I’m finalizing the flow of events in part 2. Here is the puzzle dependency chart of part 2.
The main purpose of this chart is not to prevent dead ends, (that’s quite easy to achieve) but to make sure that the “key” and the “door” are never found too close to each other (in time). This is much more insidious But, with the chart, you can see that there is enough distance between the two green boxes and the two purple boxes.
In my design I always prefer to have the “key” being found before the “door”, because this prevents frustration where the player tries to solve a puzzle that they can’t solve right now. And if you follow this style it’s also easier to prevent the door from being found too close to the key. However, in a couple of points (purple and green) I was forced to have the door found before the key. So I used this chart to make sure the key is not found immediately after the door.
In other news, I am trying to have the game (a text-only version of it) approved for the IF competition 2020.
@seguso: I’m just back from vacations and again at work. But I managed to play your game at least for a few minutes. I’m still at the early beginning, but I would like to give you some feedback about the new interface:
I prefer the new icons and the redesigned windows over the old (text) interface. As a player I noticed that you melted two different interfaces. IMHO this makes the interface a little bit inconsistent: You can see, pick up and talk like in a classic adventure game but also deduce. IMHO it won’t fit perfectly together, so in this regard I liked the old interface more.
Thanks for the feedback @someone . This is probably the 12th interface this game has gone through. I’m reasonably confident about it (but you never know).
It’s true I merged the two interfaces a bit. You say the presence of pickup creates an inconsistency with the rest, but why exactly? I don’t see a problem TBH… Maybe I’ll wait for you to play a bit more
It’s not “pick up” in particular, but that I have to play your game like a SCUMM adventure and that I have to deduce. It doesn’t seem to be consistent during the game: First I played it like a SCUMM game. I looked around, talked to the people and picked up stuff. Then I would like to “use” something, but suddenly I have to deduce something. Maybe this isn’t an issue anymore if I play your game a little bit longer.
I see. Well, actually you can use stuff like a scumm game. “Deduce” is only for those objects that makes no sense to use “with” something. Like a fountain or a horse or a hat. Puzzles involving those objects couldn’t be expressed with scumm without solving them by accident, hence the change. But you can still use objects where it makes sense.
In this game most puzzles are conceptual, like “understand that someone is actually someone else”. Unfortunately this can’t be expressed with SCUMM (without accidental puzzle solving), hence the addition. I hope you’ll be able to get used to it
meanwhile, the game has been admitted to IF competition 2020.
Deadline september 2020. I’m working hard to finish part 2 by then, in clickable text form.
Part 2 can actually already be played to completion, but as usual it’s missing the wrong combinations handling and the side dialogs. And the hint system. and the translation. So by September 30 I need to have all these things finished, plus the portraits for the new characters.
It now occurred to me that the old interface too was like that. Sometimes it had “use” and sometimes it had “deduce that”, and sometimes “hide inside/disguise as/say that”. You had different verbs depending on what objective you clicked.
Update: All the dialogs are in place. The game can be played to completion in text mode! Yay!
There are currently 6000+ lines of dialog. For a game that has basically no object descriptions, it’s a lot. No descriptions means they are basically all jokes.
Being this an open world game, where all the characters are aware of the situation, I had to write new dialog for all the characters, to respond to the each new situation. In particular the final battle gave me a lot of problems, because all characters required new dialog. But I think it came up well.
Next moves:
draw 20 new portraits, for the new characters in part 2
Here’s my submission to the IF competition. If you guys can suggest a more catchy description, feel free to . (I chose not to mention any wood in the description )
1860 lines still to translate …
(out of 6500 total)
Meanwhile, @ZakPhoenixMcKracken is breezing through part 2, easing my worries that it was too difficult!
He even went to sleep over a puzzle, and woke up with the solution!
I’ll try to! Now I am finished with translating Delores I find myself watching retrogaming related youtube videos and shopping online for new hardware gimmicks to have the best (retro)gaming experience.
…instead of actually just playing something!
Last time I played, it was UI v3 or so. This should be interesting!
Thanks man!
I’m still translating the second half, and it will take a few days. But if you want you can already start the first half, because you need to replay it anyway. Your old savegame won’t work. You need to create a new user, so the game will start in text mode and you’ll be able to play the second half
Here is the puzzle dependency chart of part 2.
But I managed to play your game at least for a few minutes. 
I’m still at the early beginning, but I would like to give you some feedback about the new interface:
But I’ll play your game a little bit further and maybe others players doesn’t share my impression. 
chop some w… I mean, keep up the good work
