JSW As Manufacturer (probably) intended .. kind of...

[Metalmickey]

I think the unused item from The Attic is a pair of beer bottles stacked next to each other (on in front of the other, but diagonally offset so you can see both)?

 

Final(?) tweak - the topmost item in The Bunker perhaps looks a bit odd floating in mid-air, without a supporting platform.  (I realise that the items in the adjacent Tree Root are also defying gravity, but at least they're 'wedged' in a corner!)

Ah yes i see it now, i'll probably move that floating item, it was originally placed there as a gentle hint that this would be the way to proceed through the game since there is no (that i am aware of) way of getting back to the tree root without life loss .. i'll probably move it down a couple of cells.

[IRF]

Ah yes i see it now, i'll probably move that floating item, it was originally placed there as a gentle hint that this would be the way to proceed through the game since there is no (that i am aware of) way of getting back to the tree root without life loss .. i'll probably move it down a couple of cells.

 

Now that I think about this, it is more of a fundamental intervention in the original game than I originally realised.

 

It means that there is an escape from the 'MegaRoots' area without climbing back up through 'Under the Drive' - one of the trickiest manoeuvres in the whole game!  That is if you're prepared to sacrifice a life after collecting the left-hand item in 'Tree Root'.

 

Or to complete the game without losing a life, the player would have to pass through the Wine Cellar/Forgotten Abbey/Security Guard/Under the Drive/Tree Root route twice - once to access 'The Bunker' and again via the traditional exit up 'Under the Drive' and onto 'The Drive'.

 

I think that is quite a major intervention if it's meant to be 'as author intended' [but filling in the gaps].  So on reflection, it would be better if the top of 'The Bunker' was closed off and 'The Bunker' was somehow made an 'in-and-out via the same entrance' type room.  What do you think?

[Metalmickey]

I see your point, the Bunker was developed when i very first started using JSWED and was the very first room i created, i spent quite a lot of time deliberating on whether there should be another exit. I originally decided against it and created 'vent' graphics using the water cells so as to make it look like there is an exit there but inadvertently made the floor beneath one cell too high so when i went to playtest it I found that Willy was able to make his way upwards to Under the Megatree i just went along with it knowing that the player would have to make his way back to Under the Drive to collect the remaining items, unless of course a way has been figured out how to get off the conveyor after collecting the top item in the Tree Root .. i don't think it's possible. if it was just a matter of being potentially tedious having to work your way all the way round the house to collect the items in Under the Drive i'd probably have just left it as it was but seeing as this could be seen as a deviation from the script so to speak then perhaps it's worth making some necessary adjustments.

Once again i have edited my previous post as you will see it is only a very minor alteration to the room .. even if it does make a big difference.

 

My next project is creating a 128K version (obviously moving away from the as Mr Smith intended theme) which, i hope, will be the first one to use all of the available 256 rooms   :o  .. i'll start another topic on that once i'm nearing the half way stage .. if the internet is still around by then... or someone else hasn't beaten me to it 

Edited February 28, 2017 by Metalmickey

[jetsetdanny]

I am quite intrigued by what you ended up doing, Metalmickey, and since I have an evening all to myself (a rare luxury!), I will have a go at version 4 of your project after posting this message, and I will post an RZX here when I'm done.

 

Regarding this:

 

> My next project is creating a 128K version (obviously moving away from the as Mr Smith intended theme) which, i hope, will be the first one to use all of the available 256 rooms    :o  .. i'll start another topic on that once i'm nearing the half way stage .. if the internet is still around by then... or someone else hasn't beaten me to it 

 

If you mean a project (a game using the JSW128 game engine, since it's the only one which allows up to 256 rooms) in which there are the 60 original JSW rooms plus 196 other rooms - no, it has never been done before TTBOMK.

 

If you mean a JSW128 game with all rooms edited (not necessarily including the original JSW rooms) - it has been done before.

 

Question 61 in "Willy Games: The First 30 Years Quiz" actually concerns it:

 

 

Which was the first JSW game ever to feature 256 edited rooms?

 

A "Frosya the Cat"

 

B "Soul Miner"

 

C "strangel"

 

D "where's woody"

 

 

The correct answer is D. Sendy did it in back in 2000, and I did it (using also other author's material) in 2010. "where's woody?" has 256 edited rooms. So does "JSW: The 2010 Megamix".

 

This is not to say, of course, that it won't be nice if you design another game with 256 rooms - quite to the contrary, it'll be great!  :) Plus there is something else you could do, which would be a first:

 

[I would insert it as a spoiler, but I don't know how to do it  :o ]

 

 

Neither of the above games I mentioned requires the player to play all 256 rooms in order to complete the game successfully. If your future project did, it would be a first, indeed  ;) .

[Metalmickey]

Thanks for taking an interest in my little project, hope you enjoy playing and completing it, look forward to the RZX once you've completed it. I do have one done but it's of a previous release before i modified the Megatree rooms.

 

In answer to your question about my considerably bigger project, i am indeed working on a JSW128 game which will still feature every one of the 60 original rooms and keeping them in their original location I will probably have to make a few modifications for access purposes but i intend to keep this to a minimum. My aim is to create an extension to the house, this of course has the added benefit of giving me a 60 (or 64 in my case) room head-start.

 

I also want to make the player access all of the rooms in order to complete the game, it will take me a long time to build all the rooms and it would be a bit of a waste to leave them unexplored.

 

This also will help in giving me a bit of guidance as to the look and feel of the rooms as well as some much needed practice in using JSWED 

 

If you have a look in contributors section you will also see where i have made an experimental version creating a path between the Forgotten Abbey and the Security Guard rooms so i have a few more ready made rooms there. 

 

I've not long started this project and i will perhaps begin a new topic with more information about what to expect once i'm about 150 rooms in

[jetsetdanny]

Okay, here's the complete result of my playtest, which only goes to show that *everything* should be playtested from start to finish before release:

 

AMI4 playtest.rzx

 

The game is impossible to complete, because there is an invisible item in "A Bit of Tree", in the right half, three blocks to the right from the second lowermost platform. The item can be collected by jumping from the platform, but the collection will always result in an Infinite-Death Scenario (IDS) [without cheating, such as using the Writetyper].

 

I found out about the item in JSWED, when I started wondering why Maria wouldn't disappear with 100 items - seemingly all of them - collected.

 

Anyway, it's not a big deal and can be corrected easily  :) .

 

Now, my impressions after playing the game.

 

The first one - and it doesn't really concern *this* particular game, but theJSW48 game engine in general - is that I played the game after playing "JSW2" and "JSW2+" repeatedly in recent days, many times over. And my first impression upon loading "AMI4" into the emulator was that it was slow... painfully slow! :o  It's amazing what happens when you get used to things. I've got used to the speed of the "JSW2" game engine, and the original "JSW" almost seems boring by comparison. Soooo slow....

 

Well, towards the end of the playtest I forgot about the speed of "JSW2" - apparently I've got used to the speed of JSW48 again.

 

Now, concerning your project, Metalmickey:

 

It was very nice and refreshing to play the new rooms. I liked all of them, I thought they were very good, and I am looking forward to your new projects - I am sure there will be a lot of new, exciting rooms in them. In fact, you did design several new rooms already in another project - isn't this right? I remember seeing them in JSWED a couple of weeks ago, nice ones, too. What's happening with that project, by the way?

 

The shortcut to "The Front Door" is very nice. It induces a change in the optimal route. My recording would have been marginally more efficient if I had done "Ballroom West" right after doing "To the Kitchens / Main Stairway". But at that time I didn't know about the shortcut. I might improve my route if you release a fixed, final version and I re-record it  :P . The completion time should be around 8.10 am anyway.

 

I did note some details corrected / improved(?) in relation to the original "JSW", but I am not the best person to comment on these things - I am more interested in new games (and rooms, at least), than improvements on the details of the original.

 

Anyway, thanks for this fine effort and I look forward very much to your future work on "JSW"  :D .

[jetsetdanny]

If you have a look in contributors section you will also see where i have made an experimental version creating a path between the Forgotten Abbey and the Security Guard rooms so i have a few more ready made rooms there. 

 

Yes, that's the project I was referring to in my previous message. I'm glad you will include these rooms in your new game  :) . I remember Ian commenting about some of them being impossible to pass, and I remember my confirming that in gameplay (I think I didn't post about it, but I did have a look at the new rooms, setting the starting point in JSWED to one of them) - so there's a need for some fixes there. But in any case you are already advancing in your project, which is nice  :) .

[IRF]

Probably the easiest way to fix the extra (unwanted?) item in A Bit of Tree, would be to edit the Item Graphic for that room (fill a pixel in), then you can see where the item is and delete it from the room layout.

[Metalmickey]

Thanks for your comments, glad you like the new rooms and apologies for the unintended hidden item which i have now removed, i have replaced the file so feel free to download and have another crack at it  :)

Referring to your comment about the differences in the speed of the game engine in JSW2 and 2+ yes i remember when i bought the game and played it for the first time, my first impression back then was how slick it seemed but much harder as a result which was a little off-putting in some ways but i was nonetheless compelled to keep playing mainly because i wanted to see what the new rooms looked like.

 

I really like the 2+ version and was pleasantly surprised that it was actually written by Derrick Rowson himself ..

 

As for my mini-project in the contributors section i will be taking a look at that to see what else needs doing 

[IRF]

You probably should re-upload the corrected file as V.5 to avoid confusion, especially now V.4 has been subject to recorded playtesting..

Edited March 3, 2017 by IRF