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Message: 4858

Author: Daniel

Date: 06/08/2005

Subject: Dr. Andrew Broad's list of MM / JSW Games

 

Andrew wrote:

> Currently, my List of MM/JSW Games is based on the
> principle that each entry (other than Titbits or Future Games)
> corresponds to a released product and a single zip file.

Andrew, thanks for the explanation, it makes me understand things
much better :-) . I have to say that you have applied this principle
consistently, and that the principle itself is difficult to question
since you have chosen to adopt it.

My "problem" is that I would rather use a different principle for the
list of games on my future website. I would include in the list
finished, released products, assigning them one number for each game
file (/not/ zip file) in each category. I would offer the map, the
picture gallery, the .rzx walkthrough, etc. for the highest existing
version of the game, whether it is described with a number (e.g. v.
3.0), letter (e.g. Rev. E) or as a special edition. Obviously, this
would also be the file of choice for the download section (included
in a zip file containing the text file and any other files the author
has chosen to include), even though, should the author wish so or at
least have no objection, I would make available for download also the
other, older or alternative versions. An additional criterion would
probably be that the game be "different enough" from the original or
other existing games - hence, e.g. Darren McCowan's "JSW: Sunday
Afternoon Graphical Remix" would not be considered a new game, as it
is not "different enough" from the original JSW, even though it
contributes new, excellent sprites and graphics.

Under these circumstances, it looks like I may have to make my list
slightly different from yours, since they would be based on different
principles. In such case, would you mind if I still based my lists on
yours, even though they might be slightly different? - I would
obviously give you credit and describe my lists as "based" on Andrew
Broad's lists, or whatever wording you would prefer.

For me the ideal solution, of course, would be to find some kind of
common principle, so that there would be /no/ difference between the
lists. However, I realise that it is me who would have to adjust to
you rather than the other way round. So if, for conceptual reasons, I
found it very difficult / awkward to fully mirror your lists, could I
still use them in the way I described above?

If you firmly consider "Party Willy" 48k to be one game, perhaps I
could include it in my list as one entry, but with a double number? I
would then have just /one/ page for every "section header page" for
this game (entrance to the picture gallery, map download page, .rzx
walkthrough download page, etc.), but I would maintain the double
number everywhere. However, there would obviously be just one zip
file for download, and I could offer the maps, the walkthroughs, etc.
(one for each part of the game) as one zip file for every category as
well (i.e. for example two maps in one zip file), to honour your
decision that "Party Willy" is just one game.


As far as your (/excellent/) list is concerned, I would just like to
kindly bring to your attention the following considerations:

a) Now that you have explained the principle, I understand it fully.
However, the principle you apply is not explained on your website, I
believe, so someone who just visits it would not know what it is (I
realised it only after your last post). Now, your lists are
numerical. So if a visitor to your website just has a quick look at
them, he (or she) will think, for example (a year or two from
now): "Okay, so there exist 50 JSW 48k games" - by just looking at
the last number on the list for this category. However, if the list
includes, by that time, DrUnKeN mAsTER!!!'s "Seven Days in the Sun"
(under one entry, if they are released in one zip file), the person
will be misled, because the /real/ number of existing game files will
by that time be around 60 (the difference being made by DrUnKeN
mAsTER!!!'s new games, plus the F.I.T, plus - arguably :-) - Party
Willy, etc.).


b) I believe you and I share the "healthy obsession" (to use the
expression DrUnKeN mAsTER!!!
used a few months ago) of giving importance to every single JSW room
ever created. Speaking for myself, I feel that if a room has been
created (brought to life, as it were), it deserves a place in
the "official" MM / JSW world, that is, namely, on one of your lists
of finished games. The desire to see this happen was actually the
main driving force behind my creating "JSW: The 2005 Megamix" -
to "resurrect" Paul E. Collins's rooms from "JSW '96 Remix", Rob
Moseley's rooms from his "JSW Remix" and some other rooms which
didn't belong to any of the "official" games included in your lists
(in fact, I also felt that Darren McCowan's sprites deserved a place
in an "official" game). It is also the driving force behind my actual
process of creating a finished, compleatable game with the use of
Sendy's rooms from "The Unlucky Seven", and my intention to finish
up "JSW 128k Mass Collaboration".

I say that you share this "obsession" (or is it love for JSW?),
because you explain in the text file which accompanies "Manic Miner
4":

"ROOM 5: 'Processing Plant (Version 2)'. This is one of three rooms
from the original Manic Miner 1 that were changed when the second
edition was issued by Software Projects. The idea of having it in
Manic Miner 4 is that completists only need to get Manic Miner 4 and
the first (Bug-Byte) edition of Manic Miner 1."

and I think you've done it with some other rooms, too, including them
in "Party Willy" (sorry, I haven't played the game yet, but I look
forward to it :-) ).

So I understand that you would be sorry to eliminate the original
edition of Adam Britton's "The Continuing Adventures" from your list
of games, because it would lead to the elimination of the room "The
Sky-Ladder" from the "official" JSW world. However, perhaps this
problem could be solved, somehow - perhaps we could get Adam to
include the room in the special edition of "Willy's Holiday" if he
ever gets down to it (room 002 is unused in the original edition), or
in one of the new games which are being created (128k Mass
Collaboration perhaps?).
And, since you promised to give it a thought, perhaps you might also
consider the following solution: if you do merge the two versions
into a single entry, dated 1985, which I imagine might
look something like this:

5. The Continuing Adventures [Adam Britton, original edition 1985,
Special Edition 1998]

then perhaps you could make the words "original edition" a link to
the zip file containing the 1985 release, and the words "Special
Edition" (and "The Continuing Adventures") a link to the zip file
containing the 1998 release? Or would it be against your principle to
point to two zip files in the same entry? Or maybe Adam would agree
to have both game files distributed in one .zip file? (especially
taking into account what he said about both versions of "TCA",
message # 4732).


c) Andrew wrote:

> Including opinions is a thorny issue, and one which I have avoided
> for my List of MM/JSW Games, partly because the List is objective
> and unbiased in nature.

Well, your list /is/ objective and unbiased, but it is also evident
that the criteria on the base of which a game is included or not (and
how it is included, as one entry or more, etc.) have a strong
subjective element, which is the result of the principle adopted
initially.
I am writing this, because please consider the following:

Steve Worek wrote in one of the Club messages at the end of last year:

> Two years after releasing the very rough, unbeatable version on
> Andrew Broad's website, "Jet Set Emily: Baby On The Go" is finally
> nearing completion. Over the past year, Andrew and myself have
> scoured the game, and I've been trying to fix any problem and
> glitch that may occur. While doing so, I've also decided to give
> the game a major overhaul, so for anyone who played the original

JSE in 2002, expect a huge change.

I haven't played "Jet Set Emily: Baby On The Go" yet, and when I do,
I will most probably play the final version and not the earlier ones,
so I won't compare them. But the way it sounds, Steve could have
easily called this new version a "special edition", since it features
a "huge change" in relation to the original release.

If he had done that, today you would probably have two entries
of "Jet Set Emily: Baby On The Go" in your list, the original one and
the special edition. And everything would be according to the
principle: there would be two releases, two zip files and two release
dates (3 years apart!) plus "a huge change" and "major overhaul" of
the game, probably quite visible while playing it.

Steve didn't choose to call his game a "special edition", but rather
decided to release the final version of the game and "Jet Set Emily:
Baby On The Go" has only one entry on your list today.

And it feels the right thing to do. However, I might (just for the
sake of the argument :-) ) take "Willy's New Mansion", eliminate one
or two of the weakest rooms, replace them with newly-created rooms,
introduce some other minor changes, call it a special edition and
release it a year after the original edition. In such case you might
assign it a separate number on your list, leaving the original
edition where it currently is.

Then a new game would appear, by another author, created from
scratch, with new sprites, graphics and all, which may have taken a
year or more to create. This new game would be put on an equal
footing with the hypothetical "WNM SE", each of them constituting a
separate entry on your prestigious list.

This would clearly be unjust to the other author, because the result
of his / her hard work, different from the other games and so
bringing in new quality into the field, would be sort of equalled
with the result of my (hypothetical) work, which would be minor and
would create very little novelty in relation with the original "WNM"
(already assigned its number on the list).

Well, sorry about the lengthy example, I just wanted to explain the
way I feel about it :-) .


d) A remark about Phillip Bee's "Jet-Set Willy (again)". It is just a
thought, nothing I feel strongly about.

In the text file, Phil says:

"Jet-Set Willy (again) could have been released way back in 2000; in
fact, I released the whole game as a gift to the MM/JSW Yahoo! Group
in December 2000. This is the exact same version, only as a tape
image."
Well, "could have been released" means it wasn't released, or at
least Phil does not /perceive/ it as released back then. However, it
was made available to the MM / JSW Yahoo! Group, so one might call it
a "club release", I guess. And the version itself is /exactly/ the
same, so someone playing the game back in the year 2000 or now in
2005 is playing exactly the same game.
What's more, in the game file, in the scrolling title message, you
can see the copyright date "2000". Also, in the text file, Phillip
mentions a double date: "(c) 2000, 2005 Filsoft".
So, with all of the above, I was just wondering if perhaps it would
not be more accurate to move "Jet-Set Willy (again)" up on the list
back to the year 2000? (and give the double date of release). The
only problem I see with it is that Phil didn't declare it
as "officially released" back then, and I guess it was on your list,
Andrew, ever since, in the "Future Games" section. But well,
Herve /has/ officially released his excellent "JSW in Paris", but in
reality, to the best of my knowledge, at the moment it is only
available for download from the Files section of the MM / JSW Yahoo!
Group, so it is only available to the Club members, so in a sense it
is still a "club release", even though it has been officially
released (this situation should change as soon as possible, of
course - that's one of the reasons I would like to create a Download
Centre with free access to all of the existing games).


e) A remark about Sendy's "The Unlucky Seven".

Andrew wrote:

> _The Unlucky Seven_ is actually one of the biggest headaches of
> updating my List of MM/JSW Games, because it doesn't fit neatly

into

> any of the existing categories (it's released, but not really a

true

> gamma-release; we are "encouraged not to spread these, but I do not
> prohibit it"; they are Future Games, but "will never see the light
>of day"). I expect I'll find a way to integrate _The Unlucky Seven_
>into the appropriate Future Games sections (of JSW, JSW128 and
> JSW64), but the exact solution will require further meditation...

Well, if I may express my humble opinion, to me this is clearly
a "club release" (I think that Sendy actually used this expression in
one of her messages), and I think you are perfectly right in
integrating its parts into the appropriate Future Games sections.
They "will never see the light of day" in finished games created by
Sendy (according to her declaration), but then there are various
games in your Future Games section whose authors evidently have no
intention of finishing them, either. There are also several files
with unfinished or demo versions of various games in the Files
section of The Yahoo! Club, and those have been "club released" as
well, even though the authors may not have used this actual word.

This brings me to a point which has some importance for me. I have
incorporated the unfinished games by Paul E. Collins (formerly "Paul
Howard") - the "JSW '96 Remix", and Rob Moseley ("JSW Remix")
into "JSW: The 2005 Megamix" (well, they passed from the 48k category
to 128k category, but they are still the same rooms, in some cases
identical, in some cases developed where they were clearly
unfinished). I don't suppose anyone else will deal with them again.
So if I might make a small suggestion, if think it would be logical
to transfer them from "Future Games" category into "The Tidbits"
section (I'm not sure whether 48k or 128k), where it could be
explained that such games were partially created and left unfinished
and that they now form part of "JSW: The 2005 Megamix".

I hope you will relatively soon be able to apply the same principle
to Sendy's "The Unlucky Seven", after the material contained in the
package (or at least most of it) is released in a single, 128k engine
game, which, as I noted earlier, I would like to call "JSW: Mind
Control". Hey, Sendy, I must say that I /really/ like your rooms a
whole lot, I think that they are /very/ good (I totally disagree with
your self-criticism applied at various points of the document
included in the .zip file of "The Unlucky Seven"), and it's been such
a pleasure working with them that I think I may actually progress
with the game more quickly than I originally imagined (because I like
it so much that I will probably be putting other ideas aside to
indulge in the pleasure of compiling and developing "JSW: Mind
Control"). I have now designed a couple of new rooms, but I have many
ideas for other rooms, plus a desire to make the game /really/
attractive - not just to "resurrect" Sendy's rooms so that they
can "see the light of day", but to create a /very good/ JSW game out
of this splendid material :-) .

The story behind the game will be the following: While enjoying a
nice afternoon on the sun deck of his New Mansion, Willy is abducted
by aliens. He is marooned on an unknown planet, and the aliens put a
special helmet on his head to monitor and influence his thoughts
(hence the title). He can get rid of the helmet by collecting all of
the items scattered around the strange place where they left him.
He climbs down the mountain, and begins exploring the new territory.
He has a countryside to explore and a system of tunnels, which
ultimately brings him to a house. There he discovers another flying
saucer, which he will be able to hijack (skyjack? spacejack?) as soon
as he has collected all of the 256 objects. When he has completed
this task, he takes control of the UFO and flies back to his New
Mansion.

Well, this plot is probably rather lame, but Sendy says in the
document accompanying "The Unlucky Seven": "I'm beyond the stage
where just designing rooms is satisfying - they have to fit together
and tell some kind of story or theme, no matter how wacky". So here
you have a very wacky story, and I hope the rooms will fit together
well within it :-) .

Well, this is it for this post, and I still want to write a few words
about Andrew's games and projects.

Daniel

 

 

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