this game a chance and give it a try. It's a bit different than most adventures, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Adventures of old have had a system of sorts that is now adopted by other genres. For example, when playing old adventures I often found myself in one of two situations:

1) I found a red door and discovered it was locked. Solution: I need to look everywhere for a red key.

2) I found a red key. Solution: I need to find a red, locked door somewhere in the game.

Obviously (?), the first is more satisfying than the second, even though these aren't exactly high brow puzzles. These "puzzles" are found frequently in other genres. The first one I thought about was Doom, with its red and blue keycards.

There is also the notion that everything you can pick up, end up being useful. True, there is the odd "red herring", but most of the time, when you are close to the end of the story, you know which items are left unused in your inventory, and all too often, you know that the solution will be to use those. (This is, btw, totally similar to how Scandinavian folk tales/fairy tales go - the hero will get three magical items and need exactly the effects these three provide.)

The games are in, as we all understand!

Originally, 25 were entered, but four of those are already taken out of the competition, so we are down to 21.

Spoiler

Bad Blood is obviously an action game.
20 000 Leagues: An Epilogue is taken out for not following the theme. (It also looks like a platform game.)
Robo Ruse is a sort of sneaking/puzzle game where you need to fool robots and steal stuff.
Frosty Agent is perhaps taken out because it is unfinished? I''m not sure.

[close]

Let's start with the AGS entries!

The Books of Knowledge has you playing an alien, seeking knowledge about earth. This is good fun, and much of the humour is in the banter from our hero's portable AI, and the fact that everyday items seem totally alien to our visiting alien(!). (Polished version also available!)

Stranger in Utopia is a science fiction investigation story, where the player is a visiting cop investigating a murder in a supposedly utopian society. Amazing art and great story. Puzzles based on using machines for investigation.

D-List Diva Another very good-looking game, yet in a different style. This is a very funny game! The player character is a grumpy manager who has to find items for a has-been's rider before she will perform. Easy to moderate puzzles, yet very satisfying because they are done in multiple steps.

Why the Wrong Face is a heist story, neatly incorporating the ability to change disguises. Good game! Worth playing for the disguise functionality alone.

Yip Quest is a game made in the Gobliiins style, where the player can switch between three kobolds with different characteristics, in their quest to steal a princess' treasure. Good puzzles and lots of humour made this a good gaming experience, too. I hope RamoRama has plans to make more stories about this trio!

@heltenjon I'm trying to picture this and I think I get it--do you mean it creates the illusion of turning while standing still, like looking toward different walls within the same space? That could be useful, thanks.

Yes, that's it. If say, a recognizable lamp was to your left and now is on your right, you seem to have turned. I've encountered this mostly in escape the room-games on mobile phone. It works best with objects that may look the same from different angles, like a round lamp.

My suggestion is of course a way of cheating.    If you create a background, then chop a third of it  and use that at the edge of another background, you can make the impression that you have turned. Not much work saved, but a bit less to draw. (Note that this is the lazy guy's solution, and not a recommendation.)

@cat , what is OROW?

I can answer that for you.

OROW = One Room One Week.  Basically, you'd have a week to make a really short game that only takes place in one room.

https://archive.org/details/adventuregamestudio_oneroomoneweek

I will have to take a look at the other 24 games in the jam, of course, but I would not be surprised if this one is the winner. Stunning art, as usual, but the writing is top notch, as well. There is a very nice science fiction story here with investigation puzzles naturally integrated.

This isn't the answer I'm sure since it all feels like a stretch, but: a horse pulling a cart?

Two pointing up = the heads of the horse and the driver. Eight pointing down = the horse's four legs plus the cart's four wheels. Two showing the way to town = two blinders on the horse. One dragging behind = the cart itself?

Close. This could have been the correct answer if the riddlemakers had thought of it that way.

A squid?

Not so close. 

Some kind of trailer truck?

Good suggestion, but no. 

Two pointing up, four eight pointing down,
two showing the way to town,
and one dragging behind.

Whoops!

A scorpion?

Nope.

My turn to be stuck. Difficult mode.

I have reached a sort of computer room where it looks like I need batteries. I don't have any. I am at a loss about what to do next.

Spoiler

I had an idea that I could use the neodym for this, but I lose it after showing it, so I guess it's useless in this mode?

[close]