Crystals of Time [please vote on Desura]
Community Forums/Showcase/Crystals of Time [please vote on Desura]
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| Hello all, December Update Guys, I need once again your help. The game will be out on Desura too in the next days. I need your help to vote for it here: http://www.desura.com/games/crystals-of-time I also have plenty of Gift Keys. Do not hesitate to ask for it here in this post. Just give leave an email and I will sent you the key. Thanks, Original post: I need your help with this big project of mine. Since September last year I am working at this Adventure Hidden Object game. I am making it with BlitzMax for windows and mac and Monkey for ipads and tablets, of course. I have a dead line on this September and it is very close. I still have a lot to do, but for now I am interested in how long will it take to a normal player to advance in the game. I sent this build to some casual game players (former clients of my previous games) but I would like to also receive some feedbacks from you. This is the download link: http://rvlgames.com/ahogbuild.zip The game has a checking method at the start, so you will have to wait a few seconds, depending of your Internet speed. NO DATA is collected by me. Just check on my server if the build is still playable :) The game itself is far to be polished, but I tried to make a test version good enough to be playable. You will encounter a few bugs but nothing annoying.. I hope. So, if you like to have a look and help me will be great. Also if you have friends, girlfriends, mothers, wifes, etc. who likes to play this type of game send it to them. I am interested in how long did you take to find the "Blue Crystal". Any questions or feedback, write it here. Thank you, R. |
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| Just started looking. The first thing that I noticed is that you have a lot of spelling mistakes in the text; i.e. "dissapeared", "dissapeard" - both should be "disappeared". Also, "the property is surrounded by a tall stone fence". More of a wall, than a fence. [edit] I'm finding that some of the puzzles don't make sense. Eg, to get into the house, why do I have to find a missing floor tile, put in place, and hit it with a hammer? There's no logical connection between doing that and the door unlocking, but that's what I did to get it to open. Again, with opening the gate right at the start, the round puzzle piece is hidden inside the wall. I only found that by random clicking around after becoming completely stuck. [edit] Sorry if I'm coming across as over-critical. There's plenty I like about it, but I figured you'd rather hear about the other stuff. |
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| possible to post a pic of ingame? I dont want to really download some random game without seeing it first. NOT that looks are everything, but still, would like to see if it looks like something id be interested in trying...SOUNDS cool though, otherwise i wouldnt have asked for a pic :P |
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| An hour later, stuck. I have a knife, and a corkscrew. I used the knife on the statue thing to find a gear. I have 3 gears, and put them in place by the door. Still missing the rest. Also I've found one piano key, cannot find the others. There's a puzzle on the beach with a seahorse missing, and one in the kitchen with a part missing. Also missing something to get the box thing near the fusebox to work (there's a round recess on it). Oh, and a bit of paper stuck in the top of a mirror which it says "I can't take it with my bare hands". Also, a boat engine I'm not sure what to do with, and the telescope that needs a clean. Can't seem to progress any further. [edit] Oh, I've collected five map parts. [edit again] Think I need five candles for the fireplace. I've found one, right at the start but I can't get it. |
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| I found the door handle, and put it on to get into the second room at the top of the stairs. The 'door handle' graphic is jut a yellow hand-drawn squiggle. Figured I'd mention as I don't know if you forgot about it. |
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| I've found a bug. The painting on the landing - I got the medallion from behind it and used it. If I use the knife on the painting again, I get another medallion. [edit] ...and if I use the medallion on the box thing, I get another door handle! Think you need to add in some checks to see if an object has already been awarded. |
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| Are the graphics 3d renders or hand drawn? |
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| @siredblood: this is the project I am talking about. You can see some screens here: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/crystals-of-time/x/3848800 @Gfk: nice feedback man! thank you for those spelling mistakes. that particular part of the game (the start) was not corrected yet. I hope I will fix them soon. also the bug with the medallion is brilliant. I will start repairing it right away. the graphics are 3D rendered for lighting and camera and then painted in photoshop :) |
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| DUDE this looks epic, downloading now :D |
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| a few bugs were fixed. please redownload it from the same location. TIP: the minigame from beach is not playable so don't waste time on it :) |
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| I'm intrigued by your art workflow. If I understand you correctly, your artist renders untextured stuff in 3D, then hand-paints over the top of it? How does that not obliterate the shadows/lighting? I'd love to see some work-in-progress shots of the technique used. |
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| @Gfk: My artist is making the scenes in 3D exactly for lighting and shadows. This helps him understand how the light will come in the scene. It is simple then to paint over it. I attached some screens here and some explanations: Mainhall:    - mainhall1: was what we received from our final render. this is what you will have to give us. the camera must be correctly setted and of course the lights and shadows. also please observe that the carpet and the floor have some basic textures. in some scenes we put some color map. - mainhall2: was what we have done in Photoshop. We textured the scene and applied some details - mainhall3: was the same scene but we made it to be old. (both scene will be used in the game, because here you can travel in time) Beach Stairs:     - stairs1: this is a crayon sketch. - stairs2: this was the first render. the artist was not satisfied. - stairs3: this is the final render (observe the trees from the left). the artist was only added the sky and the water in photoshop and then he showed me the image. - stairs4: this is the final image. Kithcen:   - kitchen1: another good interior example of the final render - kitchen2: the 'almost ready' scene to be used. Hope this will help you understand the mechanics. I am sure there are better techniques than that :D |
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| also, some objects are just photos of real objects and inserted into the scene. |
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| @GFK... 3d paint overs are quite common. I'm surprised this is the first you've heard of the technique. It 's useful to ensure correct shadowing and perspective etc. It's also a lot easier to play with composition when you can just move 3D object about rather than having to redraw everything. :o) Have a look at this. If you really don't want to pay for it you can find it on one of the many torrent sites* [edit]Someone's put it up on YouTube[/edit] Oh, and you don't *have* to use Blender...;o) *Before you embark on one of your mouth frothing anti-piracy rants...:op...It's released under a creative commons licence, so it's perfectly legal to download. :o) @Ravl...Downloading to have a play...Although I doubt there'll be much GFK has missed. |
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| Thanks, I just reuploaded it. The current version has now some interaction icons with objects. it is more playable now: http://rvlgames.com/ahogbuild.zip |
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| That's much better! Bug: When in a 'sub game', selecting an item from a scrolled inventory gives you the item from the inventory's initial position. Bug:?? On the 'beetle lock' sub game, you can't drop items you've taken from the inventory. |
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| @Yan: the inventory issue from minigames is my next think to fix. good point with the bug minigame. thank you! |
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| Bug: On the 'beach rings' mini game, the help appears and immediately disappears again. Is there any way to load in the saved game? I keep hitting escape to get out of the sub games...Bad habit... :o( |
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| @Yan: the beach minigame can be ignored. it is not playable so I did not programmed the "help". cannot load yet the game in this version, but I made a new build here where ESC is now ignored. to quit the game use the in game menu: http://rvlgames.com/newmain.zip |
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| First I've heard of it too...impressive, and intriguing. |
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| It looks great. i would kill to be able to make a game like this. |
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| @Gfk: The graphics are the most important here. And for them you need a good artist. The programming part is quite simple. I am not even proud of my code.. |
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| Not so much for the programming, for the creative freedom and story writing. |
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| It's a bit easier now I don't have to keep restarting...;o) I think I've got as far as possible (the fountain) and haven't found anything else. It does look great, but you already knew that. :o) |
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| @Yan: there is the crystal. in the fountain. you must search the scenes again to find a wrench and later a faucet.. anyway. tell me please how long do you estimate an average player will spent until reach this point? |
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| Ok, got the crystal... Bug: You probably already know this, but the 'decoder' sub-game does the flashing help thing. Bug:?? In the car HOG, the fishing net has no alpha and, therefore, completely covers the padlock behind it. I previously forgot to mention that some of the HOG items have slightly odd names:- Pipe - Recorder (not sure if it's the same in American English) Cutting Saw - Hack Saw Scuba Can - Scuba Tank / Air Tank Cristals - Crystals Chiesel - Chisel (Although some may prefer chiesel ;o)) Automaton Head - This is correct, but the more common form would probably be 'Robot Head'. There were a few others that escape me for the moment. If I get some time later, I'll go through the items folder and check. No guarantees though. How long?...That's hard to answer as I restarted *many* times and I wasn't really keeping track of the time. :o/ I'd make a guess at 1.5-2.5 hours? It'd probably be better for someone to come into the game afresh and keep track of the time they spent. All in all, I think the game plays rather well so far. :o) |
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| @Yan: thank you for all these, especially the 'odd names'. it is quite hard for us to have a proper translation. the bug with the fishing net is interesting. I will have a look over it to see how could I fix it. 1.5-2.5 hours... 1.5 would be ok for this portion of the game, will see. the game MUST be ready at the end of September so I am going back to work now. |
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| Interesting artistic process, thanks for sharing it. |
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Had a chance to go through the items last night...Scuba Can - Scuba Tank Poket Watch - Pocket Watch Cutting Saw - Hack Saw Chiesel - Chisel Cristal - Crystal Candle Stand - Candle Stick Oillamp - Oil Lamp pillbox - Pill Box Pickup? - Record Player Inkpen - 'Fountain Pen' / 'Ink Pen' Vinyl - Record (Broken Record?) Spool - Cotton Spool? Goldbar - 'Gold Bar' / 'Gold Ingot' Steering - 'Steering Wheel' / 'Helm Wheel' Sea Star - 'Sea Star' my be more common in the US but I know it as 'Starfish' Potcover - 'Pot Cover' / 'Pot Lid' Rubic Cube - Rubik's Cube? (Although probably trademarked) Fishnet - Fishing Net Scale - Scales Drill - Hand Brace...Maybe better off sticking with drill? Clew - 'Yarn Ball' / 'Ball of Yarn' / 'Yarn' (Had to google this as I'm a bit thick ;o)) Lifebouy - Life Preserver? 'Lifebouy' may be more common in the US Capricorn - ?? Penknife - Pen Knife...'Pocket Knife' may be more common in US. Amphora - Maybe 'Urn' would be a more common term? Wood Planer - Wood Plane Cigars Box - Cigar Box Earth Globe - Globe? Tuningfork - Tuning Fork Pinecode - Pine Cone Corckscrew - Corkscrew Pandant - Pendant Jambon - Gammon ...Think it's just 'Smoked Ham' in the US |
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| Thank you Yan for this list. BTW, Capricorn was used like a zodiac sign. Is that wrong? |
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| See, I quite like the fact that some of the descriptions are cryptic. I.e. "vinyl" instead of "record". Jambon - Gammon ...Think it's just 'Smoked Ham' in the US Jambon is French for Ham. So I'd just put Ham, for that. Rubik's Cube? (Although probably trademarked) It's Trademarked. I'd probably have "puzzle cube" for that one.There was one object which annoyed me, though I can't remember where it was. The description was "decoration", so I clicked on a Christmas tree decoration, thinking I'd found a bug because nothing happened. After a bit I just randomly clicked around the screen and it picked it up as something else. |
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| Capricorn in that context is fine. looking at the item images in isolation, I couldn't make out what it was. :o( Ah yes...Again, didn't know what it was. I assumed 'Chair Doily Thing' wouldn't be very helpful. ;o) The nearest thing to it would possibly be 'antimacassar'?...But not really... Also failed to add it to the list, it seems. :o/ |
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| I just created this page in order to start looking for more 'fans': http://www.indiedb.com/games/crystals-of-time |
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| Wow, impressive imagery to say the very least. |
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| Wow! Very impressed! Looks amazing and really Professional! :) I maybe a moron, Friday Night: I have had a couple drinks at this point, but I can't figure out the first puzzle. I have the chisel, the newspaper, and the key looking tool I got from the car. But I can't figure it out! :( I gathered a bunch of items from the car, but only the chisel was in my inventory. Also, I can scroll almost indefinitely to the right of my inventory despite the fact that those spaces are blank. Just a suggestion. I would limit the scrolling of the inventory to the max amount of items you have. Still playing the game trying to figure the first puzzle out! :) |
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| Hi again, I will not make another topic so I continue posting updates here. Just added this post on indiedb: http://www.indiedb.com/news/characters-bio Here you can learn a little about the characters from the game. The game should be ready to send to publishers later this week. |
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| keep going looks good. |
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| i must say this hall remind me of one tomb rider places.. or was its quake 3 :) anyway amazing. what software ? |
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| thanks guys! @Hardcoal: what do you mean by: what software? |
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| what software for the graphic design |
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| It's written in the topic posts: Photoshop, Blender and Max. |
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| No more download available ? |
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| @Pingus: Sorry, the game is Release Candidate 2 now and was sent to publishers. |
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| Ok, I'll have to wait the demo ;-) Will the scene have some animations ? What is the targeted screen resolution ? I saw that you plan to release it also on tablets (monkey forum) so I wonder if you work also on 2048 pixels for the retina screens. |
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| We are now on 58 on indiedb as popularity :D I dont know if its good but I like it :P Here it is today's last entry: http://www.indiedb.com/games/crystals-of-time/news/in-game-screenshots3 @Pingus: unfortunately the game res will be 1024 x 768 on iPads and Android tablets. The desktop res is 1280 x 768. we have some small animations in scenes but nothing fancy. we didn't have time to make all what we wanted... |
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| Wow, that indieb screenshots looks very good ! The inventory interface seems nicely detailed (for what I can see at the low res screenshot). Funny, in our current project we also placed a rubik's cube in a HOG scene inspired by sea :-)... but we removed it in case of copyright issue with it. |
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| I saw a lot of Rubiks in the other HO games. We use now Puzzle Cube as the item name.. you can see the full res of the photos by clicking on it :) |
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| you can see the full res of the photos by clicking on it :) Ah ! Yes, I did not tried the 'hq' button. Nice blurring effect in 2nd screenshot. Real time blur ? |
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| @Pingus: nope. those closeups are just normal scenes, so we made the background from photoshop. |
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| Hi all, We made this 1 minute trailer which also contain in-game footage: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cstglUnsLwU Hope you will enjoy it. Also, the launch date for Windows PC will be December 1st. |
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| Looks great, but I have to tell you that you spelt "mystery" wrong (you put "mistery"). Is this going on BFG? |
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| @Gfk: of course we have... every time when I do not spell check the content I have a bug :)) I will reexport the movie.. I hope I will be able to put it on BFG at the end. As I told you guys earlier they no longer accept classic games except Collectors Edition. |
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| I must've missed that. Never gone down the HOG route as everything these days seems to be a "collectors edition" anyway. |
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| not everything. Collectors edition are made by big budgets studios. no indies there, that's for sure.. |
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| By the way - where's it being released? |
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| iWin and WildTangent in December. Also I am waiting a response from BFG, but nothing is sure.. I tried to contact gamehouse but all I see is this useless page: http://partners.gamehouse.com/ Any ideas, btw? |
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| My bad... I was thinking of another company... |
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| Game house sold oone ofour games the other year.... Never got a penny from them, I wouldn't bother with them! I'm sure that's a mistake. I have one of my games on Gamehouse (and Zylom), and they always pay on time. |
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| GameHouse are fine and Zylom is also really good. As GfK says, you should chase them up. @Ravl Love the 3D paintovers! Good luck with the game. |
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| thanks Grey Alien, but I cannot simply get in touch with them :D so again, anyone knows other portals where I should try? |
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| Opps... not GH... Sorry! I must have been tired last night :P With GameHouse they actually contacted me... and yes they are good. Sorry for the misunderstanding. (GH also goes under RealNetworks, Inc). |
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| iWin it's the 1st portal which is selling our game: http://www.iwin.com/games/crystals-of-time |
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| Congratulations! |
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| 'grats! I hope it does really well - certainly looks "just like a bought one". :) It's an awful time of year to be releasing games, though. For the next five or six weeks the charts are going to be full of sickly Christmas-themed games, with cute lil robins, pretty snowflakes and gyrating snowmen. I'm sure you'll manage to cut through all of that festive nonsense. |
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| Thanks GaryV and Gfk. I really need to success with this one, otherwise I might end here my.. indie game dev job :D |
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| I really need to success with this one, otherwise I might end here my.. indie game dev job :D The times I've said that. But my problem is I'm too thick [on paper, at least] to do anything else, so I guess I'm stuck with it. :) |
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| Good news: BFG will also release the Mac and Windows version of the game: http://www.bigfishgames.com/download-games/25484/crystals-of-time/index.html I am so happy we made it with BFG, too. btw, on iWin we are on place 3 now: http://www.iwin.com/top/games/new |
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| Hey ! It jumped 1436 places, it does means something :-) Congratulations ! It's not a so bad timing... Good luck on BFG, with all that f2p stucking the top ten it becomes quite hard to enter in the charts. |
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1st place now on iWin: @Pingus: yes, that F2P sucks a lot. Unfortunately it seems this is the future, at least until the users will refuse to play those type of games :) |
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| Good news! I mentioned it to my contact at BFG a few weeks back. I don't know if it did any good or not but I'm pleased they took it. Makes a change for something to get to the top of the charts that *isn't* made my a massive team of Russians with an endless supply of money. |
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| @Gfk: yes, unfortunately Casual Games are not more indie. All Collectors Editions are now big games made by big studios with Voice Overs, CGI, etc.. On BFG it does not work very good for now, hope I will get some better reviews these days.. :D |
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| Just bought it. Graphics look excellent, and the presentation is extremely professional/polished. Found a few translation errors: 1. "openned" should be "opened" 2. "handler" should be "handle" (i.e. door is missing its handle). 3. "glases" should be "glasses" 4. "sac" should be "sack" 5. "No one used was up here" - should be "No one was up here"? A few of the screens have inconsistent exit directions. If I move left to enter a screen, I expect to move right to exit it (if I'm going back to where I came from), but some screens are entered from one direction (i.e. left) and return via another (i.e. down/south). It's a real shame (IMO) that it only plays in widescreen with no option to change the resolution. It looks too squished in [default] fullscreen on my 1280x1024 monitor, and too small to see detail in letterbox format (i.e. widescreen in windowed mode). Just as well I've just updated my glasses...! :o) |
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| Its making me want to start a blog. It's gotten some terrible reviews on BFG. And when I say "terrible", I'm not referring to the number of stars given, but the quality/content of the review itself to justify WHY they gave it that many stars. One reviewer has given it 1/5, propped up with this review; "Just don't bother, boring..... save the download". Seriously, is this what the world has become? We can just tell everybody to NOT bother doing something for themselves because WE'VE already done it and think that they shouldn't, and can't even be bothered to offer any justification for what we're saying?? Another cruelly brands it "Worst game ever" simply because, from reading their two-line review - they couldn't work the puzzles out. I've helpfully flagged all of these reviews as "unhelpful", in the hope that others will follow suit and the people who are writing this drivel will at least put more effort in next time. If you're going to dislike a game, that's absolutely fine, I've no problem with that - nobody likes everything. But if you want to convey your experience to others then why not stop being so friggin' lazy and do it properly and constructively? That way you can at least give yourself some credibility, if nothing else. </rant> |
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| @Chalky: a lot of misspelled words were reported from the players. next time i should be more careful about this. the game resolution it's fixed to 1280 x 768 yes. if the video card does not support this I change it to 1024 x 768. Most of these games are using fixed resolution and the user cannot control it.. @Gfk: There are games on BFG with 219 reviews. Most of them 4 and 5 stars.. I say 2 guys voted 1 star with the following line: "this game sucks. i do not like it.." :D |
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| Well - I've completed it - and really did enjoy it while it lasted. The artwork is outstanding - as is the presentation, so don't be put off by the negative reviews. I hope this does well for you. |
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| Thanks Chalky. I hope others will see the nice part of it too. Guys, I need once again your help. The game will be out on Desura too in the next days. I need your help to vote for it here: http://www.desura.com/games/crystals-of-time I also have plenty of Gift Keys. Do not hesitate to ask for it here in this post. Just give leave an email and I will sent you the key. Thanks, |
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