This blog has now moved to
enterthestory.wordpress.com
I'll still come back here to check for the next few days, but I get confused trying to run two different blogs on the same game. I'm using the name "Enter The Story" on everything, to keep things simple.
It feels like moving away from a childhood home - I'm gonna miss you guys (wipes tear from eye). But hopefully some of you might drop by the new place once or twice? I'll make cookies.
Friday, January 02, 2009
Thursday, January 01, 2009
This is probably the last but one blog here. 870 posts! That's a lot of blogging. Tomorrow I start blogging on enterthestory.wordpress.com - about Dante's Inferno! And hopefully not blogging about Les Miserables bugs that I missed. :)
LesMisGame.com now has its new look, and will probably be mothballed.
EnterTheStory.com has a new look, with new pages and screenshots, and most important an actual game. Plus a free demo.
I think I've trapped all the bugs that matter. By the time you read this, I should be well into designing Dante's Inferno.
LesMisGame.com now has its new look, and will probably be mothballed.
EnterTheStory.com has a new look, with new pages and screenshots, and most important an actual game. Plus a free demo.
I think I've trapped all the bugs that matter. By the time you read this, I should be well into designing Dante's Inferno.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
It is done.
https://secure.bmtmicro.com/servlets/Orders.ShoppingCart?CID=4751&PRODUCTID=47510000
I'll upload the free demo and the improved web site in the morning, then get emailing everyone who needs emailing. Then get working on Dante's Inferno.
I did it - and in 2008! With just minutes to go :)
Happy New Year!
https://secure.bmtmicro.com/servlets/Orders.ShoppingCart?CID=4751&PRODUCTID=47510000
I'll upload the free demo and the improved web site in the morning, then get emailing everyone who needs emailing. Then get working on Dante's Inferno.
I did it - and in 2008! With just minutes to go :)
Happy New Year!
Monday, December 29, 2008
I have a day with the family today so won't be able to put any finishing touches to the game, but I'm really happy with how it's looking. This last big revision was definitely worth it. Just about every task now has extra clues and various tweaks.
Sunday, December 28, 2008
You would not believe the time I spent today in tracing a tiny but annoying bug. Well actually I'm sure you would believe it : 8 hours. It was an annoying little thing - nothing major, but noticeable, and potentially very annoying, depending on what users do. What happens is, sometimes when a character enters a room they don't enter where you expect. They might float down from half way up the sky, or walk through some furniture, or they might be giant sized, or they might be pure white in a dark room. It didn't happen very often, and was usually fairly minor, but it happened enough to be worth fixing. It turned out to be a combination of several things:
1. Character have to be on a floor or they can't walk around things
2. The built in "find a floor" function isn't reliable for narrow floors (it just checks every ten pixels or something).
3. There is an alternative function, which will show if a floor exists at a particular place (I used this function to create my own "find a floor" code) but it only works for the part of the screen that's visible (it uses mouse coordinates, and gets very confused with negative numbers).
4. If a character suddenly appears out of nowhere then of course it looks wrong, but if they walk onto the screen then of course they have to start off away from a floor.
5. Coloring and scaling rely on being on a floor - so before you reach the floor you'll often look the wrong size and color.
6. If a character leaves a room you want them to change their appearance AFTER leaving. But if they enter a room you want them to have already changed BEFORE they enter.
7. During the normal tweaking of things the floors sometimes change, hence the risk of not being on a floor at a crucial moment (and hence being unable to walk normally).
8. It might be an idea to constantly check "is the character on a floor" but this leads to a jerky kind of walk.
9. I've also found out that AGS does not like complex floors - when moving between two adjoining floors (left to right), AGS often takes the scale from the BOTTOM of one floor and then jumps to the scale from the TOP of the other floor, resulting in a strange growing/shrinking walk. Not a major problem, but when combined with other minor niggles it risks becoming noticeable. I'll definitely design my rooms to avoid this in Dante.
10. Etc., etc.
None of these things seemed that important until this week, but I've been going through the game again and again, and have started to notice all those annoying little things that I just crossed my fingers and ignored before now.
Every time I fix some bug like that I think "This is it! Surely now it's finished!" And one of these hours/days it really will be. Honest! If you think YOU'RE impatient to see this thing finished, imagine how I feel - I've been working on this for ten years!
1. Character have to be on a floor or they can't walk around things
2. The built in "find a floor" function isn't reliable for narrow floors (it just checks every ten pixels or something).
3. There is an alternative function, which will show if a floor exists at a particular place (I used this function to create my own "find a floor" code) but it only works for the part of the screen that's visible (it uses mouse coordinates, and gets very confused with negative numbers).
4. If a character suddenly appears out of nowhere then of course it looks wrong, but if they walk onto the screen then of course they have to start off away from a floor.
5. Coloring and scaling rely on being on a floor - so before you reach the floor you'll often look the wrong size and color.
6. If a character leaves a room you want them to change their appearance AFTER leaving. But if they enter a room you want them to have already changed BEFORE they enter.
7. During the normal tweaking of things the floors sometimes change, hence the risk of not being on a floor at a crucial moment (and hence being unable to walk normally).
8. It might be an idea to constantly check "is the character on a floor" but this leads to a jerky kind of walk.
9. I've also found out that AGS does not like complex floors - when moving between two adjoining floors (left to right), AGS often takes the scale from the BOTTOM of one floor and then jumps to the scale from the TOP of the other floor, resulting in a strange growing/shrinking walk. Not a major problem, but when combined with other minor niggles it risks becoming noticeable. I'll definitely design my rooms to avoid this in Dante.
10. Etc., etc.
None of these things seemed that important until this week, but I've been going through the game again and again, and have started to notice all those annoying little things that I just crossed my fingers and ignored before now.
Every time I fix some bug like that I think "This is it! Surely now it's finished!" And one of these hours/days it really will be. Honest! If you think YOU'RE impatient to see this thing finished, imagine how I feel - I've been working on this for ten years!
Saturday, December 27, 2008
I'm three quarters through the final, final (etc.) test. Anyone who's tried the "final test version" will be pleasantly surprised that the "on sale" version will have a lot of improvements.
All going well the game should be done, done, done by tonight. Then I'll make the demo tomorrow and upload everything tomorrow night.
All going well the game should be done, done, done by tonight. Then I'll make the demo tomorrow and upload everything tomorrow night.
Friday, December 26, 2008
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