Hehe. I've finally decided to get motivated into doing stuff (see my "Creator's Block" thread). I'm thinking about following the trend here by making a very simple dating sim (how simple does 1 girl, 1 ending sound? ).
I'd like to plan this out (a lot, even though it's simple). What would be the best format for writing a script (and how exactly would I determine where I want my story to go)?
Also, any pointers would be greatly appreciated.
Sorry if I'm bugging you all, I'd just like to entertain people, just like you folks.
Figure out what you are capable of doing first of all. I'd personally design top-down ish. I.e., figure out overall how you are going to do the game, then go down deeper and deeper till you have everything down to the functional level. If you run into a problem going down, revise your original plan. I.e., you might find out for example, that having a dynamic storyline that changes with each game play might be a bit out of your league :p Or more realistically, you might find that adding an rpg element to your game like tales of lemma 1 might be a bit too hard for your game here. So when this happens, you either figure out how to change what you've decided so that it is possible, or you drop it.
Like for example, say you want your game to follow a script. This means you'd have to write a parser to parse the script. Might not be such a fun idea. So you might decide you want to hardcode in all your choices, then next game you make, try the script idea. So then you try and figure out how your game will go from scene to scene. For example, you might make a simple display function that takes a picture and up to 4 "choice" strings as input, then returns the answer. Then hardcoding your story would be pretty easy... i.e.
answer = Display3Choice("HappyFace.jpg", "Do you like me", "Yes", "No", "What do you think?")
if answer = no {
DisplayNoChoice("SadFace.jpg", "Ohh...");
relationship--;
} else if answer = yes
DisplayNoChoice("ReallyHappyFace.jpg", "I knew it!!!");
} else if answer = "what do you think?" {
DisplayNoChoice("PuzzledFace.jpg", "She looks away, but starts thinking, trying to figure you out");
relationship++; //Bonus for remaining a mystery
}
(and yes I intentionally didn't increase the relationship point on the second choice).
I'm not saying the above is the way to do it, just an example. At any rate, like I said, start off with the overall desgin. Then get deeper. Like for example, figure out the plot. Then figure out what the graphics look like, and what kinda sound there will be. Figure out how each scene transitions. Then figure out how to do whatcha want (this would be a point where you'd might find yourself saying things like... "Wow... flying in the next scene from the left is a lot harder than I thought! maybe I'll skip the transitions!"). Then maybe figure out how you want to moduleize it. Will you represent a particular scene as a class for example? Or do you want to represent a girl as a class? Lots of choices.
And lastly but not least, I've probably confused the heck out of you. If you've decided that this is all to complicated for a first game, you might wanna look into some of the game making tools some people have made, like the Ren'Py engine on this website, that make doing what you wanna do a heck of a lot easier.
As for the best format to write your script in... basically whatever makes it easier to understand. If you honestly wanna have a script that your engine parses, pick a format that's easy for you to parse:p Brackets and stuff may seem cool, until you realize that parsing nested stuff is hella lot harder than non nested stuff.
For example,
BACKGROUND pic.jpeg
is a heck of a lot easier to parse than
SetPicture(BACKGROUND_ELEMENT, "pic.jpeg")
Why? You got parentheese and commas and quotes you gotta wade through. It's not as easy as going until you hit a whitespace anymore, then seeing whatcha got.
As for figuring out how you want your story to go... that's the writers job, and something I'm not too good at:p You can always write your plot, have a friend read it and see if it's anygood, correct spelling, suggest changes, that kinda thing.
Do you know any programming languages currently? You say in your other thread that you're wanting to learn C++ etc, but I really wouldn't say that for your first attempt at using the program you should be attempting to make a game to be released to the public.
It sounds pretty pessimistic, but even for a one girl, one ending thing you're gonna need a fully working engine to display pics, and show text and questions. Simple enough concept right?
But even so I'm not sure I could knock something together after a quick look in the help file and rushing into the code bent on making a game.
Anyway I've probably rushed in to answering the wrong question, but it is something to think about, you shouldn't be limiting your story because of what you can and can't code.
In that case you might want to try getting hold of Macromedia Flash or something.
I taught myself how to program in the actionscript Flash 5 uses without the help of expensive books or anything, and it's what I wrote my game in.
It's a powerful language at one level, but on the other hand it can be used almost without any knowlege of the actionscript, if you just work with frames and the basic scripting mode which lets you pick the commands you want to use etc.
Not too sure about Flash MX though, I tried a demo and didn't like it
Or there's Macromedia Director, but don't ask me what the differences are between Flash and Director since I haven't really used Flash O_o;; There are some but eh (like interface I suppose).... Well the most obvious one is the fact that Flash's coding is called Actionscript and Director's is called Lingo.
I've used Director for a little while now... Currently I'm studying lingo.... Haven't started Flash yet x_x
Heh, I havn't used Director, but it looks like it's more for integrating thousands of image/video formats than game making/general cool stuff from Macromedias page about it.
And then theres at least two other graphic creating/editing products they make to confuse the issue even more >_<
It can be used to make simple games like Flash I'd say, since it has it's own coding language for doing functions.
My current project right now actually is to code a multiple choice test in lingo. And a dating sim is like a multiple choice thing =D
I just hope lingo and actionscript aren't too different O_o I already have to learn enough coding languages as it is XD *isn't that into coding* x_x
Well I'm not into coding... but when I actually get something to work it's like yay! Quite rewarding XD
Yeah you're right, it is confusing. My friend was like what's the difference between Director and Flash they seem exactly the same and that's a waste O_o And I think I asked a teacher and now I can't remember the answer! If I'm gonna make a wild guess.... I'd say maybe Flash is more heavily orientated on web stuff since it seems the favourite for that stuff *shrugs* I really have no clue ~_~
Yeah Macromedia are confusing XD
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