Welcome to the TREASURE HUNT JAM.
Feel free to use this thread to introduce yourself.
Er, g'day. My name's Garry. I'm an Aussie, but don't hold that against me. I participated in the first two Adventuron game jams and had a lot of fun, so I'm planning to enter this one, as well. I've already got a few ideas floating around in my head. If I can get these ideas to work in practice, I can promise something very different to what you might be used to. It will be very puzzle-centric.
I'm hoping to see a lot of the previous participants, as well as lots of new participants. If you're a beginner, don't be scared. The folks on the forum are very friendly and will help you out with any problems you may have. If Adventuron is busy, I'll be here as a backup.
I'll just give one word of advice. Start now! Don't leave it until the last minute or you'll run out of time.
Hmmm, maybe two words of advice. Test. Test. Test. Aim to finish at least one week before the deadline and ask others to test it for you. A good tester will find all sorts of issues that you missed yourself.
hey there!!
Thanks for the message. Im alive and well. I tried to participate in more adventuron jams but I couldn't finish the games and they are canceled.
I tried using unity and now im working on a game for isolation jam.
And for the state of this part of world, well, all the world is on the same situation now, we are not doing too bad with the virus.
Hi Dee,
Good to have you back.
Do play (at least some of) the TWO adventure game to see how object-centric games work. It's very different to previous jams as you said yourself.
The constraints that TWO uses are much more severe than the jam constraints. One way of conveying state or story could be smart examine messages, and plentiful listed objects. There is no limit to the amount of objects that can be listed in a room.
I think it's still possible to tell a proper story in the constraints, but as someone not a natural storyteller, I can think of the method, but I can't think of the story.
Good luck !
C
Hi everyone!
My name's Aleksandr, and this is going to be my first game jam, if I follow through on it. (Though not my first game dev experience!)
Question for the pros: How do you approach a text adventure game? Do you draw a map before you model it in code? How do you approach writing a cohesive narrative or creating a good setting?
My biggest challenge currently is figuring out what I want my game to be about.
Hi Aleksandr,
Welcome to the jam.
Garry is a great person to talk to about this subject. Until Garry comes to the rescue, do check out this link (Computer Adventures:The Secret Art by Gil Williamson). This is a transcript of a book that discusses adventure design. You can buy the book here.
This is also an interesting article to read when thinking about puzzles and player flow through the game.
Chris
There is no simple answer to this. It depends on the adventure and the individual. For me, I like to think of the time, the place, the puzzles and the objective.
By "the time", I mean when does the adventure take place? Past, present or future. Most adventures take place in the past. This gives them more character. The present tends to be a bit boring. The future tends to mean science fiction.
By "the place", I mean where does it take place? Is it on Earth or another planet or a fictitious world? If it's on Earth, what country and what city?
Once you have decided on the time and the place, start to think about what the scenery would look like during that time at that place. Is it indoors or outdoors or a mixture of both? What sort of buildings would you expect to find? How would the buildings be located with respect to one another? What sort of rooms would be in the buildings? What sort of locations would you expect to find if it's outdoors? What sort of objects would you expect to find in all those locations in that time period? Write lots of lists. Do Google searches on the time and place and before long, you'll have so many ideas that you won't know what to do with them all.
By "the puzzles", I mean what puzzles will you need to solve in order to meet the objective? It helps to decide on the time and the place before you start thinking about the puzzles. All the objects you thought of will start to give you ideas. Mix it up. Some objects should be in plain sight. Some should be hidden. Some objects should be found before you know what they're used for. Some should be found after you know that you need them.
The best puzzles are when you use common, ordinary, everyday objects in unusual ways.
Take lots of notes and be prepared to discard any ideas that don't fit the final game. It's okay to have a few red herrings (objects that serve no purpose), but try not to have too many.
And finally, to answer your question, yes, definitely draw a map and locate all the objects on the map before you enter any code. In fact, you should be able to write a complete walkthrough on paper before you write any code. It is much easier to see what works and what doesn't on paper than to spend lots of time coding only to find that you've got to change it because it doesn't work. Design, design, design, then code.
Hi I'm Michael from Sweden. I am dipping my toe in this wonderful genre for the first time. I have done some games and jams before but never text games. Really looking forward to seeing what you guys create for this jam. I can't wait to design puzzles without getting stuck creating graphics.
Best regards!
Hello Michael,
Welcome to the treasure hunt jam.
I agree it is freeing to not worry about graphics. There are some amazingly talented artists out there, and it can feel soul destroying to have a good game idea slowed down or cancelled entirely due to the inability to produce graphics that match the vision in your mind's eye.
This is just text and it will live or die through the quality of your world and your puzzles.
Good luck,
Chris
Hey guys Dethmunk here AKA John Blythe. My first adventure JAM. The restrictions for this adventure are a nice focus for the mind. My adventure might not be amazing, we'll see, be gentle. First time using Adventuron so fingers crossed. As some know I'm all about the graphics so doing this without those is a challenge. At least I can have a little flurry with a Loading Screen ;)
Thanks for the complement about the system. It's not at all perfect, but I have tried to document it best I can. In the end it may still be too complicated for some without dedicated guidance, for others it is enough.
Whatever category you fit in, help will be available in this forum.
Good luck with your game!
Hello TheGamer,
Welcome to the jam.
If you are not a story person, then just come up with a simple scenario. Maybe you are trapped somewhere and have to find seven keys for an exotic door? Each of the keys is acquired by solving a different puzzle tree? The great thing about treasure hunts is that (although it can have a good story) it doesn't have to have a great narrative.
Good luck with making progress, and if you get stuck for inspiration, check the design thread out in this community. Garry just wrote a post on design.
Be seeing you,
Chris
Hi Chris,
Really nice to have new authors coming on board.
Do get accustomed to the Adventuron system as soon as you can and do play the TWO game. If you get as far as the dungeon location, then you should understand how puzzle design works under tight text constraints. If you get stuck in TWO, there is a full PDF, and SVG to assist. Adventuron has its own tutorial video + web documentation.
If you get stuck, don't be afraid to ask for help in the forum. Make sure you extend the two theme, and that you nominate a treasure_room (as shown in the sample code on the main jam page).
Good luck.
Chris
Hi. I'm Artem. Can be said that I'm new to gamedev, but just as a average developer I have a lot of started and not finished projects =) In childhood I liked text adventures and want to join the jam.
Btw, I didn't find any word about sound and music in jam games. Is it allowed or forbidden? I'd like to add some ambient music for atmoshpere.
Hello,
Welcome to the jam. I do hope you will enjoy it.
Sound and music is permitted (and optional), but dialog is not permitted in the sound and music. The game should be able to be completed without sound, so don't encode hints and clues into the sound effects.
Remember that you should only use music and sound for which you own a license.
To properly attribute assets you use in the game, there are multiple ways, but the simplest is to embed any attributions in the "notes = " section in the game_information {} section. Typing CREDITS will reveal all the embedded credits, which is the only breaking of the fourth wall that is permitted when playing the game (as to its word count constraints).
Chris
I haven't documented the music / sound functions of Adventuron much yet, but here is a simple example. Note that you can use a relative path of the mp3 file when it comes to the final build, but in testing, you either need to save off the game to the folder containing the mp3s (in order for sound to play), or you upload files to a server you own and point to that server in the testing phase.
'll try to document this better later ...
start_at = start_location
game_information {
notes = Bell sound effect is Copyright of Author of Bell Sound + License Text.
}
locations {
start_location : location "Type \"BELL\" to play a bell sound." ;
}
######################################
# On Startup #
######################################
on_startup {
: play_music sound = "song_intro" ; // Starts playing music (no preload here)
: print "Introduction text here !!!" ;
: preload "incidental_bell"; // Will preload (in the background) an audio asset you may wish to use soon
: press_any_key ;
: stop_music ;
}
on_command {
: match "bell _" {
: play_sound sound="incidental_bell" ;
}
}
assets {
sounds {
## Please attribute your sound effects in game_information / notes section.
## NOTE: You can also use relative paths here, and place the files in the zipfile you
// upload to itch.
## Sound effects should start with incidental_
incidental_bell : sound_sample "https://your.domain.here/bell.mp3" ;
## Music should start with song_
song_intro : sound_sample "https://your.domain.here/your_tune.mp3" ;
}
}Hello everyone,
My name is Helpinghand, Helping, Hands, Ricky, which ever one you guys prefer to call me is fine. I am currently doing a lot of game jams so I have stuff for my portfolio for when I graduate in the fall. I am currently taking a Fundamentals of Game Development so I want to get as much practice I can. I have done a text based game in Java back in high school but I think this would be a good challenge for me to re familiarize myself quickly. Thank you for making this jam! Good luck to everyone :D
Hello! My name is Benjamin. I live in Inwood, New York City. This is my first game jam. I've been programming a long time, always wanted to make an adventure game. I know it's easy to lose focus on a project and I think the constraints set by the rules will give me a fighting chance of getting over the finish line. :-)
Hello Benjamin,
Welcome to the jam.
Best place to start I think is to load up the sample code and see how it works, also play TWO and check out the code for TWO.
The default theme (two) can be left in place, and you can tinker with it later on.
Try to keep your word count low, and build mood with items in your per location object list. There are two word limits per object, and two word limit per location description, but you can fill a room with as many items of scenery or objects as you want, and manipulate the object list as much as you like in response to player inputs.
I'm rambling. Good luck to you.
Chris
Hello, I'm clearly not actually named Rex Mundane, but this is the internet and it's as good a callsign as any.
Not my first GameJam, but my first with Adventuron/Text Adventures. Casual fan of IF since way back. First game I ever tried to code was, if you can believe it, a Text Adventure about Sonic the Hedgehog, written in QBasic in 1994. It was... I mean, imagine how bad that idea must have been, right? Yeah, it was worse than that. I promise.
Anyway, didn't even know about the jam or the software until about a week ago and have been hammering out a project ever since. My game itself will be about collecting Text Adventures, because that's about where my creativity level is. Hoping to finish an Alpha in the next week I can post in the appropriate thread. Good luck to all!
Hello Rex (not your real name),
Welcome to the jam and good luck with your very novel treasure hunt.
Just a word of advice, learn how to upload your game to itch with the right settings as soon as possible, but be sure not to mark it as public. It will be stressful to try to sort all that out in the final 24 hours.
Here is the uploading guide (re-using this post from a previous Adventuron gamejam):
https://itch.io/jam/cavejam/topic/543846/tutorial-uploading-your-adventuron-game...
Chris
Welcome Mr. Mundane (not real name). Sounds very cool idea. I hadn't done anything with Adventuron before this Jam either. but found it super quick to get into. BTW I hope there is a Zork I, II & III to collect in your list... bit of advice, given the Adventure Master Scott Adam's a judge drop a few of his in there too!! ;) LOL Welcome and I hope you get it finished in time for the deadline.
Hi all! I actually submitted an entry to the jam a few hours before the deadline, but didn't get around to introducing myself until now.
I come from a programming/electronics background, although I'm currently working in an unrelated industry. I have a lot of downtime in the office at the moment, and over my lunch two days before the (extended) deadline, I checked out itch.io's jam listing to see if there was anything that I could join in. Like a lot of people, I've been dreaming/thinking/talking about making a game for years, but I always get sidetracked by my own overreaching.
I liked the idea of a minimalist text adventure game, and after playing around with Adventuron for a couple of hours, it seemed doable. I spent the rest of the first day thinking up a story, drawing a map, and filling the world with obstacles and objects on paper. My second day was spent actually typing everything into Adventuron. At around 11pm I had to call it a night, and knowing that I wouldn't have time to work on the game any more before the deadline, I cut out a couple of things that I had planned. But on the whole, I'm pretty happy with my little game.
Hi there,
Thanks for the story of how you came to enter the jam. Very fast work. I do hope the system didn't get in your way too much.
If you ever want to code another game outside of a jam, and the jam constraints, then feel free to post generic questions about Adventuron using this forum over the next month.
Well done on finally making a game. I look forward to playing it.
Chris
I added some playtest feedback for Tastybuns. You don't necessarily have to address anything in the feedback. Just relaying my experience. I'm not a judge by the way.
https://itch.io/jam/treasure-hunt/topic/707529/comments-on-tastybuns-burgers