The Crimson Diamond Gazette #65
Welcome to the latest issue! News and fun facts inside!
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Find game bugs? feedback@thecrimsondiamond.com
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MEDIA
YakWaxLips video: Most Anticipated Adventure Games of 2024!
Adventure Game Hotspot's PIXEL ART Adventure Games you MUST PLAY in 2024
Adventure Game Geek's Upcoming Adventure Games 2024...And Beyond!
vicek83's "Plans for Adventure Game Developers for 2024" (guest spot)
Rock Paper Shotgun Screenshot Saturday Monday
Adventure Game Hotspot interview
FireFlower Games interview article
Hello Playdate Podcast interview
FMM Live: Discussion with Julia Minamata Dev of The Crimson Diamond
2D Game Art Tips for Solo or Small Teams -- Pre-recorded panel
Scene World Podcast #160 - The Crimson Diamond with Julia Minamata
vicek83's "Plans for Adventure Game Developers for 2023" (guest spot)
Exposing Decades-old Secrets of The Colonel's Bequest (guest spot)
Adventure Game Hotspot Streaming Event Guest Spot #1
Adventure Game Hotspot Streaming Event Guest Spot #2
Current "The Crimson Diamond Demo" Speedrun World Records
The Crimson Diamond on Speedruns.com
Disaster SquadCast episode
"Talking To Women About Videogames" podcast episode part 2 of 2
"Talking To Women About Videogames" podcast episode part 1 of 2
Joystick interview (in English)
Joystick interview (in Greek)
Plans of Adventure Game Devs in 2022 (timestamped link)
IGDA Twin Cities Talk: "The Practical Magic of Pixel Art"
Steam Next Fest (Oct 2021) Developer's Let's Play of The Crimson Diamond Demo
Interviews from the Multiverse: Julia Minamata
Lockdown Con II "The Indie Games Revolution" Panel (first panel of the day)
WIRED.com's Geek's Guide to the Galaxy
Pixelles BIPOC Creator Program grant recipient
usesthis interview (interview about my hardware and software set-up)
8-bit Ninja interview about The Crimson Diamond (in German)
CAAD52 magazine article about The Crimson Diamond (in Spanish)
Cabel Sasser's Photoshop Revelation clip
HomeTeam GameDev Podcast -- Guest Julia Minamata
CityNews - Canada Showcased Through Video Games
CBC Thunder Bay - Superior Morning Radio Interview
PAX East 2020 "What's Next for Adventure Games" Panel
Adventure Games Podcast episode
Classic Adventurer, Issue 07 -- Featured
Adventure Gamers AdventureX Round-up, part II
Adventure Gamers Announcement Article
Adventure Corner Article (German)
The CGG Podcast: # 44 Third appearance, updates since April 2019!
The CGG Podcast: #20 The Crimson Diamond updates & The Colonel's Bequest
The CGG Podcast: #1 Episode featuring me discussing The Crimson Diamond
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CLASSIC GAMER? JOIN CLASSIC GAMERS!
I part of a thriving classic gaming community called the Classic Gamers Guild on Facebook. We host plenty of events during the week, as well as contests and a bunch of other great stuff. We even have a podcast and I was the first guest!
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Click here for the entire DevBlog
Editor: Julia Minamata - julia@thecrimsondiamond.com
February 2024
Hello, dear readers! Happy February! We've had an unseasonally mild February here in Ontario, so I managed to get out to a park last weekend. The ducks had the same idea!
We finally got some sunshine in Toronto! It was glorious! Here's a beautifully brutalist building in our downtown, The John P. Robarts Research Library!
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Developer update: Alpha version 2.0 is nearly complete! I'm doing my last checks (with a lot of bug-fixing along the way) and I've made some improvements! I'm excited to get to work on the last set of assets. The end is in sight!
Please wishlist The Crimson Diamond on Steam, it really helps me out!
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Adventure Game Hotspot featured The Crimson Diamond in their list "33 Adventure Games to Get Excited About in 2024"! Hooray! Read the full article here. AGH is organizing an adventure games focused event in Tacoma, Washington this summer. They're currently running a Kickstarter! I won't be able to make it, but I hope it goes well!
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I love discovering Crimson Diamond posts, and am always glad when people share them with me! Michael Klamerus of Virtual Moose wrote a post titled "Games I’m Looking Forward to in 2024" and included TCD! Thanks so much, Michael!
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Here's a discussion about The Crimson Diamond on resetera from May 2023 that I only discovered recently! I'm always grateful when people take the time to share my game.
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Speaking of discoveries, I was over the moon to find some of my EGA portraits in the Noclip documentary about Return to Monkey Island! What a pleasant surprise! I was commissioned to produce more than a dozen portraits of LucasArts game developers for Limited Run Games' Monkey Island 30th Anniversary Anthology edition. It's sold out now, and tough to obtain. So I was happy to see the portraits in the documentary, where more people can see them!
To see the process of me working on this style of portrait, check out this video! And here's a video of me showing some of the LucasArts portraits!
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Here's an incredible Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure mod made just for me, by eviltentacle (via Twitch) and Emmxyzzy (one of my favourite DOS game streamers on Twitch)! My heart is so full. I am now playing Pantsmo's Pantaloon Adventure as my warm-up game before my Let's Plays! I am going to thoroughly enjoy all that Pantsmo has to offer.
I LOVE EGA and I love Apogee 2D scrolling platforming games... But I don't love Pantsmo in his original state (aka Cosmo) where he is non-panted. Thanks to these lovely folks, I can now enjoy this game! Hooray! <3
Here's the title screen. Check out the pantsed UFO and also a familiar face in the bushes!
The wonderfully pantsful gameplay
Look at how happy Pantsmo is! If you're interested in spreading joy by modding DOS games, check out Camoto, a collection of utilities to do just that! It can even run in web browser, with no installation!
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Dan's back from touring in Australia with Sean Paul! We had a busy stream on February 6. Dantheband was on --and special guest CosmicVoid, the indie game dev who recently released Twilight Oracle! If you enjoy the game, please leave him a review on Steam. Check out his other games here! Pantsmo also debuted on this stream, as seen above!
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If you'd like some awesome The Crimson Diamond stickers, hats, t-shirts and more, I have some fun stuff on my Fourthwall store!
And if you're interested in setting up a Fourthwall store of your own, here's my referral link (I'd get $15 credit :D).
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Art streams continue! I'm nearly finished this museum close-up shot, looking forward to tackling the next background. There's still plenty of art to complete before game launch!
Livestream VOD round-up! All the streams since last gazette are here!
Jan 30th art stream, Feb 6th CosmicVoid/art/music stream, Feb 13th art stream
Crimson C'Tuesday happens every Tuesday at 8pm Eastern on Twitch! Come and hang out!
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After a bit of difficulty (see above screenshot of my inventory corrupting into ASCII), I managed to finish High Seas Homicide! I live for little EGA adventure games like this. Thanks to my stream chat for the recommendation! Here's the finale, and here's the full playlist!
I've started a new Let's Play! Denarius Avaricius Sextus, by Thorsoft of Letchworth (1992). Another EGA text parser adventure game! It's a really neat game with a unique interface. I'm having a lot of fun with it!
Even this odd gladiatorial lion-fight minigame was kinda fun! It's in part two of this Let's Play.
My completed Let's Plays:
Personal Nightmare (Horrorsoft 1989)
Last Half of Darkness (Softlab Software Laboratories 1989)
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (LucasArts 1989)
Rise of the Dragon Let's Play (Dynamix, 1990)
The Sorceror's Appraisal (Yahtzee Croshaw, 2002)
Cruise for a Corpse (Delphine Software International, 1991)
Mortville Manor (Lankhor, 1987)
Legend of the Sword (Silicon Software, 1988)
Altered Destiny (Accolade, 1990)
The Dark Convergence (Jeffrey Kintz, 1993)
The Dark Convergence 2 (Jeffrey Kintz, 1994)
High Seas Homicide (Sherwood Forest Software, 1993)
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CRAFT CORNER
Nearly complete! I'm very pleased with this little cross-stitch project. Though the EGA brown I have listed below... I might swap that out for a different brown. But because I have plenty of DMC 301, I'll use that one up before ordering the new brown.
Here are the DMC embroidery floss colours I used for my EGA palette:
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MINERAL TRIVIA SECTION
DID YOU KNOW: There are indeed garnets in Ontario! The park visit I mentioned at the top of the gazette yielded some more stones to add to my vast collection. I love finding actual garnets on the shores of Lake Ontario, embedded in schist. They're not rare but it's still a real treat to find lovely specimens!
Above image from https://malindaprudhomme.com/minerals.html
Here's a fantastic photo of an overview of different types of garnets from Malinda Prud'homme's mineralogy site! Malinda has a Youtube channel called Malinda's Minerals, the above image is from the garnet video. Check it out here!
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INTERESTED IN SUPPORTING THE CRIMSON DIAMOND?
Check the sidebar for links to my Patreon and PayPal! Or visit The Crimson Diamond's Steam page follow the game, and add it to your wishlist! There's a FREE playable demo too, for Windows PC and Mac! <3
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Thanks for reading! Happy February! 2024 is the year of The Crimson Diamond!
-- JM