January 2008: officially started work on game
February 18 LiveJournal entry:
I can barely believe it.
I entered some code in Adventure Game Studio's global script, and it ACTUALLY WORKED. No error messages, no weird glitches, nothing! After years of strugging to wrap my head around this concept, I've actually been able to not only understand it, but actually USE IT.
I'm not a code virgin anymore!
March 5 LiveJournal entry:
Just when I think I've mastered the basics of AGS, something like this happens:
My character's idle views (views that play if you don't move the character for a certain amount of time) weren't playing. I tried everything I could think of to get them to work, closing and restarting the program, searching the help forums and the manual, but to no avail. I was up until 4:30 AM trying to fix this problem, unable to understand why such a simple thing was causing me this much trouble. Finally, I gave up, typed up a message to post on the help forums, shut down the computer and went to bed, prepared to humbly plead for help the next day.
Today, I started up the computer and AGS...
...and the idle views worked.
Much pain.
March 7: Imported nearly all of Thalia's sprites, most backgrounds finished (but not imported into AGS), most characters done. Finished intro, now working on implementing CommKey system.
March 18: Finished first batch of puzzles, now working on the first "interlude" and the meeting with Suzy-Ann - considering changing Suzy's last name from Edison to Alva.
Early March 19th: finished first closeup with Thalia and Suzy-Ann.
March 20: Finished KQ7 scene, started work on Sidonius' first appearance
March 22: Finished cutscene with Sidonius, Viewport in the Indiana Jones scrolling scene wouldn't work for me, so I set an invisible character as the player character and made it walk across the room to make the scene pan to the right (which I found much quicker and easier).
March 23: Ironed out all the errors in the second set of CommKey locations (Thalia's finger sticking in odd locations in the closeup, sounds and finger animations in the closeup not playing, etc.).
March 24: Added taking out CommKey animations for second set of locations, working on the locations themselves
March 25: Finished inserting card into walrus animation and getting tar animation, finished getting the bowling ball puzzle
March 26: Working on picking up bowling ball animation - this thing is LONG.
March 27: Finished picking up bowling ball animation, fixed problematic door bug in DOTT scene, working on Thalia/Tlotzin exchange in DOTT scene.
March 28: Finished DOTT scene, almost finished with team meeting scene in TP. 1068 sprites, 31 characters, 56 views
March 29: Finished TP scene and almost all of SQ4 secret room scene, starting on KQ7/SQ6 scene
March 30: Finished Ichabod/Thal conversation, working on KQ7/SQ6 scene (actual thought from today: "I need to make Clem drool less frequently.").
March 31: Finished KQ7/SQ6 scene, finished Sid/Thal conversation, implemented Thalia interactions, working on cutscene where Suzy-Ann calls Thal
April 1: Finished Suzy/Thal cutscene and LSL3 office room, working on puzzle room and animations
April 2: Worked on puzzle room door opening animation
April 3: Finished puzzle room door opening animation
April 4: Finished puzzle room knob and pliers animation, started work on throwing knob animation
April 5: Finished small EGA walk cycles, finished all puzzle room animations but picking up lube animation, implementing animations
April 6: Implemented all animations but "picking up lube" animation (yet to make)
April 7: Fixed problems with LSL3 office, added sound effects to puzzle room, worked on picking up lube animation
April 8-9: Finished puzzle room, SQ2 escape pod and Ichabod's Island Adventure, working on last "doors" cutscene
April 10: Finished doors cutscene, working on Inherit the Earth scene
April 11: Finished Inherit the Earth and Conquests scenes, starting work on Thalia's room scene
April 12: Started work on first Suzy/Thalia cutscene
April 13: Finished Suzy/Thalia cutscene
April 14: Working on animations for Sidonius's treehouse, modeling Sidonius' "real" room
April 15: Working on animations for Sid's treehouse, working on Sid's "real" room, writing text for rooms
April 16-17: Working on animations for Sid's treehouse, working on Sid's "real" room, working on GUIs
April 18: Working on animations in Thalia's room
April 19: Working on animations in Thalia's room and Sid's treehouse
April 20: Finished Thalia's room, working on Sid's treehouse
April 21: Working on Sid's treehouse animations
April 22: Finished opening chest animations and Joey emerging animations
April 23: Working on pole puzzle
April 24: Finished pole puzzle, just about finished Sid's room, working on stairs scene
April 25: Finished stairs scene, started work on Sid's real room
April 26: Working on Sid's room, finished picking up toenails animation
April 27: Working on Sid's room, started work on secret lab scene, working on inventory messages
April 28: Working on secret lab scene, starting work on drawing door cutscene
April 29: Working on secret lab scene and drawing door cutscene
April 30: Working on secret lab scene, finished drawing door cutscene, starting work on door opening cutscene
May 1: Working on door opening cutscene
May 2-6: (out of town)
May 7: Working on door opening cutscene
May 8: Working on door opening cutscene and lab animations. Became very concerned to find that the animating button on the Save/Restore menu was not animating (a problem which I thought I fixed after months of struggling with it), fortunately, I managed to fix it without much trouble.
May 9: Almost finished door opening cutscene
May 10: Finished door opening cutscene, added most music, working on smashing jammer cutscene
May 11: Finished smashing jammer cutscene, working on running down stairs cutscene
May 12: Finished running down stairs cutscene, working on shutting down main machine sequence, added cutscene beginnings and ends in script (strange AGS problem: I removed a sound from a loop frame, and when I tested the game, I still heard it. I tried everything I could think of to solve this problem, eventually resorting to moving the sound file to a different folder [oddly, when I moved them to the /AGS/Thalia/Compiled folder, it still played.])
May 13: Working on shutting down main machine sequence and DW2 cutscene
May 14: Finished secret lab room, working on DW2 animations
May 14-15: Finished Suzy jumping onto Thalia animation
May 16: Finished nearly all of the DW2 outro scene, starting work on Toonstruck scene (and listened to Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon for the first time)
May 17: Finished DW2 outro scene, finished most of the Toonstruck cutscenes
May 18: Finished Toonstruck cutscenes, working on Galapagos cutscenes
May 19: Worked on GUIs, finished Galapagos cutscenes
May 20: Worked on GUIs, fixed problem with DW2 scene
May 21: Talked with MusicallyInspired about credits music, started testing game by playing from start to finish
May 22-May 30: tweaking and testing
Jun 3: Game nearly complete except for outro/credits music, 3016 sprites, 69 characters, 117 views
Oct 27: Music FINALLY done, game released.
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