Hi Everyone:

Thanks again for the feedback. I've fixed almost everything you mentioned. Some things I am unable to do at the moment due to time constraints or artist constraints (see below).
At the moment someone is writing a detailed manual with pictures so that should help the people who need this kind of thing.



persil:

I think the inventory problem is fixed now. However you mentioned the following

>However, I also noticed the strange inventory problem. In fact, I was completely unable to re-equip my character after having taken the rope, which, itself, didn't want to stay in my inventory.

I was wondering if you could get the latest demo and see if you still have this problem? I haven't been able to reproduce it on my system.




HTH,
Anon :


>I have a mouse wheel on my system. When I highlight one of the text items (I think it was the dt/dr label), and spin the mouse wheel, the machine beeps repeatedly.

This one I couldn't fix because I don't have a mouse with a wheel. Also I'm not sure what the mouse wheel would be used for in this context.


>Once you tag a skill, the number goes up, but otherwise it's not clear what skills are tagged. There is a tiny

I improved the instructions to explain this better.


>I saw the graphics ripple when I scrolled all the way to the left, and again all the way down during the training bit.

Not sure why it is doing this. It could be the back buffer is flipping to the front buffer before it has finished drawing. I'll take another look at it.


>I suggest keeping it mostly the same, but making the gage cover only 1/2 of a circle, with full health at the top and dead when the needle is pointing straight down.
This would also free up the other half of the circle to display an image of the hero's body that could be colored in by location if it suffers damage. As it is, you won't know your arm is damaged unless you look at the character screen.


Won't be able to fix this until I can get a hold of my artist. He's gone walkabout.


>Gameplay:
Weapons don't autoload when you are outside of combat and pickup ammo.

This will go in when I get more time.


>The abbreviations in the weapon decription screen are unclear.

I forgot to add an explaination for these in the instructions. I'll do this on the next update.

>Then there is the problem with
>The writing:

The next thing I'll do is get the people in the writing forum to take a look at the script.



Voodoo4:

>lack of shorcut keys!

This is being looked at now. I'll have to come up with a good scheme.


>The best solution is to add an option in the Options menu for scrolling speed

The scroll speed option will have to go in at later update.



[edited by - Davaris on May 18, 2004 9:55:51 AM]

I have a final question for everyone:

What element would you like to see go in this game that would make it a lot of fun to play and would tempt you to buy it.

Is it a different style of combat system? A better script? Anthing you can think of.

How many copy of this game did you sell up to now?*
if you don''t want to reveal it
you can post it to my email ü
tonymontanaofcyberspace@hotmail.com

This is supposed to be the premier place on the net for discussing isometric games and no one has any ideas for making a better iso game? Oh well...

Anyway there’s a new update. I have added short cut keys to streamline the combat and speed movement in and out of menus.

Read all about it here:

http://www.ausgamedev.com/omegasyndrome/news.html

Get the latest demo here:

http://www.ausgamedev.com/omegasyndrome/files.html

The new demo only has the training area as we are going to polish the text in the game. When this is done we''ll release 30-40% of the game for free. If people want to keep on playing they''ll have to buy the full version.

I think I might have achieved perfection this time (no bugs). However if anyone notices anything odd please let me know.

Thanks!

>This game looks good in the screenshots. I'm curious, have you been able to sell copies?

I haven't begun to push it yet. At the moment it is only getting 200 downloads a month. I haven't sent out press releases or done any advertising or set up a forum on my site. So far all I've done is upload it to ~20 sites. I'm a complete novice when it comes to marketing and am learning it as I go.

At the moment I am working on the controls and game play as I've noticed a lot of people are having difficultly learning to play it.

Like anything there are Indie games that sell very well and there are Indie games that don't sell at all (Smugglers 2/3 is a simple game that sells extremely well). The great thing about Shareware is there is no final release date. You can polish your game indefinately.

The next and last engine update will let the player take control of his party members. Look for it next week.

>I wonder, once we have a game, how do we market/sell it at no cost?

Ask the people in the forums at www.dexterity.com about this. There is a thriving Indie scene there. Most of the people at GameDev are only interested in getting jobs working for the big game companies whichj means very hard work, low pay, zero job security, boring games. Not for me.







[edited by - Davaris on June 9, 2004 7:50:18 PM]