Adventure Game Studio

It's not like it's life-threatening, but I always see a lot of new scripting functions and no expansions to the point & click options, (give inventory, move character, etc.....you know the options in the main list).

Is that not how it works.......Scripting eventually gets shortcuts in the main option list???

Do these options ever get upgraded, or am I just not noticing.

By moderator:(See next post)...So, everyone is encouraged to post your suggestions about adding more functions to this thread, to let Chris knows more about what we really want.

Note that this is NOT a thread for posting general suggestions/feature requests, it's just for posting something that is already possible via text scripting but you want it to appear directly in the interaction menu.

You mean the actions in interaction menu?

Yes, I agree that the action list is still quite small, seems that theye're many obvious simple actions yet worthy of adding to it.

But the problem is, as there're TONS of features for text scripting, it would be hard for Chris to decide which of them are more important and provide more convenience if that's added as interaction actions.

I think the game creators (like you) know more about which features are more important to be in the list.

Unfortunately people here seldom makes suggestions about which actions to add (but there're many general feature requests).

So I think it may be a good idea to turn this thread into putting suggestions about adding functions to the list, so CJ can have a better image on what we generally need more and implement them faster.

I think the DisplaySpeech function might be a useful one to add to the drop-down menus.  I know you can use it via the Display Message As option, but it's a slightly clumsy way of doing it to my mind, and while it's not exactly hard typing in DisplaySpeech (X, "blah blah");, it's a little tedious.  Just my two cents' worth :)

These are the ones that I type most often.  I hope more people respond to this.

DisplaySpeechAt
DisplayAt
SkipUntilCharacterStops
DisableCursorMode
EnableCursorMode
SetCursorMode
AreObjectsColliding
AreThingsOverlapping

I am also using CursorMode Commands a lot - I support this suggestion.

Here is my suggestion:

How about the option: Game - "Run Global Funciton" and a drop-down, containg all imported functions for that room?

I am using global functions for almost all "standard" clicks. Like function looked_at ()... if player looks at object do this, make this, display this

It is way to tedious to click "Run Script" and type in the functionname each time (even if the editors auto-text is helpful - thanks!). Besides it would add to the transparency of set interactions on the first glance.

I guess the real question is, how many people actually use the interaction editor? I've always tended to get the impression that most people don't use it and just have "Run script" for all their inteactions.

I wouldn't want to give too much away, in case Radiant doesn't want to let his secrets out, but it is possible to write a global script AND room scripts in such a way that you DONT need to go through adding run script for everything. This is what we have for the FOY demo...

Well yes, the interaction editor is only triggered by the ProcessClick call in the default on_mouse_click; if you wanted to bypass it completely you could write your own on_mouse_click function.

What I mean is... you can still use room scripts, even if you dont use ProcessClick and the interaction editor.

I use the interaction editor all the time.  It saves so much time when adding a lot of detail to the game.  I use the scripting when I have to, but if it's in the editor I cut my production incredibly!!!!

P.S. - If adding DisplayAt & DisplaySpeechAt is decided for the interaction editor, it would be nice if the values someone allocates remains until the person changes them.  When I use these commands, I often place them in the same programmed position for many messages before I change them.


--PRESERVE THE INTERACTION EDITOR, IT'S BEAUTIFULL--

Personally... I type faster than I search,point, click... so the interaction editor actually slows me down... besides being a programmer by nature/hobby/future job I tend to think in script/code more than real words...

So no... I never used it... ever... even when starting out I went straight to scripting

Quit beating about the bush SSH and tell us Radiant's secrets. >:(
What is this, 20 questions? :=

[edit]
Ok, I'll start.
Is there a "switch (room)" statement (equivalent) involved?

Nope, I think, it's quite strange that we have "Conditional - If player has been to room" but not "Conditional - If character isin room"(maybe I overlooked?), I think this would be nice to add this.

I use the interaction editor, but that's because I'm worthless at scripting. I script only if I must :P.
I think:
-DisableCursorMode
-EnableCursorMode
-SetCursorMode
are marvellous ideas to implement!

Quote from: SteveMcCrea on Fri 17/09/2004 03:14:03
Quit beating about the bush SSH and tell us Radiant's secrets. >:(
What is this, 20 questions? :=

[edit]
Ok, I'll start.
Is there a "switch (room)" statement (equivalent) involved?

No

19 left...  ;)

Hi there,

Ooooh, people are talking about my secrets!!

Well, let me share one room from King's Quest III+ with you, you'll see what I mean.
http://www.liacs.nl/~psimoons/Room72.crm

The global script takes care of everything that's not in the local script, such as room transitions. Neat, eh?

In short, for those that dont want to fire up AGS to import the room, you can use each room's on_call function, running it with CallRoomScript (int value) from the global script. The value passed represents the event: Enter room, exit, click hotspot, move onto region, etc. So all the room stuff goes into one function in the room script and no "if ( room == 1) { etc." stuff is required.

From the to-do list:

* DisableWalkableArea/EnableWalkableArea as interaction command
* add SetScreenTransition as interaction editor command
* 'Character - Set Location' function for setting npc x/y

Edit:

Oh, and:

- easy non-script based way of doing SetPlayerCharacter and ChangeCharView

I'd say about 5 blank interactions in the list.-
The user can then define these to their favourite and most common interactions.

But personally I don't really mind because I NEVER use the interaction editor, mainly because I can think in scripting and have a pretty fast typing speed.

I have a suggestion of a few things to add to the Interaction editor for the lazy (me!) and non-programmers:

* Character - move NPC to different room at specific co-ordinates (x,y)
* Else interactions after you made an if[/ i] condition.
* Game options like game.text_speed 15

I'll add more if I find useful additions.

~Yurina

Quote from: Yurina on Mon 20/02/2006 09:48:46
* Else interactions after you made an if condition.

I think thus might be possible with something like this (not tested):

if (blah)
Ã,  Mwaha
Ã,  Stop running more commands
Xaxa

Which should be identical to the text script:

if (blah) {
Ã,  Mwaha;
} else {
Ã,  Xaxa;
}

Though yes, it'd be more readible if there's a real 'else' don't know how this can be implemented/if it's worth doing as it complicates stuff.

I personally never, ever use the interaction editor outside of using it to 'create' the sections of my room scripts. So I second whoever was asking whether the need to do that could be eliminated.

Personally I'm no longer convinced about whether I should update the interaction editor by adding new commands to it, as it seems that most people never use it. I'll keep it under review.