The Dink Network

Malachi the Jerk - Report bugs here

October 3rd 2013, 02:10 AM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I told myself I wasn't gonna do this - that I was going to wait until I'd all but finished and ask for beta testers. I ought to know myself better than that.

Malachi the Jerk is a dark but silly comedy in which Dink (and you) are tormented by a real jerk.

That word has a lot of meanings, so let me be crystal clear.

jerk (n.)
Someone who thinks they are better than everyone else. Arrogant, mean, conniving. Will use people for no other reason than to hurt them, causing themselves joy.


That's the kind of jerk we're dealing with here. He'll ruin your day for fun and profit.

The central theme of this story is "frustration." How much can one man take? How deep do you get in before you're just causing your own problems? Is perseverance even worth it in the face of so many setbacks? And by the way, just who does this Smallwood guy think he is, anyway?

He'll have to find out. So will you.

Screenshots.
1

2

3

4

I suspect that for you guys, this DMOD will be a bit of a throwback. That's okay. I'm not going to wow anybody with my programming or game design (and I certainly can't do my own graphics), but I'm doing my best on both while focusing on my strength, which is writing - at least, I hope it's my strength. Don't worry, I didn't use any of my best lines so far in those screenshots.

I've been working on this several hours a day since September 18 (and planning for some time before that), and I intend to continue working hard on it. Having said that, right now there's only 18 screens and 45 scripts. Some might call me detail-oriented, others slow; both would be correct. This is going to take a LONG time, folks.

It's an odd thing, making a DMOD now. I think I missed the boat by a couple of years, which is a real shame, but I'm going to do it anyway. 15 years ago, I was the worst person in the world at something, and I've never felt okay with that. I'm here to set things right. It would have been cool if any of the people who were around when I was a miserable drain on the community were still here to see it, but I'm really doing it for myself.

Hell, I've already put more effort into this one than all my previous mods combined. I never knew what a depth dot was back then, or how to use hardness tiles. I only ever knew a handful of DinkC commands. I've rectified all of that now (Thanks, Robj and other tutorial makers!).

I've already designed the broad outlines of the game and written some key scenes. It will feature:

*11 major areas, probably comprising somewhere around 300 screens total, although that's very subject to change

*A subquest that involves collecting things and leads to an alternate ending

*Just loads of dialogue. Seriously, I hope you guys like text.

*A respec system - this one is already fully implemented. Once per level, you can take all of the points you've assigned at level-ups and reassign them. Stats you got by potions are not affected and can't be changed. Anybody who knows DinkC knows how I did this, but since it was the first script I wrote after watching the tutorials, I'm rather pleased that it works.

*Lots of graphics from the wonderful dev files available on this site

I've also done lots of design work on an idea I have for a very serious and ambitious epic (a story I'm very excited about), but if I get around to that at all it'll surely be after I've finished my "play the DMODs" project.

So yeah, throw this on the pile of announcements. I shall continue to plow onward.

POST-RELEASE EDIT: Please post bug reports here. Post other discussion in the "new DMOD: Malachi the Jerk" topic. Thanks.
October 3rd 2013, 03:47 AM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I don't even see your posts, Pun. Just FYI.
October 3rd 2013, 03:57 AM
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Great to see a new DMOD up cocomonkey!
and I saw his post..jerk lol
October 3rd 2013, 07:52 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Lovely! The premise and screenshots look promising. The map in the second screenshot could use some more decoration That's really one of the ways you can stand out without adding new graphics and it only really takes 5-10 minutes per map square to add some stuff. The other screens look cool though, so I know you have it in you

I for one hope to see this thing finished!^^
October 3rd 2013, 05:16 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Thanks a lot, Kyle.

I've just written some procedures for checking what you've hit something with (including magic), so there'll be lots of different text for fans of hitting things just to see what it says. I know I'm one of them.
October 3rd 2013, 05:33 PM
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iplaydink
Peasant He/Him Sweden
Hmm.. 
Sounds really promising! Can't wait
October 3rd 2013, 06:00 PM
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Just loads of dialogue. Seriously, I hope you guys like text.

Yes, yes, yes. I am a big fan of lots of dialogue (as long as it's good). And from what I've seen so far of your writing it seems like a good bet it will be quite good. This jerk idea has some strong potential for hilarity, so definitely looking forward to the DMod.
October 3rd 2013, 11:24 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
Awesome. I can't wait.
October 4th 2013, 07:28 AM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
Sounds good, but the map could use some more work. It seems you've focused only on the key elements on each screen, and left out smaller details. Such as: Bar has tables and shelfs, but it could use more cups on tables and barrels in the corners etc. The cave could definitely use some more cracks and dirt on the ground.

And yeah, I realize I'm not the best mapper either, but I feel I should still point out stuff like that when I can.
October 4th 2013, 12:59 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Boy, I was afraid of this. (Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the feedback.)

I'm not a visually minded person at all. Back when I worked for high school newspaper, they once had me try to lay out a page. That sounds pretty simple, and I was using Quark Xpress which pretty much does it for you, but somehow my result was still such a visual mess that they had to throw it out and start over. I have trouble even understanding decoration.

Actually, I've been diagnosed with a visual learning disability, one of the effects of which is that I can't remember people's faces like most people do. I've lost a lot of friends that way. I don't mean to suggest this excuses bad map design, though.

I probably don't have to tell anybody that mapmaking is the hardest part of this; even scripting is hilariously easy by comparison. You're going to think I'm hopeless or exaggerating, but I spent hours on that bar screen as it is, and it's probably the most thoroughly decorated screen I've made so far. That's not to say I'm averse to going back and adding more detail, but even as I've been going it seems such an excruciatingly slow process that it feels like I'll never finish. I'm still early in my first real area despite putting pretty much my entire life into this for weeks. Mike Snyder finished the Arithia trilogy in as much time.

Sorry, I don't mean to whine. It's not common for "Upcoming DMOD Hype" threads to rapidly turn into "Help the author with Making Maps Not Look Terrible 101," is it? I must be looking pretty bad here.

Anybody want to be "Map consultant" and look over this thing as I make it? Heh, I very much doubt it. At any rate, I won't give up.
October 4th 2013, 01:22 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
Mapping is my favorite part of dmod creation.

The bar looks fine to me. It's a pretty empty bar so it makes sense that there aren't cups all over the place. The only screen I thought that needs detail is the cave screen, but seeing as how this is just a hype-thread I didn't think that was going to be the final product.

I honestly can't imagine spending hours building a single screen. I practically mapped out an entire area in detail in an hour- though those were all outdoor screens. Inside screens are a bit trickier.

If you honestly need some help making screens you can message me and I'll tell you my thoughts.
October 4th 2013, 02:11 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
First of all, don't make it too hard on yourself. You seem to have a tendency to make yourself look really bad at whatever you're doing, and I really don't agree with you on that. Your old DMods weren't good, I will not disagree. But they also weren't so extremely bad as you made them sound. I quite enjoyed the dialog with the rainbow fish.

Also, to my standards, the screens you posted look really good. The cave screen with the golden people looks a bit strange, but seeing what Dink says there, that was intentional. I'm sure the other's comments weren't meant as "this is aweful", but as "this is good, but could be even better".

Mike Snyder finished the Arithia trilogy in as much time.

It wasn't looking that good, either. Especially part 1 is pretty much lots of empty space with trees that just make it hard to walk in a straight line. The only reasons it isn't horrible, IMO, are that it's part 1 of a trilogy (and so it creates a setting for the next parts, which is a valuable feature) and that it's so old that being bad is excusable. Although I was surprised that Dink's Doppleganger was older; it looks much, much better.

Anybody want to be "Map consultant" and look over this thing as I make it?

I'm happy to take a look and tell you what I think or suggest changes, but...

I'm not a visually minded person at all.

Neither am I. So I'm not sure how much help I can be.
October 4th 2013, 02:49 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Thank you; you're right that I tend to be very hard on myself.

I went back and looked at that rainbow trout script from "Oddyssey." I didn't even bother freezing Dink! Lordy, I had no idea what I was doing.

Actually, I had forgotten that Dink's Doppleganger was older than the Arithias myself and was pretty surprised when reminded of it. I think I was around for the release of Arithia part 3. Do you know that it has one of the earliest anti-cheating scripts in it? Kills the game if you've messed with your stats or moved one of a few key objects. Snyder's old scripts are actually well-documented with comments despite the fact that they were .d files and hardly anybody saw them until WDE made decompressing them ridiculously easy in 2011.
October 4th 2013, 05:02 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
I went back and looked at that rainbow trout script from "Oddyssey." I didn't even bother freezing Dink! Lordy, I had no idea what I was doing.

Oh, I thought that was intentional. If you didn't bother listening to the entire story, you'd miss the end where he tells you the password. Looked like a nice feature to me.

Do you know that it has one of the earliest anti-cheating scripts in it?

I wouldn't know that, I try not to cheat whenever possible. And I didn't check the source, because everything just worked for me (that is, I found the castle wall cutscene before fighting the bonca-hell).
October 5th 2013, 03:48 PM
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ThePunisher
Peasant He/Him Australia
(Tag Line) How long is this line. 
I hate American humour/toilet humour so much.
October 5th 2013, 05:44 PM
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Poop. LOL.

October 5th 2013, 07:18 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
I hate Pun so much, yet I don't make tons of idiotic topics and posts about it.
October 6th 2013, 01:34 AM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
In an attempt to make this thread about my DMOD again, I'll just note that I've been working on adding more detail to the maps. I'll never have impressive maps, but I think they are much less likely to make you go "yuck, that is a terrible map" now.
October 6th 2013, 02:24 AM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
I've never said that about a map, though I have said that I could make a better map, and then did in one D-mod, can't remember which one though.
October 6th 2013, 06:52 AM
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The most important thing is to put value in the DMod in some form. From the sounds of it the writing and story will be the big thing, and the character of Malachi. As long as you do that strongly, we should be able to forgive an imperfect map. That said, an improved map is always nice, just don't push yourself too hard.
October 6th 2013, 06:51 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
You shouldn't push it too hard, push it too the MAX! Then you might get a cookie, might.
October 7th 2013, 06:42 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Yes yes, maps are important, but so is story and writing. I'm sorry to say that in 90% of the available d-mods the latter falls short. So if mapping isn't your thing, so be it. Just do your best and things will fall into place

You can always PM for some mapping advice, I consider myself pretty good at it
October 7th 2013, 10:48 AM
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Toof
Peasant He/Him
I disagree. 
In my opinion, if map is similar to the original game (and your screenshots are quite nice), it is a good map. If it is a little better, well, that is even better mapping. If map looks better than you could have ever imagined, that's MsDink syndrome.

Seriously though, screenshots are good.
October 7th 2013, 11:54 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
if map is similar to the original game (and your screenshots are quite nice), it is a good map

Dear lord the original has atrocious mapping, aside from the outdoor housing/castle construction, which is difficult in its own right. Not saying every d-mod has to mimic As Good As Eternity though
October 7th 2013, 12:18 PM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
The original game's map is not that great. There are tons of screens with just nothing but a tree and some grass in them. For some weird reason, it works though. I can't stand the map in AGAE. There is a thing called overkill, which that D-Mod demonstrates very well. The map in that one was a big reason to why I never bothered to finish it.
October 7th 2013, 12:44 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
There is a thing called overkill,

Fair enough, I think for standard gameplay this is actually true. Too much clutter and combat becomes a chore.
But for set pieces, like a hidden house in the forest or a special landmark like a grave of a loved one, etc... I feel like you should remember those spots when you turn off the game
October 7th 2013, 01:02 PM
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I agree with Skull. I don't think AGAE was well-decorated so much as trees and grass were just madly stamped everywhere.

You don't actually have to run into the sprite limit for a screen to look pretty.
October 7th 2013, 01:10 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
You don't actually have to run into the sprite limit for a screen to look pretty.

That really depends on your definition of pretty But yeah, it's not necessary, but I for one wish that limit was 200 and not 98. You're right about the grass/tree stamping in AGAE though

Often times good mapping is also surprising the player with something new. In one of Robj's tutorials about clipping, he has some good examples of this, like a ledge on a mountain and some other stuff I don't remember.
October 7th 2013, 03:47 PM
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Toof
Peasant He/Him
I disagree. 
I was talking about map appearance, not about whether or not the map is 'practical' ( or if it has some hardness issues ). From the screenshots, I can see the guy has an idea, and the mapping is done quite nicely. Walls aligned,some decoration here and there. That's good enough for me, if a mod has a decent story. The rest I cannot judge by looking at the pictures.
October 8th 2013, 03:06 AM
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metatarasal
Bard He/Him Netherlands
I object 
Mapping is overrated. Of course mapping is important, but gameplay and storytelling are at least as important. The most important thing about mapping is the lay-out and the hardness, decoration is just gravy.

Personally I absolutely love a good, immersive story for DMODs. Looking at how much I enjoy reading through your playthroughs I am very much looking forward to this.

Also, I find the screenshots looking pretty good actually. Different from how I would do it, but I wouldn't bother about it too much. Make sure you also focus on the your DMOD's gravy: Dialogue
October 8th 2013, 05:37 AM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
I like gravy, and don't forget another important factor, Midis or else it will start to get boring and bland.
October 8th 2013, 10:19 AM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Oh, you want MIDIs? My friend, I'm still in the first dungeon and the game already contains 7 MIDIs. There are three in the intro alone.
October 8th 2013, 12:07 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Make sure the player gets a chance to listen to it all the way through at least once xD
October 8th 2013, 06:20 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
So it's bad in the original since I can't listen to all the midis unless I wait a while?
October 10th 2013, 04:29 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
The more I write this DMOD, the weirder it gets.

There are now going to be four endings, but two of them come pretty early on...
October 10th 2013, 05:01 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
I take it they're bad endings though, also I think there would be 5, when Dink dies unless you made a ending updated for that, maybe you should.
October 10th 2013, 05:34 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
"Bad" is up for interpretation. I think the early endings I've come up with are really cool and you'll want to see them on your way to the "real" ones.
October 10th 2013, 07:12 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
Can you tell us the kind of endings and possibly how to get them, like is there a silly, a good, a bad, a something else ending or what?
October 10th 2013, 07:46 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I think that is spoiling a bit much at this point. The DMOD isn't going to come out this year, I can promise you.
October 10th 2013, 07:59 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
So it will take a year to make, must be awesome then.

Can you at least spoil a little of one ending, do it for your family who you have not met personally and possibly won't ever.
October 10th 2013, 08:48 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Er, I started it in September, so I'd have to have it done in a total of three months or so for it to come out this year. Ain't gonna happen.

How about this: One of the endings does involve Dink dying, as you guessed, but it only triggers in a specific situation.

There, you've made me spoil more than I wanted to, I hope you're happy
October 11th 2013, 12:54 AM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Going the Initiation route? Pretty cool. Would be fun to find all 4 endings.
October 11th 2013, 01:32 AM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
They won't be hidden. It'll be pretty obvious where they are, I think.
October 11th 2013, 06:30 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
It'll be pretty obvious where they are, I think.

Good. I don't like it when endings are triggered in obscure ways that don't have a clear action/reaction scheme attached to them.

No, collecting all frogs in a game doesn't mean you'll keep the main character alive. Unless said frogs team up to kill the end boss for you.
October 11th 2013, 06:33 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
I'd change the frogs to bunnies, then I would find it a little cute, funny and possibly scary if they turned into a DEMON BUNNY.

Also thank you for spoiling some, we had to get something out of you, though we might find a cookie for your good spirit.
October 15th 2013, 06:39 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
STATUS UPDATE:

After many days of work, the first major area of Malachi the Jerk is complete.

Current DMOD stats:
Screens: 42
Scripts: 114
MIDIs in use: 10

Feels good! I played through it several times and I enjoyed it. I can't speak for anybody else, of course, but that's at least a good sign.

Now I shall take a break so I can play some more DMODs for that DMOD-writing topic.
October 15th 2013, 08:28 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Can't wait to play it! Just don't get burnt out on D-mod making like I did. My game has been sitting at about 30% complete for the last two months, after I worked on it for like 5 weeks almost non-stop.
October 16th 2013, 03:12 AM
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ThePunisher
Peasant He/Him Australia
(Tag Line) How long is this line. 
You still havent ask my question

Will it be rude and crude?
October 16th 2013, 06:39 AM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
Why not release what you have so far for beta testing, maybe some people can give an idea or two or spot some tals[bugs]?
October 16th 2013, 09:28 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Why not release what you have so far for beta testing, maybe some people can give an idea or two or spot some tals[bugs]?

No, that's a bad idea We don't have the unlimited playerbase to support this. People might try it, write some feedback and never touch it again. Even real games that release an alpha have this problem.
October 16th 2013, 01:51 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I agree with Kyle. Even when I do finish a beta, I intend to "release" it to no more than two or possibly three people. Anything more and you've come close to making a full release in this community nowadays.
October 16th 2013, 03:33 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
Well you guys just get bored or it then.
October 16th 2013, 06:44 PM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
The big reason nobody is bothering to make Epics (or D-Mods in general) anymore, is just that: the size of the community. Who wants to spend two years making an Epic non-stop, just for the 50-60 people who still lurk this site occasionally, out of which probably 20-25 are gonna actually play the game, and 5 people are going to give any sort of feedback?
October 16th 2013, 06:59 PM
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Toof
Peasant He/Him
I disagree. 
There are probably some ghost lurkers who play dmods. As for the number of members on this site... well, I remember how I first encountered this game. By pure accident. It's a surprise that it has it's own community web page, and the number of mods. And it still lives on. That's why I like this site. It is twisted in some dark way
October 17th 2013, 06:33 AM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
I think it would be fun to release art to a about dead page.
October 17th 2013, 06:59 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
The big reason nobody is bothering to make Epics (or D-Mods in general) anymore, is just that: the size of the community.

I think it's more likely a case of time management these days
October 17th 2013, 07:09 AM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
I think it's more likely a case of time management these days

Time management that nobody bothers to deal with because the community is so small.
October 17th 2013, 07:17 AM
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Quiztis
Peasant He/Him Sweden bloop
Life? What's that? Can I download it?! 
Yeah, it's not worth the time... An update to the Dink engine to support more stuff, that's what I want.
October 19th 2013, 07:52 PM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
"Releasing an epic that's great would be like showing off great magical wizard skills to a small audience here", It still sounds like fun.

Also how goes the Dmod?
October 20th 2013, 08:00 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
It goes fine. I've written a lot of dialogue recently.

I'm having to do my first real outdoor screens now. It's, um... difficult for me. To put it mildly. I kind of wish I could just go right to my next set piece, but I know that's not the kind of DMOD I wanted to make.
October 21st 2013, 10:59 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Don't get hung up on the stuff you're bad at, add to that stuff later on, when the project is close to being finished. Especially map detail can (usually) be safely added while the d-mod is being tested for example. Your priority should be to stay motivated!
October 21st 2013, 11:35 AM
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iplaydink
Peasant He/Him Sweden
Hmm.. 
I agree, focus on what you do best and what you enjoy doing!
October 24th 2013, 06:51 AM
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DackFight
Peasant He/Him United States
Making Topics off-track faster then you can say it 
What about if he hates scripting or Dmoding?
October 24th 2013, 01:38 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I don't. I've been working on this mod a lot.

Here's a bit of evidence for y'all.
October 24th 2013, 07:49 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
I hope I'm in that screenshot somewhere
October 24th 2013, 08:06 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
The Dink Network in this game isn't exactly the same as the one on the Web. "Dink Smallwood" means something slightly different to them than it does to us.

...but it really is mostly an excuse to make references to the community, so I'll work you in. >_>
October 24th 2013, 08:37 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
Please tell me the reason behind those barbie super model pictures in that photo album.
October 24th 2013, 08:51 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Haha, okay.

On another forum, there's a project to beat all of the Sega Genesis games this calendar year. Doesn't look like it's going to make it, honestly, but I played the game for that and made fun of it here.

I'm a big Sega Genesis fan, what can I say.
October 24th 2013, 09:23 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
Did I waste my time reading that?
October 24th 2013, 09:49 PM
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dang, that's a neat project. I feel tempted to beat Mazin Saga fair and square... but I don't think I have the patience to go through outrageously cheap bosses without savestate scumming on an emulator. =) (as opposed to ragequit -> come back ad innumerae on an actual console.)
October 24th 2013, 10:09 PM
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cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I've been working on this DMOD all dang day and I feel like I've gotten nowhere. Plus, I just went and looked at MsDink's thread for "A Simple Quest" and remembered how much my maps suck, hahaha

Sorry, I should try to be more positive. I think I've come up with some interesting dialogue for this mod. As I said, there's quite a bit of it. I just added up only my really dialogue-heavy scripts so far and they're over 53 KB.
November 2nd 2013, 03:17 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I am spending several hours a day, 5 days a week on this. I'm excited about how it's coming along. I doubt anybody else would be as excited as me, but hey, who am I making this for if not myself, right?

Current DMOD stats:
Screens: 99
Scripts: 177
MIDIs in use: 18
Takes longer to play than 99 screens makes it sound?: Yes
Is that a good thing?: *shrug*
November 2nd 2013, 03:48 AM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
After a month working on it you have a good number of scripts more than I had done in the same time frame. Though, I have a lot more screens in use because my mod is "open world." Plenty to explore, just not much to find at the moment. Keep up the good work and I still can't wait to play it

Also, I'd be happy to beta test when your mod is nearly done
November 2nd 2013, 03:50 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Thanks, I would really appreciate that.

My mod is pretty relentlessly linear, I must admit. It's just the way I seem to design things.
November 2nd 2013, 08:25 AM
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MsDink
Peasant She/Her New Zealand
Tag - Umm.. tag, you're it? 
hey coco i didnt read the entire thread but i saw your screenies and think they look awesome - no more beating yourself up - how u map is putting YOUR stamp on the dmod, dont worry about that till you are done because worrying about one little bit of it will surely stop you completing it and that I just wont accept I have seen some terrible mapping and yours is perfectly fine. If u want a hand just yell.

Personally I think as long as hardness errors and crashes dont happen you will be fine - thats the thing that annoys when playing - not 'oh i am not playing this the screens dont look like i would make them' ...yeah not gunna happen huh

You are doing fine
November 2nd 2013, 09:40 AM
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Most games are really more linear than they appear to be, especially RPGs. Adventure games like Zelda hide their linearity really well, but you still have to do things in a certain order (can't just go fight Ganon at the beginning of Zelda for example, there are other things which must be done first). No matter which game you play there's always a certain amount of objectives that must happen in a sequence to properly finish the game, so in that way all games are linear. However, it's generally good to try to disguise the linearity, and there are many ways you can do that.

Here's a few examples of ways to make a game feel less linear:

1.) Create a decent amount of area to explore and put stuff worth finding in it. This doesn't effect the main story in any way but gives the player some incentive to look around and something to do besides go from point A to point B. The hard part is finding the happy medium between a map that is too big and sparse in content, and one that is too small and claustrophobic.

2.) Allow a main story objective to be completed early, before the point in the game in which it is required. For example, if you need a long sword to get into a dungeon, make it possible to get the sword before the player has learned they need it for the dungeon. It sounds trivial but things like this can make a game feel less scripted and more dynamic.

3.) Add collectables. For example, the pixie poops from Quest for Cheese. If they are hidden well but not unreasonably, and have some kind of reward than it can be very effective.

4.) Add mini-games or optional content. So for example, in the Isle of Croth, the brothel and the bar/casino (though they don't have to be QUITE that rewarding! ). Also, the ice castle and the town that was built on a dragon nest (where you can buy the throwing axes) in Dink's main game. It gives the player a diversion/break from the linearity and adds to the overall fullness and personality of the game world.

5.) Give the player multiple objectives, which can be completed in any order but all must be done to continue. So for example, say Dink needs a pot, a seed, and some water, and the player must find all three in order to grow a plant (yeah lame example, but hey!), however they can collect them in any order. Then use the plant to reach the next plot point. It's another simple thing and really it's one task split into 3 parts, but it really does a lot more than you'd think and can be done on larger scale. For instance, 4 small dungeons each with a piece of a key hidden inside, which together can open the path to a boss (oh... I should do something like that in my DMOD...didn't even think of it till thinking of this list of ideas...thanks!).

6.) Give player choices. Even simple small choices like dialogue choices which only serve to change a small amount of text are worth putting in. Sure, it's not really getting rid of linearity from an exploration perspective, but it does make linear exploration a lot less noticeable when you are actively making choices in some way as a player. And even bigger choices can have even better (but sometimes harder to develop) effects. For example, the choice to let a town be destroyed or survive, or to choose a permanent weapon type of bow or sword (not recommended for bigger DMODs, but great for mini-game type ones) would be considered big choices. Having the choice to call a woman "fatty" or just say hello would be considered a small but still valuable choice in giving the player a greater feeling of interactivity with the game world. A couple of choices that are present in almost every DMOD are the option of grinding and the option of choosing which stat to increase at level up. Every choice counts.

Phew.... That was a bit more than I thought I would write. I'm sure I still missed some simple things that can be done to curb linearity, but hopefully this is still helpful. These things don't all have to be present in a game for it to be good, so don't feel pressured to include everything I mentioned just to make it less linear feeling. They are just some ideas to get the ball rolling.

Good luck with your DMOD and thanks for bringing linearity to attention. I think talking about it may have just helped me come up with some interesting stuff to add to my DMOD.
November 2nd 2013, 01:50 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
That's a pretty good amount of stuff added since your October 15th post.
November 2nd 2013, 02:21 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
@thenewguy, the funny thing about that list is most of that stuff is going into my D-Mod already. #1 My side quests are unnecessary for completing the game, but rewarding. #3 I haven't thought about collectables yet but it's something I might add as a side quest in a later area. #4 I have a good mini-game idea, the problem is the area required might be too large to fit into my D-Mod, because just the main areas & dungeons will take up 5-600 screens at least. Plus it would be a scripting nightmare for me to get it working just right. #6 my paragon/renegade quest system already gives lots of choices for how Dink behaves and there are pretty major changes in dialogue based on the choice.

So I guess I'm good at making a non-linear game? >.> If nothing else, I'm good at making a short main quest line with tons of distractions that don't really contribute to the main story. I seriously need to work on my D-mod again.
November 2nd 2013, 04:40 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
You should! I'm in no hurry though, I wouldn't get to play it until I've played over 200 other DMODs anyway
November 2nd 2013, 07:36 PM
goblins.gif
@DinkKiller
Hehe, yeah it's possible to make a game feel too non-linear to the point where it feels like the main story doesn't matter. I know others will disagree, but Elder Scrolls games make me feel this way. As long as the main story still feels important and the side material is enjoyable to find and do, than it's probably a good balance.

My advice about the minigame you are thinking of? Scrap it. If it's that complicated, maybe you can make a separate DMOD out of it or something. But trying to put it in this DMOD will probably take too much time/ map spaces and it had better be one insanely good minigame to be worth that kind of time. I'd say your best bet is to try to think of a few simple minigames instead of 1 huge elaborate one, unless you can come up with a simpler easier way to implement your minigame idea or something.
November 3rd 2013, 03:02 AM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
It's too bad I'm terrible at coming up with good ideas. Coming up with decent small mini-games that are at least somewhat original will likely not happen. And the main reason I haven't worked on my D-mod is that I'm just not motivated enough to put in like 3-5 days worth of effort into getting my first dungeon's puzzles working exactly the way I want them too. Because to do it, the scripts would get a lot more complicated than I want to put the effort into. I wish the move(&blah, #, #, 0); would work the way I want it to. The hard boxes are so iffy
November 3rd 2013, 03:31 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Boy, I know what you mean. move commands fail to work the way you want them to for reasons that are frankly baffling.
November 3rd 2013, 09:16 AM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
Oh god move commands. The last thing I was working on - which happened to be like a few weeks ago - was cutscene animations. And in one of them there was supposed to be multiple people walking around with set paths. It was absolutely terrible trying to get all the move() commands timed right.
November 3rd 2013, 02:52 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Yeah, my first little dramatic cutscene in game I had to time correctly a bunch of move commands between two sprites. I never got it perfect but it was close enough to where I just gave up and left it alone. Same with another cutscene a little later on. The issue I'm having with the puzzle however, is that the sprites aren't moving as far as I'm telling them to, and they can also continue to be pushed into another sprites hard box, and that tends to leave a gap that Dink can move through when there should be no gap. What I probably have to do is drop the local variables I'm currently using, tell the sprite to move a specific distance but ignore hardness, and use a new local variable to stop you from moving the sprite in that direction again. I mean, it wouldn't be hard to figure out, I just don't feel like putting the time into it. Plus, a new issue that would come from that is I'd really only be able to make 1 solution to the puzzle, and that's just not fun for the type of puzzle it is.
November 3rd 2013, 11:27 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
You can use sp_x and sp_y to make sure a sprite is where you want it to be. It might flicker from one spot to another a bit, but that's better than having it in the wrong spot if you need it to be somewhere specific.
November 4th 2013, 12:32 AM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
The weird thing is, I have it scripted to where it uses sp_x and sp_y and I tell it to move an exact distance so that it would fit perfectly between two other sprites. The problem is, the move command for some reason doesn't move it that exact distance, which might just be as simple as me overthinking the script and so it just doesn't like what I'm trying to tell it to do. That, or I typoed something or forgot to put something into the script. I really have no idea.

Here's a piece of the script as an example:
void main(void)
{
 sp_hard(&current_sprite, 0);
 int &x = sp_x(&current_sprite, -1);
 int &y = sp_y(&current_sprite, -1);
 int &temp;
 sp_speed(&current_sprite, 2);
 draw_hard_map();
}

void push(void)
{
 &temp = sp_dir(1, -1);
 if (&temp == 2)
 {
  freeze(1);
  sp_hard(&current_sprite, 1);
  draw_hard_map();
  &y += 44;
  move(&current_sprite, 2, &y, 0);
  wait(500);
  sp_hard(&current_sprite, 0);
  draw_hard_map();
  unfreeze(1);
 }
//etc.
}
November 4th 2013, 12:36 AM
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The move command isn't exact. Sad but true. The final resting place for the sprite may be off by a few pixels.

To fix, you can do this:
move(&current_sprite, 2, &y, 0);
wait(500);
sp_y(&current_sprite,&y)
November 4th 2013, 12:40 AM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Yeah that would probably help. But what I currently have set up, the sprites only seem to move about half the distance I'm telling them to, so don't think it'll be as simple of a fix as that.
November 4th 2013, 12:54 AM
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Weird... I tried out your example, and you're right, it goes slightly more than halfway then just stops. I tried move_stop and it actually goes the whole way. But if it gets stuck on something than it'll lock up... hm...
November 4th 2013, 12:56 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I've had problems with move_stop not going exactly where I want it to sometimes as well. I just tend to stick sp_x and/or sp_y (both if it's diagonal movement, you see) in there whenever that happens.
November 4th 2013, 01:05 AM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Yeah I'm probably just gonna have to use local variables to figure out if you've pushed the sprites certain directions and how many times, and then use specific x/y coordinates instead of &x and &y for movement, so that way it should move exactly where I need it to go. And I'm too unmotivated to put effort into trying to write it out.
November 4th 2013, 01:08 AM
goblins.gif
Unfortunately Dinkkiller is probably trying to keep pretty precise collisions and teleporting the things to the end location would prevent proper collision checking. One thing I notice is that you can make Dink keep pushing when you use move instead of move_stop. If move_stop does the right distance for every direction, there is probably a way to get around Dink freezing, but I'll have to do some thinking to figure it out, and it probably involves using two different scripts together.
November 4th 2013, 01:26 AM
spike.gif
Weird... I tried out your example, and you're right, it goes slightly more than halfway then just stops.

Just going out on a limb, but perhaps wait(500) isn't enough to get the sprite as far as you want it to? You harden the sprite after that time, so unless you are doing forced movement (move,sprite,blah,1), it will stop.
November 4th 2013, 01:31 AM
goblins.gif
Nope, the wait(500) is fine I think. However, I found a solution where you can use move_stop so it will move the proper amount, but not freeze Dink permanently. It also has no memory leak, hurray!

You need two scripts though. The basic idea is the second script is called to do the movement, and is destroyed after the wait(500) is done in the main script so that even if the object got stuck, the second script will be killed and Dink will unfreeze as normal. I'll post it after I figure out why they won't collide with eachother and why if you don't let go of the button Dink sits there and pushes the air...

edit:
well they sort of collide with eachother but not at the edges for some reason

edit 2: I owe you an apology Scratcher... wait(500) WAS too little time. dang.
November 4th 2013, 01:49 AM
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Yep, just take Scratcher's advice and set wait to like (1000) or so and it should work just fine. Don't bother with my overcomplicated solution, hehe.

There is still however the problem of them not colliding properly at the edges of the sprite (I'm using a bush sprite), but other than that it works fine.

edit: wait(1000) is still not enough! wait(1200) seems to work though.
November 4th 2013, 11:03 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Thanks, the wait(1200) actually solves pretty much every issue I still had with my puzzle, but I still need to iron out a few more things and it should be good. So I guess I might have motivation to finish off my dungeon soon. And I apologize to Cocomonkey for partially hijacking his thread to get some help on a scripting issue I had
November 5th 2013, 12:00 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
Note that no matter what you do, move and move_stop are not pixel-precise. I think the engine sets the velocity of the sprite and periodically moves it. It also periodically checks if the move is done. However those two clocks are independent of each other, and on systems which need a lot of cpu time for drawing things, the movement may be different from systems which are more powerful. Which means that testing on one machine doesn't prove that it will work everywhere.

The conclusion should be to never rely on move[_stop] being exact, and if you need an exact position, always use sp_x/sp_y to make sure your assumption is correct.

Similarly, always use move[_stop] (..,..,..,1), unless you have set up a way to handle the sprite not reaching the position: given the inexact nature of movements, enabling hardness checks in a move command is asking for trouble.

I apologize to Cocomonkey for partially hijacking his thread

Oh right, that was what this thread was about... Feel free to steal it back, Cocomonkey.
November 5th 2013, 01:24 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
MALACHI THE JERK you guys it's gonna be the BEST DMOD

Okay, probably not. But I played through what I've done so far for the first time in quite a while and I was like "hey, wait a minute, these story scenes rule!" I'd seen it so many times in script form I had become kind of numb to it.

I am concerned that I made the monsters too tough. Still working on that.
November 7th 2013, 09:42 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
I am concerned that I made the monsters too tough. Still working on that.

Don't forget that those of us left active on the site are veteran players Then again, we also don't want to grind or reload too much

Looking forward to playing your d-mod, seriously.
November 7th 2013, 12:25 PM
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Toof
Peasant He/Him
I disagree. 
Veteran yes, but I still hate long and useless hit and run tactics. It gets boring after a while. Just put option to gain some free strength points in the beginning, for us, lazy pacifists.
November 7th 2013, 02:16 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I did already! It's called "Wuss mode." It should make the game very easy. I only get concerned that I've made the game too hard when I have a lot of trouble beating it myself.

By the way, thanks everybody for your support. Thanks, MsDink - although I admire your maps, it wasn't really because my maps aren't like yours that I was down on them... it was because they're, um, bad. Seriously, the screenshots I've shown are way, way above the quality of most of my maps. For now I'm not worrying about it, and just focusing on getting the DMOD done and functional. Hopefully when the basics are in place I can see about getting things looking better.
November 7th 2013, 03:23 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
For now I'm not worrying about it, and just focusing on getting the DMOD done and functional. Hopefully when the basics are in place I can see about getting things looking better.

That's exactly what I'm doing too. I'm just doing the basic layout of the map, with terrain and stuff, enemies, and other things just so the D-mod is playable. The fully detailed maps will come once everything else is done.
November 10th 2013, 02:10 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I'm writing so much fun dialogue (fun to me, at least), but a frustrating bit is that I doubt anybody will see quite a bit of it, because you see some of it by going off the path and talking to people you've got no reason to be talking to at certain points, or by NOT talking to somebody for a certain amount of time in the story, or other weird things.

By the way, can somebody explain to me what an "epic" is? Because I don't know if this DMOD's going to be one or not. It's bigger than I'd intended, but it's still certain to have fewer screens than epics I've played (Maybe 300, maybe less, very unlikely to be much more). Even so, I think it'll take longer to play through than, say, the Dorinthia mods - the way things are going, a reasonable run will be well over 3 hours. I'm sticking to my design either way, I just want to know how I ought to bill this thing. Does time or map size make an epic?
November 10th 2013, 02:58 AM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Definition of Epic: A game roughly the size of the original game, or bigger. So you're shooting for a minimum of 3 hours of gameplay. Map size isn't necessarily relevant, but a bigger map definitely allows for more quests to extend play time.
November 10th 2013, 03:02 AM
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An epic is roughly the size of the original game, or bigger... there's nothing exact about the definition, really. If your dmod has a lot of optional content, and a normal playthrough lasts about 3 hours, I'd say it's probably warranted to tag it as an epic.

What you say about dialogue sounds intriguing... Does this mean that, if I go to a village I've previously been to, for example, there might be new things to see? That would be awesome, because I'm always disappointed when I visit an old location late in the game, and people are still going on about the witch I killed at the beginning or something -- rather than having anything new and interesting to say.
November 10th 2013, 03:14 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Hmm, now that you mention that, it is a bit uneven. Maybe I'll add some more dialogue for some characters after their active role in the story is over.

The first major area of the game contains three bosses. There's a character at the start of that area. I assume everybody will talk to him right away, but he's got a different chunk of dialogue if you wait to talk to to him until after beating one or two bosses, and yet another chunk of dialogue if you don't talk to him until you've beaten all three. Actually, there's even some different lines in that segment depending on something else you might have done. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about. I've got more crazy stuff like that elsewhere, although that's probably the most far-out example.
November 10th 2013, 09:43 AM
goblins.gif
What you say about dialogue sounds intriguing... Does this mean that, if I go to a village I've previously been to, for example, there might be new things to see? That would be awesome, because I'm always disappointed when I visit an old location late in the game, and people are still going on about the witch I killed at the beginning or something -- rather than having anything new and interesting to say.

I support this message

The first major area of the game contains three bosses. There's a character at the start of that area. I assume everybody will talk to him right away, but he's got a different chunk of dialogue if you wait to talk to to him until after beating one or two bosses, and yet another chunk of dialogue if you don't talk to him until you've beaten all three. Actually, there's even some different lines in that segment depending on something else you might have done. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about. I've got more crazy stuff like that elsewhere, although that's probably the most far-out example.

optional dialogue is definitely something that makes a game feel more alive. Although I must admit, if he is in broad view I doubt anyone will pass him up without talking to him unless they have a reasonable suspicion that it will change something.

Also, yes, I would call your DMOD an epic if it turns out the length you mention.
November 16th 2013, 11:29 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I've been trying to reload the arrow graphics into sequence 100 in a different order so that I can place it as a sprite and make it "rotate" with brain 6. I don't want to pointlessly add more graphics to my already 8 MB graphics folder, so I tried to do this with set_frame_frame, like this:

load_sequence graphics\effects\arrow\arrow- 100 300
set_frame_frame 100 1 25 1
set_frame_frame 100 2 25 2
set_frame_frame 100 3 25 3
set_frame_frame 100 4 25 6
set_frame_frame 100 5 25 5
set_frame_frame 100 6 25 8
set_frame_frame 100 7 25 7
set_frame_frame 100 8 25 4


It doesn't work; the graphics are still loaded into the same frames in the new sequence as they are in the original. Can anyone tell me what I'm doing wrong?

Edit: Whoops, should have put this in the other topic. Oh well, can't delete posts on here.
November 16th 2013, 11:59 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
I think you have your numbers reversed. set_frame_frame starts with two numbers saying which sequence and frame are going to be changed, followed by two numbers saying where they're copied from.

So your code will set the 100 graphics to things you have loaded into 25 beforehand. If you didn't load anything into 25, I think these statements will be ignored.

Another thing you have to watch out for is the way allocation works. The first time a sequence number is used with load_sequence (_now or not), its frames are allocated. This means that if you want more frames than there are graphics for, you need to use set_frame_frame before loading the graphics.

For the same reason, the sword graphic is loaded into dink only to be replaced with the fist sequence; the fist has fewer frames, so if that was loaded first, it would be impossible to replace it with the sword later: they wouldn't fit in the allocated space.
November 17th 2013, 12:22 AM
custom_coco.gif
Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Well, I'm trying to load the graphics in sequence 25 (the arrow) into sequence 100, so I think I've got the order right.

I'm not sure this is ultimately relevant anyway. I worked around this by just renaming the arrow graphics and putting them in my graphics folder, but I still can't get them to do what I want, which is stop on a certain frame when the player does something.

int &check
&check = sp_brain(&save_y, -1)

if (&check == 6)
{
//stop arrow rotation
&frame = sp_frame(&save_y, -1)
sp_brain(&save_y, 0)
sp_frame(&save_y, 8)
wait(1)
wait(100)
sp_pseq(&save_y, 100)
sp_pframe(&save_y, &frame)
}


The weird thing about this is that sometimes, it'll work (it never worked before I put not one, but TWO wait commands in there). On those occasions it'll "stop" on the frame I want it to, but the rest of the time it stops on the last frame (8) of the sequence.

The sp_frame(&save_y, 8) after I change the brain is there to make the animation go ahead and stop, since an animation started will keep going until it reaches the last frame even if you change the brain to 0.

This might not work.... Maybe I should try using an sp_pframe loop instead of animating the sprites at all. Then again, if I did THAT I don't know how I would get them to stop when I want them to. Argh. What a mess.
November 17th 2013, 03:39 AM
spike.gif
Try adding an sp_seq(&save_y,0) along with sp_brain(&save_y,0) and sp_frame(&save_y, 8) to stop the current sequence from playing to finish. If that doesn't work, sp_picfreeze(&save_y,1) (<- not sure if correct syntax) should definitely stop it.
November 17th 2013, 04:07 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Hey, adding sp_seq(&save_y, 0) makes it work perfectly! Thanks, scratcher. Now I know how to stop those pesky animations.
November 17th 2013, 10:54 AM
peasantm.gif
shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
The original source's fireball script includes
sp_kill_wait(1); //make sure dink will punch right away

However, if I understand DinkC.txt (in particular the added comments), sp_kill_wait doesn't actually have this effect (in fact it doesn't have any effect at all). Since the fireball also sets sp_seq and sp_frame, no action should be required to make Dink "punch" right away...
November 17th 2013, 03:22 PM
goblins.gif
In my experience sp_kill_wait does absolutely nothing. Because of this there is a glitch where a small delay can happen before Dink's attack/spell animations play unless you change his facing first (usually setting sp_dir = sp_dir) in order to reset his animation. It's the same thing I did in my script improvements.
November 21st 2013, 04:39 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
So... still working on this. Yup.

I'm working in a battle minigame like "Battle Sqaure" from Final Fantasy VII. It's a bit simpler than that one, but it does still have random handicaps.

Pointless stats that don't really tell you much (I will write a new .c file for practically anything, I'm afraid):

Screens - 140
Scripts - 250
MIDIs - 25
Signs with read and hit responses: at least 31
Wasps?: Big ones
Annoying fetch quest?: Hur yeah
November 21st 2013, 07:56 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
So... still working on this. Yup.

Cool.

I will write a new .c file for practically anything, I'm afraid

Why do you say that like it's a bad thing?
November 22nd 2013, 05:43 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
I will write a new .c file for practically anything, I'm afraid

This has become a trend in programming for some time, it's definitely not a bad thing. Having clear names for your scripts is important though.
December 3rd 2013, 07:59 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I cut a pretty good chunk of my finger off when cooking today. I've been trying to work on this anyway, but it's not going so well. Ouch.
December 3rd 2013, 08:12 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
Is it enough of a chunk to earn you the nickname of "stubs"?

If so, can I call you stubs from now on?
December 3rd 2013, 08:16 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
No and yes.
December 5th 2013, 07:11 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
No and yes.

Error: Not compatible in this context!
December 6th 2013, 01:04 AM
goblins.gif
Ow.

I guess it's a good time for mapping though at least, since you can do that with one hand more easily than typing.
December 6th 2013, 11:40 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
The end's in sight.

One more big dungeon (this may take a while), a couple of small bonus areas and I'll be at beta.
December 7th 2013, 06:43 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
If the end is really in sight already, that's one hell of a fast development cycle for d-mods these days!

December 7th 2013, 02:18 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Wow, so your D-mod is going to beta before mine. That's awesome. Though I haven't worked on mine since...November 15? >.>

Looking forward to the beta then
December 13th 2013, 09:49 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
This DMOD will make you fall in love with the Flame Bow. When you get it, you will hear the lamentations of your enemies.

Also Dink bellows a mighty "* POWER SHOT *" every single time he shoots it because that's what real men do.
December 14th 2013, 09:26 PM
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December 15th 2013, 11:26 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
*fanfare*

Malachi the Jerk is now feature complete. Yep, it's a whole DMOD with everything implemented. Spiffy! There's just two things left: Map detail and testing.

Speaking of map detail, I am extremely pleased to report that I won't be doing it. I've turned that over to Leprochaun. I've admired his map work since I first saw it, so I'm sure the final version will look much cooler than the one I'm playing right now.

I'm so excited about this. I've spent several hundred hours on this project and I really like how it's turned out (then again, I'm weird). And hey, I should be able to get back to work on my "play the DMODs" project... soonish.

I still don't know when the release or even the proper beta will be, but rest assured, this one is going to be a real finished DMOD instead of another abandoned project.
December 16th 2013, 12:58 AM
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Wow, very nice! Can't believe it's already almost finished!

Your speed of pace puts mine to shame. Maybe I should get back to work...
December 17th 2013, 03:12 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
If your dmod has a lot of optional content, and a normal playthrough lasts about 3 hours, I'd say it's probably warranted to tag it as an epic.

I just finished my first run through the finished (ish) game: 3:06.

Malachi the Jerk: The littlest epic? 254 screens.
December 17th 2013, 03:41 AM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
Well, if you wanna be "official" about it, I'd say a 3-hour D-Mod is still a quest. That's what the site seems to suggest too ("A medium-sized adventure that lasts a few hours"). Of course, if there's a lot of optional stuff, then it's a different thing. I'm not really sure if optional stuff should be counted into the whole "how long the game is". Never thought about it.

Personally, I always thought a first-time playthrough should reach 6 or so hours before the D-Mod can be counted as an Epic. Now I'm kind of curious how other people see it.
December 17th 2013, 03:52 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
There isn't THAT much optional stuff. If everybody thinks it's a quest, that's what I'll call it. It's not like I had my heart set on making an epic. I'm just trying to be consistent with the standard that's set here.

The reason I wondered about the three-hour mark is that Quest for Dorinthia 1 and 2 are labeled epics, and I spent 3:00 and 3:05 on them respectively. That includes getting really hopelessly lost in the first one and doing all the optional stuff in the second one. I've never played anything that took that long and was called a quest (yet).
December 17th 2013, 04:18 AM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
Well, it's hard to say. First of all, the standard for D-Mod lengths has changed overtime. And then there are also some D-Mods out there I'm not quite sure are actually deserving of the Epic title (including HH1, which looking back I'm not sure actually truly belongs on the list). Not to mention, everybody plays at slightly different speeds. I'm willing to bet a lot of people didn't finish Dorinthia in 3 hours when it was first released. Maybe you're just really good at D-Mods?

Personally, I just think it's kind of wrong towards D-Mods like Stone of Balance, FIAT and CC2 (the last one being Quest until it was changed to Epic years after its release, btw, even though it's around 6-7 hours long) if we start naming every 3-hour D-Mod an Epic again. Times have changed.
December 17th 2013, 04:22 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Ok, fair enough. A quest it is. It really does feel rather thin to go calling it an epic anyway.
December 17th 2013, 05:36 AM
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metatarasal
Bard He/Him Netherlands
I object 
I believe that 4 hours used to be the definition? There is a lot of subjective interpretation to this though. I think I've mentioned this before, but infinidink might take an infinity to complete, but it's still only a romp because of its proceduraly generated content. SabreTrout released CC2 as a quest originally because it only had a single town, though content-wise it should really have been an epic. I realeased my own DMOD The Scourger as a quest because it had fewer scripts and screens than the original game, even though in terms of gameplay time it probably could have been an epic. I eventually cleared up the situation by adding an additional world to the DMOD getting both the screen and script count above those of the original game. (Actually, I think I may have had one or two screens less than the original game but considering how many of those were not in use...)

Originally the definition of an epic was simply that it is about the same length as the original game, or longer.

There's also a lot of ego involved, as people having made a three hour adventure do consider this to be significantly larger than an adventure just over an hour long. So they want to be in epic territory, even though they're at least as far away from some of the big epics as they are from that simple one hour quest. The distinction between romps/quests/epics really is a very coarse one, each really describing very different kinds of DMODs. But there's no denying that there are some very large quests out there as well, they deserve our credit too! EDIT: Also size isn't everything, there are romps that are better than epics!
December 17th 2013, 06:09 AM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
SabreTrout released CC2 as a quest originally because it only had a single town, though content-wise it should really have been an epic.

This is true, but I'm very curious why this was also done with Initiation? It was also originally a Quest, but was changed into Epic at the same time as CC2. I wonder if there's a reason to this? Or maybe it was done just cause the two can be considered the biggest rivals in the history of D-Mods.
December 17th 2013, 06:19 AM
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metatarasal
Bard He/Him Netherlands
I object 
Initiation is an epic? Oh... I still thought it was a quest, it's one of those borderline cases in my opinion. Initiation is a bit on the small side for an epic as I remember it. Still, it is remarkable for a DMOD that was intended to be a romp...
Initiation and CC2 are definitely the best two DMODs ever released in the same month!

Also, reading back in time I came across this thread, ancient history indeed...
December 29th 2013, 03:11 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Hmm. 3 hours was my time playing my own DMOD through. I was watching my friend play it, and it's taken him over six hours to get up to about halfway through the final area.
December 29th 2013, 08:05 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Yes, it always takes waaaaay longer for first timers to finish your d-mod, it's actually quite funny when you finally realize your d-mod is twice the size you thought it was xD
December 29th 2013, 09:52 AM
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As long as it appears the player is having fun for all that extra time, it's a very good thing. If you can tell the player just wants to move on but absolutely can't because it's too difficult to tell what to do, there's a problem (like how I always felt while trying to get through FIAT, haha...).
December 31st 2013, 11:33 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
like how I always felt while trying to get through FIAT

Amen to that...
January 23rd 2014, 08:14 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I just got my DMOD back from Leprochaun. He completely redid my unbelievably sad maps.

For example:

Before

After

Very exciting. This is going to be a much better DMOD now.

EDIT: That was fast! I had a request for testers here, but I already have two volunteers to test the mod, so no further testers are needed. I'll post here again when the final DMOD is submitted.
January 23rd 2014, 10:33 AM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
Looks great, but maybe that one little island has a bit too much detail now.
January 23rd 2014, 12:05 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Hell no, that's just the right amount of detail imo I mean, that island's decoration has been put in places where it won't interfere with combat or exploration and it adds so much to the atmosphere. Great work Leprochaun
January 23rd 2014, 12:46 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
I… may have gone overboard in certain areas.
January 23rd 2014, 01:36 PM
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It is great to see that some minor collaborations are still happening. Two minds is better than one in this case.

Also, looking forward to this DMOD Cocomonkey!
January 23rd 2014, 03:44 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
I really hope this D-Mod will work on my Dink HD mobile so I can actually play this when it comes out. I hate not having a working computer.
January 23rd 2014, 04:02 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Oh boy. I've never tested this on Dink HD and I'm not optimistic. I do a lot of unusual things and at any rate my code is a mess. I use a key-xx.c script at one point, I think I read that that causes a conflict?
January 24th 2014, 06:14 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
I use a key-xx.c script at one point, I think I read that that causes a conflict?

This will indeed cause a problem, simply because there are no keys to press

As far other functionality, you might run into quite some bugs or incompatibilities.
January 24th 2014, 04:23 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Actually, it does have access to a keyboard in the menu, and I just tested it in the main game. Pressing 'M' opened the map Hopefully your D-Mod will be somewhat playable for me then?
January 24th 2014, 04:46 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Oh, that's actually a nice feature then. Still won't be playable if it's a button that needs constant use during gameplay.
January 24th 2014, 05:07 PM
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Quiztis
Peasant He/Him Sweden bloop
Life? What's that? Can I download it?! 
Hehe, looking great!

My DMOD I'm working on is unplayable in DinkHD.
January 24th 2014, 05:49 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I opened up Malachi the Jerk in DinkHD (PC) and ran into problems immediately (text doesn't display when the screen is faded down).

Maybe I'll try to get it working in DinkHD after the initial release, but for now, I just want to get it out there already. See if people even think it's good enough to bother. >_>
January 27th 2014, 04:45 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I dabbled with Dink HD a bit more. It was easy to work around that text problem, of course, but other problems soon pop up.

I'm not sure that the engine finds fake brains (like, say, brain 20) or uses inside_box properly. The latter problem I could easily work around, but I use the fake brains so much that I can't imagine trying to fix this. Then again, I had the fake brain technique work on one screen but not another, so I haven't really got a clue what the problem actually is. Has anybody ever tried to put together just what it's necessary to do to get your mod working in Dink HD?
January 27th 2014, 04:50 PM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
Mine didn't get through the intro, which was just a cutscene. I gave up instantly
February 2nd 2014, 04:05 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
It's done. Done as in DONE. Look for it soon.

Big thanks to my beta testers Synbi and shevek for their hugely important assistance. For all I knew it was fine, and they showed me how very broken it actually was.

Thanks to Leprochaun again as well. You guys are the best.

Of course, I am hopelessly messy with code and the editor (I'm not sure why, I do try very hard) and will undoubtedly be updating it repeatedly. But it feels good to get it out there.
February 2nd 2014, 08:00 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
I'm very much looking forward to this! Great job on finishing another d-mod!
February 2nd 2014, 12:34 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
I can't wait to see how bad it messes up in DinkHD!
February 2nd 2014, 12:47 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I could tell you some of the early problems, but I don't want to spoil it.
February 2nd 2014, 09:14 PM
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ExDeathEvn
Peasant He/Him New Zealand rumble
"Skinny Legend" 
Going to assume this is where I can submit a bug report; The boss on the purple-tiled floor (trying not to spoil) can get stuck behind the torch and becomes a cakewalk.

There's also a typo during the intro, "it's it's".
Back to playing!

EDIT: I'm playing on regular 1.08, by the way.
February 2nd 2014, 09:25 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
I played it on DinkHD for about 30 minutes. Probably less. Definitely cannot be completed.
February 2nd 2014, 10:32 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Huh. It shouldn't be possible for that boss to get stuck because of this:

sp_move_nohard(&current_sprite, 1)


According to the DinkC reference, "If move_no_hard is 1, the sprite will move freely through hardness." Is that not how it works?
February 3rd 2014, 12:40 AM
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ExDeathEvn
Peasant He/Him New Zealand rumble
"Skinny Legend" 
It was moving just fine before that, then it tried to cross between the 'torch' and the vertical wall in the middle of the screen. No idea which part it was having trouble with; the wall, the torch, or the flame on the torch.
February 3rd 2014, 04:10 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I've been getting quite a few bug reports. I'd like to ask that people please post further reports here so that the other thread (on the news item) may be used to discuss the mod itself. Thanks.

Incidentally, I had a couple of goes at getting things working in DinkHD and really can't figure it out. If anybody is really familiar with DinkHD and wants to help me with that, let me know.
February 3rd 2014, 04:19 PM
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IIRC, sprites with move_nohard 1 can still get stuck if they attack while moving through hardness. For example, if a ghost knight takes a swing while going through a table, WHAM! They will thenceforth stutter in place sillily, just like a normal sprite would.
February 3rd 2014, 04:46 PM
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magicman
Peasant They/Them Netherlands duck
Mmmm, pizza. 
Stairs between the pointless dungeon and the outside world sound like doors. As do the stairs in the house of the disappointing mayor (and I consider those in particular a feature, to be honest )

No major game-breaking stuff found so far (playing on 1.08, Windows 7, 64-bit). dnotalk.c seems to increase script count sometimes, but not always, but as far as I've been able to detect it, this resets on screenchange. I'll get some more measurements done if you want me to.
February 3rd 2014, 06:03 PM
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Toof
Peasant He/Him
I disagree. 
Positive feedback:
The ghost victims of a mad designer, hilarious.

Negative feedback:
So far, none, although I've only completed the 'dungeon' part. Don't lose pessimism
February 3rd 2014, 09:01 PM
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liquid141
Peasant They/Them
Sons of liberty 
i dont understand what to do with those sea shell , only one disappeared right after talking other do nothing but repeat the same thing ,is this a bug ?

loving how you can let other enemies slaughter each other and silently collect the gold but that dang star enemy is the worst it charges fast and leeches you to death and the sound it makes is annoying. so many deaths
February 3rd 2014, 09:04 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
That's not what's supposed to happen. I can't reproduce your bug, though. I tried talking to the shells in every possible order and it worked correctly every time. I looked at my scripts and I can't see any problem. What version of Dink are you using?
February 3rd 2014, 09:12 PM
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liquid141
Peasant They/Them
Sons of liberty 
normal dink v1.08
February 3rd 2014, 09:15 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
Are you really talking to all the shells? They are not all the same shape.
February 3rd 2014, 09:19 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
All the relevant shell scripts contain an external command that calls the same message if a variable called &shell is 0, but when you talk to one of them, no matter which one, it should increase &shell by 1. One of the scripts does actually contain the procedure that the others are calling, so that one doesn't use external, but I tested talking to that one first and it ought to work just as well...

Can you send me your save file? I think &shell didn't get set for some reason (not that I understand why that'd be). I could make sure that's what happened and even fix it for you and send it back.
February 3rd 2014, 09:20 PM
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magicman
Peasant They/Them Netherlands duck
Mmmm, pizza. 
Not all seashells disappear. I think only 6 (out of many) do.

Also: I was able to talk to the shells on the screen with the wizard-hut even when there were wasps around. Nearly killed me, too. Other shells had a "there are still wasps!" text, so that's all cool.
February 3rd 2014, 10:06 PM
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liquid141
Peasant They/Them
Sons of liberty 
Facepalm epic fail. i wanted to send two saves one to show that well + old man punch getting the game stuck and this shells...and overwrote the latest save with the first one....while saving....
does the game run under dink hd ? i think i am going to activate wuss mode,and speed through it again with insta save/load
February 3rd 2014, 10:11 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Sorry, I never could get it working properly in DinkHD. I don't think it's possible to finish it in that without cheating.

I did fix the old man and well bug. I've fixed quite a few things in the version I have right now, but I'm thinking it might be smart to hold off on updating for a few days, as more stuff is probably going to come up by then.
February 3rd 2014, 10:36 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
My experience playing Malachi the Jerk on DinkHD(A novel in progress):
First up I hit the start button, I got a black screen. Thought the game was broken already. Turns out there's a choice menu or something, so I just hit control and the intro played.
Next up after watching that long intro, I run through the cave with the purple boncas. Everything seems to work all right. Okay okay this is good.
Now, not wanting to hav to try so hard in case of more bugs, I wuss out.
Then I proceed down the stairs save and talk to the old man. Upon finished my pleasant conversation with the man. The game freezes.
Load save game, talk to the old man again and choose a different option. After finished conversation- game freezes.
You know what, screw that guy.
I go up and I take the left path, I do everything I can over there. Which mostly just involves the kickbutt wuss slaying of some monsters. But kickbutt non-the-less.
After finding nothing of importance I return to the fountain.
From there I go right. AND I SLAY THE KILLER BUNNY! Was it a bunny? I don't remember. Anyways I killed the thing with my magic wuss powers, then sneakily snatched the fireball scroll.
After which, I proceeded south. I know this because I checked my compass. It came with the game- don't question this, just believe.
Next up I trodded around the maze of stuff. Yes, maze of stuff. I attempted to buy some of the stuff at one point thinking it to be a yard sale. Unfortunately it was not. I made my way through the maze and fought a deadly ghost.
I pounded him upon his body many times with my wuss fist, and killed him. Then the game froze, and I called it quits.
That is the end of my adventure. It appears as though princess malachi was in another castle.
February 3rd 2014, 10:49 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I'm beginning to suspect that Malachi secretly collaborated with Seth on DinkHD.
February 3rd 2014, 11:38 PM
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liquid141
Peasant They/Them
Sons of liberty 
lol i reached the first beach i think there is no bug with the shells i was only talking to the ones in the second beach , now i realize you have to do it in both.
is dink hd very different from 1.08 , a lot of good dmods dont run well at all but that instant save/load and speedup is good to have
February 3rd 2014, 11:43 PM
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Wait... Fireball scroll? Bunny? I beat the whole game and never found those, shame on me!!

Well, it's nice that it wasn't necessary to beat the game at any rate.
February 3rd 2014, 11:43 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Hot dang, you never found the fireball scroll? I... wow. Good going winning anyway.

He's lying about the bunny.
February 3rd 2014, 11:44 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
You don't know that! I was playing on DinkHD. It's a completely different experience!
February 3rd 2014, 11:49 PM
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Nope, I was wondering why I was finding magic potions when I had no magic though.
February 3rd 2014, 11:55 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
Red and blue makes purple. Magic potions are purple, but also if you combine a strength potion and a defense potion you'll get a purple potion.

There's no fireball script, the purple potions are just a strength and defense mix.
February 4th 2014, 12:02 AM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
There's no fireball script, the purple potions are just a strength and defense mix.

You're playing the wrong DMod. Potion mixing is what you do in Friends Beyond 3.
February 4th 2014, 12:04 AM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
There's no fireball in friends beyond 3?
February 4th 2014, 12:37 AM
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I did actually find a few bugs by the way, nothing too serious, all found playing on Aural+. WARNING, some spoilers ahead!

1. If you return to the final room of the main story, the treasure will reappear on the floor. Nothing happens when you touch it but it's not supposed to be there either way.

2. In the final dungeon, in the first screenlock of the final stretch (with the machine monsters) you can get stuck in the wall upon entering if you enter at a bad spot.

3. The first time I reached the darklands area, I couldn't seem to use the third teleport machine to teleport there. It worked after I checked again after beating the game though. I'm not sure exactly when the teleport activated but it seems to have been later than it should have. Luckily there were plenty of other shortcuts to utilize.

4. In the arena, sometimes your projectiles will hit things that aren't there. The most noticeable place seems to be an area directly above Dink's starting position where projectiles like to mess up at. It is also possible, though I haven't checked to make sure, that some enemy spells leave behind hittable artifacts that can mess up some projectiles (by the way, that 12th challenge was neat and totally unexpected).

5. When getting the loaf in the area before the darklands, there are many wasps on the screen and they can attack you while you are picking it up.

6. The hitboxes for the wasps seem kind of strange, maybe too far to the right, but it makes hitting them a bit more challenging than it should be.

I think that's all the bugs I found; there were some minor typos but I didn't take the time to jot them down.

P.S. I just went back and got the fireball magic, which took all of 5 seconds. I'm a bit surprised I missed it. I remember seeing the scroll but I must have forgot about it by the time I could get out of the dungeon. It wasn't that it was hidden too well, I just managed to forget about it somehow.
February 4th 2014, 12:56 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Thanks, and congrats on being the first person to finish it after release as far as I know.

100%, you say. Did you fight the secret boss?
February 4th 2014, 01:02 AM
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I never looked at the walkthrough so I don't know if I got 100%, but I certainly beat a secret boss and got the secret ending (and missed fireball, haha!).

edit: OOhhh I didn't do everything. I forgot about erm... something important... hmm... back to the drawing board.
February 4th 2014, 01:52 AM
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Okay! Now I think I've did every important thing in the DMOD.
February 4th 2014, 12:15 PM
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ExDeathEvn
Peasant He/Him New Zealand rumble
"Skinny Legend" 
Well, I just completed (sort of) the entirety of the mod. Your bonus final boss beyond the secret area though, with the purple wall? ... Talking to the sign while an active boss is there spawned a second one. I hadn't intended to do this, mind you; I can read the text quickly enough that I'll hit space to skip it, and somehow ended up reading the message again.

Also, I'm not sure what the point of the INTERMISSION was after the end credits from killing Malachi, but I sat here waiting for something to happen and was met with disappointment when the mod decided it would just exit itself instead of fireworks. Nice trolling.
February 4th 2014, 12:47 PM
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liquid141
Peasant They/Them
Sons of liberty 
wait there is nothing after intermission ? crap i am still waiting :X
February 4th 2014, 02:06 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Oh crap! Thanks for telling me about the bonus boss problem. I will fix that straightaway.

The intermission is just there because I like having a little music play me out at the end of something.
February 4th 2014, 02:11 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
That's how it felt to me, and I wasn't disappointed by it ending after it. But "intermission" does indeed imply that something will follow.
February 4th 2014, 02:50 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Can anybody think of a better word to use than "Intermission?"
February 4th 2014, 03:03 PM
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"The End" is always a safe choice.
February 4th 2014, 03:07 PM
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ThePunisher
Peasant He/Him Australia
(Tag Line) How long is this line. 
It a shame that you didnt get to fight Malachi himself.
February 4th 2014, 03:30 PM
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shevek
Peasant They/Them Netherlands
Never be afraid to ask, but don't demand an answer 
You did. But as it goes with bullies, he wasn't such a tough guy after all.
February 4th 2014, 04:53 PM
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ExDeathEvn
Peasant He/Him New Zealand rumble
"Skinny Legend" 
Post number 200!

An alternative to simply "Ending" the Dmod and having it close itself, would be to send it back to the Title screen as if choosing the restart option. Personally I would suggest doing this in place of exiting when the player finds an ending, as they're not likely to have unlocked everything on their first playthrough without extreme persistence and/or your built-in Walkthrough. Simple re-playability.

PS: Your bonus boss now lies defeated with an Arena reward weapon sticking out of their heads... It was difficult as heck with two of 'em! particularly since the first was mobile while I was skipping through the dialogue after spawning the second (took a couple attempts, but I figured I'd give a dual-boss a go). Good to hear you'll fix that.
February 5th 2014, 03:12 AM
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ThePunisher
Peasant He/Him Australia
(Tag Line) How long is this line. 
When? the closest I fought to him was a Robotic Dink Smallwood.
February 5th 2014, 12:50 PM
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liquid141
Peasant They/Them
Sons of liberty 
Thought i would just find out what these bonus are so i started playing the game fresh again but this time got stuck right after you chase malachi and he explodes the rocks.
Right after the scene ended , i moved right there was a small bush that got me stuck and i could not move out ....
February 6th 2014, 07:21 PM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
Hey, just ran into a weird bug at the mud area. Didn't really read all the bug reports by other people through, so dunno if someone already mentioned it. Anyway, after I started Malachi back up and loading at the mud area, I walked into the mud, but instead of getting slower, Dink kept walking at normal speed. When I went back onto land, he started going super fast. I loaded the game without quitting and it fixed the bug.

EDIT: Also, there seems to be a colour error in one of the blue Bonca's lines. Just thought I'd point that out while at it.
February 6th 2014, 08:20 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Where did you load the game when you had this problem? Was it at the save point in Disappointment?
February 6th 2014, 09:08 PM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
At the save point in the mud maze. And when I walked from the regular ground onto the mud, that's when the bug happened.
February 6th 2014, 09:20 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
OK, I see the problem now. It'll be fixed in the next update. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

EDIT: Wait, nope. Thought I had it, but I still can't figure this one out. Dang.

Were you on or off of the mud when you saved? I'm sorry, but I'm a little unclear on that.
February 6th 2014, 09:59 PM
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liquid141
Peasant They/Them
Sons of liberty 
I thought it was a normal thing ,sometimes dink walks normally in the sand for a screen max and then slows down
February 7th 2014, 11:48 AM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
I was off the mud.
February 7th 2014, 05:15 PM
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Skull
Peasant He/Him Finland bloop
A Disembodied Sod 
Found another bug. This one's with the sorcerer dude who lives at the beach. When you pick the "Purchase an elixir" option, and after that pick "No" when it asks if you wanna buy an elixir, it goes through the scenario of when you first ask him about the anti-freeze spell. Probably caused by a missing bracket or something simple like that.
February 8th 2014, 12:10 AM
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Did you hear Sn1 went on a date with Sn2? He stole my trousers and now clowns will eat me
February 11th 2014, 07:59 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
So I finally got around to playing this. I finished the game with 11 of 10 legendary loaves.

Anyways, after finishing the game via bonca- the screen fails to fade back up. Which isn't nice.
I had some issues where if I left the mud area at the southern entrance dink's speed would fail to revert back to normal.
After collecting the golden duck figurine I realized it didn't go away for good in the church- something you might fix.

And finally- you're probably wondering how I got the 11th loaf. Well once I got into Dink Forever, I threw a few coins in the well and the loaf appeared! It was pretty legendary.
February 11th 2014, 10:05 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
I'm playing the heck out of this and I'm really enjoying it. I'm about 2 hours into the D-mod so far and it's great. I plan on writing an extensive review once I finish the D-mod, as well as post a list of bugs I've come across. Already have a good list of things to include in both the review and bug report.
February 11th 2014, 10:11 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
YAY A REVIEW! Non-existent score begone!
February 11th 2014, 10:59 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Edit 2: I retract my retraction. The bug has done a bit more harm than I initially thought.

So what happened is I talked to Colin about going to talk to the general store owner about the blue bonca. I talked to him again afterward and after he said his one line "Ain't got nothing more to say", Dink was frozen and couldn't move. I then reloaded my previous save, and went back to Colin to continue the quest, but the first thing he said was "Ain't got nothing more to say" instead of that whole conversation about the blue bonca. So I figured I'd continue with the quest, and I got the figurine from his granddaughter, and I went back to him. I talk to him and nothing happens other than him saying the same line. I think a global got messed up between Dink freezing and me reloading the save, or that getting the figurine didn't add the required global to continue the quest.

And yeah, I'll most likely have the game beat tomorrow and then the review will probably be up a week or two later because of lazy staff.
February 12th 2014, 12:56 AM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Wow, ouch. I've fixed this and the new version will be up soon. Thanks for letting me know.
February 12th 2014, 05:22 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
No problem. Once I beat the game I'll post a list of all the other bugs I've found.

What kinda sucks is that bug messed up my game, and because of the location my Dink folder was in, I couldn't access the Malachi file to edit a script myself to fix whatever global was messed up to be able to continue the game. So I moved my Dink folder and later I get to replay the first half of the game. Means I'll find more bugs
February 13th 2014, 05:43 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I'm holding back version 1.2 in anticipation of your bug list, so don't forget to post it, please >_>
February 13th 2014, 07:19 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
I should beat the game tonight once I get home. When I do I'll PM you my bug list and start writing my review. If I don't end up beating it though, I'll still PM what I've found up to that point.

I look forward to beating the game, it's really good

Edit: Beat the game with ~5:30 of play time and hitting level 13. Great game. Also messaged the bug report and wrote my review.
February 17th 2014, 03:40 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
4 days for my review to be accepted, quicker than I expected. Enjoy the review & score, Tim
February 17th 2014, 04:01 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Wow, thanks for the great & thorough review. I really appreciate it.

It's funny - I actually didn't adjust the power of the fire bow at all. The only thing I did was make Dink say **POWER SHOT** ever time you fire it.

Oh, and I got "Disappointment" from an actual place. Disappointment, Kentucky. I've been there. It's not so bad.

I submitted version 1.2 back on the 14th, so that should be up soon, hopefully.
February 17th 2014, 04:03 PM
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synbi
Peasant He/Him Finland
 
Your review also echoes most of my thoughts about MTJ. I've decided not to be lured into playing any mods before I'm done with the modding contest (a reasonable attempt to fight against procrastination! what is this evil magic?!), but even with my initial impressions in mind MTJ shows there's still so much you can do with dink that hasn't been given proper attempts yet. Like attempts at actual storytelling what with Dink having an actual character arc over the course of an adventure, holy dang. Sure some of the scenes in MTJ came out as melodramatic and sissy, but whyyyy did that bonca have to die?!
February 17th 2014, 05:08 PM
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DinkKiller
Peasant He/Him United States
The world could always use more heroes 
Well, I've never really had the firebow in the main game, maybe once or twice, so I'm not very familiar with it. 25,000 gold was just way too much, so I never really saw its power.
February 17th 2014, 07:58 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Melodramatic, I'll cop to that. But sissy? You make me sad
February 17th 2014, 10:19 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
I'll take the blame for anything you found that you thought was sissy. I'm not saying I had a hand in it, I'm just saying I'll take the blame for it.
February 18th 2014, 03:34 AM
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synbi
Peasant He/Him Finland
 
Hmm, now that I actually look up what sissy means instead of thinking I know my english it's not really what was intended sorry
February 18th 2014, 11:04 AM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
perhaps you meant wussy ?
February 18th 2014, 11:56 AM
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Kyle
Peasant He/Him Belgium
 
I kinda like the melodramatic As long as its not blatantly over the top.

Btw, I haven't even said anything on here, I'm really enjoying the d-mod! I admit I waited a bit because of all the bug talk I'm into it now though. Is the 1.2 patch able to be applied on existing saves?
February 18th 2014, 03:51 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Yeah, I don't think there'd be any problems.
February 27th 2014, 11:13 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I realized that I made a change I forgot to document in 1.2.

*Changed text "INTERMISSION" at end of game to "FIN"
September 20th 2014, 03:03 PM
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I can not find a button which says "WUSS MODE" in the treasure cave. What shall I do? At my age (87) I MUST have that button.
September 20th 2014, 03:19 PM
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leprochaun
Peasant He/Him Japan bloop
Responsible for making things not look like ass 
It's the cave malachi traps you inside of right at the beginning of the game. There's a red button on the wall. You should be able to initiate wuss mode by interacting with that.
September 20th 2014, 04:21 PM
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CocoMonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
Just to be sure it's clear, I've taken a screenshot and indicated the wuss mode button for you with a little red arrow.

September 21st 2014, 02:43 PM
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Where do I find the wuss button?
September 21st 2014, 02:50 PM
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Skurn
Peasant He/Him Equatorial Guinea duck bloop
can't flim flam the glim glam 
...
September 21st 2014, 04:48 PM
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Can you see images in threads? Cocomonkey posted a screenshot of the wuss button in his last post. It's literally a big red button on the wall, you can't really miss it. =)
September 21st 2014, 11:56 PM
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CocoMonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
You have to fight a few screens worth of purple boncas before you can activate wuss mode. That room is at the end of the cave you start the game in.