The Bianco Mansion

Games for Spectrum, C64, Amstrad, Amiga, Apple ][ and the rest of the 8-bit and 16-bit platforms. Pleas for help, puzzles, bug reports etc.

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jgerrie
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#16 Post by jgerrie » Tue Feb 19, 2019 4:00 am

And Garry those are wicked maps. What software do you use to create them? I really like your cleaned up one. Maybe Gifford was on acid? Or it was just his way of creating a little bit more complexity. Can't really say, although as Strident mentions above, there's a link to the author's current on-line presence. Maybe I'll go ask the man himself.

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Garry
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#17 Post by Garry » Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:54 am

I use Trizbort for the maps. It has some quirks and takes quite a bit of effort to get used to, but I prefer it over anything else that's out there. I've now done several hundred maps with it (perhaps half are on CASA) and I've learnt lots of little tricks to get the most out of it. Alex also uses Trizbort, but the styles of our maps are completely different. You can develop a style to suit yourself. Alex also spiffies his final image with a fancy title. I wish you could do this in Trizbort. Incidentally, I use version 1.5.9.3. Later versions have "features" that make it worse (for me) than the version I settled on, particularly in the bit-mapped images.

I checked Clive Gifford's web site and couldn't find any mention of his text adventures. Perhaps he's embarassed by them.

I think you're right about intentionally trapping you in the vault, but he doesn't warn you beforehand, doesn't tell you that the door has closed behind you, doesn't tell you that there's a door there and doesn't allow you any means of escape unless you happen to have the key and guess that you can use it to unlock the invisible door.

On the subject of the stool/ladder (I used the stool in the solution, as it's much closer to the study), you can climb the stool while you're carrying it, then drop it, even though you're standing on it, then get the map, even though it's now out-of-reach again. Very sloppy programming.

I forgot about the inventory limit with the stool/ladder. I actually took advantage of this bug in the solution, but I did note it. Perhaps this was cheating.

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Garry
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#18 Post by Garry » Tue Feb 19, 2019 12:00 pm

Gunness wrote:
Mon Feb 18, 2019 5:05 pm
... but please don't abandon us in here :D
Wouldn't dream of it. Perhaps you could use the Facebook group to notify people about significant new entries, new solutions etc. on CASA. That's up to 1400 potential CASA users and, hopefully, contributors.

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Gunness
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#19 Post by Gunness » Tue Feb 19, 2019 3:08 pm

I have thought of it, but spamming the FB group might turn a lot of people off.

Anyway, I will post tomorrow as it's a special date :)

ahope1
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#20 Post by ahope1 » Tue Feb 19, 2019 4:57 pm

Gunness wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 3:08 pm
I have thought of it, but spamming the FB group might turn a lot of people off.
The news posts that appear on the CASA homepage and in the Planet IF blog aggregator feed are very infrequent and would be welcome on Facebook, I think.

:thumb:

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jgerrie
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#21 Post by jgerrie » Tue Feb 19, 2019 5:42 pm

I fixed the vault interaction in the following way in my latest: If you search in the entrance room to the vault, it tells you the vault has a time lock door and is "currently open." Hopefully enough of a warning. I also fixed the ladder/stool handling. Now you can either be holding it or have dropped it in the room before typing "CLIMB STOOL" or "CLIMB LADDER". In any case the item (ladder or stool) is dropped in the room along with the map. Also fixed up the murderous results of combat with the guard. Now if you use the wire cutters you just knock him out cold, or the rope-- you subdue him and tie him up (losing the rope). Also, worked on the quirk about "opening" in the letter. Added a message for the library regarding the reading of books in there ("there's too many") and added a "Nothing" message when you are carrying nothing.
Garry wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:54 am
I think you're right about intentionally trapping you in the vault, but he doesn't warn you beforehand, doesn't tell you that the door has closed behind you, doesn't tell you that there's a door there and doesn't allow you any means of escape unless you happen to have the key and guess that you can use it to unlock the invisible door.

On the subject of the stool/ladder (I used the stool in the solution, as it's much closer to the study), you can climb the stool while you're carrying it, then drop it, even though you're standing on it, then get the map, even though it's now out-of-reach again. Very sloppy programming.

I forgot about the inventory limit with the stool/ladder. I actually took advantage of this bug in the solution, but I did note it. Perhaps this was cheating.

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Strident
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#22 Post by Strident » Tue Feb 19, 2019 7:47 pm

Gunness wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 3:08 pm
I have thought of it, but spamming the FB group might turn a lot of people off.

Anyway, I will post tomorrow as it's a special date :)
CASA gets a lot of mentions on the FB group... I probably link to it at least three times every day. :)

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jgerrie
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#23 Post by jgerrie » Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:50 pm

Found another bug. After you get the map you see a message "The Alarm has sounded. You don't have much time!" But if you drop the map and pick it up again, it gives you the same message, which means the end timer has been reset to 25. This can happen anywhere, so you can effectively reset the map at will! I changed it so this message only will display once.

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Garry
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#24 Post by Garry » Wed Feb 20, 2019 11:42 am

jgerrie wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 11:50 pm
Found another bug...
Great work. By the time you're finished, the source will be unrecognisable from the original. And it should be a half decent game, too. :thumb:

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Garry
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#25 Post by Garry » Wed Feb 20, 2019 11:49 am

Strident wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 7:47 pm
CASA gets a lot of mentions on the FB group... I probably link to it at least three times every day. :)
I've joined up. Lots of interesting stuff and CASA does get mentioned quite often. I'll probably lurk for a while until I have a chance to read the backlog and get a feel for the general vibe. I recognise a lot of familiar names on there, including Jacob and other CASA regulars.

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Strident
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#26 Post by Strident » Wed Feb 20, 2019 5:29 pm

Garry wrote:
Wed Feb 20, 2019 11:49 am
I've joined up. Lots of interesting stuff and CASA does get mentioned quite often. I'll probably lurk for a while until I have a chance to read the backlog and get a feel for the general vibe. I recognise a lot of familiar names on there, including Jacob and other CASA regulars.
It's generally very good natured... the moderators never really have to do much and I've only ever had to block one person on there.

People do tend to have their own specific niches of interest, myself included, but there is quick a wide overall area of interest across the group.

It's just such a shame it's Facebook... it's an absolutely awful platform for such good content... it would be so much better threaded and archived in a forum like this.

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Garry
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Re: The Bianco Mansion

#27 Post by Garry » Thu Feb 21, 2019 12:28 pm

Strident wrote:
Wed Feb 20, 2019 5:29 pm
It's just such a shame it's Facebook... it's an absolutely awful platform for such good content... it would be so much better threaded and archived in a forum like this.
I couldn't agree more. As a first-time Facebook user, I was surprised at how cumbersome it was to use. I tried it on a web browser on the computer, web browser on a mobile phone and Facebook Lite app on a mobile phone. Computer is best.

I get the impression that Facebook is targeted at the here-and-now throw-away generation. For something like the 8-bit Text Adventures group, there looks to be some great information stored over a period of time, but it's very awkward (slow and time consuming) to work your way back to see what's there. Some of the best info is in the comments and you have to drill down to see the comments and the comments to comments and it's very easy to miss something in the process.

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