Dialogue tree writing tools

[JarlFrank]

So, does anyone know of any tools to easily write branching dialogue trees? It's kind of annoying to do it in word and a tool would be greatly appreciated. Googling mostly results in tips on how to write linear dialogues for books, so I haven't found a tool yet.

 

[Baron]

I looked into this ages ago and didn't find anything I liked. I went back to Notepad with wordwrap off, indenting with tab to show the branches. But yes, it's clumsy for longer dialogues. At least the files open and close instantly, my favourite feature as I jump between a lot of files.

But you've just reminded me I meant to check out Notepad++, it apparently has collapsible blocks. I'm going to check it out now.

 

[Forest Dweller]

Ask Vince.

 

[Excommunicator]

You might consider using a spreadsheet program like Excel. Especially for lots of conditions and variables.

Much more versatile than a standard document; has everything you will need, including a rudimentary ability to do certain simulations.


Also Jarl, are you working on a formal project?

 

[JarlFrank]

Yeah, I'm the lead writer of Splintered Core, a post-apoc indie RPG project led by fellow Codexian soggie (there's a thread here in the Workshop - haven't been any updates for a while because soggie was busy with work-related stuff, but the project is still very much alive).

I'm currently toying around with a mindmap program to see if this can do what I want. If it doesn't, soggie is planning to program a tool anyway, but I thought I'd look for already existing free-to-use tools to spare him the work. And I already started my work on some of the dialogues, so I'd like to use a good tool instead of having to use simple word/notepad.

 

[JarlFrank]

So, I was searching a little more and found this:

http://www.bigbluecup.com/yabb/index.ph ... ic=39568.0

Doesn't look too bad. Not exactly what I want, but it serves my purposes well enough until soggie's programmed our own tool.

 

[zenbitz]

I wrote some in parpg using YAML and a text editor.
Of course we had our own parser for it in python

I think you have to have a GUI to write anything beyond trivial "pump NPC for info" trees (i.,e conditionals, loops).

Well, I guess it's not much different from programming at that point... you just need some other script to validate your logic.

 

[shihonage]

soggie has to make the tool. There's no other way to keep dialogue maintainable as it grows. Using a text editor, even with collapsible blocks... maybe you can use it as a general guideline, but that's it.

I would suggest just making a series of folders named after the NPCs, and putting little "scraps" of select dialogue snippets here and there.

When the tool is ready, you place them properly where they belong.

 

[lisac2k]

soggie has to make the tool.

Seconded.

There is a good example of a dialogue building tool (DialogEditor) made by Cvet for the FOnline engine - easy to learn, intuitive and comes with examples. No doubt, it will remind you of Fallout dialogue trees. You can find it in the FOnline SDK package. Maybe it gives you [soggie] some pointers on how your tool may look like in the end. Godspeed SC team!

 

[Truman]

I write it in Neverwinter Nights 1 Editor since it has a clean organized interface. Good for prototyping too.

 

[JarlFrank]

Yeah, we are going to make our own tool because there's nothing around that suits my purposes well enough. Thanks for the tips, though, I might check out the FOnline dialog editor lisac2k recommended. Won't try the NWN one because I don't have NWN1 around right now.

 

[Davaris]

I'm surprised the open source community hasn't tried to create an RPG standard for all game engines to use. I would want it to be a unified system for creating both quests and dialogue though.

The idea would be to create a visual editor where you can write and test the game entirely in the editor and then export out xml files, to use in your game engine of choice.

 

[shihonage]

It's too specific to an engine and its features. Dialogue is never just a selection of phrases.

There are conditionals, recall and assignment of internal variables for quest handling, possibility of reusing branches under different topics (i.e. "Tell me about the bears" could appear under "Dangerous this world is, with all the bears" and also under "My daughter was eaten by a bear")...

 

[Davaris]

shihonage,
If you are referring to my comment, I think it is possible. But not with the kind of editor that JarlFrank posted.

If something like this was fully developed it could work:

http://www.terathon.com/wiki/index.php/ ... g_Language

I'd also want to be able to add dummy functions, where you can set their output. A nice debugging feature would be to ask it to search a quest tree, testing every possible combination of the functions inside it and telling you under what conditions, the quest can be completed or not.

 

[soggie]

Missed me?

I got a whole different idea though, Jarl. I just registered seedojo.com, and am working on a unique data management service. With this we can turn it into a dialog writing tool

The idea for Seedojo (pronounced Seed Ojo) is that writing a design document is a pain in the ass. The usual workflow involves me opening a new word document, putting in a table of contents, and then start writing sections and shit. Then days later, i return to the document, add some information about a town here, and then days later I return and add more information.

But the thing is, I might add a character information into the town's section, but when I'm on the quest section, I have to navigate back to that page in order to re-read shit I wrote weeks or months ago.

Needless to say, navigating a word document is as easy as jerking off an aligator.

So I figured out a much better way to organize data, and a much better way to call up references. What I plan to do is to create a node graph, with each node updated twitter style. Combine micro-blogging with a network visual presentation, and you'd be able to navigate the data easily.

This can be applied to our own dialog creation tool. Heck, we can do much more. Our design document would start with a geographical map, with each location containing a "location node". Clicking on each location node would then zoom into it, showing several other root nodes like characters, quests, items, etc.

Ah hell, maybe I should just mock it up first. -_-

 

[JarlFrank]

Missed me?

Needless to say, navigating a word document is as easy as jerking off an aligator.

Yeah but at least I know now what you've been doing all the time

 

[Jim Cojones]

Notepad++ or any similar application will be your best option until you get your own editor. Tools like NWN editor or FOnline dialogue editor are fine but they are less convenient to use if you don't need their most important capabilities anyway (or rather you need them but you can't use because they won't be compatible with the game you're making).

 

[soggie]

Missed me?

Needless to say, navigating a word document is as easy as jerking off an aligator.

Yeah but at least I know now what you've been doing all the time

I won't tell the 'dex that you were the executor. I swear I won't.

Notepad++ or any similar application will be your best option until you get your own editor. Tools like NWN editor or FOnline dialogue editor are fine but they are less convenient to use if you don't need their most important capabilities anyway (or rather you need them but you can't use because they won't be compatible with the game you're making).

Notepad++, or any tool that organizes everything in a tree structure, would not be sufficient for a dialog design tool, simply for one reason: loop-backs.

Say, you have a nice hierarchy going, but you want one option to return to the 2nd level, option A. How do you represent that? You can't.

That's why a cyclic node graph is a better representation, and it is much easier to find orphaned nodes visually too.

 

[mvBarracuda]

In case you're hack happy, check this out: http://adonthell.berlios.de/doc/index.p ... it:Editing

 

[Davaris]

Missed me?

I got a whole different idea though, Jarl. I just registered seedojo.com, and am working on a unique data management service. With this we can turn it into a dialog writing tool

The idea for Seedojo (pronounced Seed Ojo) is that writing a design document is a pain in the ass. The usual workflow involves me opening a new word document, putting in a table of contents, and then start writing sections and shit. Then days later, i return to the document, add some information about a town here, and then days later I return and add more information.

But the thing is, I might add a character information into the town's section, but when I'm on the quest section, I have to navigate back to that page in order to re-read shit I wrote weeks or months ago.

Needless to say, navigating a word document is as easy as jerking off an aligator.

So I figured out a much better way to organize data, and a much better way to call up references. What I plan to do is to create a node graph, with each node updated twitter style. Combine micro-blogging with a network visual presentation, and you'd be able to navigate the data easily.

This can be applied to our own dialog creation tool. Heck, we can do much more. Our design document would start with a geographical map, with each location containing a "location node". Clicking on each location node would then zoom into it, showing several other root nodes like characters, quests, items, etc.

Ah hell, maybe I should just mock it up first. -_-

What you are describing sounds like a Mind Map. They are used for brainstorming, storing and retrieving information quickly. The commercial ones I know of are Mind Jet and Buzzan's Mind Map. There is an open source one called FreeMind that you may be able to modify into an engine tool.


http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/in ... /Main_Page

There is also an open source library called GraphViz, if you want to build an editor from scratch.

http://www.graphviz.org/

 

[Orgasm]

My bet would be a html file and a WYSIWYG editor for design documents. The cheap and easy solution and yet oh so expandable if needed.

 

[soggie]

My bet would be a html file and a WYSIWYG editor for design documents. The cheap and easy solution and yet oh so expandable if needed.

I'd rather die than write my design document in HTML, personally. I don't want to spend more time writing HTML and CSS than I do writing the actual content.

 

[Jim Cojones]

Notepad++ or any similar application will be your best option until you get your own editor. Tools like NWN editor or FOnline dialogue editor are fine but they are less convenient to use if you don't need their most important capabilities anyway (or rather you need them but you can't use because they won't be compatible with the game you're making).

Notepad++, or any tool that organizes everything in a tree structure, would not be sufficient for a dialog design tool, simply for one reason: loop-backs.

You don't use tree structure, you write something like this. You have FOnline editor on the right for comparison, structure is exactly the same but editor allows to add variables, check them, add skill checks, give rewards for the player etc. Notepad++ on the other hand has superior search function, is easier to edit (because in editor you need to choose proper functions and in N++ you just write what you need), copy fragments of text.

Neither option is optimal because a tool that can easily convert designed dialogue into script is absolutely needed but since Jarl asked for something he can use until you finish editor for Splintered Core, Notepad++ should work fine.

 

[The Yawning Dragon]

Hi!

I convinced a friend of mine to publish her project earlier that she planned it. It's a generic dialog editor in early stages of development, but stable enough for quick dialogue prototyping. I believe that some of you will find it useful.

Take a look at http://olivia.aob.rs/virial.

Recreation of the Darklands character generator is included in the download package, as a showcase for scripting, conditions and actions taken to the extreme

 

[Orgasm]

My bet would be a html file and a WYSIWYG editor for design documents. The cheap and easy solution and yet oh so expandable if needed.

I'd rather die than write my design document in HTML, personally. I don't want to spend more time writing HTML and CSS than I do writing the actual content.

You said that you are writing it in Word. A WYSIWYG editor is exactly like Word.