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[Rowen's Grand Adventure]

Rowen's Grand Adventure is a reboot of my very first AGS game.

What started off as a normal day (for Rowen at least), quickly turns into him being forced to take a couple of vacation days. So join Rowen and his (supposedly evil) twin brother Roger, as they travel to a strange country known only as the United States of America. While there, Rowen will enter a cooking show, mess with the mafia, help finish a movie, and escape from a hotel. But Rowen's blundering eventually leads him into stumbling into an operation that deals with something that's worth more than ten times the price of gold.

During this adventure you will meet many colourful characters, such as a clown with globophobia, a cactus which says it can't talk, and even the Grim Reaper himself.

So join Rowen on this truly grand adventure. 


Screenshots:







Current Progress:
Story--  90%
Puzzles-- 85%
Graphics--  55%
Scripting -- 70%
Music/Sound-- 75%


Release Date:
TBD


Development Diary:
25th September 2023
This is the biggie. The game I've been working on since *checks notes* 2014. Although that's when I started this iteration of it. The absolute first time I worked on this game was *checks notes* 2008. Because this was actually the first game I ever tried to make with AGS. I never finished that game though. Instead I turned it into a crappy comic, and I subsequently made a crappy game that served as a prequel to said crappy comic. That game was the first game I ever uploaded onto AGS. It was so bad, that I spent the next 8 years improving before I tried uploading another game onto AGS.

This game is also quite easily the largest game I've ever made to date. I'd easily say that the end product will be about four times larger than my current largest game (which I think is Crepe Fields). I've not announced this game until now, because I wanted to get it to a state where I could see the end goal in sight. And while I am still many months away from that finish line, I can finally see it. Although that's in no small part due to the sheer amount of time I've been spending on it this year.

I'm currently at 33 characters, 32 rooms, and 143 items. So that should give you some indication of the scale I'm going for with this game. And that's just the tip of the iceberg, I want to make one of those small demos that reuse assets from the game but has it's own set of unique puzzles, and I want to include another (much smaller) game as a completely optional easter egg. I'm really making sure to earn the "Grand" in the title.

Of course before doing that I still need to finish the game, improve all of the graphics (primarily the backgrounds), and do some thorough bug testing.
I don't know if I'll be giving an update every week like I usually do, but I'll definitely make sure to give an update at least once a month. 
If you've read this far, thank you. 

Click here to buy.

The sequel to my point and click adventure game, Black Friday.

It's been twenty years since the incident, but the killer scarecrow has finally come back. Will this brand new group of five teenagers be able to accomplish what their predecessors failed to do, and rid the world of this pumpkin-headed scarecrow once and for all, or will they end up barely surviving a traumatizing event that will haunt them for the rest of their lives?

A homage to the slasher movies of the 80s in the form of a point and click adventure game, with some gameplay elements reminiscent of the Clock Tower series. With multiple endings, longer puzzles, and a deeper story, this is sure to please any fan of adventure games, horror, or slasher movies in general.

• Two-click interface: left-click to interact, right-click to examine.
• Spacebar to pause.
• F5 to open save menu, F7 to open load menu.
• Contains strong themes and gore.
• Multiple playable characters.
• Multiple endings.
• Game length 1 to 3 hours, depending on player skill.

OS: Windows XP or above

Processor: Intel or AMD CPU

Memory: 512 MB RAM

Graphics: DirectDraw or DirectX compatible card

DirectX: Version 9.0c or above

Monitor: 800x600 or above

Sound Card: DirectX compatible sound card

Additional Notes: Mouse, keyboard

If you like the game, why not
play this game's prequel here for free.

[Autumn of Death: Black Friday II]

Autumn of Death: Black Friday II is the sequel to my point and click adventure game, Black Friday.

It's been twenty years since the incident, but the killer scarecrow has finally come back. Will this brand new group of five teenagers be able to accomplish what their predecessors failed to do, and rid the world of this pumpkin-headed scarecrow once and for all, or will they end up barely surviving a traumatizing event that will haunt them for the rest of their lives?

A homage to the slasher movies of the 80s in the form of a point and click adventure game, with some gameplay elements reminiscent of the Clock Tower series. With multiple endings, longer puzzles, and a deeper story, this is sure to please any fan of adventure games, horror, or slasher movies in general.


Screenshots:







Current Progress:
Story--  100%
Puzzles-- 100%
Graphics--  100%
Scripting -- 100%
Music/Sound-- 100%


Release Date:
Depending on when I get feedback on the beta version, it could be anywhere from the end of this month to sometime next month. More info once I'm certain, but definitely soon either way. I'm aiming for the 28th of November though, and I think there's a good chance I'll make it.


Development Diary:
17th June 2022
I've made pages on both GameJolt and Itch.io to use as DevLogs.
I'm planning on making this my first ever commercial game, so obviously I'll need to up my game in terms of art and quality, as well as come up with a good price.
(Is it too ambitious to want to sell it? If you have any advice or if there's something I need to know beforehand, please share it.)

24th June 2022
I've been working on scripting, sprites, and the living room.

You can now open all of the cabinets and drawers in the kitchen!

1st July 2022
This week I've been mostly polishing up that first act. Drawing character sprites, refining backgrounds, making animations.

8th July 2022
I gave some of the animations and backgrounds a first pass.

I also finished Act 1. Other than a few missing animations (including graphics that need another pass), it's pretty much playable without issue.

15th July 2022
I've done all sorts this week, including giving the backgrounds another pass, adding interactivity to the rooms, making inventory icons, and working on yet more animations.

22nd July 2022
This week I finished the inventory icons, added lip syncing (although there won't be voice acting), and sorted out most of the room interactions.

29th July 2022
This week I worked on act 2, polishing up a lot of the cosmetic details.

There won't be an update next week as I'm going to be taking a short break. But there will be an update the following week.

12th August 2022
I worked on the ending cutscenes. But they still need custom animations for that extra bit of polish.

I also implemented a note that you can pick up and read.

19th August 2022
This week I've been working on the main menu and the credits screen, as well as the game's music. Also the microwave after you've put something inside it, and the character wielding the weapon they use to attack the scarecrow.

26th August 2022
This week has been about polishing and removing placeholders.

I've worked on the main menu some more, the downwards sprites for two of the characters, a proper pixel-art version of the logo, and the basement's fusebox.

3rd September 2022
I gave the fonts another pass, made and implemented an animation for the scarecrow, and started working on making the characters actually sit down on that sofa in the intro.

9th September 2022
This week I finished off the introduction, the animations for the endings, and started going over all of the backgrounds and improving them, having just finished the basement.

Lastly, I finally added the game over screen.

16th September 2022
This week has been all about improving the artwork for the rooms. I've been adding objects, shadows, and foregrounds, among other things.

The game looks way prettier now.

23rd September 2022
This week I spent all of my time coding in responses for everything I drew in the rooms last week.

I also made a credit sequence, to give the game a bit of extra flair at the beginning.

30th September 2022
This week I fixed a few problems, such as missing sounds and animations. I also improved art used in the last game, so it's more consistent.

I added an extra step to one of the puzzles, and been working on an easter egg.

7th October 2022
I've been working on the smaller stuff this week, such as bugs and missing art.

Next week I plan on brushing up the menus and GUI elements, and finally make some icons for the game. Then it's testing time.

14th October 2022
This week I've been prepping myself for entering the polishing phase by doing up the GUI elements and making an icon for the game.

I'm very proud of how the icon came out. It took me an entire day to make it though.

21st October 2022
The polishing phase continues.

I've been fixing more than just bugs though. I've also put hints into places where someone might try a solution, correcting and improving artwork, and just generally polishing everything up.

28th October 2022
The polishing phase continues apace. It's taking a lot longer than I expected, but I should "hopefully" be out of the pre-alpha stage sometime next week and into the alpha stage.

4th November 2022
This week I finished spellchecking the script, and I'm now alpha testing.

I've fixed a few minor problems already, a missing hint here, a bigger clickable area there. I also added an additional puzzle.

Next, beta testing.

11th November 2022
This week I fixed up problems found during alpha testing, and have sent the beta off.

Now to wait to hear back from them. If there's no update next week, it's because no progress has been made as I'm still awaiting feedback.

22nd November 2022
I've finally uploaded a trailer announcing my game's release date.

28th November 2022
Fixed up some more things according to feedback from the beta test phase, and uploaded the finished game.

I like AGS, so I've kept using it. But it's occurred to me recently that I've never really considered the benefits and drawbacks of using AGS.
Then I started thinking about how some people will choose a game engine, start working on their game for a while, find a problem with the game engine, choose another game engine, recreate their game up to the same point, find another problem, and just keep doing that over and over until they either give up on the project or settle on a game engine. (Usually the former.)
So then I started thinking about the various pros and cons of every game engine.

For Adventure games alone, you have:

• The Unity Plugin "Adventure Creator"
• Adventure Game Studio (of course)
• Sludge
• Visionaire
• And Wintermute

(assuming I haven't forgotten one)

For more generic game engines, you have:

• Unreal Engine
• Unity
• Game Maker Studio
• Or a custom built engine

So what would you say are the pros and cons of the various engines? Why would someone choose AGS over the others, or reject AGS over the others?
Personally I think a big pro for AGS is that it's completely free and open source, with an active community.
But I think a big con for AGS is that it's really difficult if not downright impossible for multiple coders to work on the game at the same time. It's not really a drawback that affects most of us, since we generally work on games on our own, but I still think it's a major drawback.

Thoughts?