It was fun for a while. The mood was great, as was the music. The gameplay was fun to start with, but when it got to the more complicated levels (read: Have to make huge piles) it got a bit annoying. I also kept getting stuck on the sides of blocks that were on a corner. Had to restart a few levels as i couldn't move despite not being obviously trapped. Still, it's a great little game. Congrats

That is the essence of most errors i end up getting in flash, accessing objects before they exist or have been created yet. It's a right pain!

Yeah i hear what you're saying. But even if there is a good way of embedding them all easily, you're still going to have to instantiate them all individually when you need them which is going to take time too. Working with that many images sounds like a pain all around

It's probably not suitable but another option is to import them all as one huge file, then have an array with references to where in that bitmap the individual images are, basically the process used for blitting animations. But i guess that could be just as big a headache! I hope the JSFL thingy works for you, whatever that is.

Maybe i'm missing the point here, but for images/sounds you can just import them to your library (in the flash IDE), and then in the properties check the "Export for Actionscript" checkbox. You can then access them at any time and they'll be embedded into the swf.  Unless of course you are saying that this process in itself is too time consuming, in which case i'm not sure there is a faster alternative.

You can also embed them in actionscript usign the embed tags, which is useful for stuff like icons. I create a static class called Icons.as in which each icon is embedded as a public static classes that i can then refer to from anywhere in the application. This is with flex though, but i believe it the same with flash.

XML can be done as coffin mentioned.

Just wanted to say that i just tried the build posted, and it is adorable. It's an extremely good concept, and so far looks like you are heading in a great direction. Can't wait to see how you tackle making this game. Making the mechanic into a full game sounds pretty challenging, but sounds like you have good ideas. Good luck

Couple of ideas off the top of my head. Platforms that require the special ability to activate, but decrease in size over time, so you can introduce time challenges if you want. Also maybe moving enemies/friendly npcs that can be temporarily grown into platforms. You'd have to choose the right spot to transform them to progress ... maybe? Just thinking out loud.

Oh and the water looked great, which is a tricky thing to pull off.

Looks great. One thing I noticed in the video is that you can't slide through low gaps without a bit of momentum, which sounds fine in theory but in practice ... i even got a little frustrated by the mechanic just watching the part in the video where you have trouble getting it to work. It also makes no sense from a physics point of view as there's no way she has enough momentum to get that far through the gap without being able to propel herself while she's in there, so maybe just make her able to go through from stopped?

Just my 2 cents though.

Do not collect 200 dollars.

No but he could definitely use more breast jiggle. 

Wow, just listened to Ichi Ni San Cuatro on your myspace page. That is fucking great. It makes me feel nostalgic at the same time as sounding quite modern and fresh, which is pretty impressive.

That just looks, and sounds, fucking fantastic!

 

Do you mean MXMXL? If that's the case then it makes no difference whatsoever. When the flex compiles MXML it is actually converting it to as code. Having an assets class with all your embedded assets collected in one place is a good way to go. They're easy to find, and easy to modify.

http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/quickstart/embedding_assets/#EmbeddingFonts

Rinku: Flash files can run before being fully downloaded because they stream (like a YouTube video for example).  A SWF is actually just a bitstream that is parsed by the Flash Player when it arrives.

The format was designed for interactive movies or interfaces with a timeline, not so much games, so it doesn't make as much sense for our purposes.

Um ... what? How does it not make sense for games?

If you want to put your games on one of the flash portal sites, I think they require it to be one file, so no dynamic loading. It's a shame as it makes the initial download bigger, but i guess it makes the coding easier.

I realise it's a very stylised piece, but the shadow of the house is from a hard light source. However that light source isn't carried over into any of the rest of the picture. The shading on the planet implies a soft scattered light source, which wouldn't cast any hard shadows like that. The shadows on the fence wouldn't even be there if the light source of the house is to be believed. That whole side of the planet would be in shadow. As people have said, the spacing on the fence posts aren't even, but also the angle of them aren't all facing towards the centre of the planet. The red planet looks really quite flat compared to the others. I didn't notice the fishing line curving the wrong way, but manunderground is right.

I like the soft rendering, and the tomes on the house are lovely. I think if you think more carefully about light sources it would hugely improve it though.

Oh god that video made me laugh. The poor neighbour just looked embarrassed to be there.

It's either 6 an a half, or 7.

This is true for a realistically proportioned person, which is often not the case in game characters. For example a more heroic character will often be 8-9 heads tall, and cutesy characters less than 6.

Honestly at this point based on the last sketch you posted, I think you are getting ahead of yourself. As hard as it is to swallow, you really do need to study anatomy, and the earlier the better. You don't need to do 4 hours drawing a day for a year (although that would be great!), but at least put a few hours in a week doing proper studies. This is going to be especially important when you come to animate the character. You can just about fake a still image with no knowledge of anatomy, but when you start doing different poses and actual movement then a solid understanding of the basics of anatomy is going to save you SO much time.

It IS daunting though. I have let my art skills drop for years, and am trying to get back into it a bit, and it's tough to make yourself sit down with an anatomy book and sketch bone structures for even an hour. But do it, and you will improve rapidly.

My advice is to download Andrew Loomis: Figure Drawing For All Its Worth here: http://www.gfxartist.com/features/tutorials/7639

It's out of print, so digital downloads is the only way to get it if you don't want to shell out loads on ebay! And they are really the best I have seen. Study it bit by bit, and read the preface/introduction as it's extremely well written.

Also check out the conceptart.org forums, as there are some really good resources for learning to draw the figure.

Stache or no stache is never a question that needs asking. The answer will always be stache. 

Wow. That is a well implemented protest right there! And it's surprisingly fun. Good job! I almost want a whole series of this, protesting the killing of various endangered species by enabling the gratuitous killing of said species.

I really didn't experience anything different than what I experienced in mainstream 3D adventures.

Seriously? The experience totally flies in the face of mainstream games if you ask me. In fact I can't think of any other game mainstream or not, that gave me the same feeling of discovery in such a short time. I absolutely loved it.