Adventure Games Live
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Adventure Games Live (AGL) is a feature at RinkWorks. The games on it are single-player turn-based adventure games run in CGI on an engine written by Samuel Stoddard, who runs RinkWorks and wrote five of the nine games currently available on AGL. The main site rates the games' difficulty levels on a scale of one to ten.
Technical details
AGL games are written in a simple programming language called Smash, derived from an earlier language called AGLL (from "Adventure Games Live Language"). Smash is generally intended for producing menu-based adventure games, though it is flexible enough for many other types of single-player, turn-based games as well. The former AGLL language is deprecated and is no longer in use on RinkWorks.
The specification of Smash is publically available from its page at RinkWorks. Anyone who wants can write a game in Smash, and if they want, send it to RinkWorks for evaluation. Following a period of feedback and extensive playtesting, if the game is approved, it is published on the AGL page.
The Smash source code for the simplest and easiest game, The Trainer, is freely available on the Smash tutorial page. The source code for the other games is proprietary and not available without explicit permission from the authors.
The Smash interpreter that is responsible for running the games on the RinkWorks server is proprietary software written by Samuel Stoddard and not publically available. People wishing to play AGL games locally on their own computer are free to write their own interpreters, or can use Rex, a Smash interpreter written using wxPython and developed by Andrew Walters (who also developed two of the games available on AGL).
AGL games
- The Trainer, a game to introduce players to the Adventure Games Live playing format.
- Written by Samuel Stoddard.
- Difficulty level 1.
- Outlaws of the Sierra Nevadas, a western dealing with a confrontation between a gang of bandits and a small town in 1874 California.
- Written by Heather Billings
- Difficulty level 5.
- Fantasy Quest, a fantasy game in which the player rescues a princess.
- Written by Samuel Stoddard.
- Difficulty level 4.
- Fantasy Quest II, a sequel to Fantasy Quest originally based on a joke made in the RinkWorks chat room.
- Written by Samuel Stoddard.
- Difficulty level 5.
- The Game of the Ages, a fantasy game based on a story by Stoddard and David J. Parker using their respective fictional characters.
- Written by Samuel Stoddard
- Difficulty level 8.
- The Mystery of Brackly Hall, a game in which the player searches for a wealthy man's inheritance.
- Written by C. Patrick
- Difficulty level 2.
- The Early Years, a collection of games of varying quality written by Stoddard in his childhood and youth, adapted for AGL format.
- Written by Samuel Stoddard.
- Difficulty level 3.
- The Perils of Akumos, a science fiction game in which the player (as Kenneth Connell) solves puzzles and explores a space station.
- Written by Andrew Walters.
- Difficulty level 10.
- Trail of Anguish, a prequel to The Perils of Akumos in which the player (Kendra Connell) searches for a madman on her college campus.
- Written by Andrew Walters.
- Difficulty level 6.
External links
- Adventure Games Live (http://www.rinkworks.com/adventure/)
- Smash Information (http://www.rinkworks.com/smash/)