Changing the GUI mid-game?

[Ted Anderson]

Another one of those possibly-dumb questions from a beginner...

Is it possible to alter the buttons of the GUI partway through a game? Say, for instance, that I've got a standard LucasArts 9-verb setup--'Look at', 'Talk to', 'Give', etc. Halfway through the game, my character gets his vocal cords cut out, so he can't talk to anyone (for example). Is it possible to change the GUI at this point so that the 'Talk to' button is now blacked out, or changed to 'Gesture at', or something?

[Khris]

That's perfectly possible.

To be specific, you can simply call Action7.Enabled = false; (Action7 is the internal name of the Talkto-button.)
Or you can change the reaction; say after the user clicks the button, they get a message reminding them that the main character is mute.
Or to alter the button's appearance, simply change the associated sprite slots. You'd have a global variable (e.g. player_is_mute) and in every talk to interaction, you'd check it and proceed accordingly.

AGS is extremely flexible and the LucasArts-GUI is completely custom-built, so pretty much anything is possible.

Btw, your question isn't dumb at all, it just shows that you need to do lots of manual reading and lack AGS/scripting practice. This isn't a bad thing, I was there once too, of course, just saying that you're going to have to learn AGS anyway in order to get anywhere with your game, and by the time you get that far, you can easily answer questions like this yourself.
I get that you want to know if AGS is capable of realizing your vision, if you will, before you start investing time into it. Believe me, it is

[Ted Anderson]

Btw, your question isn't dumb at all, it just shows that you need to do lots of manual reading and lack AGS/scripting practice. This isn't a bad thing, I was there once too, of course, just saying that you're going to have to learn AGS anyway in order to get anywhere with your game, and by the time you get that far, you can easily answer questions like this yourself.
I get that you want to know if AGS is capable of realizing your vision, if you will, before you start investing time into it. Believe me, it is

Thanks for the help! And yeah, right now what I need to do is sit down and play with the editor for a while. My problem is, I've got this idea for a game, but I'm spending all my time on the big-picture design stuff, the story, the dialogue--in short, everything but actually making the game.

I know that there's a general ban on trying to organize a team game, at least until you've got a solo game or two under your belt, but what's the consensus on posting a design doc and seeing if there's any interest?

[Khris]

It's not banned, it's just much harder to find people willing to make a game with you if you don't have anything to show for.

You can always try posting your design doc in the Recruit a team thread.