Messages

1

AGI Development Tools / Re: Looking for specific versions of AGI files

« on: October 10, 2017, 10:25:01 PM »

Thanks guys. This is very helpful.

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AGI Development Tools / Looking for specific versions of AGI files

« on: October 09, 2017, 10:34:40 PM »

Seems awful quiet here in the AGI forum. I guess everyone had a busy summer.

I've made a ton of progress on WinAGI v1.2.2. I'm working on the help file now. To make sure it's as accurate as possible, I've been working with a decompiler on the AGI files. I've been working with primarily with version 2.917, and have it almost fully decompiled, which has led to a ton of new information and corrections regarding the AGI specs.

I've been able to check other versions I have to look for differences among versions, but unfortunately I'm missing a few versions that I would like to have in order to validate my assumptions about what's different.

Years ago, I got a zip file with most DOS versions from someone (I think from MegaTokyo days). But I found out that three of the versions included are not what they seem. The files for v2.425,2.439 and 2.903 all include a version stamp of "2.CBC" in the AGIDATA.OVL file, and have a bit of extra code at the end of the executable that's associated with a Sierra loader for Windows 98 - other than that, they're byte for byte equal to v2.936. It looks like they're from a Windows 98 compatible version of Space Quest that included both SQ1 and SQ2.

So if anyone has the 'real' versions 2.425, 2.439 and 2.903, I'd love to have them for comparison against the other versions I have. Oh, and I don't have any version 1 files; I wouldn't mind getting my hands on those too, but they're less of a need for me.

thx!

3

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI 1.1 BETA available for download

« on: May 22, 2017, 01:08:32 AM »

Here's the list of bug fixes and other changes/additions being worked for v1.2.1:

Please check here to see if any bugs or improvements you want to report are already listed here. As I get feedback, I'll add them to this list, and also track the status of fixes.

4

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI 1.1 BETA available for download

« on: May 22, 2017, 12:39:59 AM »

Great! Will definitely give this a go as I get time.

The first thing to report is with regards to installation. I assumed I should probably uninstall the earlier version, so I did that. I'm on Windows 8.1. After uninstalling the old version and then executing the installer for the new version, I got two different error messages during installation but neither appears to have stopped the tool from working.

The error messages I saw are shown in the attachment below. The user I installed with is an Administrator.

wshom.ocx is a Windows Scripting Host Object Model wrapper. I used it for folder management when changing a game's directory (which probably isn't going to be done very often). It's old code, and in other places where I need to access directories, I use API calls. I should probably clean this up and replace it with API calls too, so that OCX isn't needed anymore.

Regarding the second error, it's nothing as nefarious as compatibility errors - it's a result of changing some setting variable types between versions and failing to check for it when loading settings. ugh, I should know better. I've already fixed that bug.

I've already identified over 25 new things (either minor bugs [thank goodness no major issues found yet!], or feature improvements) that I'm working on - mostly in Picture Editor and Sound Editor. I'll upload that here and keep it updated as new things are reported so you can avoid reporting what's already known.

Thx all for the feedback!

5

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI 1.1 BETA available for download

« on: May 18, 2017, 12:41:08 PM »

Your link says 1.1.1, but the file is 1.2.1 :3

Good catch. Fixed.

6

AGI Development Tools / WinAGI 1.2 BETA available for download

« on: May 18, 2017, 07:25:07 AM »

Took a bit longer than I had planned, but here is next version of WinAGI:
WinAGI 1.2.1 BETA

There are a lot of improvements since last version. Here's a short list of the more significant changes:

• converted Interpreter Version property to string type, so no more errors when trying to open templates when using non-US country settings
• Better validation of default settings on startup so no more 1 point fonts in editors
• Colors can be edited in Settings, so custom palettes can be created for pictures and views
• Graphics features make more use of API calls to manage transparencies, masking. Should improve overall performance as API calls much faster than native VB graphics methods
• Layout Editor overhauled, significantly improved performance and features; editor is now much more resilient to changes made by user both inside and outside of the editor to rooms and exits
• added ability to show pics on layout editor as inset to room boxes
• a ton of picture editor improvements:
• added ability to resize/reposition background image on picture editor
• background feature now includes transparency option for drawn image (to see background through the drawn picture)
• Test Mode in picture editor does not force background to hide and switch to full draw state; user can do tests on partially drawn pictures, and background image can be visible during testing
• added mousewheel support to Picture Editor to zoom in/out
• added export feature for picture images (export as bmp, gif, png, tif, jpg), you can export visual image, priority or both
• new option for cursor highlighting in picture editor: small square for current coordinate; all others marked with x OR original WinAGI, with flashing cursor around selected coordinates and all others not marked
• added new gif export feature for view loops - you can convert any loop into an animated gif
• fixed menu editor to extract actual message strings if arguments in the menu commands are local/global defines or variable tag(e.g. m1, m2)
• double-clicking menu editor lets you change background picture so you can see your how your menu looks against actual in-game pictures
• compiler warnings are displayed in a separate window; double-click a warning to go directly to corresponding line in logic source
• made improvements to argument tips feature
• when using reserved names, they can be viewed in the global defines editor on a separate tab (can't be edited, but can be copied, search-in-logic enabled)
• diasbled VB syntax as an advertised option. (It is still available as an undocumented feature: on settings form, use Ctrl+Shift+? to show vb option checkbox on Logics tab. In Logic editor, use Alt+S to switch a logic to/from VB syntax)

I haven't updated the Help file yet; I'll do that after I polish things up for full release. I'd love to get as much feedback as I can. If you find a problem/bug, let me know here. The more information you can give to help me reproduce any errors or bugs the better.

If you have any questions about features (old or new),  I'd love to hear those too. WinAGI has a ton of capabilities that many of you probably aren't aware of. Please post those questions in a separate thread, or PM me directly.

7

The Games and other Sierra Adventure stuff / Re: What are we working on?

« on: May 06, 2017, 12:14:00 PM »

I only have the one version... I think. I'll check.

And AGI required more steps because I couldn't just click Export All. So I used SV-CLI to extract and convert the pictures, Paintshop Pro's batch processor to convert them to PNG because PNGOUT wouldn't take them even though it takes any other BMP file I have and ImageMagick frightens me, then another round in PNGOUT to optimize them. Same for QFG3, which crashes SCI Companion's export-all feature. The others only get a combined convert-optimize pass.

If you can wait just a few more days (I plan on realeasing beta of WinAGI 1.2 by 13 May 2017), you'll have a better option. You can export pictures (visual and/or priority) as BMP or GIF, individually, or all at once. I have only implemented these two formats since I haven't had time to figure out how to implement the file format/compression algorithms for PNG and JPG - they're much more complicated. But once you get BMPs or GIFs, I imagine it'd be pretty simple to batch change those into another format using different tool.

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The Games and other Sierra Adventure stuff / Re: What are we working on?

« on: May 03, 2017, 01:36:48 PM »

That looks really good. I can still see a few pixels here and there that aren't quite right.

What are you using for your line drawing algorithm? The exact algorithm used by Sierra in AGI is pretty simple, and uses only integers. If you implement that algorithm, you'll get lines that come out exactly as Sierra drew them.

Here's a pseudo-code example of the Sierra line algorithm:

Code: [Select]

void drawline(int X1, int Y1, int X2, int Y2)
{
  //assumes X1 != X2 and Y1 != Y2
  //assumes pset knows correct color to set
 
  int xPos, yPos, DX, DY, vDir, hDir;
  int XC, YC, MaxDelta, i;
 
  //determine delta x/delta y and direction
  DY = Y2 - Y1; vDir = (DY<0? -1, 1);
  DX = X2 - X1; hDir = (DX<0? -1, 1);
 
  //set starting pixel
  pset(X1,Y1);
  xPos = X1; yPos = Y1;

  //invert DX and DY if they are negative
  if(DX < 0) DX *= -1;
  if(DY < 0) DY *= -1;
 
  //set up the loop, depending on which direction is largest
  if(DX >= DY) {
    MaxDelta = DX;
    YC = DX / 2;
    XC = 0;
  }
  else {
    MaxDelta = DY;
    XC = DY / 2;
    YC = 0;
  }
  //draw line
  for(i == 1; i == MaxDelta; i++) {
    YC += DY;
    if(YC >= MaxDelta) {
      YC -= MaxDelta;
      yPos += vDir;
    }
    XC += DX;
    if(XC >= MaxDelta) {
      XC -= MaxDelta;
      xPos += hDir;
    }
    pset(xpos, ypos);
  }
}

For plotting, there's good information in the WinAGI help file that explains how to code that, including brush sizes and shapes. For splatter plotting, the actual algorithm that Sierra used is a lot simpler than the bit array in the AGI specifications that has been used for years. Here's the actual Sierra algorithm:

Code: [Select]

//read starting pattern from picture data stream
pattern = pattern | 1
//set starting pixel to first pixel on top row of desired pen shape
do {
    newPatt = pattern >> 2
    if ((pattern & 1) == 1) {
      newPatt = newPatt ^ 0xB8
    }
    pattern = newPatt
    if ((pattern & 3) == 2) {
    //draw this pixel
    }
  }
  //move to next pixel, in left-to-right, top-to-bottom order
while !done //loop until all pixels in desired pen shape are tested

If you haven't already done it, make sure your fill algorithm handles cases where the visual and priority pens are set/not set; if only visual pen is set, fill will use boundary lines it finds in the visual picture; if only priority pen is set, fill will use boundary lines it finds on the priority screen; if both pens are set, fill will set pixels in both images, but will only use the visual screen boundaries it finds.

If you have any questions about AGI resources, take a look at the WinAGI help file - it's got a ton of information. Or you can message me/post here.

9

Everything-Else / Re: How old is everyone?

« on: April 22, 2017, 12:01:26 PM »

Looks like I'm the greybeard around here. I'm 52. My first computer was a RadioShack Color Computer with a whopping 16K of memory and a cassette tape storage system.

I was in college when Sierra hit its prime, and bought/played most of their games as they were released.

I also remember the Apple Lisa - it came out in '84 IIRC, and we had them in our computer labs at University of Michigan. They were pretty cool. I started writing a text based adventure game about escaping from a prison on the Lisa. All long gone now.

Also remember when the first Macs came out. By then, I was really entrenched in IBM PC/DOS systems, so I never got bit by the Mac bug. I do remember working with Excel for the first time on a Mac and realizing it was a big step forward from Lotus 1-2-3 (in which I had become quite good at writing macros, getting it to do some pretty cool stuff).

What I remember most from those days was the excitement of going to bookstores/software stores, and checking out the latest releases. There was a ton of great stuff being made back those days.

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The Games and other Sierra Adventure stuff / Re: What are we working on?

« on: April 21, 2017, 04:33:44 PM »

I'm working on a new release of WinAGI. It's got a lot of improvements and bug fixes. Most of the big changes are done (I am still working on an improvement to line editing in the Picture Editor), so hopefully only a few more days of testing, then I'll build and release a beta.

I've decided I need to to something with all the old disk-based games I have - a bunch of Sierra titles, all the AD&D/SSI Goldbox games, a bunch of Microprose games, and others. Hopefully the disks haven't died yet. I was able to get a 5.25 drive USB adaptor, so with that attached to the last system I had with a built-in 3.5 drive, I should be able to capture all the disk images. Maybe this will inspire to play some of them again...

I need to learn C# as well. Once I'm done with WinAGI, I think I'll jump in and see how hard it is for an old dog to learn these fancy new tricks.

I am also trying to get more experience with java because I recently bought a Mazda, and I discovered on the user forums that it's pretty easy to write custom apps for the entertainment system - IF you know java. I wrote a speedometer/clock app, but haven't gotten enough courage to upload it to the car yet. This project's been back-burnered until WinAGI is done.

11

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI is Back

« on: April 13, 2017, 01:58:31 PM »

I just want to say again that I'm really impressed with the WinAGI help file. I've been using it as the go to place for checking how things work in AGI. It's far more detailed with its explanations of the AGI commands than other sources, and what it says I've been verifying against the interpreter and the original source code fragments and so far it has been spot on.

Nice to know it's useful. I spent a lot of work on that back in the day, mostly by disassembling the interpreters. If there are still questions about how things work, I still have all my disassembly notes, and can usually find answers pretty quickly (depending on nature of question of course!) Oddly enough, I kind of enjoy the process of digging answers out of the assembly code.

12

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI is Back

« on: April 13, 2017, 01:30:00 PM »

Hello pabuslem, thx for the compliment. I am almost done with the next version of WinAGI - just polishing up a few new added features and tracking down miscellaneous bugs as I find them. If you've had a chance to do much with the last version (1.1.22), I would love to get any feedback on it, in case you've uncovered something I haven't.

For me, my 'return' to AGI honestly is driven mostly by moving from 'kids in the house' to 'kids in college, and eventually on their own'. I wonder if that might be true with some of the rest of you. Anyway, after a long hiatus, I've been spending a lot of time relearning what I used to know, and remembering how much I enjoyed it. I never did write an AGI game myself, but it's still on my to-do list.

I'll post a link to a beta version of WinAGI 1.2.1 soon.

13

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI is Back

« on: March 18, 2017, 01:16:28 PM »

I think I have been able to address the Layout Editor issues. Keeping the Layout editor and the logics in sync is tough because it's hard to anticipate all the ways a user might make changes in logics and in the editor. But I think I've got it mostly figured out. I'm also adding more checks to make sure everything stays correctly synched, and either warning user to rebuild or fixing issues automatically.

I like your suggestions for the picture editor. I can add both of them very easily.

I assume you're using version 1.1.22? If you're interested, once I've got a build ready for testing, I can provide a beta of 1.2.1 so you can see what's already been fixed/improved.

14

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI is Back

« on: March 16, 2017, 09:41:03 PM »

I just discovered the Repair Layout option. That has reintroduced the missing room but has also added in a whole lot of extra unattached links that I assume might relate to links that I may have deleted at some point.

Edit: I was just going through and removing those extra unattached links, i.e. right clicking on them to delete, but before I finished doing this, the tool and in fact the whole IDE has locked up with the spinning circle. It's not coming back. The very last thing I was doing was attempting to remove some strange links from "Room 1", which I hadn't yet removed. This is the original room that comes with the template game. I'd left it there by itself while I was creating the rooms for the game. After using the Repair Layout option, the links around this room looked a bit strange, so as part of the removal of unattached links, I tried removing those ones as well. It was in attempting to remove one of them that it appears to have gone in to some sort of infinite loop.

I try to put error trapping in all routines that have any potential for bad loops, but might have missed one or two. Hopefully when I fix the stuff from above it'll address these issues as well.

15

AGI Development Tools / Re: WinAGI is Back

« on: March 16, 2017, 09:37:49 PM »

Thx, this is just the kind of feedback I need.

The one thing I can't seem to find at the moment is a way to change the text in the room box, i.e. the Room ID.

The LogicID can be changed by selecting it in the Resource list, then choosing Description command on Resource menu. You can also change by double-clicking directly on the property box (below the resource list).  These changes are dynamically linked to the Layout editor so you will see changes made immediately. You can also select the Description command when you are editing a resource. But I can see that it would be intuitive to be able to change ID from within Layout editor- that's easy to add.

So I had to resort to deleting the room (I did this within the layout tool) and recreating it with a different name. I was able to pick the same Logic number, which was good.

When a room is deleted, any exits from other rooms to the deleted room should show up as errors (arrows pointing to red triangles). Did you see them?

When I tried to link it back up to the other rooms, I somehow ended up linking in to the middle of the room, so I attempted to delete the link, but both the link and the room box disappeared. The Logic was still there in the resource list though but I couldn't work out any way of adding it back in to the layout. If I tried the show room option, this particular room wasn't available for selection, even though it existed in the resource list and wasn't shown in the layout.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'linking to middle of room'? Can you elaborate? If the room was not in the list, then the layout editor thought it was being drawn- that's not good. If you are able to duplicate it, the exact steps taken would be helpful.

So I had to delete it again, this time with the right click option in the resource list. What appeared to have happened when I reopened the layout tool is that another one of the rooms had disappeared from the layout. The links from the two rooms that it joins to were still there but the box for the room was missing. I was able to add the original room that had disappeared (and that I then deleted) back in, and I was able to join it back up to the rooms on its side, but after saving this, then closing and reopening the layout tool again, the second room that disappeared mysteriously reappeared again but the original room that disappeared that I had recreated and linked up again has now disappeared again. Not sure how to get around this now. The original deletion of the room appears to have confused the tool.

I can't seem to replicate your situation exactly, but I do see there are some problems when deleting then re-adding rooms. After several times of adding, deleting, redrawing exits, I also got a bunch of 'straggler' lines that didn't seem to connect with anything. Selecting and moving them eventually causes a hangup. I think I can track this down though, and fix it.