Well. After struggling through a bunch of mansions the old-fashioned way (and, in multiple cases, restoring from saves), I have finally played and beaten Spider Palace on Hard! Found a few issues, most notably some graphical glitching.<br />
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This will be over multiple posts again.<br />
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<strong>[1]</strong> There is a slight graphical glitch in the second phase of the mansion (gray stone level texture, two red doors in hub) where the floor does not appear correctly. It should be noted that these images are only a SAMPLE of places where this appears; the glitch occurs in quite a number of rooms, and I realized I would have problems if I tried to capture them all.<br />
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In the first image (room 17698), we get to see an example of the glitch, just to the left of where Jack is standing: a floor block that appears divided strangely in half. This example is easy to spot because the red background behind it makes it show up clearly.<br />
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In the second image (room 17696), we see a few more instances to the left and right of Jack.<br />
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In the third image (room 17497), we get to see what the glitch appears like when not behind an easy-to-see background. Look in the bottom left corner (you should just be able to see Jack's foot) for another example.<br />
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(continued, next post!)<br />
So here's a question: with the game being distributed on the Mac App Store, I need it to be self-contained. Everything in one app. As such, this leaves the question of where the Custom Mansions folder should go.<br />
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I see several possibilities:<br />
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1) User must create Midnight Mansion HD Custom Mansions folder in the same parent folder that has the Midnight Mansion HD app. (This was *supposed* to be how beta 5 did it, but as brell discovered, it's broken. I can fix it easily.)<br />
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2) User control-clicks on Midnight Mansion HD, selects <blockquote>Show package contents</blockquote>, and inside of /Contents there would be a Custom Mansions folder that users could place custom mansions inside.<br />
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Advantage: when you move your Midnight Mansion HD app around, the custom mansions come with it. Disadvantage: when you download and install a new version, you lose your custom mansions. Now that I think about this, I guess this isn't a good option.<br />
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3) Custom Mansions folder is located where all the other prefererences are, inside:<br />
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/home/Library/Application Support/ActionSoft/Midnight Mansion HD/<br />
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I guess Option #1 still sounds the best now that I write them all out.<br />
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Ideally the game would create the Midnight Mansion HD Custom Mansions folder upon launch, but the Mac App Store will reject my app if I do this. (They will reject anything that writes files to <blockquote>unapproved</blockquote> locations on the disk.)
In room 18890, there is a gap between bricks on the lower level; this gap is used to run a ladder. However, the coloration of the background makes this gap hard to see, and I'm not entirely sure how fair this is for an Easy-difficulty mansion. Thoughts?
In room 16305, there's a zapper beam that starts the game off. Pulling the above lever will turn it on (or off again; the lever doesn't lock). <br />
I'd like to suggest that the beam is supposed to start on, with the lever above to turn it off.<br />
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Additionally, in room 16904, there is a skull spider that can get stuck on a half-brick when a trapdoor control lever is pulled (it is supposed to fall down and further impede the player). See the attached movie (2nd attachment) to get a better idea of what I'm talking about.
...it's more like a medusa <em>hive</em>, if you ask me... anyway. Found several issues.<br />
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1. Rooms 18500, 18498, 18704, and 18709 all have the same kind of graphical glitch: odd blue-and-dirt half-brick edging on walls somewhere.<br />
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(this will be continued below as I can only post 3 images per post)
Hey,<br />
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I found this small bug (maybe it's intentional) where if you try to press ENTER in front of a sign when a hint is still show, the Sign Dialog box won't appear, I originally found this in room 15904<br />
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Cheers<br />
Leon
A few small nitpicks you should probably know of.<br />
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<strong>1]</strong> A falling girder platform will block a moving platform if the two are right next to each other. This is deliberate, right?<br />
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<strong>2]</strong> When a platform has touched down in lava and is being consumed, any attempt to jump onto it will result in Jack falling through into the lava; as the platform still appears standable, Jack should be able to land on the platform while its top is still above the 'waterline'.<br />
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<strong>3]</strong> Clicking on 'Load Save' in the main menu will interrupt the organ music (abruptly, with no fade-out) before bringing up the file dialog box. There should probably be a fade or something...<br />
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<strong>4]</strong> Speaking of the title organ music, can there be an option to trigger it to play while on the title screen or something? While I understand that people may be sick of it, I only hear it once a run (at the main menu when I first start the game, only), which is usually before I've plugged in my headphones. I've found myself missing it, so I was wondering if there could be an option or a button or <em>something</em> to let the user have a little more choice over whether to hear the organ music or not... thank you for hearing me out.
Finished Spider Palace Easy. Missed one or two secrets. Have one red key to spare! ( wish Jack had had it in NM easy ;D)<br />
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Graphical glitch, but I can't find the screen shot!!! ><br />
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Otherwise working fine!<br />
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