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Thanks Ashen, I've just got it working and came to post my soloution, I will optimize my code as per your suggestions as they make a lot of sense, if its my weakest failing in coding anything, its that I wrap myself up in knots, and end up with complex soloutions to simple problems, here is the code I have that is currently working 100%

the code for notebook entries are placed in the script of any event you want to trigger an entry, eg using a computer or examining a fridge.

NBList is the ListBox
NBDisplay is the textbox
Global Message 982 states "Your Notebook has been Updated."

//This is the Entry placed in the code for an event, adds it to the Notebookl
NBlist.AddItem("John's Journal Entry");
Game.GlobalStrings[0] = "According to John's journal, there is a safe in the study,";
DisplayMessage(982);


//This is the Entry placed in the code for an even to it adds it to the Notebook
NBlist.AddItem("Kitchen Note");
Game.GlobalStrings[1] = "John for some strange reason wrote the word Password on the fridge";
DisplayMessage(982);

// This  is the script for the the listbox
function NBlist_SelectionChanged(GUIControl *control) {
   String seltex = NBlist.Items[NBlist.SelectedIndex];
      if (seltex.CompareTo("John's Journal Entry") == 0){
         NBDisplay.Text = (Game.GlobalStrings[0]);
         }
      if (seltex.CompareTo("Kitchen Note") == 0){
         NBDisplay.Text = (Game.GlobalStrings[1]);
         }
// and so on and so forth
}

EDIT right this is the final code, interestingly, you cannot export/import strings, so I had to stick with Globalstrings, but it should be fine. thanks again!

Thanks for the tip, I did'nt know about the narrator option. At the moment, I've had limited success with a custom GUI containing a textbox and listbox and utilising GlobalStrings (limits me to 50 entries but so far its the closest I've got to what I need).  but it won't quite do what I want, this is the code I have:

NBList is the ListBox
NBDisplay is the textbox



String NBE1 = "John's journal entry";  //This entry is placed on an event to add the entry into the journal
NBlist.AddItem(NBE1);
Game.GlobalStrings[0] = "According to John's journal, there is a safe in the study, the combination is the date of his wedding";


String NBE2 = "Kitchen Note";        //This entry is placed on an event to add the entry into the joutnal
NBlist.AddItem(NBE2);
Game.GlobalStrings[1] = "John for some strange reason wrote the word GRENDEL on the fridge to remind himself of something"; 


int entry;                           //This is entry is in the listbox script to trigger the displaying of the relevent entry
      if (entry == (0)) {
         String output0 = (Game.GlobalStrings[0]);
         NBDisplay.Text = output0;
         }
      else if (entry == (1)) {
    String output1 = (Game.GlobalStrings[1]);
    NBDisplay.Text = output1;
   }

Now when I click on the Journal entry, everything comes up roses, it displays the relevant text, but when I activate the second entry (The Ktichen note) the entry appears in the listbox, but it won't display the text, nothing happens at all, this happens no matter which order I activate the events.  Now I'm almost postive I've made a stupid coding mistake, but I'm damned if I can figure out what it is. any suggestions?

Aaah I see, I had it backwards, I've been trying to retrieve dialog options in a function within the global script,  and display them in the GUI code, I have read the Bfaq, it just never occured to me to use run-script-x in this manner

as for the Listbox Idea, I have been fiddling with the damned Listbox, Textbox and GUIlabel functions all night and tearing my hair out in an effort to understand them and their relation to each other, what I've been trying to do is within the listbox add an item that retreives a dialog option,which you then click on and it displays the dialog in the adjacent text box but no luck.

I'm begining to think this whole idea is a bit beyond my coding skills
Is there a basic listbox tutorial and their relations to other gui options anywhere, this is driving me nuts! in the mean while I will give the run-script-x idea a try, thanks!

I think you're right Ashen, maybe one of the moderaters should swap the threads around

That said, thanks for the input, that really helps a lot, I'm a little  unclear as to what you mean by using run script to have it displayed however I like, could you elaborate?

thats what I had initialy intended, but I ran into a couple of problems, first off, how do I display the dialog in a gui, without a character? do I need to create a blank character, if so how do I do that, and how would I tell AGS where to display the various texts, (like the dialog options in a listbox, and the text displayed next to it ) without messing up my default dialog options in the process?

Thanks Scorpius that formulae is incredibly useful, and in reply to scummbuddys post, I fear I may have given you the wrong impression, I am by no means abandoning the concept of the games, I'm just scrapping what I have so far, (which is not a lot, and the essential purpose of which was to re-teach myself AGS since I last used it in 2004) and starting from the beggining, however, what you say is good advice, and I will upload a demo, and will edit this thread as soon as thats done,

It's also a relief to see that It's probably a better idea to keep my current resoloution and re-import things as 16 bit as oppose to re-rendering my work at 640X480, I will lose far less quality than I initially feared.

Thanks to both of you for the input, I will let you know when "Our Darkest Hour" demo is available (sometime later today)

EDIT:I posted the link, and have been told that the damned thing is corrupt, when I get a working copy online, I will post the link within the critics loungs and be sure to drop a link to that thread, please bear with me. oh and forgive my awful grammar and spelling tonight, I dont know whats wrong with me (You'd swear english was'nt my first language)

please let me know what you think on all counts, its bassicly the result of me reteching myself AGS after 2 years

I did indeed, and copied the code and played with it, but the concept seems far too overly complex for what I want. I dont want the player to add his own text, nor do I want any other games to be able to access it,

what I'm looking for is far closer to the principle that the AGS dialog system works on, where an event, such as reading a newspaper, note or book, would "unlock" a text entry in the GUI making it viisble to the player so he may consult it at a later date.

The game I'm working on is based on the world of Call of Cthulhu, and thus lends itself to a fair amount of books, news paper clippings journals, Using thse as clues, I dont want the player to have a ridiculously stocked inventory consisting of books he may or may not need to refer back too, nor do I want him trecking back and forth between the libary and the puzzle to solve it.

I've been trying to get it to work with text overlays but again, this seems incredibly complex. I was just wondering if anyone had any ideas on an easier soloution.

I am aware of this, I zipped the folder down to 10 megs, the problem, as I worked out, I did a room count (of the ones I have not yet prodoced,) characters I have'nt yet made, etc etc, the installed game is going to end up being over 500 meg, meaning the zipped install would probably be over 120 meg! as I've browsed the games in the AGS I'm always a little more reluctant to download a game thats overly big, the largest one I've downloaded yet was 90 megs zipped, and the game seriosly was'nt worth the effort. I want to avoid this with my game.

Hi there,

I want to make a GUI that represents the character's Note book, being an investiagtive reporter, he writes down clues, leads and other useful bots of information, and i want to the player to have access to this at any time during the game so he can review and keep in mind what his objectives are.

As the player unlocks a clue, say...a suicide note, I want the note to appear as an option in his gui that he can click on, and the contents of the note will be displayed, as the player unlocks further clues, they will be added to his notenook.

I have tried several things, but cant seem to get a working idea going, any ideas, help or pointing out it already exists somewhere would be great!

Hi there, I am a 3d animator by trade, and decided to use 2d rendered sprites and backgrounds for my game. I'm using ags 2.71 at 800X600 and 32 bit color, however, with 5 rooms completed, I took a look at my compile folder and just about choked, not even 20% completed the game was sitting at 45 megs! so this has raised several questions for me. so I'm going to have to scrap this version of the game and start from scratch *sigh* but before I did that I would to learn some more

1. Which would reduce the filesize more, reducing the the resoluotion or the colour depth? (Trying to strike a balance between good graphics, and downloadability)
2. What exactly does the sprite compression checkbox do? I checked it, recompiled, and noticed no discernible difference in the file size
3. Does anyone have any useful tips for high-end graphics, keeping file size down, or 3D rendered images (I have searched the forums for these, and have found nothing I did'nt already know, so hoping someone will put something new here)

There is problem with using SSH's Credits module if you are using the "Sierra with Background" speech style and a custom textbox, for some reason AGS dumps the custom textbox behind the credits (and distorts it by dragging it all the way too the right of the screen while keeping the text in the centre).

The workaround solution is as follows:

In the script you wish you put the credits, make sure you set the the speech style to LucasArts before starting your credit sequence

  SetSpeechStyle(Lucasarts);
  *Your credits code here*

Then when your credits returns the value stating they're finished use:

SetSpeechStyle(eSpeechSierraWithBackground);


*EDIT*

I tried putting up normal text overlays, and bingo, same problem, so this is an AGS bug? not one with the module?

Yup, the one used for Display(); I have since come across the source of the problem, my game 's speech style is set to "Sierra Style with Background" if I turn  this to just plain sierra style, or lucasarts, it works perfectly,  but I would really like to keep my style as it is and have my credits, so if you can think of a workaround let me know

I will post screenshots shortly, and as for the sourcecode, I copy pasted the example from the readme, so there should not be any errors there.

Edit:

Fixed it!

The problem WAS the speech style,  (Sierra with Background), for some reasons dumps the custom textbox behind the credits (and distorts it).

So I just put

SetSpeechStyle(Lucasarts);
*Your credits code here*

then when the Credits returned the value that they were finished I just set the style back with:

SetSpeechStyle(eSpeechSierraWithBackground);

Thanks again for an excellent module!

Edit 2:

ey, sorry I know I'm being a pest, and I know I will kick myself when I see the solution

I want to make it so that the player can click the mouse or press esc to end the credit sequence, but I'm damned if I can figure out how, what I have done is filled the room with hotspot1, and said that anyclick will move player to room1, but the game crashes out and gives me the error message: Invalid Overlay ID specified. so obviosly before I change rooms, I need to tell the credits that they are finished, and to cease and desist, how I would I do this? I'm sure its a similar piece of code to the one you put in the repeatedly_execute room, but I just cant figure it out.

Great Module SSH thanks! I just have one question, and I feel kind of silly asking, I have my messages displayed in a custom textbox (GUI 3) and the credits also display in this textbox (and the textbox size stretches all the way to the right hand edge of the screen), do you know how I can make the credits just display as plain text?

I have to say I like the second one best,  the larger eyes (porportiona to the head) make him look more child like, which is what makes the little bastard so creepy :)l

Heya guys, latest room, its the entrance to kyles apartment building.
The console flashes on and off, as if its on the fritz, I had originally intended for it to flicker, but  the lack of background frames makes it difficult, maybe I'll just turn it into an object

Very cool, but as a smoker I would like to point something out, almost all smokers treat "Lighting up" as a ritual, its rarely done so distractedly, I think he tilted his head down and used his right hand to cup the ciggy and the flame, this would look really cool (and obscure some of the left arm everone seems so worried about.) this suggestion would mean changing the whole animation, and I know from expierience how much that sux, but its just my two cents, otherwise keep up the good work!

P.s can someone put up a link this mayan game thread? it sounds interesting

I have given this a great deal of thought, and decided that I'm not changing the clue, the fact that several people did not get the clue in less than a day does not bug me that much

I think your clue, while less ambiguos, relies a lot more on the mathematical ability of the player, which is not what I want (its a game not an IQ test). If I think of and alternate clue, it will be a completely reworked one from begining to end, and will be released with the final game.

oh and that "D card" is an ID Card I can see why you made that mistake though, the font makes it impossible to see, so I will change it to I.D. Card, which should clear it all up.

I double checked that walkable area in the Street room I can't find any bugs where you end up on a non walkable area, has anyone else had trouble with this?

Thanks stazer I'll give that a try.

Maybe its just my PC, but the OGG files WILL NOT play in AGS if they under 1.8 seconds,,,weird huh? I fiddled with it for a while and gave up, I'll use the waves, its fine

That did the trick, How weird, they won't play as Mp3 or Ogg if they are under 2 seconds long... that should probably be note somewhere in the tuts... now does anyone know how I can make it play different sound effects for when he walks on different regions?? (ie carpet, concrete, metal etc.)

Hmmm, will give that a try and let you know...