Wednesday 2 December 2015

Teacher's Pet by Dr Realgood - Released!

Reposted from http://drrealgoodsaif.blogspot.com/2015/12/a-little-about-game.html

You are a young man at school who has the chance to dog sit for his English teacher.
There is a test at school today, if you don't do well, you'll have to stay home and study instead.
7 points needed to progress, 2 very simple bonus points to be earned. One of my testers thought the quiz was impossible, but I came up with each question and answer off the top of my head.
IF you do need help, you only have to ask, I want this shite little game to be shite and enjoyable.
All sex commands are usual.
I urge you to smell taste and take everything.


Download

Friday 9 October 2015

SNEEZECOMP 2015 Winner

By a close vote of 16-13, Condomocium by Octarine Flash is the winner of SNEEZECOMP. Congratulations!

I'm going to set up a Hall of Fame, of sorts, sometime this week or next. The authors will be getting the feedback you gave them, too, when I have the chance to compile it all.

So thanks for everyone that voted, and thanks for the people who submitted entries. And soon I'll be posting and replying to some of the feedback about the contest itself, so stay tuned for that.

Thursday 1 October 2015

SNEEZE COMP 2015

There were two entries to this year's SNEEZE Comp. Thanks for everyone who participated! These are:
  • Condomocium by Octarine Flash
  • The Heir by Efon
You can download the entries here.

Have fun playing! Once you are done, fill out the voting form here. Voting closes on October 8th, 2015, 12:00 PM. Since there are only two entries, it's a simple binary vote and instant runoff votes are unnecessary. Any feedback you send will be given to the author.

EDIT 10/1/2015: Author posted a last-minute update to Condomocium.

Wednesday 30 September 2015

SNEEZE Comp Open Until October 1st, 12:00 PM, EST

Just to let everyone know this is the final day to submit an entry to SNEEZECOMP. Please email me at [my screen name]93@gmail.com with your entry. I realize neglected to give a cut-off time, so I'll accept entries until 12:00 PM October 1st, Eastern Standard Time.

If you emailed me and didn't get a response within 12 hours, you might have typed in my email wrong. Don't put any spaces between Another and Wannabe.

Thursday 10 September 2015

You can now support Palaverous on patreon!

I love how these pitches tend to sound like they’re delivering such good news. “You can give me money now! Weeeeeee~!”

But yes, due to unpleasant meatspace circumstances I will not ruin your afternoon with, I’m finding myself more and more in a situation where I can’t really afford to turn my nose at possible alternative sources of income, especially if it’s for doing something I actually enjoy doing. I have coded and written essentially everything I’ve ever done in the scarce spare time I have between two jobs, and that spare time is getting smaller and smaller as of late. As I do not plan to use 3D modelling tools, at least in the near future, the donations are not for the sake of upgrading any sort of equipment but rather relieving some of the stress and pressure I’m under to help me focus on the games. This stuff takes time to write, but I also need to get into a specific mood and mindset to do that and few things kill that mood like wondering if I shouldn't be worrying about other things instead.

As you can see me repeating on the page itself, I would be extremely grateful if you could spare a buck for a humble storytelling internet hobo over at my patreon page.

Thank you.

Thursday 3 September 2015

No Sleep Till SNEEZE Comp

Just a reminder that the end of SNEEZE Comp is one month away. The DEADLINE is September 30th. I'm eagerly waiting to see what everyone comes up with!

And so, either one of these statements is true:

1) There has been a flood of incredible, creative, sexy submissions for SNEEZE Comp.

2) There have been none so far.

Assuming statement #1 is true, then surely you don't want to be left out!

Assuming statement #2 is true, anyone who submits anything is sure to win! Glory to you!

Either way, have fun!

Submit entries to [my screen name here]93@gmail.com

Discovering our roots

I come here every single day, and now I'm absolutely sick and tired of seeing my own post at the top of the page asking you guys to give me money so I can keep making games. 

As a result, I started thinking about something else I could contribute to this wonderful community. Then I remembered someone posting a link to a documentary in the Yahoo group about interactive fiction a few years back. I can't remember who originally posted it, and due to the horrible concept and design of Yahoo, the post was most likely quickly buried by some other thread before it received it's fair share of attention. 

The documentary, directed by Jason Scott, details the history of the main genre that we've all come to love; interactive fiction. It's based on roughly 80 interviews conducted over several years, and primarily focuses on the beginnings of the genre, and the problems authors face when creating these kinds of games. It's perhaps even more interesting for creators of IF, as we can identify with some of the issues faced when creating these games (Oh god, puzzles!), but I definitely think it's worth checking out even if you enjoy any sub-genre of interactive fiction, including adult interactive fiction.

We, (The AIF community), are actually also mentioned as a joke during the Q&A! 

So, without further ado, here it is; Get Lamp.



Saturday 15 August 2015

Support Palmer and Emily: Homecoming on Patreon

Apologies for taking your time to read something that's not related to a game release, but this is something I'm very excited about, and hence, thought I would share:

You now have the option to actively support the creation of more free and sexy games by heading over to Patreon and pledging a monthly or one-time amount! Patreon provides me with the opportunity to dedicate more time to developing games, as it serves as a potential second income.  Creating games takes a whole lot of time, in fact, more than you can imagine. As you know, I'm pretty busy with university studies and my part time work. I've so far only been able to work during evening and nights, which is often far from productive due to being mentally drained, and to be honest, is getting harder and harder to justify. Patreon provides me with the opportunity to actually quit my part time job and instead devote that time and energy into creating more sexy taboo games. This is something I'm very excited about, and I hope you are to! So if this sounds like something you'd like to support, head over to my Patreon page and pledge an amount! 

Thank you!

Wednesday 5 August 2015

Working Man by Ice

Working Man is an AIF game I’ve been working on for some time now. I hope you enjoy it. The game is built using Adrift 5.0 (Windows executable) and is 100% free.

You can download version 1.01 from either:

Mega :
https://mega.co.nz/#!M9RyjZbK!iXj7BM5fuwcl7CRlL0jXK6l2PlxGaffvLpVnk03qUZ8

MediaFire:
http://www.mediafire.com/download/d1zn69w57sgts5k/WorkingMan-v1.01.exe

Game Info

In this game, you take the role of a normal husband with a lovely wife and daughter. Each weekday you work your ass off at the office before returning home late in the evening. Today’s work day being over, you have left the office and driven back home. This is where the game starts. The game has multiples endings and include adultery (no rape or incest). The game has been tested, but probably still contains bugs/typos.

Important message for everyone having issues with disappearing images & problem after entering the "code": After some testing, I've come to the conclusion that the issue occurs when you COPY/PASTE text into the Adrift Player. Somehow Adrift Runner doesn't like it. It has nothing to do with the game itself. The quick fix is : Don't copy/paste text in the Runner, type it manually. If it occurs for you, save your game, close the runner, open it again and restore your game.

Ice


PS: Bugs can be reported, here, SharksLagoon or on YahooAIF Achives.

Thursday 23 July 2015

New game announcement and short poll


I just made a new post on my blog announcing a new title, including a link to a short poll I’d appreciate you giving a click.

No use repeating everything else I posted here, so you can find the details thataway:

Wednesday 1 July 2015

Other adult games forums

Recently I've been posting my games on some other adult games forums to help get them out there. I have found that forums are currently the best way to find an audience for adult games, and while the AIF community still definitely has many good reasons to exist, and it's where my personal heart is, it's also good to draw in players who don't know about us. So anyway, here's a little review of my experiences with other active forums:

Thursday 11 June 2015

SNEEZE Comp Announcement

NOTE: Sorry, this was posted yesterday, but I accidentally screwed something up and I'm posting it again. Sorry if you lost a comment that you made!

To encourage development of more games, I've come up with a new comp, this one for CYOA games. After putting up a draft for commentary by the community, I'm ready to go ahead with this. Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

SNEEZE COMP

 Deadline: September 30th, email to [myscreenname]93@gmail.com

The Name

Sneeze Comp is a play on words: Adult Choose Your Own Adventure

The Philosophy

SNEEZE Comp is a casual competition. The rules are designed so that people aren't killing themselves trying to win it. As such, the rules are loose, and we mostly do pinky swears and the honor system.

It's also supposed to be a fun competition. We encourage creativity, experimentation, and not taking things too seriously.

Rules

Small or medium games only, minimum 1,000 words of game text, maximum 25,000 words. Code doesn't count as game text.

Game should be complete. That is, you should be able to play from beginning to end, with no choices that are loose ends. UPDATE: By "loose ends", I mean unfinished choices, parts of the game that were obviously supposed to continue but didn't. If the game ends because the player puts it into a fail state (i.e. they die) then that's fine.

The game can be written for any interpreter, as long as it can be downloaded freely. That is, players shouldn't need to buy or sign up for anything to get an interpreter, so you couldn't write a Neverwinter Nights module for the comp.

The game must use a CYOA interface. That is:  a) All in-game actions should be controlled either by clicking or selecting a provided choice. So, no typing unless it is to select a choice.  b) The limitation does not apply to system commands (i.e. save, load, quit, undo, restart, options).

Entries must contain explicit sexual content with all characters depicted in sexual situations 18+. Games that have especially weird fetish content will probably not win, but are allowed.

(Optional) Game can follow the competition's theme. A broad theme for the competition will be provided, for example, possible themes might be "on a desert island", "damsel in distress", or "nurses". It isn't necessary to follow that theme, so if you don't like that theme you can still submit an entry, but voters are asked to take it into consideration when they rank the game.

Voting will be done by rankings. Each voter will be asked to rank the three best games, or in the case of less than five games, just the best game. Winners will be determined by an instant run-off vote.

If there are five or more games, any game that doesn't win first prize is viable to win an honorable mention. These include: Sexiest Game, Funniest Game, Best Writing, Best Implementation, Best Use of Theme, Most Original. Voters will be asked to give out the honorable mentions.

Some multimedia is allowed, but games are expected to be mostly text. You are responsible for providing attribution or obtaining licenses if the work is not your own. Absolutely no photographs of RL people! To give writers without access to expensive graphic suites a chance, please no images of sex. Yes, I like them too, but not all of us can sink a chunk of money into a good image program. UPDATE: Having an image of sex is discouraged but won't disqualify you. It is not in the spirit of the comp.

Game file should be 4 MB or less. Leeway can be if given the file-type is "naturally large" for a blank story file.

The game should be the original work of you and your co-authors. You are, of course, encouraged to recruit beta testers.

Whoever runs this competition can't submit their own entries.

By submitting an entry, you are stating you've read and understood all the above.

 This Competition's Theme

Out of the dozen and a half or so submissions for possible themes for the competition, I've used an RNG to pick from the eligible ones at random. If you want to submit a theme for a future competition, follow this link.

The theme that was randomly picked was:

Cyberpunk/Dystopian Future

Rogue AIs, virtual worlds, tyrannical governments, greedy mega-corps dominate public life. Some do what they will, the hackers, jammers and runners do what they must on the unforgiving streets. Think Blade Runner, The Matrix, Shadowrun, Neuromancer.

 SNEEZE Comp and Minicomp


This comp does not influence the Minicomp in any way, the Minicomp is still taking CYOA submissions as far as I know. The important thing is this isn't competing with the Minicomp. Not only that, I actively encourage people to participate in both, and if they have to pick one, they should pick the Minicomp.

In any case, if necessary, I'm willing to push deadlines so that people can participate in both the Minicomp and SNEEZE Comp. This is not a conspiracy to push CYOA out of Minicomp. This is, in fact, a conspiracy to make Adult CYOA more of a thing.

 Submissions and Deadlines

The deadline for the comp is September 30th. If the minicomp has a similar deadline, SNEEZE comp will be pushed back.

Submit your entry to [my screen name here]93@gmail.com with the game file, any readmes, and optionally, a text file with all the game text.

  F.A.Q.

Q: Is the Minicomp no longer accepting CYOA entries?/What happened to the minicomp?/You can't replace the minicomp!

A: I don't run the minicomp, and I don't want to detract from that venerable institution.

Q: What do you mean by "mostly text"?

A: Pictures, music and sfx should support the text, text should not support the multimedia. You shouldn't be clicking pictures, you should be selecting from a menu of textual choices.

Q: It's difficult to obtain word counts on my interpreter. How will you obtain the word counts for the game?

A: The 25,000 word limit is informal, and there's no need to send exact word counts unless serious questions are raised about the length of the game. It would be nice to send a file with all the game text, but not necessary.

Q: Will not following the theme seriously hurt my chance at winning?

A: It depends. An exceptionally good game that doesn't follow the competition's theme should be allowed to win, but the theme shouldn't be meaningless, either. Voters are asked to consider the use of theme when voting, so it depends on what they think.\

Q: What are my options for interpreters?

A: Some of the common interpreters are twine, choice script. You can also use traditional engines like TADS, Inform 7 and ADRIFT with the proper extensions.

Thursday 14 May 2015

A few words from GoblinBoy

Hi again,

Sorry to be monopolizing this blog :) Firstly, here is a picture of Penny from the 'new game':

 
Edit: a second picture:
 
and a third:
 

She and Karen are the main girls, mostly, and are opposites in many ways.

Also, for those of you wondering about my future plans I just posted a fairly long comment at ExLibris' Over-Analysing AIF blog. The maincontent of this post was:

...
As for my future here - I still haven't decided. I *should* quietly fade back away, but then I shouldn't have really posted in the first place. The fact is, writing colossal games with hundreds of pictures takes a lot of time. A *lot*. And the rest of my life was suffering as a result.
...
My reimagining is trying to whittle the plot down to a point where I could write a game in months rather than years, but currently the only way I can think of doing that is by removing all the key scenes which were the reason I originally wanted to write this game
...
 In the reimagining literally *none* of what I wrote before is in the current version of the plot. And the 'key scene that starts the game properly' has been relegated to one possible branch that you might do, but might not. In short, the game I think I *can* tell is very different from the one I want to. Which does not help me to get the enthusiasm to commit the next x months of my life to writing it.
...
at the moment apart from plotting I have not written a single word of a game.
...
So, I have been idly creating a few pictures of the characters that *would* be in the game if I wrote it. But I'm still thinking that I probably won't write it. But who knows, if I get the inspiration and a compact enough plot that lets me do what I wanted...

Or I could just write something entirely different. Or I could fade quietly away again. I still haven't decided.

You can skip over to his blog (it's a comment in the Make Love Not War post), but that is the gist of it.

Cheers!

GoblinBoy

Tuesday 5 May 2015

Karen's sister Sarah

Aaannnd, here's a little picture of Karen's younger sister, Sarah. The scene(s) with her were the original inspiration for the plot of the game.

Cheers!

GoblinBoy


Thursday 30 April 2015

Hi again. Here's a world exclusive!

Hi again,

Here's a world exclusive! A picture of the main female character in the game that I am currently not writing. Make of that what you will.

Cheers!

GoblinBoy





Tuesday 21 April 2015

Hello, this is GoblinBoy

Hello.

This is GoblinBoy. Just a quick post to let you know I am alive and well. I found an old drive containing bunches of my files that I had deleted. Below are a few previously unreleased pictures of Alison from the making of SD3, just as a little bonus for people.

Not played an AIF or anything for a very long time, but I just played Palmer's Emily: Sister Attraction. Gosh, that was good. Keep it up!

Cheers!

GoblinBoy







Wednesday 1 April 2015

(April Fools) Pervert ASCII: Crisis

Today, Another Wannabe, Phinn and I are announcing a brand new upcoming rererelease of the popular Pervert Action: Crisis, to be titled Pervert ASCII: Crisis. In this new version of the game all the art will be entirely reimagined as ASCII art. Marvel at Kyoko’s spectacular body like you’ve never seen it before - represented entirely by lines and keyboard symbols! Think of the reduction in download times when images are replaced by text!

                           __.---.
                         ,' `     `-.
                        /            `.
                       /               \
                      |                 \
                       \     .'-.        \
                       (    ,'   `-..    \
                        \  /      9: `.   \
                        | (\  9:      /\   \
                        \  \`.     / /..)  )
                         \.````-..,.`   | /`-.
                       ,'               \/    `
                      /    ,          `.`   ,. :
                     /   ,' ||   ,.    |    `` '
                    /   /    \\  ``   ,-.____,'
                    |  |     | `.__,,'     |
                    |  | __../          (  \
                    | ,'              ,' \  \
                    :'           ,   '    \  \
                  ,'                  `-._ \ |
                ,'           ;;;;`        `|  \
              ,'            ,"".           \   \
        ____,'          _,-'    `._         \_\ \
     _,'  ,'         _-'   _,..   '-._        \_/`.
   ,-'  ,'        ,-'  _.-'    '''''` `-.__       |
   |    \      _.'.gan(____...--...___     ``   _/
   `._,-``...-'                       `''''''''`

Also, as a special bonus goal on my Patreon account - if I get up to $2000 I will upgrade all the art in Pervert Action: Legacy to beautiful ASCII images. Get pledging now!

Monday 30 March 2015

Game Announcement: Marvel: Director, and request for Alpha Testers

The multiverse is collapsing. Heroes are missing. What is left of humanity is sheltered within one city and a few pocket universes. The only thing that seems to be stopping the collapse completely is you, the new Director of SHIELD. It's your job to find heroes, give them assignments, and fight off dangers, all while dealing with the new universe which scientists have dubbed a class-XXX.

This is my announcement for an upcoming game Marvel: Director (working title). I'm far enough along now that I'm confident the game will be released, though it could be a few months down the road depending on how fast I work on it. This is also a request for a few Alpha testers (I have the testers I need, thanks to everyone who replied. If you sent me an email and have not received a reply with the current Alpha version, please contact me again) willing to take a look at the game/offer suggestions as it finishes development. I have been working with SpiketheGoat who has been extremely helpful, but he is short on time and expanding the pool is probably a good idea.

Monday 23 March 2015

The Erins 2010-13 - The Results!

The results of the Erins 2010-13 can now be announced!

There were 148 voters, which is a very impressive total given that this is the third major poll in a relatively short space of time. A big thank you to everyone who took the time to vote.

The winner in each category is listed below, together with honourable mentions (listed alphabetically) for anyone else who got a significant proportion of the vote.

2013

Game of the Year
Winner: Pervert Action: Future by BBBen
Honourable mention: Bad Sister by Another Wannabe, Return to Pleasantville by Lamont Sanford

Best New Author
Winner: Another Wannabe

2012

Game of the Year
Winner: The Tesliss Equation by GoblinBoy
Honourable mention: Peril in Pleasantville by Lamont Sanford

Best New Author
Winner: Lamont Sanford
Honourable mention: Gary Plume

2011

Game of the Year
Winner: Gifts of Phallius 3: The Valkin War by GoblinBoy
Honourable mention: Last Horizon: Director’s Cut by GoblinBoy, Pervert Action: Crisis by BBBen

Best New Author
Winner: Blue Satyr
Honourable mention: Archer, Rogue AI

2010

Game of the Year
Winner: Meteor by GoblinBoy
Honourable mention: British Fox and the Nationalist Conspiracy by Lucilla Frost

Best New Author
Winner: lightwing_2001
Honourable mention: LordYoni, Portmanteau

As expected, Game of the Year 2012 was the most tightly contested category, with Gifts of Phallius 3 edging out Pervert Action: Crisis by just a handful of votes. At the other end of the spectrum, Another Wannabe dominated Best New Author 2013 with over 80% of the vote.

Congratulations to all the winners!

Friday 20 March 2015

Where did all these new games come from?

This will be a short post just to hopefully start a discussion, but I've noticed there have been a lot of releases recently. I don't remember a spontaneous busy period like this since... I don't know, maybe all the way back to 2005. Things were already going better than they had been, but then we got LLtL's project, followed by four games in this month so far. (By the way, is anyone keeping track of release dates these days?)

I have many questions and few answers about this busy patch. Is it just a coincidence? Is it a sign of more to come? Is the AIF author vacuum being filled? Has a big influx of new people been introduced recently? Can we find some way to ruin this again? Post in the comments if you have any ideas.

Wednesday 11 March 2015

March Open Thread: Replayability

I've been reading through some old threads and noticed that talk about replayability of AIF games was pretty common. Most of the talk though didn't actually go into what made a game good to play multiple times, thus an open thread.

First: I don't want to imply by any means that a game has to be replayable to be 'good'. A good game might be great for just one play through, that shouldn't necessarily detract from the quality. I think though that many authors design for replayability for more of an emotional payoff (I believe I've seen both Palmer and BBBen discuss this). It takes a long time to design a game and it would feel better if it got multiple plays instead of just a single go.

Here are the questions:
In general, what elements makes you want to go back and replay a game? Quality, multiple paths, hidden scenes, something else?
Do you go back and replay games long after your initial play through?
What AIF game(s) have you played the most times and why?

Saturday 7 March 2015

Game Release: The Lost Hound

Hello, I am Palaverous. I’ve been developing my first game over the past… actually, let’s not go into how long this took. I procrastinated so hard the dev time multiplied out of control. Nevertheless, it is FINALLY done. You may find it at my site:


As a slight warning, it a monumentally wordy sword-and-sorcery style adventure game with some RPG elements. It is text only, I would say because “I sought to make a game in the spirit of the classics”, but honestly it’s just because I don’t have pictures for it and I’m not a big fan of 3D graphics, at least not those at the level that I can produce.

I hope you all enjoy it and have fun.

Monday 2 March 2015

Something New


Hello fellow players of AIF,

I hope you will enjoy the new project I have posted to both the yahoo group aifarchive and to aifcommunity.org.  I seems that the post to aifcommunity.org still isn't up at the hour of this posting, and that, due to file-size restrictions on the yahoo group I cannot post the full project there.  If you go to https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/aifarchive/files/TADS3%20Games/Foundations%20Institute/ you'll find a reduced version known as The Ash and the Blackthorn.

The larger project, which should be available on aifcommunity.org soon, is called the Foundations Institute and it is an interactive manual for itself.  Eight sexual NPCs are to be found within both Foundations Institute and The Ash and the Blackthorn, each with over a thousand responses and over 30 implemented body-parts.

It is also open-source and creative commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International, so I hope you get a good read, take the parts you find useful and make something wonderful with it.

Good fantasies,

Love Letters to Love

47-/.hqksmhpkfr9qha2hqksmjhlk6jhhqici1hhnbq0hqksmhpkfr7nki6hqksm2jhlk9kvq-2qk5qbh8F,7pk9C6pbwff0lhnphuhnh55qvk3iknqy-hcabq2klhjmskqh8rwjjkq1rfkphmskqh4qbnhh6qvhjqyQ9hbq4kq8F3hbq8kq5F2gw0C94?qkj6tfskv1qc3thqphaasp2nhuh8jsggkr1ynhuh9bqcv8hns crwqckj0cp2akcja7qk3ahq4qksab,6vbknwlbcr2pcajwqakqlynr7jcmshs7w,5kP

Edit:  Full game now on http://aifcommunity.org/games/tads/tads_3/ the file is an archive named FI.7z.

wgh"./-29!wttht^kjh(lw nwanwlb)qbcnt@vknt*"awp*wokuhqbkn%#wsghwP

Sunday 1 March 2015

The Erins: 2010-13

What's all this then?

Well, the slimmed down version of the Erins looks like it has enough support to become an ongoing thing (big thank you to everyone who voted, by the way). However, that leaves a bit of a gap in the history of the Erins, since they weren't voted on from 2010 to 2013. If that gap was left unfilled it would also mean that a lot of people would miss out on the chance to win Best New Author, since you can only be eligible for that award in the year you release your first game. To rectify that problem, AIF Central presents The Erins: The Lost Years!

There are two categories for each year:

Game of the Year - What was the best (however you choose to define that) game of that year?

Best New Author - Who was the best (again, however you choose to define that) author to debut in that year?
 

The voting period will begin at 0000 GMT on 1 March and finish at 1200 GMT on 22 March. The longer voting period should hopefully allow people to play any games that they may have missed the first time around.

There is one voting ballot, covering all four years. However, there is no obligation to vote for every single year.

The eligible games are listed below, together with download links (NB. Links to aifcommunity.org do not go directly to the file). There are a couple of games I haven't linked to. These are available from the aifarchive Yahoo! group (registration required).

2013

Game of the Year
Bad Sister by Another Wannabe
Next Door Girl: April by Early Day
Pervert Action: Future by BBBen
Return to Pleasantville by Lamont Sanford
The Last Chance by Arthur McKingsly
The Midnight Room by Early Day

Best New Author
Another Wannabe (Bad Sister)
Arthur McKingsly (The Last Chance)
Early Day (Next Door Girl April, Midnight Room)
Hanon Ondricek (Briar*)
stormcage1 (Spymaster of Tyria*)

*Minicomp games

2012

Game of the Year
Another Friday Party 2 by lightwing_2001
Deadly Climax by Madquest8
Gasparillo by Lamont Sanford
Peril in Pleasantville Parts 1 & 2 by Lamont Sanford
The Adventures of Super Shlong by Lamont Sanford
The Mirror by Stormchild
The Tesliss Equation by GoblinBoy
Vicar of Dribble by Elsa

Best New Author
Armsteadhammerschlag (The After School Special*)
Elsa (Vicar of Dribble)
Gary Plume (A Dog's Life*)
kkennon (The Drunken Harlot*)
Madquest8 (Deadly Climax)
Lamont Sanford (Peril in Pleasantville Parts 1 & 2, The Adventures of Super Shlong, Gasparillo)
Stormchild (The Mirror)

*Minicomp games

2011


Game of the Year
A Halloween Tail by Blue Satyr*
Gifts of Phallius 3: The Valkin War by GoblinBoy
Last Horizon: Director's Cut by GoblinBoy
Pervert Action: Crisis by BBBen
Rex Ward by Artoreus*
Something Broken by Jamesdesavoy

*Yahoo! aifarchive

Best New Author
Archer (Buffy: Before the Date*)
Artoreus (Rex Ward)
Blue Satyr (A Halloween Tail, SS Whore*)
Dark Horse (The Wingman*)
Jamesdesavoy (Something Broken)
Rogue AI (The Princess and the Dragon*)

*Minicomp games

2010

Game of the Year
Witches Mansion by casandrakumsung
Meteor by GoblinBoy
Another Friday Party by lightwing_2001
British Fox and the Nationalist Conspiracy by Lucilla Frost
Kidnapped by UDat
Ziva by Cody Grant Smith
Aquila Station by Portmanteau

Best New Author
Begferdeth (Redskirt*)
casandrakumsung (Witches Mansion)
Cody Grant Smith (Ziva)
lightwing_2001 (Another Friday Party)
LordYoni (Sibling Seduction*)
Portmanteau (Aquila Station)
UDat (Kidnapped)

*Minicomp games

Thursday 26 February 2015

Let's Plays of Arianeb

I recently noticed that one YouTuber was making Let's Play videos of herself playing Dating Ariane.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24vnKeuFWB8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B44gxN4Tgwk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdgnrvLADpI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jLvgxTuSYk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJzaTpLG3gk

I've always felt that Dating Ariane was written for the male gaze. Watching a woman play the game definitely reinforces that feeling. Although she is obviously exaggerating her reactions for the sake of humor, it's interesting to see her reactions to behavior that would be considered normal in AIF. The videos also show how hard the game is. The YouTuber is an experienced gamer who plays a lot of dating sims and visual novels, and she can't get anywhere in the game. It might be because she uses the back button a lot though. I don't think Dating Ariane supports the back button properly.

I don't know what this has to do with anything. It's just nice to see reactions to AIF-style games from people outside the community. The player is open-minded about it and she seems to enjoy herself, but I can't help but wince at certain moments.

Monday 23 February 2015

February Open Thread: Failure and Challenge

I think the only AIF game I ever failed* at was BBBen's Pervert Action: Crisis. From the beginning I tried to have a diverse set of skills and interact with multiple girls. At the end, I ended up in a relationship with none of them.

A somewhat similar type of failure though happened in Goblinboy's games where I didn't get the ending/relationship I was shooting for. I think in my first play of School Dreams 3 I managed to piss both Becky and Molly off.

Now, for me, those setbacks just made me want to start again from the beginning. What are other people's thoughts on the issue? Does the potential for failure, and challenge** to get better outcomes, make the ultimate result more worthwhile, or just frustrating?

*I'm using a broad definition of fail here, I enjoyed my first play, so on that criteria I didn't fail, but I didn't get what I wanted (which was possible to get)
**I'm speaking generally. I think people generally agree that too much or too little challenge isn't desirable, so I'm asking in general is more challenge good?

Sunday 15 February 2015

The Erins: 2014 - Results!

The results of the 2014 Erins can now be announced! 

The top three places are listed below, along with honourable mentions (listed alphabetically) for anyone else who got a significant number of votes. 

Game of the Year 
1st - Emily: Sister Attraction by Palmer
2nd - Magician's Nephew by Mister Flibble
3rd - Master of the House by Minterlint

Honourable mention: Circles of Desire by Cassgames; Study Date by Karrek 

Best New Author 
1st - Palmer
2nd - Mister Flibble
3rd - Minterlint

Honourable mention: BrokenKnightX, Cassgames

Congratulations to Palmer, Mister Flibble, and Minterlint, not to mention everyone else who released a game in 2014. Also, a big thank you to the 147 people who took the time to vote. 

In a year that was as dominated by new authors as 2014 was, it's not too surprising that the results for Game of the Year and Best New Author match up so closely. What did surprise me a little was how many people chose to split their votes. I would guess that's due to new authors not just being judged on what they've done this year, but also on what they might do in the future. 

On the subject of what categories could be added to the 2015 Erins, nearly everyone who made a suggestion mentioned either Best Character or Best Scene. We'll be looking at how we can implement those suggestions closer to the time. 

Now you have a couple of weeks to catch your breath before the voting starts for the 2010-13 Erins. I'm giving serious thought to doing multiple years at once, since I don't want to exhaust everyone by sending out poll after poll for the next four months.

Saturday 31 January 2015

The Erins: 2014

Given the relative success of AIF Hall of Fame 2014, it seemed a shame not to also give the games that were released in 2014 a chance to be honoured as well.

There are two categories:

Game of the Year - What was the best (however you choose to define that) game of 2014? This is open to any complete non-Minicomp game that was first released in 2014.

Best New Author - Who was the best (again, however you choose to define that) author to debut in 2014? This is open to any author who released their first complete game in 2014.

Voting will close 15 February 2015 at 1200 GMT. You can vote here.

The nominees are...

NB. Links to aifcommunity.org do not go directly to the file.

Game of the Year

Best New Author

  • Anna Nee Moss (Snowstorm*)
  • AOneHitWonder (Dinner Plans*)
  • BrokenKnightX (The Henchman)
  • Cassgames (Circles of Desire)
  • Karrek (Study Date)
  • Louys Bilitis (One Last Pay Day*)
  • Minterlint (Master of the House)
  • Mister Flibble (The Magician’s Nephew)
  • nowherecity24 (Slim Spady Detective*)
  • Palmer (Emily: Sister Attraction)
  • Shannon O’Donnelly (Friday Afternoon*)
  • whsprd (Taking Charge)
 * was an entry in the 2014 AIF MiniComp and can be downloaded from the Inside Erin website.