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Interesting article with some food for thought.

The final game he came up with is pretty good. I was able to get 100% on my first go, so of course I like it 😜

I do wish people would stop saying Josh Wardle "invented" Wordle, though. The article does mention that it's basically a lexical version of Mastermind, but fails to mention that even as a word game it is not new.

I know I've said this elsewhere in the forum but I'd been playing it with some of my students (albeit with 4 letters and more chances) long before Mr Wardle turned it into an app and practically named it after himself. It was on a list of warmers to play with ESL students, alongside dozens of other classic whiteboard word games. He might as well have "invented" a game called Hangdle

I feel it's relevant to mention that here because the article is about coming up with a brand new game, not rebranding an existing one. Despite that, I appreciated the depths this article's author goes to in order to create a new game, and some interesting points came up.

I wonder whether we should earnestly try to devise our own puzzle game as a community and see if we can't sell it to a newspaper for millions of dollars.

[Highland Spirit]

Well done to ddavey1983 (GOC games) for winning with the lovely-looking Highland Spirit. You'll be contacted soon about setting a theme for January.

Thanks again to everyone who made a game and to those who voted. This was a great month indeed thanks to all of you.

Looking forward to seeing what you and ChatGPT can come up with, Kitty.

Anyone else in the running?

We've had a reasonable number of votes so far, so thanks for that. But any more will be very welcome. Now's your last chance to get your vote in.

As always, please remember to rate and comment on each game's relevant AGS page where possible. It help encourage users to keep making more games.

For me, both stories had their moments. Wham's was probably stronger in terms of word choice and expression but was lacking in any real sense of drama. I felt the pain of the protagonist's regret but I wasn't really sure what the story was.

Baron's, conversely, was perhaps in need of a tougher edit. The first act in the station created an interesting scenario, but I felt the middle section meandered a bit, as Annison literally meandered around a series of icy obstacles. I began to feel that she had more juice in her vehicle than we were led to believe. But overall it was exciting enough. The ending was interesting, although the final twist didn't hit as hard as it might because I couldn't really get my head around why the rest of the members had planned all this for so long but not told Annison (or Chrysler).

In the end I lent my vote to Baron.

Hi all! Long time no see. 

How are we getting on, folks?

I've been making a game for this month to see what I can get together in a month. Very limitted on time these days but it's actually getting somewhere. Maybe not somewhere amazing as I hadn't opened AGS in like 7 years before this 
I think I'll have something done by the end of the month, but no promises with the holidays and all.

Long time no see, man. Hope you've been well.
Good luck with your MAGS game.

How are we getting on, folks?

I didn't have time to upload the downloadable version before I ran out of time. Certainly I can add it to the page since it doesn't actually change the game but I wanted to err on the side of caution.

Don't worry about that. You won't be disqualified.

[Don't Give Up the Cat]

Wow wee! Five games. Thank you to everyone who made a game for us this month. And they all look incredible.

Now it's time to play and vote.

Please vote using the poll above.

	Don't Give Up the Cat by Eri0o
	A Very Serious Plumbing Simulator by Falsely
	Highland Spirit by ddavey1983
	Two Ghosts of That House: The Missing Toy by Volcan
	Ghost Hunter: Dracula by newwaveburritos

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

+1 for breaking in and getting the party started.

I've started on something too. It's pretty bad so far but I'm hoping to fix a few issues and have something a bit better than last round's dire attempt.

[One Big Room]

Theme: One Big Room
Set by: Ponch

The result was tied. 4 votes a piece. Well done to both entrants.

	Alien Prison Escape by Bulbapuck
	Santa Quest by GOC Games

The theme is One Big Room. All (or most) of the action takes place in one large, very detailed, and puzzle-packed room. Is it a museum? A roadside attraction? A junkyard? Who knows! But it is one room. It's like OROW, but with four times as much time to work!








What is MAGS?
Started in 2001, MAGS is a competition for amateur adventure game makers. The idea is to create a game in under a month, following the guidelines set by the previous winner. It aims to help you work to a deadline, improve your skills, and provide a kick-start into making adventure games. Regardless of skill, MAGS is for everyone. Voting is based on "favourite" games, and not the most artistic, or the best coded. If you have bad art skills, use it as a chance to do some graphic work. If you're sub-standard at coding, use it as a chance to give scripting a go. Ultimately, people will vote for the most enjoyable entry.

Rules
Entering MAGS is simple. First, conceptualize your game following the month's criteria (see above). Second, create your game fuelled only by coffee. Finally, post your game in this thread, including:

* A working download link
* The title of your game
* A suitable in-game screenshot

At the end of the month, voting will begin, usually lasting for fourteen days, and the winner chooses the next month's theme.

Remember that this is a challenge to see what you can do in a month, so any tinkering you do after that, including fixing minor glitches, is against the spirit of the competition. The exception to this is that you may go in and fix major, game-breaking bugs only during voting. We want you to have a game that voters can actually play and that runs on their machines.

So to reiterate, during the voting period fixing major, game-breaking bugs is okay, fixing minor glitches or making cosmetic changes is cheating.

Tips
Here are some ways to make sure you have a game to submit at the end of the month:
* Make a tiny game. Plan small, then cut it in half. Find shortcuts (e.g. if making walkcycles is time-consuming, make the characters static or have it in the first person).
* Plan to have your game playable and submittable with a week to spare. This way you have a week to fix bugs, add some flourishes and maybe even get someone to test it.
* Plan to submit it a day or so early. This way, if there are any technical issues with uploading, they can be sorted out in time.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Need a little help with graphics? Perhaps The AGS Trove has something you can use.
Don't want to go it alone? Try the Recruitment board.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Nice to see some pretty entries.

Seems like a couple of folks might appreciate some extra time. Would 2 more days be enough?

The Woman in the Boat in the Canal Behind the Woods

The following is a true story. Names have been changed to protect my friends. Somebody died that day. We killed her. Well, sort of. It's... well, you'll see.

We were 13 and Toby was having a bad trip. He was holding onto his rucksack like a comfort blanket saying "teacher... p...policeman...". He was over the worst though. Earlier he had freaked out and Simon had had to father him back to some kind of normalcy, telling Toby to "don't fight it" and "let it take you to new places." Simon and I had done shrooms before and had taken a sensible dose, so we were enjoying a relatively tame experience. Toby, in his enthusiasm, had eaten way too many, and then when they failed to kick in immediately, had eaten some more. In hindsight, we didn't help him by going "Woah, dude...that's way too many!" and freaking him out even more.

After some time, though, Toby, whose small stature and screwed up face made him look like a small terrier, looked up at Simon and said, "paper". Simon's eyes widened (or perhaps I just thought they did) and he said "What?"

"Paper. You've got the paper and pens. I wanna see what shit I can come up with."

"That's the spirit." Simon's mouth grew into a large beaming smile that kept getting bigger and bigger but somehow stayed on his face and he tore off a page from his notebook and handed it to Toby, along with a pencil. Toby sat down with the pen in his hand just staring at the page. For the first time since his come-up, he seemed at ease with his situation.

Simon stood up and said, "I'll be back in a minute." The trees seemed to peel back and collectively inhale him as he disappeared in the direction of the canal. I'd guessed he had just gone to relieve himself.

I watched the back of my hand for a while; the pattern of veins was shifting and bulging and shrinking. After what could have been 3 minutes or 3 hours, I noticed Simon wasn't back. Toby seemed to have the same thought and it was Toby who said "Let's go".

We left our stuff and traced Simon's route between the breathing woods.

"Simon?" I called, but there was no answer. It was nighttime by now, but the trees were sparse and the moon bright enough to see that Simon was not here.

"What's that light?" Toby said pointing towards the canal.

"I see it too," I said. It was a very dim, flickering light. I'd heard of shared trips, but this felt real. I was pretty much back to normal by that point. Just a bit of an afterglow.

"I've got a bad feeling about this," Toby said, and started backing up. But I grabbed his sleeve. "Go with it," I said, channeling Simon. So slowly we moved closer to the dim light. Toby flinched at nothing a few times, but he was doing well. And as we approached the edge of the wood, I realized the light was coming from inside a narrowboat on the canal. Someone was living there.

"Should we knock?" said Toby. "Maybe they've seen him."

I found myself inching closer to the boat. "Where's the door?"

"I don't know... try the window."

The flickering light from the windows no longer seemed scary. It was now warm and inviting. I put my head to the glass.

Just then a face pressed itself up against the inside of the window, contorted in a scream. I fell back onto the towpath, and it took me a few seconds to realize the face was Simon's and that he was screaming for his life.

Toby had frozen, as had I. We looked on in horror as Simon squealed and squirmed in the window of the canal boat. After a moment, I came to my senses and ran to help my friend. I jumped onto the stern and swung open the hatch. What I saw there filled me with dread. An old woman was squirming and writhing on the floor, her naked body wrinkled and spotted. She seemed unable to stand but was grasping a terrified Simon by his ankles and despite his youth he was unable to free himself from her grip. The woman was growling and something sticky and yellow was bubbling from her mouth. Toby came in behind me and screamed. The old lady looked at us. She seemed annoyed more than anything, but kept her grip on Simon, who had been stripped naked himself and was covered from head to toe in the same yellow substance.

"Help me," Simon screamed. And as if reading my mind he said, "This is real!"

Toby ran back out of the door. He was gone. "TOBY!" I shouted after him, but I didn't blame the kid for running. He was already fucked up enough as it was. Maybe he would find a policeman or a teacher to come and help us after all. The old woman, still grasping Simon by the legs, rolled over onto her back, swinging Simon around with her. His head hit the ground hard, but he was still conscious. Her filthy tits sagged down almost beside her as she yanked a still-screaming Simon down until his head was near her chest and she croaked "driiiink". That was when I realized her nipples were the source of the yellow liquid.

"SIMON!" I shouted, "I'll save you." The woman looked in my direction but again, she simply grunted and turned her attention to Simon again.

I was paralysed. My mind was telling me to do something, to fight her, to smack her over the head with something. There were plenty of weapons, in hindsight: large books, a candlestick. There was even a knife-rack right there on the side. But I remained frozen and useless, something for which, to this day, I have never forgiven myself.
Simon's head was now being held between this woman's sagging breasts and she kept saying "driiiiink". He managed to lift his head up to gasp for air, but she yanked him back down again and he was gagging and heaving.

"Simon!" I screamed uselessly again.

Just then, there was an almighty tearing sound and a flash of light. The old lady screamed as her entire body ripped into two pieces and exploded in a torrent of the yellow liquid. I ran to Simon and grabbed him. Thank Christ, he was alive. We took a moment to get our breaths back Simon sat staring into space for a while as I looked around the interior of the narrowboat. This once beautiful narrowboat was destroyed. I noticed a couple of picture frames and wiped the yellow goo off with my sleeve. There was a photo of the old woman, younger though, and a handsome man, most likely her husband.

When Simon was ready to move, we left the boat and started back to the clearing where we'd left our stuff.

"We tell no one." he said.

"Not sure what I'd tell them, anyway."

As if sharing our thoughts, we both looked behind us, both hoping the boat would be gone and it had all been some terrible trip. But the boat was there, and we knew it had really happened.

We got to the clearing and Toby was in a ball on the floor, crying. We ran to him and turned him over to see his face. He saw us covered in the yellow goo and he laughed hysterically for half a minute. Then he handed Simon the paper which he had drawn on earlier. On the paper was the same old lady, with the same withered body and the same evil grin, that they had seen on the canal boat. The paper had also been torn into two parts, right through the woman's torso.

Simon took out a lighter and set fire to the paper. A few moments later we saw the glow of the burning narrowboat from behind the woods.

I don't remember much after that, like how we got Simon home without being seen naked. And we never spoke of that night again. I still see Simon from time to time. He's doing all right. He's an IT engineer for a large company. And he does a bit of stand-up comedy at the weekends. Toby drifted away. He's an artist now. He never said as much but I'm pretty sure he drops psychedelics in the vain hope that his drawings come true again. Most of his work is just pictures of himself smiling.

It really grinds my gears when people use the archaic "-eth" verb ending humorously without any regard for (or, more likely, awareness of) grammar. I just came across "Fucketh thee around, findeth thee out." 

I'm not a fan of this either. Nor when people just decide to put "doth" in their otherwise completely normal speech for literally no reason.

[Ghosts]

Theme: Ghosts
Set by: ddavey1983

The winner is Highland Spirit by GOC Games.

	Don't Give Up the Cat by Eri0o
	A Very Serious Plumbing Simulator by Falsely
	Highland Spirit by ddavey1983
	Two Ghosts of That House: The Missing Toy by Volcan
	Ghost Hunter: Dracula by newwaveburritos

This month the theme is ghosts - bumps in the night, headless horsemen, spectral monks, haunted houses. Your ghosts could be friendly, malevolent or even metaphorical as in the memory of people and events past. Or...it could be a bloke in a sheet.





What is MAGS?
Started in 2001, MAGS is a competition for amateur adventure game makers. The idea is to create a game in under a month, following the guidelines set by the previous winner. It aims to help you work to a deadline, improve your skills, and provide a kick-start into making adventure games. Regardless of skill, MAGS is for everyone. Voting is based on "favourite" games, and not the most artistic, or the best coded. If you have bad art skills, use it as a chance to do some graphic work. If you're sub-standard at coding, use it as a chance to give scripting a go. Ultimately, people will vote for the most enjoyable entry.

Rules
Entering MAGS is simple. First, conceptualize your game following the month's criteria (see above). Second, create your game fuelled only by coffee. Finally, post your game in this thread, including:

* A working download link
* The title of your game
* A suitable in-game screenshot

At the end of the month, voting will begin, usually lasting for fourteen days, and the winner chooses the next month's theme.

Remember that this is a challenge to see what you can do in a month, so any tinkering you do after that, including fixing minor glitches, is against the spirit of the competition. The exception to this is that you may go in and fix major, game-breaking bugs only during voting. We want you to have a game that voters can actually play and that runs on their machines.

So to reiterate, during the voting period fixing major, game-breaking bugs is okay, fixing minor glitches or making cosmetic changes is cheating.

Tips
Here are some ways to make sure you have a game to submit at the end of the month:
* Make a tiny game. Plan small, then cut it in half. Find shortcuts (e.g. if making walkcycles is time-consuming, make the characters static or have it in the first person).
* Plan to have your game playable and submittable with a week to spare. This way you have a week to fix bugs, add some flourishes and maybe even get someone to test it.
* Plan to submit it a day or so early. This way, if there are any technical issues with uploading, they can be sorted out in time.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Need a little help with graphics? Perhaps The AGS Trove has something you can use.
Don't want to go it alone? Try the Recruitment board.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

> Take tire iron

> Take plastic jug

> Inspect the fence and gate

> Look inside your sister's glove compartment.
+1

> Pick the lock of the trunk (or just "pop the trunk", since we're in the car now)
+1

> inspect sister's car. Try opening the doors and popping the trunk.

> call sister's name

> Search through my pockets to see if there is any useful lint.