College Romance (aka Senior Year Director's Cut)

[EwanG]

OK, the flash based VN "College Romance" has been officially published. If you ever played Senior Year, this may seem familiar - although this has had some bug fixes and a couple additional scenes added.

Game can be played at:
http://www.kongregate.com/games/NaweG/college-romance

And if you'd like to help promote the game, then please click:
http://digg.com/playable_web_games/College_Romance

Thanks to all the folks who helped with flash tips and encouragement!

[EwanG]

Original link is no longer available as evidently the game is "too mature for the site".

Game can be played here:
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/479926

[F.I.A]

I've commented on the original version, so I will keep this short.

I've come across quite a number of problems from playing it. Generally the rather unfriendly user-interfaces:

- Upon entering the Menu, there is no way for you to get back to the game without using either of the options.
- Speaking of options, I cannot see the function of the Quit Game option. Clicking it sends me back to the title screen without the ability to restart it. I am using the Firefox browser, and I cannot seem to find a way to make it work, even with the Rewind or Play etc.

And the glitches

- Upon saving or loading, the player name is changed to a default "Ewan".
- If you are to save a few screens into the game, it tends to break it.

EDIT: As for the problem with Kongregate site, apparently they are rather strict on suggestive materials.

[EwanG]

The quit option is designed purely to close out all buffers and reset all variables so there is no chance of the next game you call up being "polluted" by anything that might be left in memory. Ideally you would capture the calling URL when bringing the game up, and then call that at the end of the Quit, but these days it is not uncommon for this to be a hosting URL that is not necessarily related to the game site you came from. Most games do not offer a Quit option, and in fact I don't force you to use the Quit, so it is arguable that removing it would be better since it would then make room for a...

Back function. Yes, the menu currently forces you to do a save, load, or new to go back to the game. Given that you can do a save or new, and that there isn't a lot of empty space left on the menu, I didn't consider it to be a major deal. But it would be something to consider.

As for the save and load problems - if you are seeing the name "Ewan" come up then either the save failed (I have something that is supposed to catch that, but I gather you didn't see a message?), or the load failed. Note that Flash saves to a session store that depends on the security of the Flash player you're using, and the security settings of your browser. One reason why few flash games have a save option. Again there are APIs at some of the major sites for storing this, but each one has their own API, and that would mean I'd have to implement a special version for each portal.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say "if you save a full screens in it breaks it" unless it's related to the above.

FWIW, those functions worked fine from the three machines I tested it on at Mochi and Kong. Of course the Kong version is no longer available, and the Mochi would just let you play my game. There's no reason the Newgrounds link should work differently, but...

[F.I.A]

As for the save and load problems - if you are seeing the name "Ewan" come up then either the save failed (I have something that is supposed to catch that, but I gather you didn't see a message?), or the load failed. Note that Flash saves to a session store that depends on the security of the Flash player you're using, and the security settings of your browser. One reason why few flash games have a save option. Again there are APIs at some of the major sites for storing this, but each one has their own API, and that would mean I'd have to implement a special version for each portal.

The save and load work fine. All that is changed is the name.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say "if you save a full screens in it breaks it" unless it's related to the above.

A few screens into the game, as in 1 to 6 screens before Linda comes into play. Saving during these situation will corrupt the save, that when loaded, no text is shown and you cannot proceed.

FWIW, those functions worked fine from the three machines I tested it on at Mochi and Kong. Of course the Kong version is no longer available, and the Mochi would just let you play my game. There's no reason the Newgrounds link should work differently, but...

I have requested two more people to verify the bugs. They use both Opera and Firefox, and apparently encounter the very similar glitches I mentioned.

[Jake]

To confirm FIA's problems (on Opera):

- I tried saving the first screen that Linda's visible; when I returned from the save menu, the game had advanced to the next page and Linda was much closer, but there was no dialogue visible, the Menu link had disappeared and clicking anywhere did nothing.

- At this point I closed the game and restarted it, but when I loaded the save I'd made I came to exactly the same error.

- I then restarted again, clicked through to the café, then saved again. But when it returned me to the game after hitting the save slot, my name had been changed from the incredibly-manly 'Thaddeus' to 'EWAN', all in capitals and everything. Same problem if I load that save from the menu.

- Also, 'Bartholemew' doesn't fit in the name box, for which I was quite disappointed.

[EwanG]

One other request, do you know which version of the Flash Player you are using (8, 9, or 10)?

[Jake]

One other request, do you know which version of the Flash Player you are using (8, 9, or 10)?

10.0 r12

[EwanG]

Whereas I'm using 9... FIA, do you know what version you're using?

Regardless, I'm going to do a little more testing on another hosted site to see if I can't replicate this. Thanks for the help with debugging!

[F.I.A]

One other request, do you know which version of the Flash Player you are using (8, 9, or 10)?

Similar to Jake.(10.0 r12)