Author Topic: General Discussion  (Read 3789162 times)

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Offline Xela

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #90 on: January 21, 2013, 05:27:19 AM »
I put the layout of some screens in the dropbox folder let me know if they fit  ;)


when I'm done with the layouts I'll start working on real graphics
for now I'm thinking of keeping a skin of wood, parchment and metal
any advice is welcome

I left my thoughts in the file.

One very important thing I want to add is a request that you make screens in elements (frames) instead of a entire background like for WM. That way we can make adjustments in RenPy in case we need to add stuff later (screens like everything else in the game are a subject to change) without having to go to drawing board every time and also create reusable elements (like the gold/day bar, I can create a separate screen and call it whenever I wish using 'RenPy 'use' statement.)

Edit:

I want to add a couple of things:

1) RenPy can write text on buttons, in any font, color, style etc.
2) RenPy has functions that can repaint any image in GreyScale/BW/Sepia and so on so if we need inactive buttons, don't do unnecessary work, it's one word of code for me and a lot more time for you (renaming, saving, transferring files).
3) RenPy can use layers, zoom in and many other image manipulation if your design depends on those.

4) RenPy also supports many more complicated image transformations, you can have buttons, pictures and other stuff fly around the screen, have moving text and so on. I am IN NO WAY saying that we got to have any of that but you should at the very least know it is a possibility.

5) If you have question on more complicated stuff (if it is possible and if so, whether I have the skill to write code for complex gui elements), feel free to ask :)

I think this is it...
« Last Edit: January 21, 2013, 06:04:35 AM by Xela »
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Offline CherryWood

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #91 on: January 21, 2013, 07:12:20 AM »
Hi, I have spent last few days putting together pictures for Sakura, Hinata and Tenten, I will upload them today – I tried my best to ensure they have all of these quest and emotional categories, and these dating ones when it was possible. All of these pictures have variants in, like in “full” pack – I perfectly understand these are not needed now, but I did it for myself as a reference to see what can be found and test where is good to have diversity, and where it’s just confusing - I plan to update them through development according to categories we add or discard. 

My option about girl images:

While I think it’s really nice to have specialized picture category for all events (shopping...), you shouldn’t really expect these to be present – while it’s not usually a problem for popular characters, people will always request/make less know ones too, and my experience from previous games is that sometimes it’s a problem to even get a set of decent profile pictures.

Happy/sad pictures shouldn’t be used in main screens according to girl happiness. These are usually of somewhat less quality then “normal” ones and just imagine it, if you are a good manager (not hard in these type of games), all these smiling faces = really creepy :-)

date – there’s a usually a lot of pictures with girl going out, cuddling and have fun with a guy from all of these fanfiction pairings. But that’s it, there’s a GUY in it. I can’t help it, but it doesn’t feel right to me... you know, it’s hard to imagine that this Naruto here is supposed to be you. Ideal would be pictures with only girl looking like she is with someone or where guy can’t be easily seen or recognized, but these are much harder to find... what are your options about it?

profile / profileneutral – still unsure about these, because while there are profile pictures that are not good for neutral emotion, all of neutral pictures are usually applicable for profile

costume - quite common there is a nice picture of girl cosplaying or just wearing something really different from her standard outfit or maybe with change of hairstyle/hair color, that makes her too unrecognizable for it to be used as standard profile (maybe it can be, but it just doesn’t fit in there that smoothly)  - but these are really fun so I would love to have them as a category used somewhere
---------------------
ok, that should be all for girl pictures for now. I would like to start working on events now. What should I do?

I’m most interested in writing unique events for chosen girls. For some of characters I like, I have ideas for introduction events, explaining why they are not opposed to work for you, maybe some sort of mini-quest or just few little scenes, probably in visual novel style that happen when you visit a location in city... I’m a fan of these.
Also some interaction between those girls, if you have them working for you. And I sometimes came around a picture that inspires me to imagine some sort of situation... I would like to write some of these too.

But I’m not sure if that’s a good thing to do because you have planned interaction system like simbro1x version, when you go somewhere and see a list of present girls that you can speak with. I think that’s great for generic use and little alterations I not sure if it’s compatible with that I’m imagining.
And it still would only add a girl, even if with events, so it would be probably only a “scripted girlpack“, one-time events that doesn’t add much into game.

In the way I see it, at this stage it would be more beneficial to make some generic day-to-day brothel events, those that would use emotion pictures and not target specific girl.
But I don’t have that many ideas there, and they also seems harder to code. But I can try too.

Awaiting your command sire!
« Last Edit: January 21, 2013, 10:14:43 AM by CherryWood »

Offline Xela

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #92 on: January 21, 2013, 08:01:27 AM »
I agree with you on categories and picture front so I am not going to repeat what you wrote.

On events and quests. Basically the system is ready, but you're right to say that it is prolly to early. Tifa's quest I created to show some of the capabilities of RenPy and that it basically tops WM, Otherword and Slavemaker as far as events, quests and interactions go because you do not have to mess with .xml files, can choose backgrounds, pictures, music and call conversations and images with one line of code.

But we will be adding many new places I expect... maybe a new location, like a different city or city outskirts and so on. Also a more advanced system for calling girl interactions and events is not ready, the idea I have is to check all girls for unique labels, in those labels, conditions for activating events will have to be places. That way you can replace any interaction, any event or create new unique once to appear in any city. Maybe something can also be done with flags, I need to try a number of approaches (and there are MANY to choose from) and figure out which will be easier for modder to understand (because while you will prolly develop a good grasp on RenPy as you write, modders that are not part of dev team and will come later need simpler options).

In any case, for now, I suggest you simply take a look at RenPy and PyTFall, read this thread as there is a lot of useful info here (I'll restructure it at some point and out it into one post and a file in gamefolder). Read comments inside the interactions, jobs and quest and see what question you may have.

I am planning to create girlsmeet interface and it will need events later (some we can prolly copy from somewhere, but many should be unique) and I also like some advanced stuff like girls asking you to buy stuff for them during shopping and other events. Also adding things that girl like/dislike like in SimBro 1x (it will be a bit more advanced in PytFall thou and will not depend only on traits).

Still getting splitting headaches as an aftereffect from a flu and Doc said it may be a few days until it's over so I can only work on the game in between those. You'll have to wait at least until I am finished with girlsmeet screen and advanced interaction event before you start actual scripting. If you want to try something right now, just take some of the stuff that has already been done as an example and write something of your own, testing it in the process. Ask questions as they come. It will help you get a feel for the engine.
« Last Edit: January 21, 2013, 08:12:01 AM by Xela »
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Offline DarkTl

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #93 on: January 21, 2013, 10:14:20 AM »
it’s hard to imagine that this Naruto here is supposed to be you. Ideal would be pictures with only girl looking like she is with someone or where guy can’t be easily seen or recognized, but these are much harder to find...
I guess we can use profilehappy pics, or maybe pics with girl standing or walking somewhere on the street. Anything but Naruto  :)

Offline rudistoned

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #94 on: January 21, 2013, 12:15:05 PM »
Hey guys,

just wanted to say hello. I'll try to contribute something useful to this project on the Python side of things :-)

Greets,
rudi

Offline Xela

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #95 on: January 21, 2013, 12:21:41 PM »
Hey guys,

just wanted to say hello. I'll try to contribute something useful to this project on the Python side of things :-)

Greets,
rudi

 :)

Welcome to the forum and project!

PS: Rudi works on porting Otherworld to Python, we've met on Otherworld forum before it got nuked by viruses. He is a more skilled programmer than me so depending on time both of us have to spend coding for the project, it just might go a lot faster!
« Last Edit: January 21, 2013, 01:19:06 PM by Xela »
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Offline GonDra

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #96 on: January 21, 2013, 01:34:10 PM »
Finally got around to getting my Dropbox set up correctly and am downloading the shared folder as I type this, I will probably take a look later after I worked a bit on other stuff.

One thing that I mulled a bit the last few days is if the player character should be vocalised at all.
It is easier for people to think it is them doing decisions if you don't actually put words in their mouth, so that they can imagine that they are speaking in a specific slang.
There is also the problem how different modders will write the dialogue for the player - preventing that the player will switch personality when he speaks with two different girls.
I personally would prefer to write/read 'You explain that you are <playername> a local businessman in the entertainment sector' than a lengthy dialog (but maybe I would do that because I suck at writing dialogs).
Anyway, this is just what I think about it and if you want to have the character speak that is doable too although you would probably need a character description to keep the dialog relatively consistent.

Offline Xela

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #97 on: January 21, 2013, 01:53:21 PM »
Finally got around to getting my Dropbox set up correctly and am downloading the shared folder as I type this, I will probably take a look later after I worked a bit on other stuff.

One thing that I mulled a bit the last few days is if the player character should be vocalised at all.
It is easier for people to think it is them doing decisions if you don't actually put words in their mouth, so that they can imagine that they are speaking in a specific slang.
There is also the problem how different modders will write the dialogue for the player - preventing that the player will switch personality when he speaks with two different girls.
I personally would prefer to write/read 'You explain that you are <playername> a local businessman in the entertainment sector' than a lengthy dialog (but maybe I would do that because I suck at writing dialogs).
Anyway, this is just what I think about it and if you want to have the character speak that is doable too although you would probably need a character description to keep the dialog relatively consistent.

Good point... If we create different player character types, amount of work for content creation will multiplied...

Maybe you're right, we can keep it to girls and narrator only or simply allow modders to make their own choices... the trouble is that there is also nothing we can do, we only control the content we release the game with, it is impossible to prevent modders from creating content as they please or at the very least, close to impossible.

I want to hear from Night and CW on this topic. I am sure they gave dialogues more thought than I have.
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Offline rudistoned

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #98 on: January 21, 2013, 02:14:27 PM »
:)

Welcome to the forum and project!

PS: Rudi works on porting Otherworld to Python, we've met on Otherworld forum before it got nuked by viruses. He is a more skilled programmer than me so depending on time both of us have to spend coding for the project, it just might go a lot faster!

Thank you for the praise, but it is undeserved. I'm just an amateur and have nothing to show yet, except for me liking to fool around with Python. However, if anybody needs something coded in Python I might be able to help.

Offline DarkTl

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #99 on: January 21, 2013, 04:09:26 PM »
There is also the problem how different modders will write the dialogue for the player - preventing that the player will switch personality when he speaks with two different girls.
In slavemaker, for example, main character's personality theoretically bases on his/her background, traits and so on. This is tremendous amount of work, but modders will be able to write it's own dialogue for each background or traits set if PytFall will use the similar system.

Offline Xela

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #100 on: January 21, 2013, 04:23:06 PM »
In slavemaker, for example, main character's personality theoretically bases on his/her background, traits and so on. This is tremendous amount of work, but modders will be able to write it's own dialogue for each background or traits set if PytFall will use the similar system.

Yeah, Slavemaker's GUI and gameplay leave a lot to be desired but amount of usercreated content is incredible. In PyTFall modders will be able to write own dialogues regardless of the system we choose, we'll take it one step at a time, for now we need to decide how we handle this right now...
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Offline rudistoned

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #101 on: January 21, 2013, 05:04:35 PM »
Hey guys,


I looked at Items and their effects today and noticed a problem.

Consider this scenario:
A girl has a charisma attribute. Minimum value is 0, maximum value is 100. Currently her charisma is 90.
Now she puts on a nice dress (charisma + 20). The current implementation recognizes that this would raise charisma above maximum and limits the value to 100.
Next, she takes off the dress. The current implementation drops her charisma by 20, leaving her 10 charisma short of where she started.

Suggestions?

Offline DarkTl

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #102 on: January 21, 2013, 05:26:08 PM »
I'd say, Xela, it's too early to worry about it then, just like it's too early to create girls packs.
Either modders could use dialogues presets if you feel like adding MC's backgrounds or some others MC-related flags, or rpg-like well-branched dialogues if you don't.
Branched dialogues are supported, aren't they?

A girl has a charisma attribute. Minimum value is 0, maximum value is 100. Currently her charisma is 90.
Now she puts on a nice dress (charisma + 20). The current implementation recognizes that this would raise charisma above maximum and limits the value to 100.
Next, she takes off the dress. The current implementation drops her charisma by 20, leaving her 10 charisma short of where she started.

Suggestions?

You probably should use two variables for each stat, one for the base value and one for the actual value shown to player, i.e. base value + equipment effects limited by 100.
Or one limited by 100 and shown to player and second unlimited and not shown.
« Last Edit: January 21, 2013, 05:31:21 PM by DarkTl »

Offline Xela

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #103 on: January 21, 2013, 05:28:42 PM »
Hey guys,


I looked at Items and their effects today and noticed a problem.

Consider this scenario:
A girl has a charisma attribute. Minimum value is 0, maximum value is 100. Currently her charisma is 90.
Now she puts on a nice dress (charisma + 20). The current implementation recognizes that this would raise charisma above maximum and limits the value to 100.
Next, she takes off the dress. The current implementation drops her charisma by 20, leaving her 10 charisma short of where she started.

Suggestions?

An obvious solution would be to rewrite the whole method and have it add whatever value to a stat without actually having to mod the stat. kind of a two variables scenario, one is stat itself (base) and another whatever the equipment adds to it. That would solve most problems...

Other less technical solution would be to have every item in preWMlike version of PyTFall modify maximum of a stat as well as the base, also solving the problem.

Leaving it as it is would be the least technical option :)

I am sure there are other solutions thou...

Edit: The thing is that we already have a very advanced items system in Alkion, so I wanted to create the simplest system possible for SimBro version of PyTFall and then simply use the Alkion system for WMlike version when we get to it... this thing with items was definitely not intended to work like this, but I would say live and learn :)

I am wondering what the best way to solve this thou... I don't want the sGirl's class to get to messy so now we need to think of a way to mod the original self.charisma stat by second variable: Writing separate method like self.getStat('stat') and use that in game seems like an answer... but that would make transition to WMlike version a bit more of a mess I expect...

I'll check how it is done in Alkion and figure out the best way... maybe it will be simpler to leave the matter as it is for SimBro PyTFall or just import Alkion's system right now and be done with it.
« Last Edit: January 21, 2013, 05:49:10 PM by Xela »
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Offline Xela

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Re: PyTFall Dev Thread: Writers needed!
« Reply #104 on: January 21, 2013, 05:34:21 PM »
I'd say, Xela, it's too early to worry about it then, just like it's too early to create girls packs.
Either modders could use dialogues presets if you feel like adding MC's backgrounds or some others MC-related flags, or rpg-like well-branched dialogues if you don't.

Well, night is already writing some interactions and CW will prolly soon start as well so it not that early...

Branched dialogues are supported, aren't they?

Yeap!

You probably should use two variables for each stat, one for the base value and one for the actual value shown to player, i.e. base value + equipment effects.

That's what I've said :)
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