MAGS January “Break Some Rules” (VOTING)

[jfrisby]

Bah. One of these days I'll submit a MAGS entry properly on my first attempt.

Been having a fantastic time with One Million Years Dungeon, hoping you can give me a nudge...

Spoiler

I have mapped the dungeon. 
I have all the orbs.

-SNIP SNIP THE ORB SOLUTION HERE-

I'm not sure what the white thing on the floor of the Head pedestal room is...  any help appreciated

[close]

[Falsely]

Been having a fantastic time with One Million Years Dungeon, hoping you can give me a nudge...

Spoiler

I have mapped the dungeon. 
I have all the orbs.
I've tied vines to get back to the entrance.

I've been swapping orbs based off all the hints I can find, but can't seem to get the eastern door open.

-snip-

I'm not sure what the white thing on the floor of the Head pedestal room is...  any help appreciated

[close]

Wow, I wasn't expecting anyone to enjoy the game. Sure!

Spoiler

Those colours are correct! Shame some idiot printed the manual in black and white. There's no "solid" hint for the sea, other than process of elimination.

When you've got everything in the right place, return to the tablet and place your hand on it. It won't unlock the door in the damp room, but it should help you get going again. (There IS a way to unlock it, but since you haven't mentioned certain things yet I'm going to err on the side of caution.)

The white thing on the floor is a badly-drawn puddle. You don't need to do anything with it.

Also, condolences on already having the vines set up. I see you've met the mimic. 

[close]

edit: Ugh, just noticed an obnoxious glitch relating to the eastern door. It's not game-breaking, but I'll write it here just in case.

Spoiler

Attempting to push an item through the crack in the wall will cause it to drop onto the floor of the current room, not the other side. You can retrieve the items from the floor by leaving and returning.

There's still a way to get items past the door, so I don't know if it'd be acceptable per MAGS rules for me to patch it out. But it does make the next section a bit harder.

[close]

[jfrisby]

Spoiler

There's still a way to get items past the door, so I don't know if it'd be acceptable per MAGS rules for me to patch it out. But it does make the next section a bit harder.

[close]

Spoiler

This has just been fantastic, I think I'm at 3-4 hours, but enjoyed it a ton... 
.. I am also stuck again and wanted to confirm this isn't a bug.

I've brought Quintus back, and he 'retired' me and sent me to open the door from the other side...
It felt like the goal here was to return to the crack and talk to him and he'd tell me what to do.. but I can't talk to him through the crack.

I have the key, I have the lost and found tree (I'm assuming this is the only way to pass items over right now?). I don't think I can lost and found the translation spell over?  Am I just trying to open the door on my own?  Please tell me I don't have to rearrange orbs

[close]

[Falsely]

Spoiler

This has just been fantastic, I think I'm at 3-4 hours, but enjoyed it a ton... 
.. I am also stuck again and wanted to confirm this isn't a bug.

I've brought Quintus back, and he 'retired' me and sent me to open the door from the other side...
It felt like the goal here was to return to the crack and talk to him and he'd tell me what to do.. but I can't talk to him through the crack.

I have the key, I have the lost and found tree (I'm assuming this is the only way to pass items over right now?). I don't think I can lost and found the translation spell over?  Am I just trying to open the door on my own?  Please tell me I don't have to rearrange orbs

[close]

Nope, not a bug! You've hit the point where the puzzles get really mean. Partly because of the theme, and partly because I ran out of time to put in proper hints. (Fair point about not being able to talk to him through the crack. I hadn't thought of that! I'll see if I can add that in a post-jam release.)

Some hints, if you want to try and puzzle it out on your own:

Spoiler

• The Lost and Found Box and Tree can't be used to sneak items into other parts of the dungeon. They'll only respawn items that belong in the East and West respectively. (It'll also bring back 'personal' items, i.e. the adventurer's weapon.) If it doesn't bring an item back to you, then rest assured it's either fulfilled its purpose or is a junk item.
• Don't worry, you're done with the orbs. They were a one time thing. 
• The key is a red herring. There are no keyholes in the Dungeon.
• You'll need Godere for this. If you haven't experimented with it much, it will teleport you exactly one room in the direction you're currently facing. And I mean ANY direction you're facing. ...So long as there's space for a person.
• Is there a direction you're forgetting?
• What might suggest there's a room behind all that brick?

[close]

And if you're truly stuck, here's the solution:

Spoiler

When you're in the water room, look up. There's a crack in the ceiling that's leaking. Cast Godere on the ceiling and you should find yourself up a floor and very damp. (Your screen might turn green while doing this - that's a cosmetic bug. press Down to fix it.)

You can undo the lock from there. Then, hop back down and open the door.

[close]

I will say I'm a bit worried about the next puzzle in particular. I was very tired when implementing it and the dialog surrounding it. Sorry in advance. P:

[jfrisby]

I will say I'm a bit worried about the next puzzle in particular. I was very tired when implementing it and the dialog surrounding it. Sorry in advance. P:

Spoiler

I made it!!
I'll try to be vague to not spoil others that might be tempted to look.. and I'm going to go back and delete that orb post to foil them

I swear I had thought about teleporting up there, but thought it was an ocean or something above me. (I'd used the knife up there and the animation from that made me think it was water coming down).

That last puzzle is great, that only took 15 minutes or so to figure out   I thought that might come into play, but hadn't tried to mess around with it
(the text in the l+f room made me think I had to take/leave certain things for a bit).

I still only have a vague idea what the Dark Servant was, or what happened, but it all worked well with some 'calm adventure and exploration' youtube music.. Love the interplay between the manual and game - I've been trying to think of a copy protection that worked as well... Please make more!

[close]

[Falsely]

Spoiler

I made it!!
I'll try to be vague to not spoil others that might be tempted to look.. and I'm going to go back and delete that orb post to foil them

I swear I had thought about teleporting up there, but thought it was an ocean or something above me. (I'd used the knife up there and the animation from that made me think it was water coming down).

That last puzzle is great, that only took 15 minutes or so to figure out   I thought that might come into play, but hadn't tried to mess around with it
(the text in the l+f room made me think I had to take/leave certain things for a bit).

I still only have a vague idea what the Dark Servant was, or what happened, but it all worked well with some 'calm adventure and exploration' youtube music.. Love the interplay between the manual and game - I've been trying to think of a copy protection that worked as well... Please make more!

[close]

Congratulations on finishing, and thank you very much for the kind words! I've gone ahead and edited some of my own hints down too.

(Big ol' spoilers in this comment. This turned into a bit of a postmortem, oops.)

Spoiler

Good instincts RE: the ocean. It was originally going to be completely flooded, resulting in a timed puzzle to unlock the door and escape before you drowned. But I struggled to think of anything that wasn't a carbon copy of Return to Zork, so I focused my efforts elsewhere.

Glad the final puzzle was easy enough to intuit! I wanted to capture the ridiculousness of a "you mean I have to start AGAIN?" puzzle without actually forcing a reset.

And, yeah, sadly there's a lot of cut/wonky story content due to time crunch.

The way I picture it: once upon a time there was a single afterlife, but it got blown up in some cosmic disaster. The main god of death died, and the "Servants" that worked for it (guardian angels, I suppose?) rescued the ghosts and moved them to other safe places.

Quoris's Servant was injured and never really recovered, so it accidentally let the ghosts that were in its care loose in the world. Hence why they were able to haunt the town freely. Centuries pass, most people forget the incident. The Servant grows sicker and sicker, and I guess at some point it half-remembers what it's supposed to be doing and forces all the ghosts underground to protect them from a threat that's long since passed.

It's not hostile, just very unwell.

I kinda visualize its effect on the dead like a ghost magnet. If a ghost in the area isn't grabbing onto something (like the player possessing an adventurer, or Qintus haunting his own skeleton), they get sucked into some deep, dark part of the dungeon they can't escape from.

Naturally, very little of that made it into the game or manual. Gamejams!

I blame the vagueness on me writing the bulk of Qintus's dialog at one in the morning. If/when I come back to the project the pacing's gonna get a lot of reworks. ...Prrrrrobably also a third section to the dungeon, too, so I can fit in some of those spells and mechanics I scrapped at the last second.

Regardless, I'm pretty happy with what I accomplished in a month. And I'd certainly like to do more games in this style! It's a shame feelies only exist in collectors editions these days, because they have so much potential.

OMYD's manual is sort of a mish-mash between the manual for The Lurking Horror and Bivotar's journal from Zork Nemesis. The latter is well worth a read if you like this style of game. While not actually copy protection, it works hints into its story in a very elegant way.

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[Stupot]

IT'S VOTIN' TIME!
Please vote for your favourite entry using the poll above

	Bière Américaine by Ponch
	Skrexeval's Quest by Emma Gundersen
	Artifact by Kara Jo Kalinowski and pell
	One Million Years Dungeon by Falsely

As always, please let me know if I've missed anything.

[WHAM]

Here we go again! I played all four games, even managed to beat one of them within my self-imposed one hour time limit, and now you can find the videos of my attempts below. While I'll always recommend you play the games yourself, if you just can't find the time then this might be an option for you:

Artifact
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCGtbyj0rJ4

Bière Américaine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BXCzkagPP0

One Million Years Dungeon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjTvmo2pnhI

Skrexeval's Quest
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW01BZC-X9Q


All in all I found it funny that 'breaking the rules' was mostly interpreted here as just going back to how games used to be back in the olden days, before design evolved to be more kind, gentle and accommodating towards the player. In many ways these games were a fun romp back to the good old days for me and I struggled to really find many ways in which any real design rules might have been broken! If anything, these games could all have been much more mean and creative with how they violate the player's expectations. Because of this I'm kind of struggling to decide how to vote on these. Do I vote for the game I feel is genuinely the best designed entry, or the one that breaks the most rules of game design? Hmmmm...

[EmmaGundersen]

Skrexeval's Quest has a few reported glitches: mainly a bug that lets you get infinite money and another one that crashes the game if you right click on your inventory items. Avoid doing those.

I'll patch/update after the vote has closed.

[Kara Jo Kalinowski]

I didn't post a walkthrough for my game, but if you need a hint somewhere feel free to ask.

[cat]

I'm a bit torn regarding this MAGS. Initially, I wanted to continue my last year's strike of playing every MAGS game. But this topic makes me think that all the games will include stuff that I do not enjoy. So I think I will pause for a month and continue playing the February games.

[Kara Jo Kalinowski]

I'm a bit torn regarding this MAGS. Initially, I wanted to continue my last year's strike of playing every MAGS game. But this topic makes me think that all the games will include stuff that I do not enjoy. So I think I will pause for a month and continue playing the February games.

I tried not to be *too* terrible with mine, but I definitely kept the theme in mind

[Falsely]

Meanwhile I wanted to see if I could take bad or generally shunned mechanics and somehow make them enjoyable. Definitely interesting seeing all the different approaches to the prompt! 

Not sure if I'll be able to complete any of the other entries on my own but I'm gonna try before I go asking for hints.

[Ponch]

I'm kind of struggling to decide how to vote on these. Do I vote for the game I feel is genuinely the best designed entry, or the one that breaks the most rules of game design? Hmmmm...

As I see it, you have several crucial criteria to consider...

Spoiler

1) You could vote for the person who finished their game first (whoever that may be).
2) You could vote for the person whose game you were actually able to finish (whoever that may be).
3) You could vote vote for the person who was clearly farming for votes in a desperate bid to win (whoever that may be).

[close]

Once again, thanks for playing the MAGS games on your channel. And thanks for once again finding a game-crashing bug in one of my MAGS games while the world was watching. 

UPDATE: Just uploaded a new version of the game that fixes the bug WHAM found.  Whoops!

[Kara Jo Kalinowski]

I'm kind of struggling to decide how to vote on these. Do I vote for the game I feel is genuinely the best designed entry, or the one that breaks the most rules of game design? Hmmmm...

As I see it, you have several crucial criteria to consider...

Spoiler

1) You could vote for the person who finished their game first (whoever that may be).
2) You could vote for the person whose game you were actually able to finish (whoever that may be).
3) You could vote vote for the person who was clearly farming for votes in a desperate bid to win (whoever that may be).

[close]

Once again, thanks for playing the MAGS games on your channel. And thanks for once again finding a game-crashing bug in one of my MAGS games while the world was watching. 

UPDATE: Just uploaded a new version of the game that fixes the bug WHAM found.  Whoops!

Don't forget

Spoiler

1) You could vote for the person who has the least amount of completed adventure games before this one
2) You could vote for the game with the best adventurer's hats

[close]

(And actual spoiler)

Spoiler

3) You could vote for the game with no in-game voting plugs 

[close]

I've completed the sliding puzzle game myself and have barely scratched the surface of the other two, though I'm trying. So far I am enjoying them but I get the feeling that after a while I won't 

[WHAM]

Hmm, there are some very good arguments being put forward on what to vote by. Tough call, tough call...

[Kara Jo Kalinowski]

I've just beat Skrexeval and it definitely had that king's quest feel to it, as well as the sliding puzzle

I'll leave thoughts about all three when I manage to beat the last one - going to need to properly map that one, I can already tell.

[Ponch]

Spoiler

3) You could vote for the game with no in-game voting plugs 

[close]

But hustling for votes breaks the unwritten rules of good manners. It's thematically appropriate! 

[Kara Jo Kalinowski]

Spoilers about my progress in One Million Years dungeon:

Spoiler

Me realizing that "No Soul Left Behind" could possibly mean that if I ever die, therefore adding an extra name to the wall, if I can't save my previous souls I may not be able to beat the game. And not sure if I want to play it out anyways to see what happens or just restart since I'm not very far into the game

[close]

I got the impression that this game is going to be so much longer than the other games, at least it seems that way, so I saved it for last.