'Time Gentlemen, Please!' from Size Five Games

[Ben X]

Hi everyone!

I'm afraid my bi-annual plugfest has now become annual, because within a year of releasing Ben There, Dan That!, Zombie Cow Studios Size Five Games has released the sequel, Time Gentlemen, Please!

The new game, co-designed and co-written by me, is available for £3/$5-ish here (demo available).

If you haven't played the first game, it's pay-what-you-want, min. £2, but you're probably better off buying the double-bundle for £3 total on Steam.

I hope you guys can try it out, and enjoy it. If you do, please pass it on to all your friends, family, employees, people in the street!

[toblix]

Awesome, can't wait to get back home, buy it and play it naked.

[Ben X]

Good, that's how the designers intended you to play it.

[Shakesbeard]

Jumping on the naked play bandwagon, I'm at work but now I have something to look forward to when I get home!

[brkl]

You have my money. I hope you spend it on pints.

[SignorSuperdouche]

I'm stuck a little way in right now, so I thought this would be a good opportunity to take a break and write a bit about what I think of it so far.

The writing is hilarious and I've genuinely LOL'd a few times. It reminds me a lot of one of my favourite authors, Robert Rankin. I don't know if he's an influence at all but if you renamed Ben and Dan to Jim and John this could easily be mistaken for part of The Brentford Trilogy (As a quick aside, anyone who hasn't done so should read The Brentford Trilogy - they're ace books).

I also love how dense the writing in this game is; often when playing an adventure game you wind up trying everything with everything in order to progress but here I find myself doing so because there's almost always a funny piece of dialogue about it. I particularly enjoyed using the

plug

on the

umbrella

because Ben's response was pretty much the exact same thought process I went through. I hope Zombie Cow will consider doing something similar to Telltale's "Did you try?" list of things with funny responses that players may have missed.

This is not a major complaint, but a couple (and only a couple, so far at least) of the puzzles have seemed a bit on the arbitrary, illogical side. Putting

Ben on the skateboard

, for example, is something I did with no idea why I was doing it or what was going to happen - there just didn't seem to be anything else to do.

My other complaint is that the orange writing on an orange background in the menu can be a bit hard to read at times. Call me a dullard, but I was very confused during the 10-15 seconds it took me to find the load game button.

Given the price though, and how god damn funny it is, these nitpicks are barely worth mentioning. There is no excuse for not buying this game, it's fucking awesome.

[brkl]

Brillo game, lads.

Signor, maybe there's something wrong with your monitor or settings? Sure, it's pale orangey writing on an orange background, but the contrast is pretty strong. Or maybe your eyes are even more fucked up than mine.

[brkl]

Hmm, if you press tab in the text adventure and then ESC, the game responds with becoming totally unresponsive.

[Ben X]

Thanks for trying the game out, and for the feedback (and the bug, brkl - I'll pass it on), guys!

SSDouche - I haven't read any Rankin, but I'll put that trilogy on my list! Re. the example of arbitrariness you mention -

Dan does mention when he exits the rip that the cold water is very refreshing.

We hoped that would be enough to plant the seed... I'm glad you're enjoying it, though!

Good luck, everyone!

[Noyb]

Haven't had much time to play (only at the

professor's house

) at the moment, but I'm enjoying it a lot! Time travel paradoxes are my favorite puzzles.

By the way, when trying to run it from the shortcut, AGS crashes before anything happens. Works fine from the actual EXE for god knows why.

---------------------------
Illegal exception
---------------------------
An exception 0xC0000005 occurred in ACWIN.EXE at EIP = 0x6C1335DE ; program pointer is +5, ACI version 3.12.1074, gtags (1,100)

AGS cannot continue, this exception was fatal. Please note down the numbers above, remember what you were doing at the time and post the details on the AGS Technical Forum.

in "room2.asc", line 71


Most versions of Windows allow you to press Ctrl+C now to copy this entire message to the clipboard for easy reporting.

An error file CrashInfo.dmp has been created. You may be asked to upload this file when reporting this problem on the AGS Forums. (code 0)
---------------------------
OK   
---------------------------

[Ben X]

Glad you're enjoying it Noyb! That error has actually been fixed already - you must have downloaded an earlier version. You can re-download for the latest version, or contact Dan (dan at zombie-cow dot com) for a fixed version. Or, to sort it for the version you've got:

If you installed to Program Files/Time Gentlemen Please - right click the icon, go to Properties, and add the following to the "Start In" box:

"C: \Program Files\Time Gentlemen Please" (had to put a space in there to avoid smilies!)

Have fun!

[SignorSuperdouche]

Being an unemployed bum, I was able to sink in several more hours today and finish the game. It was a blast, I got my monies worth several times over. I think the best compliment I can give this game is that if someone told me this was an old, forgotten, LucasArts game I'd believe them.

I did find a couple more bugs though:

It's possible to use the tights

to make a fan belt without putting the other cog on first

. If you do this and then use the starter motor the game becomes unresponsive.

I used Dan on

the microphone in Hitler's mech

and left him there whilst I went outside. There's a little square just outside the entrance which you can interact with as if it were Dan (If you look at it, Ben says "It's Dan" etc), and if you try to use it Dan's sprite vanishes.

[Ben X]

I think the best compliment I can give this game is that if someone told me this was an old, forgotten, LucasArts game I'd believe them.

Lumme, that's a compliment and a half! Thanks SSD!

Thanks for the bugs. That last one was found just recently and should be fixed in the latest build - I know that's not much comfort to you now you've played through it! The second one is bizarre and new! It is frustrating to have these bugs found after we've released, but unfortunately we can't afford to employ proper full-time playtesters. And, hey, we're still less buggy than a Bioware release!

Edited July 3, 2009 by bbX1138

[Noyb]

Found another bug. After the absolutely hilarious scene where

Dan revives Ben

, trying to use anything on the

localized time machine

makes the game think it's

Dan trying to put his leather jacket in there

.

Not sure what I did to trigger that. I'd send the save file to you, but I'm not sure where they're located.

And Jake, if you're reading this, get Telltale to contract Zombie Cow to design the next Sam & Max season.

[Ben X]

Thanks Noyb!

We can't recreate that bug of yours at all, so I think it must have been a weird one off. Let's just think of it as a paradox...

[OssK]

Listen here fucker, I got tired of my fellow thumbs making awesome games I can't play so I bought Crossover games just to play your shit... I better be good, buying it right now.

[Ben X]

Listen here fucker, I got tired of my fellow thumbs making awesome games I can't play so I bought Crossover games just to play your shit... I better be good, buying it right now.

Sorry! And good luck - did you try the demo? I think it works on Parallels, but not sure about Crossover...

SuperDouche, I pm'ed you...

[Ben X]

Any luck with Crossover, OssK?

PS - two big reviews!

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/time-gentlemen-please-review

http://uk.pc.ign.com/articles/100/1000790p1.html

[twmac]

Yeah I read the Eurogamer review, the writing style is all over the place but at least it was enthusiastic and the comments thread was generally very positive.

Congrats!

[Noyb]

Stuck again. Trying to find a

makeshift pen

, even though

I have plenty of sharp inventory items, and a rasp to make the dull ones sharp

. Tried everything I had with the

inky sap

, so I'm probably missing an item somewhere.

[toblix]

Oh, shit! I had totally forgotten about this game, and now I'm off to bed.

Idle Thumbs, what should I do?

[toblix]

All right, I just bought it.

[toblix]

All right, this is going to be great! Awesome graphical effects, racism slider... I can't wait to get started on this tomorrow. BTW I'm naked.

[Ben X]

Toblix: Yay! Enjoy! Have emailed Dan re. your PM, and will let you know...

Noyb:

You need an old-school pen...

EDIT: Oh, apparently the whole game works great on Crossover.

Edited July 6, 2009 by bbX1138

[toblix]

Everyone who hasn't bought this already, just do it. Even if you aren't planning on playing it, and even if you have adventure games in general or Ben There, Dan That in particular for some reason. Give these people money, that they can make more hilarious games for me to play.