The Silver Lining

By: Tim

On: August 23rd, 2006

Park it under the late news department, a demo for The Silver Lining is out. This King’s Quest sequel had been the debate of many but with Vivendi’s approval it was then elevated to a partially official status.

The developers have gone the route of impressing with 3D graphics instead of concentrating on telling a story. Character models don’t look too good either. Fairly disappointing to play, especially when just about everyone had such high expectations for it.

I’m certain that Matt will disagree with us. Placing a ‘save King’s Quest XI’ banner on TIGSource? After trying out the demo, this game really does need saving from being a mediocre adventure riding on the name of a famous series.

Posted in Adventure, Freeware, Windows

Cycle

I really enjoy the honest opinions on this site.

I haven’t gotten around to playing the demo myself yet, but it looks a bit iffy from the screenshots. Then again, adventure games were never really the best games for demo releases.
anonymous

Game Tunnel, Jay is Games and a host of other matching game developers don’t agree unfortunately.
ARelativelyHotGirl

Our late news department kicks arse.
Tim W.

Had planned to shove this under the useless news department, but it’s filled with clones and there’s no space left.
anonymous

should have stayed cancelled. the quality of the graphics gets worse as the game goes on.
Sergio

Sadly, I agree… it has so much less polish that other demos of highly-anticipated fangames I’ve played (FoY). Had it remained cancelled, its legacy would have been far greater than it is now. But it is not too late, the game is far from finished.
Tim W.

maybe someone likes it. i’d like to hear them out (even matt)
http://www.origamihero.com Bernie

I wouldn’t mind playing the game with those graphics. What bothered me more was how Graham moved. Sometimes he would even move without his walkcycle showing.
The presentation of the dialogue felt weird for an adventure game, as well.

It could be an interesting game with some more work on the engine and the presentation. Let’s see how it’ll work out.
ARelativelyHotGirl

Then again, as far as I understand it its a bunch of people working for free out of the sheer love in their little hearts for all things King’s Quest. Maybe a little pat on the back and a nudge in the right direction would be more effective than a big ol’ bitch slap in the face.
Snickers

(A) I predicted this way back on the old TIGSource and everyone got self-righteous over how I was being a cynical jerk. I win.

(B) @ #9: Uhh, right, “sheer love . . . for all things King’s Quest” and not the least love for self-aggrandizement. I’m sure they would’ve made the game without the thousands of groveling fanboy posts . . . . Right.
Tim W.

sorry if i sounded harsh. i’m not particularly mad at anyone, just disappointed that the spotlight on kqix couldn’t be shared with the rest of the superb AGS adventures released lately.
Derek

Nah, tell it like it is, Tim! Tell it like it IS!!!
http://www.origamihero.com Bernie

You like AGS games, Tim? Here’s a suggestion: Check out http://www.infamous-adventures.com. They made a great KQ3 remake with AGS – with voiceovers and stuffs. Hooray!
http://www.joy90.co.uk Moschops

I wanted to like it, but I don’t. The controls are horrid, you can’t really tell what you’re clicking on, you have to keep clicking the RMB ‘coz there’s no context to the controls, none of the hotspots highlight to help you with what’s interactive in the scene and the narator is just plain anoying.

Oh and the room with the reflective floor halved the framerate .. eek!

Without all the noise about this game it could have survived as an average fan project (albeit one that a lot of time has gone in on). However, as it stands the game doesn’t live up to the noise and people will remember that more than the game itself.
Tim W.

Hi Bernie, thanks for the suggestion. Had it downloaded to my hard disk, and was waiting for the voice pack to arrive before I begin playing this weekend. But I appreciate the kind reminder!

Though I still like yours the best. :)

Heard that the original team who envisioned KQIX left, and only one founding member stayed on to get the project to this stage.

Yeah Derek, AGS games kicks TSL to the curb! (unfortunately)
ARelativelyHotGirl

I’m not saying the game doesn’t suck or that games can’t be kicked in the face, but it *was* made for free release i.e. not on a deadline, so the people involved do have the time/opportunity to try and improve it.
failrate

If you hate the interface, send the developers bug reports. If you’ve already done that, huzzah, I love you. If you’ve only groused on this forum about it, then boo, I hate you.

Seriously, though, developers get so close to their works that they often can’t see the suck for the trees. They have to get fresh feedback. If you want KQIX to get better, you’re going to have to send mail to the dev team.

Word!
TribeHasSpoken

Thank you to everyone for your comments so far. It’s important to note that this is technically not a demo of the final product. In fact, it’s an abridged (any scenes, characters, conversations that gave any explicit plot spoilers were removed) version of a demo that we put together in three weeks last November to convince Vivendi to allow us to continue development on the game. We figured this was the easiest way to give you a taste of what our vision was without taking away any time for the development of the final game. Many of the problems you’ve mentioned so far do not exist in the current build of the final game (particularly the graphical and control issues that have been mentioned).

If you would like to interact more directly with the rest of the team and express your concerns, please go to http://www.tsl-game.com/forum/index.php?board=49.0

Michael A. Bright
PR Lead
The Silver Lining Development Team
Phoenix Online Studios
http://www.tsl-game.com
[email protected]
Neil Rodrigues

Thank you Tim, for choosing to bash our game because you feel it is somehow taking the attention away from AGS games. This wasn’t our intention, but you may believe whatever you wish.

After being on this team for 3 years, I know how hard we have worked to get to this stage. So, if you have something constructive to say about our game, or suggestions on how we can improve, I invite you to do so.

As well, I suggest that you and everyone that has downloaded our demo to get our latest patch at http://www.tsl-game.com/trilogy/ It contains many fixes to the base demo, which as Michael already mentioned, was created 10 months ago as a means of Saving us from being permanently shut down by Vivendi.

Despite the minor flaws in our game, it was obviously enough to garner the support of tens of thousands of fans, as well as convince a multi-million dollar company to reverse a Cease and Desist order. So, you may continue to bash it if you like, but please get your facts straight first.

Thank you