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Post by Discoalucard on May 16, 2013 10:40:39 GMT -5
Not "death", exactly - just not a whole lot of progress. What ultimately happened last year is that I decided to put more work into the Sega book. After that was published, I moved into a new house (and got a new job), so I've been spending my weekends alternating between getting it fixed up (we learned our upstairs bathroom is literally collapsing, hooray!) and trying to clean out the backlog for the site articles.
I've been doing a lot of design work (i.e. typing up stuff in the design document) but only smattering of actual programming here and there, when I get the time.
I actually have been thinking of releasing the work-in-progress version I have. It's all MS Paint-y, but the entire first act is playable (though there are still plenty of embellishments I need to add), and could probably finish up parts of the second act to make that playable too. It's about the only way I can think to generate interest for a potential Kickstater/Indie Gogo. I'm confident that it's a very funny game that people will enjoy, but gauging the quality of writing is a little difficult without actual playing the game - it's something that doesn't really come through in a video.
The only thing that's really stopped me at this point is the music, which right now is full of songs taken from assorted NES/GB games. I'd like to ask the composer for permission to re-use these songs since I want to distribute this version freely - I had actually had plans to ask if he'd be willing to be hired and provide a full score, should it ever get any real funding - but I haven't gotten around to it. The alternative is to just play it in silence which is kinda boring, but I guess better than nothing.
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Post by wyrdwad on May 17, 2013 14:19:21 GMT -5
I've got a bunch of sucky MODs and S3Ms I composed back in high school, and would be happy to donate them to the cause if you'd like. They're not particularly great, but if nothing else, I think they'd go well with MS Paint graphics.  Just let me know if you're interested in checking them out! -Tom |
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Post by Discoalucard on May 17, 2013 14:37:19 GMT -5
You know what? Sure! Send them over.
The music I have as placeholder stuff is from Asterix, Smurfs, some Martian Martian game for the Game Boy. The games themselves are eh, but the music in them is surprisingly great. I only stuck them in there because I was playing the NSFs when testing one day, found that they somehow went along, and added them in just to give something to listen to when mucking about it.
Thanks!
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Post by wyrdwad on May 17, 2013 15:54:15 GMT -5
No problem. I'll PM you a link or something after I get home tonight and ZIP 'em up.
-Tom
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Post by Discoalucard on Jul 7, 2013 10:03:23 GMT -5
So I've resumed work on this, fixed a few things up, and have posted the first act to play, which is (maybe?) a couple hours worth of time. www.hardcoregaming101.net/columbus/columbus-idiot-act1.zipI'll write up more on the official site update, but just keep in mind a few things: It's obviously in a rough state. It's definitely playable from beginning to end, but I'm sure there are bugs that we haven't stumbled upon. I'm also looking for feedback on sticking points, things that seem too confusing, things which are presented to the player out of order (it's tough designing something when you have three different quests going on at the same time!), things that break the game or seem buggy, or otherwise areas that are kind of stupid. My goal isn't to make the game difficult, just silly. Also, from a technical standpoint, AGS is weird. You might need to muck with the separate setup program to get the screen ratio correct, plus vsync only seems to work with the DirectDraw 5 driver. Even running in full screen, I can't get it working without the image being letterboxed. I've been told that there are some hacked versions of AGS that allow true widescreen support, and if that's the case, then I will be using those going forward. The game also runs in 16-bit color mode, so Windows might complain for a second when you start it. This is because there's a weird bug in AGS that causes MP3 files to skip when changing rooms, but only in 32-bit color mode. Finally, there are a number of characters here which don't seem to do much other than talk. That's because this chapter is just a setup, and they're meant to appear in the later chapters. This download encompasses the entirety of act 1, and the first two rooms of act 2. Which is...roughly a third of the currently planned game. Anyway, thanks to Asksped for supplying the soundtrack, which is simultaneously epic and silly, which is exactly the feeling I want. More proper write-up here: www.hardcoregaming101.net/columbus/columbus.htm |
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Post by NightWolve on Jul 19, 2013 13:54:05 GMT -5
You've got some grammar problems there, missing words is all. I guess the correction would be, "Christopher Columbus WAS someone so deeply IN denial...", etc. so FYI.Anyway, boy oh boy, this is DEFINITELY a game that I'd be willing to try, time permitting, eventually, etc.! Thanks!
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ruzan
New Member
A winner is you!
Posts: 15
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Post by ruzan on Jul 22, 2013 7:20:09 GMT -5
This looks awesome.
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Post by Joseph Joestar on Aug 5, 2013 14:01:37 GMT -5
Haven't had the chance to try it out yet but plan to eventually, if anything to find out what the pile of beavers is for.
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Post by Discoalucard on Aug 6, 2013 10:36:41 GMT -5
It's just sight gag, really.
Somewhere around here I have an 8,000 word document discussing the rationale behind the design and puzzles. It's a little hard to convince people to give this a shot considering MS PAINT, but it really is a fairly full featured game (or, part of a game, anyway). The only review on the AGS site cited some technical issues (which are kinda true, though some of them are flaws in AGS that I haven't figured a workaround for) but doesn't appear if they actually played it otherwise.
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Post by llj on Aug 8, 2013 20:05:18 GMT -5
The title of this game is more applicable to Christopher Columbus the movie director
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Post by Discoalucard on Aug 9, 2013 8:48:33 GMT -5
Now that you mention it, I think a very, very early story concept involved time travel or something that ended up with the explorer Columbus as the movie director Columbus, but, even for a game with electrical gas clouds from outer space, that was a little too out there.
He was a writer on The Goonies, so that will forgive any other terrible movies he has or will even make.
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Post by Joseph Joestar on Aug 9, 2013 8:53:47 GMT -5
I was going to defend him but yeah, looks like his main contributions were to Goonies, Gremlins, Adventures in Babysitting (which is an underrated movie), and Mrs. Assfire. The Harry Potter movies weren't bad for what they were either. It's just sight gag, really. Somewhere around here I have an 8,000 word document discussing the rationale behind the design and puzzles. It's a little hard to convince people to give this a shot considering MS PAINT, but it really is a fairly full featured game (or, part of a game, anyway). The only review on the AGS site cited some technical issues (which are kinda true, though some of them are flaws in AGS that I haven't figured a workaround for) but doesn't appear if they actually played it otherwise. The MS Paint look isn't bad, if anything it makes it look more absurdist. I keep forgetting to ask KaL, but wasn't he going to be spriting for the game? |
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Post by Discoalucard on Aug 9, 2013 9:50:52 GMT -5
Yup. The first screen is actually playable with graphics that he did (the animation is really, really good), but only that screen, so I dummied it out of the public release. He also did the beaver village background, which I haven't implemented yet. I suppose I could post it, if he's okay with it.
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Post by kal on Aug 9, 2013 11:42:14 GMT -5
You can Kurt the assets aren't 100% proper for it - go ahead though if you like. There's other characters and some backgrounds that are in various stages of completeness its just moving slowly atm Joe.
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Post by Joseph Joestar on Aug 9, 2013 11:56:31 GMT -5
You can Kurt the assets aren't 100% proper for it - go ahead though if you like. There's other characters and some backgrounds that are in various stages of completeness its just moving slowly atm Joe. Neat. I saw stills from the first screen but it'd be cool to see your art in motion. |
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