Adventure Game Studio

AGS Support => Beginners' Technical Questions => Topic started by: provost on Tue 12/12/2006 20:02:43

Title: displaytopbar timeouts (SOLVED)
Post by: provost on Tue 12/12/2006 20:02:43
Hi all
   I really tried to search for this, so I do apologize if this is redundant.

   I have noticed that displaytopbar has a timeout that is something around 5 idle clicks per word in the display message.  The problem with this, is that I find it is too short.  For example, I am dyslexic and I have to read things a few times in order to get comprehension out of it, even if it is my own writing.  I know there are a few game settings for the topbar, but they only pertain to fonts and font colors.

   I have tried to come up with viable alternatives to the top bar, but they all seem to end up being overly complex.  Such as, I tried writing a gui function that appears over a standard dialog, but its too much work to write in it and also generating a dynamically sized gui is not in my grasp if it is even possible at all.

   Can anyone either suggest a good alternative to the topbar or if there is a way to eliminate the timeout and have it act as a standard display window?

I would much appreciate any advice!

Lou
Title: Re: displaytopbar timeouts
Post by: Ashen on Tue 12/12/2006 21:33:25
I think DisplayTopBar() text is treated as Speech text - changing how/if speech can be skipped should change how/if DisplayTopBar() text is skipped (the 'Skip speech' drop-down on the 'General Settings' window, or SetSkipSpeech (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/manual/SetSkipSpeech.htm) - 'Can't skip' or SetSkipSpeech(3) is equivilant to Display commands) . Also, changing the game.text_speed value might help:

Quote from: The Manual
game.text_speed
How long speech text stays on the screen. Default 15, higher number means shorter time.

(From the Scripting Global variables (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/manual/Globalvariables.htm) page.)
Title: Re: displaytopbar timeouts
Post by: provost on Tue 12/12/2006 21:56:55
Oh thats awesome.  Thanks so much, I had no idea.. I just wrongly assumed that speech or 'dialog' options only applied to lucasarts style and I guess I just never tried that.. I set the speech style to 'mouse or key (no auto remove)' and it does just that.  There are no timeouts anymore.

I really really appreciate it!