>2Roswell - Diary Of A Game Part 2 >3By Andy Gibson Welcome to the second installment of the Roswell diary. If you read the first part of this diary, then you'll know that I had plans to get the forest house completed. Well, I've managed to do that, and then some... Read on and hopefully I'll include a couple of screenshots for you to look at. I have also been waiting for a reply from a couple of gfx artists, but no word as of yet, so I'll have to keep on producing everything! It's a hard slog, but it's gotta be done. Let the diary commence.... May 1996 (9th) Noticed a nasty bug in the cave with the blocked exit! Bud could still walk behind the wood which was blocking the exit. This looked very wierd indeed due to the perspective mode. In fact, Bud shouldn't have been able to go any further than the wood, so I sorted that first of all. Also started work on another cave and fixed the sign in th cave with the blocked exit. Now it loads an Iff piccy diaplaying the sign in all its glory. I had to search a lot of clipart files to find a Minestry Of Defence logo/badge! May 1996 (10th) The two caves behind the exit are now complete. All I have to do is add a door here which will eventually lead into a Top Secret location. There is a display panel next to the door and when Bud looks at it, it loads an Iff piccy to show it in full. It requests that your hand should be placed down to gain access. Obviously Bud's hand won't do as he isn't a military person, so this is another game puzzle! How hill bud get by this point? Decided to touch up the forest house gfx a little also. I decided that the game should be modern and was sick of looking at wooden houses, so the forest house now has a modern look to it. Certain parts had to be grabbed and used to give the effect of Bud walking behind them such as the wooden fence and side of the house. May 1996 (11th) Started work on the inside of the house today and it's looking really good. In fact, it's so good that I'll even let you see it as one of the preview pics. (should be with this issue) I decided the coal fire should have `Living Flames' instead of just a non-animated look. So it's the good old Flash command again. As always I had to test out the best values and correct Hex numbers to use, so good old Amos to the rescue. I've now written a small program that flashes any colour I want easily so I can use it for future screen testing. I may even write this properly and send it to Edmund Clay so he can release it with any GRAC updates. Non programmers could make good use of this. Oh yeah, I had to draw a small crack on the brick in the very first room as some peeps said it was far too hard to find!!! Lamers! :( Not much done today because it's Saturday and I have to go out and buy food and then go to the pub later! Hehehehe Hiccup! I can tell you now that nothing will be done tomorrow due to my hangover! May 1996 (13th) If you're wondering why I don't seem to be doing much to each room in one day, well I'll tell you. After drawing a room or two, I then have to grab objects and position them. I then have to add the walkzones, objects and text and scripting. After this is all done, I load the game to check it all out and try it from as many angles as possible. Sort of playtesting while I work! Anyway, yesterday was Sunday and I don't really touch my Amiga on a Sunday! Linda grabs it before me and plays Deluxe Galaga AGA, Boris Ball, Tetris Pro, Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo CD, Bump N Burn CD and Deluxe Pacman AGA for hours! I'm lucky if I get to type up one lousy letter to my contacts! Started work on the second room of the house today and it's getting there slowly. I've also decided to animate the Wall Clock in the first room to add more life to the room. What with the burning fire and an animated wall clock, it's looking good. Obviously this room will have plenty of objects and clues to pick up and I've not yet really decided, but maybe a VCR and TV will feature! The Wall Clock's pendulum swings now, but imagine me doing frames to rotate the clock hands! I'd be here forever! So the clock will stay at the same time! I suppose I could alter it so that each time you enter the room it's at a different time, but imagine this: Your in the room and the clock says 3 O'Clock. You leave and re-enter and the clock now says 7:15pm! It's just not possible to have random images to be used in this way for a clock! I don't think anyone will notice the time on it anyway! (They will now :-) Decided to take a break and watch Star Wars video today coz I haven't seen it in such a long time. What a classic movie. I think I'll watch the next two this week also. I also took time out to write to some of my contacts. May 1996 (14th) Decided to browse over the Amiga Format CD today. (I bought it on Sunday and haven't even looked at it yet). WOW! The full version of my Ultimate Quiz Volume 1 is on there. Rated at 95% in AUI and I gave Steve of F1 permision to release it, in full, for a second time. It first appeared, in full, on an Amiga Shopper coverdisk (Subscriber's disk Dec 1995). A non-games mag too. Still enough about Quiz 1 for now. To be honest, I'm not impressed with the Format CD! Too much 3-D stuff on it for my liking. Still, it's another CD to the collection I guess. Back to Roswell, after all, this is a diary about it! ;^) Anyway, I've now altered the font used for speech in the game as the one I was using was too large! That's about the third font I've used and I think this will be the last change. Pretty neat. Started typing up this diary today (part 2 that is) and did a little updating to the source code also. But not much and it's for my own personal pleasure, so I won't bore you with all that. Basically it's just something that I know is there! May 1996 (15th) Received a letter from one of the gfx artists I wrote to this morning. Well, he didn't actually reply, but Royal Mail did. He is no longer at that address! Bummer! Still, I also received a letter from Alan (zYLAX/PTK) today and he says that Gobliiin/PTK is interested in working on my Roswell game with me. So I had to spend most of the day fixing out selected piccies to send to him and explain all about the palettes used for each locations and screen sizes etc. This took a few hours a I also typed up a huge letter to Alan to explain it all! Still, when Gobliiin gets the disks with all the piccies etc., he'll know exactly what he's doing. I did a heck of a lot of explaining, so I hope he understands it all anyway or all that work will be in vain! At last! I may have found a gfx artist to help me out. Can't wait to get to work with Gobliiin and be part of a team again. :-) Anyway, I've now linked all the house and rooms together and it's working well. I'll have a break now. Well, that's it for Part 2 of this diary. Hopefully part 3 will be as exciting as this one!!!! Now I have a gfx artist also, the game should start to take shape rather quickly if myself and Gobliiin keep in touch on a regular basis (which we will have to). Who knows, maybe by the next installment of this diary is written, most of the game will be done! Although I don't think it shall be as there is still so much to do. I do believe that Gobliiin has already started work on a new part for the intro also! Pity Alan forgot to send me the disk! :( If I remember, I'll send in a couple of early screenshots of the game for you to look at. DO NOT USE THEM FOR YOUR OWN PRODUCTIONS THOUGH AS THEY ARE COPYRIGHT © 1996 - AGAS PRODUCTIONS At this point I would like to thank all the playtesters for all their support. Until next time..... Andy Gibson.