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Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Sat Jul 23, 2016 6:53 pm
by Duke
Yes, great work Zukero! And it's nice to see you on here Ian.

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Sat Jul 23, 2016 10:51 pm
by Voom
Duke wrote:Yes, great work Zukero! And it's nice to see you on here Ian.
I second that!

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Wed Aug 10, 2016 5:34 pm
by Zukero
v0.4.7 released !

A bug fixed in maps ("outside" property mishandled, not that it's really useful anyway yet).
Much cooler is the ability to set colorfilters on maps, with a live preview. The Android feature used to implement them in the game do not exist in Java 2D, so I emulated it, using what I consider to be a clever hack. The results might not always be 100% equivalent to the in-game result, but it should be really close enough for map makers anyway.

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Fri Aug 12, 2016 1:47 pm
by Zukero
v0.4.8 released.

Not much more than cosmetic changes (colorfilters applied everywhere) and bug fixes. See the OP changelog for details.
Make sure to update to this one if you open my "stoutford_tests" github branch.

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Fri Aug 12, 2016 5:56 pm
by Voom
I'm following ya, keep it up.

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Mon Dec 19, 2016 6:45 am
by nyktos
wow, nice! :o

gonna have to give this a serious look... :mrgreen:

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2016 5:29 pm
by Zukero
v0.5.0 released !

That one was tough. I'm very proud of the new tool: the Dialogue Sketch. More on this later. :ugeek:
It also includes a rework of the JSON exporter, so that the order of fields and elements is preserved, and should now yield consistent files, more easily compared. I still have to run all existing content through the new exporter once to set the landmark though.

So, the Dialogue Sketch tool. The main idea is to quickly create dialogues, with as little contact with the mouse as possible.

I'd really love your feedback on this one. :roll:

How to use:

1° Right-click somewhere in the project's tree, and select "Create dialogue sketch"
2° Choose an ID for your sketch. I strongly suggest using only lower case letters, numbers, and underscore, as well as finishing by an underscore (([a-z0-9_])*_ for the PCRE lovers). For example: "thomas_sewer_"
3° Edit your sketch (more on this later)
4° Save your sketch using the "Save sketch" button.
5° Once satisfied, create/alter the relevant dialogues (JSON data) by clicking on "Export sketch to game data".
6° Review the created and altered dialogues, and save the exported ones (not automatic yet). The created dialogues' IDs are your sketch ID suffixed by a sequence number. For example, "thomas_sewer_0".

At this point, it should be safe to delete your sketch.

Instead of 1°, you can also edit existing dialogues this way, by generating a dialogue sketch from existing data. To do so:
1° Find the starting dialogue you want to edit (typically, the one referenced in the NPC).
2° Right-click on it in the project tree, and select "Generate dialogue sketch".

That's how you'd go back and forth between sketch and real dialogue editing. Create sketch, edit, export, save everything, delete sketch, edit dialogues, save everything, generate new sketch from exported dialogue....

How to edit sketches:

At first, you'll have an empty node with an NPC icon. Double click on it to edit its content.
During edition, hit Ctrl+Enter to save the text. You now have a single dialgoue node. Let's add more.
Press Enter, or double-click it again to re-enter edit mode. Press Shift+Enter to save your changes and create a new NPC line (The "NPC Keeps Talking" stuff, where the player can just press next, and not reply). Type some more text.
Let's add a few replies. While in editing mode for a NPC dialogue, press Alt+Enter, this will create a reply node. Type some text, then Shift+Enter to create a second reply with the same parent NPC line. In that second reply, still in editing mode, press Alt+Enter to create the NPC line this replies leads to.
Great, you created a nice dialogue, but noticed a typo in a previous line. You edit it, but before you can commit it (Ctrl+Enter, remember), your cat jumps right on your keyboard, smashing your beloved text. Simply hit Escape to discard your changes.

Now, you have a bunch of nodes, that represent more or less your structure, but you have replies that point to nowhere, and want two replies to lead to the same NPC line ? No problem. Outside of edit mode (Ctrl+Enter or Escape to leave), select your source reply by clicking on it. It turns blue (the outline). While holding Shift, move your mouse to the target dialogue, and click. You just created a new link !
There are three type a link that you can create:
- NPC to NPC (adds a new "NPC keeps talking" reply. Usefull for selectors).
- Reply to NPC, only if this reply points to nowhere.
- NPC to Reply, will actually create a copy of this reply as a new reply to the source NPC line.
Reply to Reply is useless. Makes no sense. Don't ask.

To sum up, while in edit mode, Ctrl+Enter commits your edited text and exits edit mode; Shift+Enter will create a new node of the same type as the currently edited one (either NPC keeps talking, or new reply to the same NPC dialogue); Alt+Enter will create a new node of the other type (NPC line -> Player Reply, Player Reply -> NPC line); Escape cancels; Shift+Click creates a link.

What it does, what it doesn't, and what you shouldn't do:

The dialogue sketch feature is great to quickly type dialogues (in the code, it is referred to as Writer Mode), and create the structure (the links).

It cannot edit (or even view) the requirements or rewards. You cannot even completely create a selector. You can't set a reply to start shopping or fighting. For all of these, export your sketch, and edit the dialogues with the full editor.

What you really shouldn't do (at the risk of losing data, and overwriting your own changes):
- Modify an exported dialogue's text, order of replies, or ID, in the dialogue editor without deleting the sketch. In this case, subsequent modifications to the sketch will not reflect these, and re-exporting will overwrite your dialogue-editor-made changes. Forever.
- More generally, making back and forth editions between sketch and generated dialogues, using export in-between. In many cases, it works fine, but in others it doesn't.

The recommended workflow is stated above, but I'll repeat it: Create sketch, edit, export, save everything, delete sketch, edit dialogues, save everything, generate new sketch from root dialogue....

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2016 6:59 pm
by rijackson741
Great! This should definitely make creating dialogue trees easier.

I lay claim to the first bug report. In the project tree "Dialogue sketchs" should be "Dialogue sketches" :ugeek: :mrgreen:

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2016 7:16 pm
by Zukero
Hehe, nice catch.

Re: Andor's Trail Content Studio [ATCS] - Win/Mac/Linux Content Editor

Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2016 11:01 pm
by sdevaney
The new dialogue sketch is very neat. I hope it helps our content creators better visualize their scripts. I am always impressed with every ATCS update.