In any case, I’ve been sticking with my recent tendency to focus on advancing the story in testgame, probably at the expense of making earlier parts of the game actually look good.

 *DERAILMENT* 

Man, and I got so far into my plan for the article too.  I’ve actually been thinking that I need to go back and do some touching up on earlier parts of testgame.  For example, I was just playing through the first part of the game again (I’ll explain why in a bit) and I kept finding millions of little tiny things that were really annoying me and that I could fix in practically no time.  I’m talking about things like Paul not actually reaching to pick things up, or hand things to Artie, or open his closet door.  And of course there are assorted cheating things I did when I made the game that really need to be filled in, and dialogue to be tweaked, and various stuff like that.  In any case, I think I’m gonna be working on some of that for next month in addition to the usual pressing on with the storyline bit.

 *BACK ON TRACK!* (What’s the opposite of “derailment” anyway?  Rerailment?  Hehehe.)

So with this month, we have the next big (already-planned) step in Paul’s exploration of the castle.  This part isn’t completely flushed out yet, but you can see a new cutscene and interact with a new character.  Well, he’s not really new, because he was there before.  It’s the ventriloquist guy who someone told me looks like a woman with a monkey on her lap.  Whatever.  Just go check him out in the castle courtyard.

 Now, I’ve done something a little different with this month’s download of testgame.  I finally realized that it must be really really annoying to have to play through the whole first part of the game just to get into the castle to see what’s new, especially when I haven’t been doing anything at all in the first part these past few months.  Well actually, I had realized that before, but I didn’t really care because I can cheat when I’m testing the game by jumping to any room I want, but I always make sure you guys can’t do that because that might make bad things happen.  I’m the ruler of the universe and you must do what I say. 

But recently, I came up with the brilliant idea of trying to find a way for you guys to try out just the later part of the game.  So here’s my solution: I played all the way through testgame up until the outside of the castle, and then I saved the game, and I’ve included that save file in this month’s downloadable package of fun.  Assuming this works (which it does for at least one other person), you should now be able to check out the new stuff without too much trouble at all, and without killing yourself.  I try to avoid causing people’s deaths whenever possible.  Of course, this save file is the result of me making the choices in the first part of the game.  For example, if you play from the included save file, you won’t have any of the three items that Lily offers you at the beginning of the game (because I chose to not take any).  So if you want to try doing anything with any of those items, you’ll just have to play the game from the beginning by yourself. 

So anyway, let me know if the save file helps at all, or makes you any more eager to try things out.  I also debated hard-wiring some way to start from whatever part of the game you want when you first load the game (like in KQ7), but I’ve never really been a fan of that.  Well, it came in really handy when my computer froze consistently at one part in a chapter, or didn’t play the crucial sound that I needed to get past a particular puzzle.  But whatever.  Testgame won’t be like that. 

Go testgame go!

TestGame v. 26

(no extra programs needed to run this file)

Things to do/new features of note: 

·        New cutscene!  Now, when Paul walks over to the other end of the castle courtyard, he gets treated to a show!  This means that the character in this screen is introduced and you get to hear him talking some!  This cutscene also includes.…

·        Additional crowds in the castle courtyard (but only during the cutscene).  We’re getting closer to the amount of festive liveliness that I’ve been planning, but it’s not quite there yet.

·        New dialogue!  Paul can now talk with the street performer (Anthony—I love giving things names), although there will be more dialogue later.

·        New animation!  The guy on the left hand side of the castle courtyard now does some stuff in the background while Paul’s walking around.

·        Background work: front of castle

·        Try playing the game from the included save file. (“Part 2”)

All the graphics and design are by Lizo. The dialogue was written by Lizo, with significant input by Paul. The background music is by Lizo. "Let's Go Skateboard" is written and performed by The Word Problems.  Adventure Game Studio (the program used to create this game) can be downloaded at http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/

-- Elizabeth "Lizo" Medina-Gray {07-2007}

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