Game Devs Get Game Devs To Dev Games

The typical AGS "game developer" is not a professional, but rather someone who makes games as a hobby. That's actually quite a neat thing- no pressure, no deadlines, no worries about a hostile takeover or whatever troubles the big players. But even the most carefree dabbler in the art of point and click sometimes has to throw up their hands, shout Arrgh in a most frustrated manner and drop a project for whatever reason.

How could your average AGS game dev help out? Our very own Baron (already famed in song and story as the mastermind behind SWARMAGS) came up with an interesting idea and the result is
Devs-Anon (formerly "Group").

The idea is simple. Sometimes all you need to maintain steam during the development of your game is someone who supports, fortifies, questions you. Or gives you a well-meant flick with a rolled paper. If there was a small group of people all working on projects, each one taking some extra time to check on someone elses project (and act as a mix between Gemini Cricket and Robocop), the result could very well be more completed games.

I've registered into the Dev-Anon mostly because the concept sounds awesome, and I have a game I am a bit struggling with and I'm really just curious how the group support will play out. If you like the idea even half as much as yours truly, go check out the linked page and get a closer look.

AGS Bake Sale: Return of the Jedi

May the fifth be with you?

Yeah...no, not a good one. But the new AGS bakesale seems yummy, and that's a pun intended. With creators Ponch, Radiant, Tzachs and Baron. So, who gets the money? The AGS Server does. So it's money for the community and you get to play games. I'm not very good when it comes to promoting things I like, so I will just copy Ghost's beautiful handwriting from his web, and pretend I wrote it.

I do have to say that I love finding excuses to use the downtime label on this very blog, so, without further irrelevant stuff, Ghost's writeup on the AGS BakeSale II

2034 AC 2 by Ponch
Some time ago Ponch made a fun little "Canada after the Apocalypse" game starring brave, cute and dangerously media-aware Mountaineer Paige. AC 2 seems to be a follow-up and once more features Paige, Canada and a load of fourth-wall shattering lines.

BEER! by Radiant (of Crystal Shard)
A mixture of minigames and that bubbly stuff called "liquid bread" here in Germany. From the description it sounds like a tongue-in-cheek WarioWare "microgames" affair. We all know Radiant for coming up with highly creative coding and this title may have quite a few surprises in store.

Blue Lobe Inc by Baron
Described as "game, visual novel, and interactive comic" BlueLobe is a fundraiser indy game about... some guys launching an indie game company. If the concept doesn't hook you, it's also fully voiced and it has trendy cartoon speech bubbles.

That Damn Dog by tzachs (of Parking Goat)
In a "playable sitcom", one frustrated man faces one annoying dog. May or may not have a laugh track!

So there they are, four games ready to be yours. The minimum amount you have to pay is 1 dollar, which covers the transaction costs. But the sky is the limit- if you're feeling generous or just think the forum bill could use some of your money, just give what you like.

A little extra is the "bonus content"- if you pay over the (regularly calculated) average you'll get some goodies from the authors, mostly art, wallpapers, soundtracks and whatever they saw fit to put into the mystery bonus bundle.


So check out the site:

http://bluecupbakesale.com/

How I found AGS and why I am still using it: Part I - Baron

Basically, the ever awesome Baron shares his story as a forumite from his perspective. It is as subjective as it is interesting. Behind the most intriguing games possibly ever made, an unsung hero of the community. Also the first man to coordinate the biggest team perhaps in indie game development and actually make a game out of it. If his only achievement was coming up with the full title of Besieged (a wonderful reference to a certain Kubrick film) I would love him the same. Respect from this very greek. If you have never talked to the Baron, pm the bastard and start discussions about the conquest of the world. 

January 29, 2003: a day that will live in infamy in the annals of AGS history.  Or it would, if anyone ever wrote an AGS history -but that's another topic.  On this date I decided to stop lurking like some sort of creepy dude in the bushes and start participating in this community.  Can you believe I've been an AGSer for a decade!  My, the time flies when you're having fun.

     

But this is not going to be another gushing ode to the forum and its many temptations -I already exhausted that topic for my 1000th post last summer.  No, this rambling dissertation will attempt to account for the fruits of the vast amounts of time I have poured into AGS over an entire decade, with the aim of better understanding how I have evolved as an artist and where I am heading in the coming decade.  I'm also interested in your own AGS journey: where have you come from and where are you going?

So it all began for me back in the Silver Age of AGS: The universe had already cooled, Yahtzee had already left, and CJ only occasionally deigned to smite the odd mortal from his cloud-top perch.  And into this brave newish world I released the immensely silly AL-Quest 1:

I'm not going to delve into the game's obvious graphical failings.  I remember carefully overpainting all of the original Roger sprites that I had ripped from the Demo Game, only to discover that I created a character 1/6 proper scale ....and then changing the plot to involve a shrinking sequence so that I could make use of the work anyway!  Suffice it to say I learned a lot, which is apparent as the game progresses, but I'm still amazed to this day by the fact that I created an entire game of such length (40 rooms) without learning even a line of coding.  In fact, I never would have gotten into AGS at all if not for the no0b-friendly interaction editor.  I still think it was a mistake to let that lapse....  Anyway, AL-Quest 1 was never a huge hit, although player feedback was in general surprisingly positive.  Like most first projects, it was a fantastic learning experience and served as a good stepping stone for my future endeavours.

The next game I finished was The Winter Rose, released in 2005:

This project was a vast departure from AL-Quest.  Firstly, I made myself code everything -everything!.  Sure, I'd often use the interaction editor to see what code it would use to accomplish something, but it was 100% scripted by me.  I remember being so very proud of that fact, and of course the skills I learned in this process enabled me to undertake all manner of projects afterwards.  The game itself was graphically quite complex: hand-painted backgrounds with pixel work painstakingly made to fit in.  In terms of mood it was a much more sombre adventure than I had designed before, although as you can see from the screenshot of the heroine pulling a blade out of a yeti's butt I never did manage to tame the silly beast within....   The Winter Rose was very well received, but people were in general disappointed by the ending -I've tried to internalize that lesson in the endings of my subsequent games.  

Next I worked on my opus, Charlie Foxtrot and the Galaxy of Tomorrow, a parody of the sci-fi genre released in 2007:

At 80 rooms this is the biggest game I ever finished.  The backgrounds are occasionally cringe worthy, and the MIDI music was a bit of a bust (which taught me to seek out the aid of competent musicians in future), but the animation is masterful -masterful!   Even today I am amazed at the sheer amount of animation, and by the fact that it was entirely done with MS Paint.  What was I thinking!?!  I don't even know what I could accomplish if I still had that amount of time on my hands.... The game was incredibly and intentionally silly -for the first puzzle you have to flush yourself down an alien toilet to escape the guards (pictured).  At any rate, the game was a bit of a cult classic, very much appreciated by people who like my silly humour.  I learned a lot about animation, but most importantly I learned if I was going to pursue more ambitious projects I would need to depart from my old methods.

So I decided to try collaboration.  The first attempt was with Yarooze with Besieged, released in 2008.

 

Graphically it is the best pixel art I've ever done (character art & animations -Yarooze did the backgrounds).  Funkmast's music was phenomenal.  The plot was about a lowly dung-shoveller who had to save the castle from a siege before the king catapulted him to death.  Perhaps there was a bit too much toilet humour (you literally had to sit on "the throne" a couple times to solve a puzzle), perhaps it was the authentic Olde English font that was slightly hard to read, or maybe it was just that I put it into the "short" category in the database, but for whatever reason the game never seemed to gain any traction with the players.  Considering all the work I put into the art, this made me reflect that if I was going to keep making games with my shrinking free time (ah, the perils of parenthood...), I would really have to streamline my work process.

So I collaborated again, this time with Ascovel (Igor) on a MAGS game, later expanded to a proper game with extra scenes, named Snakes of Avalon, released in 2010:  

I expressly wanted to work on the animation using the vector power of Flash, but had a fantastic time bantering plot ideas back and forth with Igor.  While the animation was panned by the critics, the amount that I learned was well worth the effort, as I easily cut the amount of effort-per-frame by 3/4.  Suddenly the sky was the limit!  I was also very satisfied that the macabre plot and social commentary in the game were extremely well-received, but of course a large portion of the credit for this goes to Igor.

My secret plan for refining my skills with vector-animation was to undertake an epic fantasy project.  I haven't finished it, and have abandoned it twice already, but I feel Curses & Castles is an important part of my growth as an AGSer so I'll share it here:

The lazy and sarcastic uncle-king has been turned into a frog (and ever present side-kick), while his dutiful princess-niece has to save the realm from five curses of an arch-sorceress.  The idea was to make a commercial adventure of epic scope and length, and I think that's why it failed (at least, so far....).  In retrospect it was too big, too ambitious for one man to actualize in his occasional spare hours.  When I pushed myself to burn the candle at both ends my health began to fail me, and it's been an off-and-on relationship between me and the game ever since.  I still believe that if I could pull this off it would be a fantastic game, but....  Well, perhaps one day I'll cobble together the means to pull it off.

A little depressed by the failure of C&C, I kind of shot my mouth off about a crazy new way of making games where everyone would do a minimal amount of work but together could create a masterpiece of game art.  While this dream of effortless game creation never really panned out (it was actually a lot of work!), the resulting Draculator II, sometimes simply referred to as "The Swarm Project", renewed my interest in the AGS community.  It was released in 2011:

 

Despite the copious correspondence required to coordinate the efforts of 40 swarmers, I liked the challenge of trying to weave it altogether into a unique piece of art.  Yeah it was short, but I will always value the connections I made through the effort.  It's also been great to fall back on that network to find collaborators for other purposes, be it voice actors or people with technical abilities far beyond my own (ie coding, sound editing, music, etc. etc.).     You rock, Swarm.

After the swarm project I tried my hand at a shorter, hereto unannounced fantasy project tentatively called Flutterby Dawn about a secret agent pixie who has to combat the evil designs of the Order of Nefarious Organisms (ONO):

  The background world was to be a living organism, with all native "technology" really just repurposed organisms (such as the sparkle vision set, pictured), and the plot a kind of James Bond-esque tongue-in-cheek spy thriller.  This time I spent much less time on art (very little animation, minimal effort on backgrounds) in an attempt to finish the game first, and then polish it up later.  Various strains on my free time (new job, no sleep due to expanding family, etc.) have also caused this project to be shelved for the time being, but as equilibrium is slowly restored to my life I can see myself picking it back up.

And lastly, I finally did finish a vector-art adventure, although you won't be able to play it until March or April or whenever the next Bake Sale is finally going to be released.  This is Blue Lobe Inc., the story about a trio of hapless adventure game developers who start their own company to make commercial adventure games (ah... sound familiar?   ).

  It's supposed to be a web-comic/game/cartoon about adventure gaming.  You'll notice more than just a bit of commentary about the classics, including the occasional puzzle twist from the past!  The game mostly makes fun of my own failed ambitions, while ironically potentially being a successful fundraising vehicle for the AGS community.  Only time will tell on that front! 

So, in conclusion, it's been a long journey, I'm still puttering away at stuff, maybe one day I'll make that perfect game, yada yada, yada.  So how did you become the master game-maker of the future?  What's your last decade been like in terms of AGS productivity?  Share! 

Snakes of Avalon gets RPSed.

An overall critical acclaim is what seems to still to this day, be enjoyed by the much hitchhockian (or whatever the word seems to be) Snakes of Avalon. The amazing Igor Hardy (the co-creator of Snakes, the other being the amazing Baron), delivers a fresh and fully punk-rock interview to one of the staff in Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

Well worth a read. The game of course is well worth a play, I won't repeat myself.

INTERVIEW HERE

GAME HERE

Snakes of Avalon on Alternative Magazine Online

Jamie Downes has written a very wonderful review on Snakes of Avalon, created by well, Igor Hardy, who is just plain fantastic, and Baron, who is plain impossible and a bunch of other talented people, especially Thomas Regin.

Anyhow, here is the review, I hope you like it.

As for who is Jamie Downes, he keeps this wonderful blog, that he probably will come back to, I cross my fingers.

You know what's hot?

1) Well, of courze ze bait of ze dracoolator, numbbberr too.
(I apologize at very bad attempt at imitating a romanian accent.)

Anyhow, indiegames featured it.

2) Oh, and before i forget, something a bit old, but well, Dave needs to know :D. Indiegames's Cassandra Khaw, reviews The Blackwell: Deception.

Clickity clicky.

3) And lastly, a radio podcast with Dave Gilbert.
As he had to say "If you care to hear me ramble about game development, I was interviewed by the Geekfist podcast during New York Comic Con. We talk about Blackwell, comics, and assorted nerdery."

BYTE OF THE DRACULATOR II

PLOT: Vampire + Mad Scientist + Terminator + Hot Twins. Do you need more?

MORE INFORMATION: This game is the fruit of the Swarm, an experimental collaborative project of the AGS Community to prove that you can Zerg Rush the f#$^ out of a game.The list of credits is impossible as many AGSers collaborated on this project. Along with the game, a fantastic voice-pack is included, that will totally crack you up. Especially Merrick's voice by ShiverMeSideways, is a reason alone to play this game.

GET TEH GAMEZ HEARS

AGS Bake Sale gets some fresh coverage

Yeah, well, here's an article on INDIEGAMES.

Also Darth Mandarb, has taken a very fantastic task to keep all the games in one topic and update the links and stuff.

So. Well, here

Have a nice day!

Maggie, I really should be back at school

It's not quite late September, but it IS two months late! Maggies winner this year was Snakes Of Avalon! Congrats to Ascovel Hardy and Baron!

ZERG RUSH HOUR

It seems that a new craze similar to the Starcraft in Korea, has gotten over the AGS Forums. Anyone could say the idea behind it, is either the work of a genious or of a totally stupid person.
Regardless it's amazing how everyone has hugged this project.

Baron, the famous ags member, thought of the following formula, initially wondering if it's doable.

"I figure it will take me another 1000 hours to finish my game. Then I got to thinking, if I could only amass a swarm of 1000 fellow AGSers then we could knock the whole thing off in just 1 hour. To summarize:

Man-Hours for Project =1000
Number of Men = 1
Hours to Project Completion =1000

And we increase the number of men, so:

Man-Hours for Project =1000
Number of Men = 1000
Hours to Project Completion =1

And suddenly since last week, everyone started contributing stuff!
So all you need is to dedicate one hour to do what you choose to do. From character art, animation, background art, writing, coding, music, sound effect, anything goes!!

Here, do your thing and be immortalized into what can be named as the most awesome thing ever.

Gutter Comfort: How Snakes of Avalon became the flawed hero of indie games

Dear reader,
I won't presume your reaction to these accusations, but I remain presumptuous in making them. You're an indie game fan, of course - but it's even more likely that you're one of a few hundred folks who considers yourself an indie developer. You make games, right? That's my best guess. Here's why that's worth remarking on, before we even talk about Snakes of Avalon: we have to agree on our shared context. INDIE GAMING's most salient grounding points are rooted in the notion that compromises in quality are necessary, because hey - You're on a budget (if you even have a budget) and you can't afford to rent a warehouse, let alone stock and staff it with expert light riggers, composite engineers, or a legal team. But, still, you somehow persist. The potential contribution of your Indie Game is greater than that of those so-called “AAA” games, which are inseparably bound to test audience consensus, board meeting red tape, and aggressive, ROI-minded streamlining. Your game would get watered down pretty fast in that world, and the bracing impact would be lost.

To them, your game wouldn't be worth making. To them, "indie games" are just a double-standard that grants freedoms and permits poor craftsmanship. But, still, you somehow persist. Because your story couldn't be told any other way. Because the greatest symphonies and poetry and novels and paintings weren't accomplished through market research and endured no sub-committees worth remembering - our great cultural inheritance is studded with masterpieces typically made by single individuals barfing their smelly guts out in either high-tone bravura or gritty greyscale, shown to anyone who will look. Now, to be worthy of this artistic inheritance and to make your contribution, you must persist without compromise. Indie Games are small, defiant stories told to anyone who will listen.

Snakes of Avalon is, in fact, a small defiant story told to anyone who will listen. We watch the storyteller barf his smelly guts out in the lowest of slapstick pathetia, but we're compelled by him. He's eager to glimpse the true, silently rumbling pulse of all meaning, but is interceded by his bouncing full bladder while respectable strangers look away with shame. Our protagonist is a failed man, once capable of greatness, who drowns his guilty blinking sorrow in a dive bar full of strangers. The more he drinks, the more he forgets, and it becomes easier for him to smile and for us to laugh along. Not a space marine or sexy gun-toting hero, but a drunken citizen, tearfully trying to remember a once shining truth and finding only watery beer - what can we do but laugh along as he stumbles. He's talking to a mounted fish, now! But still, he somehow persists.

If you've never been drunk and if you've never been a failure, Snakes probably isn't for you, indie developer. (Of course, that's no compliment to either this game or drinking. Or failing. Although I do recommend all three.) Because if you're going to create art, there are stern lessons to be found in this game - and though the vibrant punchlines are told boldly, they reveal the embarrassingly common thread of our ultimate ineptitude in the face of that true, silently rumbling pulse of all meaning. So, unless you've been a drunken failure at least once, you won't get the inside jokes. Also, get off the internet and work on your game, you unsoiled teetotaler. You've got a failure to finish.

Regarding the indie game double-standard I mentioned before, the game's creators Igor Hardy & Alex van der Wijst are getting by on charm. The main reason to play this game, the main reason to play any game, is for the story - which, in the case of Snakes, is as finely conceived and well-told as any other game I've played in years. The screenplay accomplishes its goals with warbling flourish - to further elaborate would necessitate the dissection of dialogue from character. Is that what video game reviews do? Or is it only done when the reviewer doesn't enjoy the game? Either way, if the writing IS the character who IS the art, then our gameplay experience is derived wholly from the blurry sensations of our melodramatic drunk; his ability to witness his immediate surroundings, his inability to do so, his desire to escape them, and his urgency to remember the greater truth of How did I get here, after all?

That being said, and as a small footnote to all of this, I should admit to being kind of curious about what these authors could make with a team of artists and animators? The "talking" animations were charming and, visually, Snakes is cohesive and self-reliant, but here's the deal. Double standard or no, developers (like yourself) are always at risk of losing the respect of their audience. Even though Hardy & van der Wijst have waltzed a wavy and deliberate line into risky stylistic territory, I can't help but feel that it's the finer production aspects that might prevent a wider audience from appreciating their great story. Voice acting is limited only to the cutscenes, and the recording quality of the spoken dialogue introduces those same old questions about developer resources and indie games and blah blah blah. The beneficial double-standard begins to deteriorate.

But, what if they had money to hire voice actors and a sound engineer... Or a team of animators? Or a 3D modeling engine? Who knows to what great heights this game might climb? Or yours! Just imagine how great your contribution could be, if only we lived in a world where profoundly written indie games have the staffs and budgets of those laser-sharp FPS cinemagasms that cost seventy five bucks to play. But it's only a dream, and one not worth sharing. I think we all know that it's better this way, and the joy of playing a game like Snakes of Avalon (or others like it) is that we're privileged to witness the creative process on its own terms. To play an independent game is to watch artists persist. In rare cases like this one, we get the chance to witness art being made. (I'd advise you to play worse games if you don't understand the difference.)

So, I propose we all drink a toast to Igor, Alex, and their man, Jack. Here's to cutting your own ragged path toward the truth. A toast to our shared circumstance - a huge, world-wide dive bar where indie developers like you and me can whisper our small, defiant stories and people will listen, all persisting into a night full of puns and sorrow, free drinks and infinite continues.

Richard Hofmeier is closest to glimpsing the unspeakable truth when speaking puns to empty streets at night. You can contact him through his website: richardhofmeier.com

AGS Nominations 2010: Snakes of Eternal Journey Down Technobabylon

Bicilotti as a proud host has created a very unique and awesome way to present the nominations for the AGS Awards of 2010. An AGS executable. Check it out here.

From this paragraph and further down the games will be listed. I will have a download link for each game that appears for the first time, so you can guys download. Regardless, I must say they were all predictable, as anyone with a right mind would pretty much expect them. All but some.
Head over Heels for instance stroke me with a happy remark. The best demo category is full of unexpected nominees. And I was sad, cause for another year, none of my games got nominated. But that was expected too. But one nomination. THAT SINGLE NOMINATION MADE MY DAY.

List of nominees as follows:

Best Game Created with AGS for 2010

Eternally Us
Snakes of Avalon
Technobabylon - Part I
Technobabylon - Part II
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Gameplay

Eternally Us
Snakes of Avalon
Technobabylon - Part I
Technobabylon - Part II
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Original Story

Eternally Us
Snakes of Avalon
Technobabylon - Part I
Technobabylon - Part II
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Dialogue Writing

By the Numbers
Eternally Us
Snakes of Avalon
Technobabylon - Part II
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Puzzles

Eternally Us
Hard Space: Conquest of the Gayliks!
Snakes of Avalon
Technobabylon - Part I
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Short Game

Eternally Us
Kuma Story
Head over Heels
rein
Technobabylon - Part I

Best Demo

Blockz
Indy and the Crystal Cursors
Indiana Jones and the Seven Cities of Gold
Matt to the Future
Quantumnauts

Best Non-Adventure Game Created with AGS

1st Drop
Barn Runner Halloween 1: Fully Automatic Mojo
Infinity bit
Operation: FORKLIFT
Space Pool Alpha

Best Player Character

OSD: Blades of Passion
Hard Space: Conquest of the Gayliks!
Professor Neely And The Death Ray Of Doom
Snakes of Avalon
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Non Player Character

A woman for all seasons
Earl Bobby is looking for a Loo
Technobabylon - Part II
Snakes of Avalon
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Background Art

Eternally Us
Professor Neely And The Death Ray Of Doom
Technobabylon - Part I
Technobabylon - Part II
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Character Art

Eternally Us
Death: Episode One
Hard Space: Conquest of the Gayliks!
Professor Neely And The Death Ray Of Doom
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Animation

By the Numbers
Eternally Us
Hard Space: Conquest of the Gayliks!
rein
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Sound Effects

Eternally Us
Earl Bobby is looking for a Loo
Hard Space: Conquest of the Gayliks!
Snakes of Avalon
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Music

Eternally Us
Hard Space: Conquest of the Gayliks!
Snakes of Avalon
Technobabylon - Part II
The Journey Down: Over the Edge

Best Voice Work

Ben Jordan: Paranormal Investigator - Case 2 Deluxe
By the Numbers
Earl Bobby is looking for a Loo
Eternally Us
OSD: Blades of Passion

Best Programming

By the Numbers
Eternally Us
Infinity bit
Operation: FORKLIFT
Space Pool Alpha

Interview Part 13: Snascovel of Abaron

Tonight, we host two great fellows. Igor Hardy, or Ascovel, (famous for some blog about something, can't remember now... and won a best demo AGS award for 2009) and of course the ultimate AGSer, Baron, or Alex Van Wijst (famous for Mittens 2007, Besieged, Charlie Foxtrot and of course the Winter Rose!

However they combined their forces together, and along with the complementary awesomeness of Thomas Regin in the music department, originally for the MAGS I hosted and set the theme for, they created SNAKES OF AVALON. If you absolutely have no clue, check the game here.
And if you want my opinion on it, check the review here.


1) First, let's go by the book. What is your favorite videogame? Is there an AGS one you particularly like?

Baron: My all-time favourite video game is Dr. Mario -now you know. My favourite adventure game is SQIII, so it should be no surprise that I'm a huge fan of the equally zany sci-fi AGS-made games like Time Gentlemen Please and the Barn Runner series.

Igor: My favorite game of all time would be Grim Fandango.

As for AGS games, I'm fond of way too many to list and I fear the recent onslaught of Oceanspirit Dennis productions has been spoiling my taste ;), but I’d like to mention 3 titles that are particularly important to me: Nelly Cootalot, The Winter Rose (made by some brilliant guy I know nothing about) and Infinity String.

The reason why I have a special fondness for those 3 is that I consider them to be the first utterly delightful and must-play amateur adventure games I’ve played (despite the fact I did try out quite a few before). It meant a lot to me to see that adventure games fans can treat their work this seriously, and yet… succeed at completing such top quality projects.

2) How hard is to go back and improve what's already been done? (referring to you improving Snakes of Avalon)

Baron: It had been a massive effort to complete the MAGS version by the contest deadline, and after that we just crashed. We determined that after a month's rest we would take a week to fill in the gaps and add an extra scene that was cut in the original due to time constraints. Based on our productivity in the three weeks leading up to the MAGS release this seemed very feasible, but in fact it took us several months to finally complete the game.

Igor: For various reasons our ambitions had grown far beyond the earlier plans - definitely the main reason behind us pushing the release date back several times. My estimate is that, instead of the expected week, adding the new content took us at least 1,5 month in total (broken up by a long period of holidays, renovations and computer crashes in July/August).

Nevertheless, to the very end we were extremely efficient every time we did sit down to work. We made good decisions and implemented new ideas really fast. Also, no concept we came up with, nor any animation, piece of code, or piece of music was ever wasted or proved to be out of place. So we were able to avoid any major mistakes and take advantage of 99% of what we created for Snakes in the final version of the game.


3) What was the reason behind the improvement of Snakes?

Igor: The MAGS Snakes came together so well that we didn’t want to leave it as an unpolished 1 month production. For example, having a main menu seemed useless during MAGS, but for a serious production it felt like a must. Similarly, the interface in the original needed a few fixes and many dialogs seemed rushed (non-interactive and missing important beats for the story and characters).

Then there was the opportunity to work with Thomas Regin on the soundtrack –an aspect which even on its own would make the updated game a fresh, new experience.

And finally, we invented that huge nightmare segment. It came out of our discussions about the meaning of the game’s story and I feel in the end gave it much more depth and resonance.

4) Lots of people found the game having lots of references to Hitchcock's cinematic style. Mostly his film Vertigo. Comment on that.

Igor: I’m not sure how people really feel about it (as far as I know, only the Vertigo poster reference was discussed by players), but I certainly used Hitchcock’s name in almost every description of what the game is about – my great marketing ploy. I was long wondering how to explain the genre of fiction the story belongs too. It had murder, it had mystery, but it wasn’t really a “murder mystery”. It was some sort of trippy, pulpy, suspenseful thriller with both creepy bits as well as humor in it, and so I thought Hitchcock’s name is possibly the only 1-word label that can bring to mind all of those qualities.

And there actually are many vintage Hitchcockian themes and gimmicks in Snakes: the hero spying on people, a “man who knew too much”, the hero passing out in a stressful situation, family issues, murder in domestic environment, scary scenes featuring bathrooms, dark silhouettes, and dramatic stings in the musical score.

Additionally, we tried to make the scenes feel as dynamic and cinematic as possible, so there are many close-ups, unexpected cuts, jumps in time etc. I’m particularly fond of the real-time abrupt focus changes, like the weird, static cuts between the two parts of the bar – I think they are unusual, rough, but work well.

5) Can you tell us a bit about the team. Introduce us to the members and comment on each person's work and work-flow.

Baron: I have been a member in good-standing at the AGS forums for seven years now. I've started many projects, but only finished 5 adventure games to date. I like to experiment with different genres, so it would be hard to identify a consistent theme to my games outside of humour. I really do have fun making adventure games and I want people to have fun playing them.

My reason for entering the MAGS competition was to implement a new experimental animation process I'd been developing to cut down on production time. I made this very clear from the outset to Igor, who graciously gave me free reign in the character design and animation department. We had a very loose design document outlining and prioritizing some 60 animations, but usually Igor would PM me what animations he'd need that day and I would do my best to pound them out that evening.

Igor: The team for the original version from April was just Alex and me. And qptain Nemo beta-tested our creation when it was ready. After MAGS, we were joined by Thomas Regin who composed Snakes’ original music. The occasional cutscene voice-overs were provided by family members, friends and Alex himself. However, Jack’s voice was provided by Drew Wellman (ddq). At the very end of development, we had additional beta-testing help from Leon.

So the core team is just the 3 of us - Thomas, me and Alex…

Thomas is best known for his soundtracks to Wadjet Eye’s games, including the beloved Blackwell series, but he also composed for dozens of commercial game titles. He is a master of many genres – a versatility which we were most happy to exploit for the whimsical (or even grotesque) nature of the game as it alternates between suspense, humor, jazz and even plain horror.

Based on our collaboration I can say Thomas works quickly and with passion and is a shameless perfectionist. Sadly I don’t know any of his true work-flow secrets I could spread around.

As for me, I love creating games and stories that are at least a bit unconventional. I feel great doing prototypes and experimenting with design while scripting rather than in theory. Consequently, I hate overly detailed design documents and I wouldn’t feel like I’m truly designing a game if the complete design would came first and implementation only at the very end.

My personal work flow is a combination of laziness, perfectionism and millions of how-to-make-this-feature-several-times-better-with-minimal-additional-effort-but-it-turns-out-later-it-wasn’t-so-easy ideas.

6) How was Snakes of Avalon initially born?

Baron: I was interested in partnering with someone for the April MAGS competition so I could share the predictable humiliation of being bested by Ben304 and Leafshade -er...., I mean experiment with animation techniques. I posted in the RAT thread and received a PM from Igor pitching this intriguing concept of a drunk who overhears a murder plot in the bar that he never leaves. Considering the MAGS rules that month dictated “one room”, I thought it a brilliant setting: not only does a bar lend itself to all sorts of shenanigans, but the drunken perceptions of the lead protagonist create almost infinite possibilities in terms of puzzles and gameplay. Four weeks of intensive and enthusiastic labour saw Igor's vision actualized as the original Snakes.

Igor: Yep, that’s how I would describe it too. But it’s worth adding that I originally had a rather modest and crude game in mind - so that we wouldn’t have problems finishing it in a month. It’s Alex who insisted that we go so crazy with hallucinations, animations and the like and once we started in that direction soon there was no sanity left for us.

7) Are there any plans for a sequel? Or what can we expect from you guys in the future (any projects you're into) ?

Baron: I'm amazed at the number of people interested in seeing a spin-off featuring “Bathroom Man”. But seriously, there is no planned sequel. I may or may not be working on a secret fantasy adventure game though.

Igor: I feel we used up Snakes of Avalon themes to their full potential. The story is complete. The characters ended up like they were supposed to. So any new Avalon game would feel like a forced add-on that would only weaken the impact of the original. I have to admit though that it would be nice to have a peek inside Avalon’s toilet and enter Avalon’s smelly kitchen.

As for my next game I’m working on a short-to-medium length adventure game project that will be really experimental in terms of interface and gameplay. This game will be different from Snakes in many ways – e.g. grounded in a consistent, mundane reality (no surreal touches at all).

After that I’m planning to finish off my original game - Frantic Franko - which is a crazy, surreal game quite akin to Snakes. I treat it as a “designer’s playground” - it will be full of strange, hairy, half-baked gameplay concepts gone wild and showing obscene gestures to innocent bystanders. I’m planning to have it ready for fall 2011.

8) What do you guys do beside the game-making industry. I'm referring to your real life.

Baron: I am a full-time parent who occasionally works as a substitute teacher to pay the bills. I play a lot of hockey, am an amateur but very enthusiastic carpenter, manage websites for various community groups I am involved with, and play with AGS to avoid working on my novel (the true secret to my productivity is revealed!).

Igor: For a living I’m doing freelance video-editing and occasionally translating work (just Polish-English, English-Polish).

Some strange journalistic passions make me take care of the indie adventure games blog A Hardy Developer’s Journal, and occasionally write for gaming websites like Adventure Classic Gaming.

I also try to secure some time for learning and perfecting various languages (non-programming kind), watching films, reading fiction and philosophy. A few times a week I like to break up my mostly sedentary life with sports – preferably tennis and long-distance running.

9) Is there an AGS game in production you're very excited about?
Baron: Expectation is the root of all heartache! Where is Herman Toothrot's Monkey Island when you need it?

Igor: I’m really looking forward to Shattenrayze, Gemini Rue and The Cat Lady. I expect them to be nothing less than mindblowing.

Also, I’m eagerly expecting new installments of all those cool series I’m following - from Blackwell, through Ben & Dan to Death Wore Some Feathers and Second Face.

Review: Snakes of Avalon

Igor Hardy and Alex Van Wijst, initially released a very trippy game for the OROM (One Room One Month) MAGS competition. Having lost for a small number of votes, the game gathered some interest. However my initial concerns back then were that the game was plot-wise tied in a very random way. So Igor Hardy with the help of his old team, and with some great new recruits such as Thomas Regin on the music side, decide to re-release the game, adding some content in the meantime.

-Story:
You found yourself drunk in a bar, hallucinating in the meantime, being asked what happened. It's not clarified whether you talk to yourself, to the cops, or a pretty lady, or this is all just a dream, and that feeling is repeated throughout the game in a great way, so it's up to the player to choose what happened exactly. So the story goes into flashback mode, to explain what happened through the eyes of Jack (you) in that bar. I think Mr. Hardy sums up the story wayyy better than I could ever attempt to:

Snakes of Avalon is a dark comedy point & click adventure game about alcoholic incapacitation and people obsessed with murdering their other half. It mixes the style and atmosphere of Hitchcock suspense films with a surreal game world inspired by your favorite trippy movies.

The game is separated into 4 acts all tied between them in a great way.

The greatest part of the game is the additions though. Instead of somewhat vague and random events, now the game has a more easy storyline to follow. The cinematic scenes help greatly in both the understanding of the story as well as the artistic style of the game.

Also a great number of references appear, including my favorite Knights of the Old Republic, and if you come across one, they will make you smile for sure.

-Graphics:
The graphics initially may seem what one can normally expect. But instead they contain great animations and lots of close-ups for a what seems to be a very simplistic style. They get really great to the eye on some parts of the game, and they help the immersion greatly.

-Music/Sound:
And here comes Thomas Regin. The theme still played in my head while I was writing this review, and I think that pretty much means its bloody memorable. The whole soundtrack is very neatly done and fits the atmosphere and surrealism of the whole game. The ambient sounds help the atmosphere as well, especially on the "boss fight" sequence.

You can play the game here. Or else I'll find you and kill you.

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