The thread where lethargic tests Cyberganked for an hour

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The thread where lethargic tests Cyberganked for an hour

Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

This could be a fun public thread. Lethargic has offered to test Cyberganked for one hour for fifteen dollars.

I guess that I'd like you to use a pre-built party, lethargic. I know that happy path / expected stuff in the character creator works, and I know that I don't do a lot of range checking with the creator. So to get the most out of the hour allotted, using a default party is the way to go.

I guess what I will be most interested in is your opinion about the interface. I want to know if the way to do something like fights or movement or trading equipment is so annoying that it makes you not want to play the game. You can be completely honest and you won't offend me, because the game is still in the stage where I can fix anything that rubs people the wrong way.

I am going to try to make a "walk through" of places to go in the game and get a copy of it to you by the end of this weekend.
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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

OK, I am making a build right now.
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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

I sent lethargic a URL for the download zip.

The first thing to do with the game is type prebuild. (No period.) That loads a pre-built party.

The second thing to then do is type "w" (no quotes) to go west.

After that, please type:

transcript on

... the game will ask you for the name of the file to save the transcript as. This is the most important part, because it lets me see what happens as you play.

I am interested in whether or not the game makes sense when it comes to moving around and getting you going with some quests and so forth.

If you've ever played Wizardry, Bard's Tale, Might & Magic or Wasteland, Cyberganked should feel similar.
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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

lethargic told me he had trouble getting it started. In a way this is good, others might have the same problem.

Did you try to run "cyberganked.exe"? What happens when you try that?

I don't have a "build script" or anything. (I...... need to make one.) So I could have left a file out.
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Post by lethargic »

If I had any idea this thread exist until now this probably would've helped.

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Post by lethargic »

I didn't have any problem launching the game. I was having trouble getting started trying to create a character and/or party. Apparently I hear I'm supposed to type prebuild. This changes everything!

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Post by lethargic »

I was gonna do it tonight but things got screwed up as usual when I make plans. Tomorrow night! I shall find an hour!

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Post by pinback »

Let's go, Spinner.
I don't have to say anything. I'm a doctor, too.

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Post by lethargic »

I have started. I haven't done much yet but here are my initial knee jerk reactions..

1 - I may be shooting myself in the foot...I hate the music. Is it normal for these games to have music? I find it impossible to concentrate on playing and reading and thinking while the music is on. I had to turn my speakers off.

2 - Why does the text sometimes gray out? I assume this is just a funky little thing to be fixed in the future? It's hard to play a text game if the text keeps vanishing. lol

3 - I have been unsuccessful in pulling my penis out, fingering any of the girls or making them lez out. What kind of game are you making?

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Post by lethargic »

My only problem with the interface so far is how conversations end after one choice and then to ask something else you have to restart the conversation and re-choose your person to talk. I wish you could just ask all the questions you want then end the conversation.

Also the private investigator doesn't have give any answer if I ask the #3 question.

More importantly I was unable to teabag the dead body in the gun store. WTF?

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Post by lethargic »

In a fight. I selected one character to run a program. It asks for a four letter code. The four letters I came up with did not work. It says type ? for list, it does not work. I seem to be stuck now.

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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

lethargic wrote:In a fight. I selected one character to run a program. It asks for a four letter code. The four letters I came up with did not work. It says type ? for list, it does not work. I seem to be stuck now.
Ah shit!

OK. One of these two should work:

If the character is a Hacker: donk for DONKEY.BAS
If the character is a Unix Programmer: poly for the Polybius Seizure.

(You can tell which by looking at the top of the screen - the hacker character has "HA" by their name, all the way to the right, and the Unix Programmer has "UX". Also, if you try one and it complains, the other one should work. I guess that's the second way.)

Thanks for finding that!
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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

lethargic wrote:My only problem with the interface so far is how conversations end after one choice and then to ask something else you have to restart the conversation and re-choose your person to talk. I wish you could just ask all the questions you want then end the conversation.
Great point. I will make the conversations loop back and put a "press 0 to quit talking" thing there. Thanks!
Also the private investigator doesn't have give any answer if I ask the #3 question.
Also, thanks!
More importantly I was unable to teabag the dead body in the gun store. WTF?
Here is what I am gonna do. If there's two characters in the party with social awareness less than 10, one will teabag the dead body and one will shoot a photo of it.

I guess I need to check to see if one of the two is male.

With this game being more of an RPG than a text adventure, I'm not having all the verbs that text games do, so I can't implement "tea bag body" directly. :(
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Post by lethargic »

Playing this makes me want to take my old Friday the 13th movie script I wrote and turn it into a game. haha

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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

lethargic wrote:1 - I may be shooting myself in the foot...I hate the music. Is it normal for these games to have music? I find it impossible to concentrate on playing and reading and thinking while the music is on. I had to turn my speakers off.
I tried to get the music to where, if you like one song you'll like the rest and if you don't care for the first song, you won't like any of them.

You can disable the music (so you can play other things) by right clicking, then going:

Preferences-> Uncheck "Enable Music."

2 - Why does the text sometimes gray out? I assume this is just a funky little thing to be fixed in the future? It's hard to play a text game if the text keeps vanishing. lol
Yessir, there's a bug in the game where the next line shows up as gray on a command it didn't understand. I've got to load the debugger up to track that one down. It annoys me as well!

3 - I have been unsuccessful in pulling my penis out, fingering any of the girls or making them lez out. What kind of game are you making?
Hmm. I'll subcontract out the penis code, I think!

Thanks, once again, for all of this. What's your Paypal address? Actually, let me write you a PM here asking for it.
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Post by lethargic »

Attempt #3 begins. NOW!

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Post by lethargic »

Hey, one of these songs sounds exactly like the main song from the Saints Row games. See? I'm distracted again. Turning down sound.

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Post by lethargic »

Game crashed! Who made this crap??

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Post by pinback »

This behavior is bogus and unacceptable.
I don't have to say anything. I'm a doctor, too.

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Post by lethargic »

A bunch of damn farmers killed me!

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