Topics

61

Everything-Else / GDC - Broken Age

« on: November 11, 2013, 09:15:09 PM »

There is a great discussion about adventure games in general and Broken Age in particular in this video.

Tim Schafer may have been a LucasArts adventure game guy, but there's no denying he is awesome and is making the most ambitious adventure game in decades (maybe ever?).

62

Everything-Else / Surgery tomorrow

« on: September 10, 2013, 08:42:13 PM »

Wish me luck, or say a prayer. Brutal kidney stone is being forcibly evicted tomorrow. Not the greatest experience of my life, but one I learned from. Stay hydrated out there guys, no need to find yourself in this situation.

63

Everything-Else / BA - Comedic Sword Fighting Taunts

« on: July 08, 2013, 04:48:58 PM »

Betrayed Alliance, as a kind of hommage to Monkey Island, has two sword fighting soldiers who humorously taunt eachother as they fight. It was at the point of writing these jokes that I realized I am not as funny as I assure myself that I am.

Comment with any humorous exchanges these men might have and who knows, you might find them in the game! Just an fyi, one of these men is old, and the other is middle-age and fat (and they happen to be father and son), if that makes it any easier.

Here are a couple I have done:

"I could beat you with my hands tied behind my back"
"You mean they aren't already?

"Your wit is as sharp as your blade!"
"Isn't that a compliment?""
I wouldn't know, I've never felt it!"

64

SCI Syntax Help / Props and walking into them

« on: June 25, 2013, 11:16:32 AM »

So props and Acts have a property where actors get stopped by them when walking into them and we know that "line" is at the base of the VIEW. My question is can I increase that "stopping" line to be not just a line, but more of a rectangle, obstructing actors from moving past them from right to left so easily?

Before you say just use a control line like Brian's tutorial recommends, please note that I want this object to be movable by the player, so static control lines won't suffice.

65

SCI Syntax Help / Cursor flicker and lots of views

« on: June 24, 2013, 05:18:55 PM »

(Thread split from 'Maximum Size of Views')

I have some massive Prop VIEWs in one room and multiple Act VIEWs in another. In both cases it slows the game down. I might be willing to be ok with that (particularly because increasing the dos box cycles is sufficient to speed up those sections). What I do not like, and wonder if anyone can help me with is whether I can stop my cursor from flickering while over these VIEWs?

Thanks

66

The Games and other Sierra Adventure stuff / Betrayed Alliance Book One: Release Date - Dec 24 2013

« on: June 22, 2013, 08:50:17 AM »

Many years ago I made the "Knight's Quest Demo", a very short demo that was intended to introduce the main characters and basic plot of "Knight's Quest" (now called "Betrayed Alliance"). That was about 7 years ago.

As the game evolved into something more ambitious than what I originally intended, I teamed up with Alex Schafer (trodoss) who gave me a hand with a number of PICs and a handful of VIEWS with the intention to release a "new demo". That was 5 years ago.

Life changed greatly for me in the last 7 years. I now have a full time job, a wife, and now a newborn son. But my desire to release something that would justify the countless hours of work I've done has still been with me. On and off over the years I have dusted off the game, tinkered here and there, made new rooms, some new characters, or just fixed a bug I couldn't figure out before.

Recently I looked over the game and decided that the "demo" I wanted to release long ago had become the first 1/3 of the game, which from a conceptual level is 95% finished and much of the "grunt" work has been done over the last 7 years.

Therefore for the first time in 7 years I will say there is a release date: Christmas Eve 2013.

The schedule breaks down thus:
July
Primary Objectives:
Draw ALL remaining PICs (and make sure they all connect properly)
Complete all conceptual story points

August
Primary Objectives:
Puzzles in finished order
Populate game with characters and animations

September
Primary Objectives:
Right-click look
Dialogue
puzzle points

October
Primary Objectives:
Ending Sequence
Music
Odds and Ends

November
Primary Objectives:
Get Playtesters
Fix bugs

December:
Crunch Time to Finalize Game

67

Everything-Else / Weird and strange goggles

« on: June 19, 2013, 05:04:35 PM »

I have a character in my game who is obsessed with goggles of many kinds. I'm looking for help thinking of unusual (perhaps humorous) functions. One set for instance shoots lasers, kind of the opposite of Cyclops in xmen. I have the traditional see through walls ones, and some other interesting ideas.

What are your wacky ideas?

68

Everything-Else / Happy Father's Day...

« on: June 16, 2013, 03:58:06 PM »

...to all you fathers out there. I just joined the club myself 17 days ago!

And even though I have a little poop-makin' wake-up-daddy machine I do intend to continue work on BA...and maybe get something small released this year?

69

SCI Syntax Help / running into a running problem (bad joke lol)

« on: June 19, 2012, 12:46:49 PM »

So, my ego can run like the hero in Quest for Glory, but here is where things get tricky.

When you change the xStep and yStep while ego is already in the motion, he will continue walking at the original xandyStep until he is given a new destination. No problem! All I need to do is stop ego's movement, change his xandyStep and then direct him to his original destination. And that works perfectly but for one thing.

There are two different ways ego can be directed, and I don't have the knowledge to know how to tell the script to do one action for one and the other.

If clicked, this code works

Code: [Select]

(send gEgo:setMotion(MoveTo (send pEvent:x)(send pEvent:y)))
and if direction pad is used, this code works

Code: [Select]

(switch (send gEgo:loop)
                    (case 0
                        (send gEgo:setDirection(RIGHT))
                    )(case 1
                        (send gEgo:setDirection(LEFT))
                    )(case 2
                        (send gEgo:setDirection(DOWN))
                    )(case 3
                        (send gEgo:setDirection(UP))
                    )
)
I just don't know how exactly to code the if statement. Any thoughts?

70

SCI Syntax Help / User created names

« on: November 25, 2011, 10:08:06 AM »

Suppose my character is to name a dog. This is easy enough. You set up a var and:

Code: [Select]

EditPrint (@doggyName 14 "Aren't you a good doggy? Your name shall be:" #at 70 40 )
                Format(@buffer "You shall be known as %s." @doggyName)
                Print(@buffer #at -1 40 #mode alCENTER #width 250)
But perhaps my user just hits enter without naming the poor doggy. I have been unsuccessful in giving the dog a default name. I know it's got to be a simple solution, but I've looked through all the tutorials and I just can't find it.

71

Forum Support and Suggestions / SCI Community website reliability

« on: November 23, 2011, 03:17:41 PM »

Is it just a problem for me or is the SCI Community website sometimes up and down? Sometimes I cannot navigate here and it takes a long time to load things. I don't have this issue with any other website...

72

SCI Syntax Help / Instruments tracks volumes that change between rooms

« on: November 01, 2011, 10:00:04 AM »

I have a room where music plays, but after I added some other tunes, everytime I go into that room, one of the instrument tracks volume is turned down! Is there something I should be doing to avoid this?

73

SCI Syntax Help / Music sounds that don't go away

« on: October 31, 2011, 12:29:05 PM »

I've noticed that sometimes even though the music stops, certain sounds (like say a string ensemble 2) persist even when the game is quit and dosbox is open. WHAT can I do to STOP it?!?! I dont' want to change the song for the room. I remember having this problem before, but I don't remember if it was ever resolved

74

Forum Support and Suggestions / Game Ratings - no rating for music?

« on: October 30, 2011, 10:58:04 AM »

After just now finishing JummyBummy2 I wanted to rate it and was surprised to find that there was no place for rating the music! Perhaps melding Graphics with "Presentation" or just adding a place for "Music". JB2 had some really awesome music and not having a place to rate it was no good!

Let me know what you think!

75

Community Competitions / April Competition

« on: March 31, 2011, 02:52:08 PM »

Hi guys. I haven't been around for a while. If anyone wants to post an April competition, I wouldn't mind getting my feet wet making something