Messages

1

General / Re: Hmm, First Negative Review?

« on: December 27, 2007, 07:12:48 pm »

Eragon (Luke Skywalker) lives in a secluded town called Carvahall (Tatooine). There's a nearby kooky storyteller named Brom (Old Ben) who tells crazy stories about how Galbatorix (Emperor Palpatine), a Dragon Rider (Jedi), overthrew the Dragon Riders that ruled the land and created the Empire (the Empire). Then one day, Arya (Leia) is captured by Durza (Vader), but first sends the egg (R2D2) near Carvahall (near Luke's moisture farm), where it ends up in Eragon's hands (R2-D2 ends up in Luke's hands), and the empire comes to get it and destroys Eragon's farm (Luke's moisture farm), killing his uncle Garrow (uncle Owen) while Eragon was away. He flees with Brom to chase the Razac (Nazgul). Brom gives Eragon Zarroc, a Rider's sword (lightsaber), which eventually turns out to be his father Morzan's (Vader, Luke's father). They travel for a long time (like LOTR). Meanwhile Brom (Obi-Wan) trains Eragon in the ways of Magic (the Force). Then Brom dies at the hand of the empire (Vader killed Obi-Wan). Then Eragon meets Murtagh (Han Solo). They travel to the Varden (Rebel Alliance). They fight a big battle (of Yavin), and at the end, Eragon stabs the shade through the heart (Luke fires the proton torpedo into the thermal exhaust port of the Death Star), instantly winning the battle.  Eragon goes to Du Weldenvarden (Dagobah).  There he meets Oromis (Yoda), an old high-ranked Rider (Jedi) that everyone thought was dead (yep, Yoda). Oromis trains him in the ways of Magic (the Force).  Then, with magic, Eragon sees that the Varden (Luke's friends at Cloud City) is in trouble, and he leaves his training to go help (Luke left his training to rescue his friends). He goes and he fights for the Varden against the Empire. But all of the sudden, another rider (Jedi) appears and is stronger than Eragon (Vader). It turns out that it's Murtagh, who's been enslaved by Galbatorix (Han frozen in Carbonite). "Eragon, I am your brother!" "No! That's impossible!"  Then, Murtagh takes Zarroc (Vader causes Luke to lose his lightsaber), so he has to get one of his own (Luke again). Then the hero lives because of Murtagh's (Vader's) mercy out of brotherly (fatherly) love.

Sequel: Return of the Dragon Rider.
Three Prequels planned as well.


Eragon is a ripoff.  Aquaria is not.  Aquaria is a tribute to all preceeding games of the same genre.  It's hardly revolutionary.  What's groundbreaking is that such a game can still be fresh.  It's more of a revival than anything.

wwarnick

2

Games / Re: Making my own video game: Where to start?

« on: December 26, 2007, 09:03:34 am »

I started with QBasic, text-only.  My first graphic was a hardcoded smiley face (each pixel with its own PSET call) that you could move around with the arrow keys.  I had tried to pick up C++ and DirectX since, but I wasn't quite ready for it yet.  Since then, I've learned VB, Java, and C#.  A year and a half ago I discovered XNA, which is what I'm using today.  The first app I made with it was a boat race screensaver (a line of boats race around the screen).  I've since learned a ton of what goes into a video game.  XNA allows you to pass over some of the nitty-gritty details and get straight to the game without sacrificing too much capability.  And it's great for sprite-based 2D.

XNA is C#-only (I believe).  C++ is best performance-wise, but in my mind performance isn't a worry for newb indie devs like you and me, so C# is plenty good.  C# trades performance for convenience (less coding) and increased stability (less user-errors on the dev's part).  It's easier, but that doesn't mean it's a toy.  Unless you're a mainstream game developer, the tradeoffs are small (aside from OS portability).

If you're looking to dive a little deeper than flash or Clickteam, but not straight into C++ and DX or GL, I'd highly recommend C# and XNA.  Note, however, that XNA (and C# for that matter) is Windows-only.  Nevertheless, I find that a small price to pay for such a great tool, especially for an amateur like myself.  Anyway, good luck with your efforts.

wwarnick

3

General / Re: Game Tunnel Player's Choice *Needs Fan Support!*

« on: December 26, 2007, 03:46:53 am »

Aquaria wins the 2007 Quest / Adventure / Platform Game of the Year!

wwarnick

4

General / Re: Time Paradox [Spoilers]

« on: December 26, 2007, 03:34:02 am »

Sorry to bump this topic, but I'm still curious what the Time Paradox bug was.

wwarnick

5

General / Re: Plot Progression (spoilers)

« on: December 22, 2007, 10:21:41 am »

Not all gets answered, but alot does.  And don't think it's less epic than Mithala makes it sound.  In fact, it gets more epic.  Plus, you still have some play time after the sunken city before you meet the final boss, so no worries.

However, I agree that the pacing is funny at times.  There are long stretches without any story at all, then all of a sudden a ton of exposition is thrown at you.  But seriously, the fact that it has a good story (better than most professional games mind you) satisfies me.

wwarnick

6

General / Time Paradox [Spoilers]

« on: December 22, 2007, 10:13:45 am »

Warning - Spoilers!

BTW, don’t try to find out what the “Time Paradox” bug is unless you’ve already played the game or have experienced it. Its pretty cool and worth learning about, but it also involves spoilers.

Alec says the time paradox bug is pretty cool and I've searched for info on it, but I'm not sure what it is besides the fact that it involves beating the game without Li or visiting the Sunken City.  I've heard of people getting past the tongue with either the fish or nature forms, but that doesn't seem to merit the attention given to the time paradox bug (unless there's more to it than I realize).

BTW - I had to search the forums to find out about Li.  I'd seen him, but he wouldn't interact with me and it wasn't very obvious that he was retreating to the cave.  In fact, when I finally did follow him, sometimes he'd turn around and move away from the cave temporarily.  I was curious what he was, but without a Jenna voice-over or any kind of interaction, I left and forgot about him.  It would've been nice to have him with me during the jellyfish fight.  On the bright side, the game was more challenging without him.

wwarnick

7

General / Re: Recipe list should show the function of the individual recipes

« on: December 22, 2007, 09:40:31 am »

Agreed.  I hardly ever cooked because I didn't know what anything did and I didn't want to risk wasting my ingredients on something I don't need.  Fortunately I was able to play most of the game without cooking.  More of a challenge.

I think the world map can be improved by allowing the player to toggle which depth he is looking at.  Often I would want to look at a particular map, but it would be all but overwhelmed by another map of another depth on top of it.

Despite any complaints I might have, this was one of the most memorable games I've played in a long time.

wwarnick

8

General / Re: BUG found

« on: December 15, 2007, 02:53:13 pm »

I'd like to say how impressed I am with the stability of the game.  Only once has mine crashed.  I'm not sure why it did, but fortunately it was just after I'd saved and it was bedtime anyway, so no harm done.

wwarnick

9

General / Re: Amazing jump of crazyness! Includes screenshot (may have *slight* spoilers)

« on: December 15, 2007, 02:47:50 pm »

Or if you have a digital camera or camcorder, you could record the monitor.  Bad quality, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

wwarnick

10

General / Re: Conspiricy: Aquaria

« on: December 15, 2007, 02:44:45 pm »

Ah.  A more subtle infiltration on KingAl's part.  Are you part of the club?

Anyway, it's not so.  There were more than two.  They had a voice actress and some testers, so it all makes sense.

wwarnick

11

Gameplay / Re: The ending, final boss, etc. [Obviously spoilers]

« on: December 13, 2007, 03:22:41 pm »

Yeah, maybe it's subtle, but I think you're actually supposed to be experiencing Naija's life (ie playing the whole game)through your child's interaction with the blue crystal in the "secret" ending, hence all the voice over stuff talking about things in past tence.

Hence the fact that he bee-lines to the boat and takes off: to save Naija (maybe).

You know, we don't know anything about Li.  All we know is that he happened to be in the Veil.  How did he get there?  Who is he?  I wonder if we'll find out more in the sequel.

wwarnick

12

Gameplay / Re: Can't get health egg (SPOILERS)

« on: December 13, 2007, 12:03:21 am »

Stupid stupid me.  I don't know why I didn't remember that.  I've done it maybe three times already.

Thanks.  I appreciate it.

wwarnick

13

Gameplay / Can't get health egg (SPOILERS)

« on: December 12, 2007, 09:23:23 pm »

I just beat the boss in the frozen cave just off the frozen veil.  He dropped a health egg, but I can't take it, even if I swim right through it.  Is there a console cheat or any kind of workaround to get it anyway?

14

General / Re: Steam?

« on: November 05, 2007, 02:18:47 pm »

As an added point to the conversation think of Wolfenstien 3D and Doom, (some people still don't realize or even remember this) they were both released as Shareware and developed as indie titles by indie developers...

The reason some people don't realize it or even remember it is because it wasn't so.  Both games were published by Apogee, as was their first game, Commander Keen.  Their only indie title was a PC port of Mario Bros 3, which was never released.  And there were four members, not two.

...who's to say Aquaria won't get noticed without it?

Another Introversion example.  Introversion has stated more than once that Steam singlehandedly got their company back on its feet.  I would argue that the majority of the people out there don't read the gaming mags, and of those that do, many only read about games they are interested in and skip the rest.  Fact is, Steam introduces indie games to non-indie gamers.  That's exactly how I discovered them, and to this day I wouldn't have if it weren't for steam.