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[ThetaGames]

I found a bug.  There was one moment where the view was moving faster than the van, and so it fell out of the view.  I think I hit some stuff, and had to start over (I think - I couldn't see what was happening), but then I believe the van turned invisible, because I was still hitting stuff, but could not see it.

[joseppe]

Another laptop user here. The window opens, doesn't update, and immediately crashes.

[Aquin]

I'm gonna keep hunting these bugs, but the download I have up right now (just updated it) definitely meets my satisfaction.

Does it have everything I wanted?  Mostly.  The media assets are either lame or not mine; I would take much more time for these if I had it.  Next compo, I'm cutting my idea down by at least half so I can make my own music and focus on making NOT childish graphics.

Thanks for putting up with my this compo and I'll see you guys in the votes!

---

Also, if you find glitches, let me know.  I'll still be fixing it up through the rest of today.

[Mr. Yes]

The music has suddenly made this game hilarious. :D

[Aquin]

Well, that was always my intent. 

[joseppe]

Just to be clear, this isn't just a glitch, the game is completely unplayable.

[Aquin]

Yeah, I've been trying to fix that game-loading error for awhile.  I honestly have NO idea what's causing it.  Google has been of no help.  I have error handling on the initialization functions, but it's still crashing for laptops (and a few other people.)

Sadly, I'm not a code guru by any stretch.  I would really appreciate some help figuring out this little dilemma (the source code is included with the game.)

[Kadoba]

It sounds like it's platform/hardware dependent so I'm going to have to blame your media library (allegro). But I'm no guru either.

Oh and I'll say that I've been lurking quite a bit waiting for your game and I'm really surprised what you managed to do with minimal assets. There's a lot of little things that made me just stop and say 'oh, that's pretty cool.' For example the clock in the classroom reflecting the time on my computer. When you hit a pedestrian they'll get knocked down, stand up, and run away screaming to call the cops. All meticulously programed. Nothing groundbreaking of course but it really added charm to the game.

As for charm, the child abusement part starkly contrasted with the rest of your game. I understand this was the whole point. But it seems it could've gotten by with being controversial by the theme alone. The first time through I got the good ending and I really enjoyed all the little details about the game and I thought the idea of a studiously crazed tutor stealing a rural town's children to engage in extracurricular activities was pretty funny. But I felt cheated from the intended experience so I tried again to get the bad endings and I just couldn't go through with it. I forced myself along and in the end I just realized that I wasn't enjoying it or feel like I was getting any experience from it. It was just demoralizing.

I mean obviously you worked hard on it and I'm not complaining. Anyone who plays the game should understand what they're in for. It's just that usually shock material doesn't affect me but I think child molestation was just a little too much for me.

[Aquin]

Thank God.

Yeah, I *really* hate the child abuse part too, but that's what I wanted to achieve with the game.  I wanted people to step into it, expecting to get all nasty evil or what-have-you, but being unable to go through with it.  Bright graphics, cheery music, and adorable little characters.

I wanted you to care about them, try to get them their best endings, and be a good person.  The very IDEA that you could ruin so many lives should make you feel like a bastard!  I included the "gotta-get-all-the-endings" feeling (using the endings screen/percentage complete) to force you to consider how sick you would have to be to actually go through with it.

I'm really glad you figured out the way I want everyone to play the game!  Forget the game, forget the score, and forget the extras!  Go out and be a nice guy at any cost!

[ThetaGames]

I'm really glad you figured out the way I want everyone to play the game!  Forget the game, forget the score, and forget the extras!  Go out and be a nice guy at any cost!

That's what I like about this - it is definitely possible to play through, and actually help the kids (the good endings are actually quite nice).  I got some of the bad endings once, and this definitely caused an extremely unpleasant feeling (as it should).

As far as the good endings go, it still seems a little creepy having a guy pick up all of these kids and tutor them, even if his intentions are completely good.  In today's society, even the simple act of pick-up-the-kids-and-tutor-them itself would be looked upon as suspicious.  Maybe a little backstory would help - like perhaps this guy runs a reputable business doing this stuff.  Without some sort of other motivation for tutoring these kids, it just doesn't seem possible for this guy to not have insidious motives for doing such a thing.

What I am trying to say is, even when I got all of the good endings, I still felt like I was doing something a little weird.  Unfortunately, the actions one would have to do to get the bad endings are very plausible in today's society (this obviously does not make them in any way excusable), though the actions one would have to do to get the good endings, in my opinion, are not so believable, unless the guy already had some sort of pretense for being with these kids (i.e. he is a teacher, or day-care employee, or something).

[Aquin]

Heh, I thought I actually made that clear with the endings, but I guess I didn't. 

I guess the weird thing is that what you ARE at the start of the game is very much determined by the ending.  If you were a great guy, the game tells you that you WERE a tutor the whole time.  If you act like a bastard, the game will inform you that you're just some weird creep picking up kids.

So the beginning is determined by the ending, if that makes any sense.  In any case, if you do nice things, the game will act like you were supposed to the whole time.

At least I hope that's what it does. 

[Mr. Yes]

I remember you saying something like that earlier in this thread, though I guess the endings didn't seem to make it clear enough? Either way, I really like that concept.

Also, did you make the music? Because I can't get the level 1 music out of my head.

[Aquin]

Heh, the music is NOT mine.  I just didn't have time to write it myself.

The music you hear is all from Love Hina.  Yeah, that's right. 

Oh wait, one song is from My Neighbour Totoro.  I just dug into my anime midi folder and pulled a bunch of stuff.  I'm so cheezy. 

[SidM]

The gameplay is fine, but whenever it goes into cutscenes, it starts laggginggggggggg. 99% cpu usage? what!?

(On a laptop)

[ThetaGames]

So the beginning is determined by the ending, if that makes any sense.  In any case, if you do nice things, the game will act like you were supposed to the whole time.

At least I hope that's what it does. 

This is what I got from it as well.  I just didn't think that it was very believable for the guy to tutor these kids in this manner just out of the goodness of his heart; I feel like the game needs some sort of other pretense for him doing this for it to be fully believable.  I don't know - maybe this says something about today's society.

It is like the classic Twilight Zone episode where Santa Claus actually comes to New York, and starts handing out presents to random people, in order to spread love and Christmas cheer.  In the end, he gets locked up in jail, because people think he is crazy, and has stolen the gifts.

This "slight disbelief of the good endings" is probably very nit-picky.  The emotions conveyed by the good endings are uplifting, while the emotions conveyed by the bad endings are particularly sickening.  Not many games can induce such a range of feelings.

[Aquin]

@SidM, yeah I know.  The trouble is, when I try to idle the game, Allegro gets really pissy at me.

That + the other problems people were having has made me swear off it entirely as a game library.  I'm switching to SDL for my next project (after the blind collab.)

[Kekskiller]

Gaaah, I'm so happy I haven't played this game, yet! The source code makes me having a lot of foreboding

[Aquin]

You downloaded it and the first thing you do is read the source code?

Frankly, that's pretty awesome.  I wish I had your fortitude to dig through someone else's code.

[Kekskiller]

You downloaded it and the first thing you do is read the source code?

Frankly, that's pretty awesome.  I wish I had your fortitude to dig through someone else's code.

Well, I tried to start it but there was this "screen freezes" problem mentioned earlier. So, the only thing I could do was to take a look at the source. So, what I understood was that you can drive around, collecting kids and kill people?

These messages are... well, interesting:

The kids' muffled cries for mercy are drowned out by your mad giggles.

[Aquin]

Ah darnit!  So many people with this problem.  It's gonna kill my rep for sure. 

Of course, if I actually had a rep....

Maybe I should convert it to SDL and see if that fixes the problem.  I just don't know what to do.  Did you try running it in compatibility mode with visual themes off?  I dunno. 

Darnit. -_-

PS: Read scene.cpp for a good run.