Does any one have a problem reading long mission briefing screens in a Nova Plug. The ones in Nova are pretty long, but I'm talking twice that, so that mission strings however small are almost like reading a decent sized short story. And so by the the time you have finished the story you have read a rather large novel.

I know some people love getting into the story, and having a lot of explanations, but in the same respect a lot of people just want to get into the action and can't stand reading for large amounts of time.

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Quote

Originally posted by thedecline:
**Does any one have a problem reading long mission briefing screens in a Nova Plug. The ones in Nova are pretty long, but I'm talking twice that, so that mission strings however small are almost like reading a decent sized short story. And so by the the time you have finished the story you have read a rather large novel.

I know some people love getting into the story, and having a lot of explanations, but in the same respect a lot of people just want to get into the action and can't stand reading for large amounts of time.

**

I personally would appreciate long briefing screens...you might make them spread out across multiple dialogs or in different locations, or illustrate them to keep the player engaged I suppose.

Though you're right, there are people who might want to just play. I don't have any EVN development experience, I don't know if there's a way to allow the player to choose in the beginning (or perhaps with each individual briefing) whether they want long and short briefings...but that might be a nice option.

Just my thoughts.

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I like long mission briefings.

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Quote

Originally posted by thedecline:
**Does any one have a problem reading long mission briefing screens in a Nova Plug.
<snip>
**

I think detailed briefings are great. Just make sure that you proofread them about a dozen times, or better still, have a dozen people proofread them, before finalizing the plug. A sure fire way to spoil a good story is to let spelling, grammar, and syntax errors go unnoticed until after you publish.

And don't worry about the "ActionMan" crowd. They'll just hit the return key and go back to blasting bits anyway.

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Well... it always depends on how good the story is... If its simply a longwinded version of aliceinwonderlandorsomethingequalyboring then it just ticks me off. Nova's story struck me as kinda lackluster... not realistic and not the deep physcological meaning... but maybe thats just me.

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noooo, you can't have a boring story line.

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I have a compromise. Have nice long descriptions for your briefings, but have detailed (but brief) instructions available when they check what active missions they have. That way the people that enjoy reading lots of stuff can do so, and the people who don't can just accept the mission quickly and still know where they're going and what they have to do.

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That's a good idea mrxak. What I considered doing when I read this was to set a bit using a char, and use the bit operator to change between long descriptions or short descriptions. The only problem is that the other dialogue windows will show up, though you could make them blank... That would be quite annoying, though.

However, if you set it up so that the long breifings fit in one window, using the handy scrolling function in nova, that shouldn't be too much of a problem.

~SP

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i have the solution for you.

make 2 plugins additional to the one your making or just make 2 plugins to evn..

1 plugin will have the long mission briefings ect.

other can have short simple mission briefing for exp: "gov: feds mission: go to such and such system and come back" very short mission briefing

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Quote

Originally posted by SpacePirate:
That's a good idea mrxak. What I considered doing when I read this was to set a bit using a char, and use the bit operator to change between long descriptions or short descriptions. The only problem is that the other dialogue windows will show up, though you could make them blank... That would be quite annoying, though.

That would be good, but here's the rest of it: in the OnAccept, you set a "start 2nd dialog" bit that will make another mission available instantly. That mission will only start if the pilot has the "long-winded" bit set and the "start 2nd dialog" bit set. Make the 2nd mission auto-aborting, can't refuse, and clear the "start 2nd dialog" bit on completion. That ought to work.

-Vaumnou

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I wouldn't want to read a short story in Escape Velocity. I play Nova so I can play, not so I can read some goofy story.

On another note, Alice in Wonderland is boring!? You probably didn't get half of what he was saying, did you?

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How about making a char resorce that determines whether to have long or short briefings.

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There are two schools of thought on this one:

• Those that love long stories

• Those that hate them, and want more shooting

In my next project, I'll be taking account of both sides. You'll be able to get lots of story if you want it. If you don't, simply watching the cutscenes and animated clips will give you all the info you need to get right into the combat gameplay.

Remember, fun is the key. If it's not fun to play your creation then you've missed the point as a game/plug-in developer!

all the best,

Dave @ ATMOS

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Co-creator of EV Nova

Quote

Originally posted by pipeline:
**There are two schools of thought on this one:

• Those that love long stories

• Those that hate them, and want more shooting

In my next project, I'll be taking account of both sides. You'll be able to get lots of story if you want it. If you don't, simply watching the cutscenes and animated clips will give you all the info you need to get right into the combat gameplay.

Remember, fun is the key. If it's not fun to play your creation then you've missed the point as a game/plug-in developer!

all the best,

Dave @ ATMOS

**

Next project? What next project?

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Originally posted by Ragashingo:
Next project? What next project?

Well, in this case, the next project I work on.

all the best,

Dave @ ATMOS

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Co-creator of EV Nova

Quote

Originally Posted by mrxak
I have a compromise. Have nice long descriptions for your briefings, but have detailed (but brief) instructions available when they check what active missions they have. That way the people that enjoy reading lots of stuff can do so, and the people who don't can just accept the mission quickly and still know where they're going and what they have to do.

Already done.

Yeah I guess it isn't really a problem if you tell the fellows who don't want to read the story what to do in a short, to the point, precise form through the QuickBrief desc.

Thankyo'all

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I feel I should probably speak up as an action man. When I am playing a video game I want my mission briefings to be about as long as the original EVs, just a paragraph. At times I feel two paragraphs is great, and when I complete something amazingly difficult, heck three even four paragraphs will fly with me. I think back to the texts in Marathon, these were usually about 2-3 paragraphs, often with some graphics. This seemed like a very suitable length. However, I was turned of by the consistent length of Nova's mission briefings. Simple courier missions seemed to call for a page or two of text. I found this highly tedious, especial since I do like to read something before going off to battle. But if I want to read book length text, I'd get a book. Just my couple of cents.

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A good mix of pictures and maps in briefings together with a lot of Humphrey Bogart, Film Noir style dialogue is just great for a Nova plug. As mrxak said for those that don't want to read: detailed, to the point QuickBriefs should be fine.

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I must be the opposite of the Action Man (Would that make me the Literary Female?)- I much prefer reading descs to shooting stuff..

Of course, the game would get boring if that was ALL that happened, but think about it- without descriptions, EV Nova is essentially flying from one planet to another and shooting things on the way. Not much more exciting than your typical shoot-em-up (ugh, the scourge of the gaming world..). Nova, however, is classified as "strategy" by Ambrosia, and I personally would put it on the edge of the rpg world. (Just the edge, mind. Look up (link=www.spiderwebsoft.com)Spiderweb Software(/link) for mac rpgs.)

The reason it's able to make the leap into a much more sophisticated category of games (don't hit me, action people!) is -because- of the storyline and description. Granted, Nova's stories are not the best.. (I enjoyed Vell-Os and Pirate, but Polaris was terrible.. haven't finished the others yet..) However, the game makes a definite, visible effort, and it pays off. I would never register a shoot-em-up.

The plugin I'm currently writing (I'd give you a link, but my site's not up yet.. sigh..) is really, really story-oriented. I'm trying to break up descriptions between separate windows, but since the best way to do that is with extra missions, and I'm writing a really long string.. that may not work too well. If that fails, I'll be having descs as long as yours, thedecline.

Make your descs as long as possible!! It will make me download your plugin.

On the subject of the char resources, just make two chars that the player will choose from at the beginning. One sets b9999 or whatever, the other leaves it clear. b9999 bypasses the long descriptions, by accessing different mission resources- just copy all the missions and have them access shorter descriptions. You'd have to change the bits, too, but that's all. Pretty easy. Not sure if this is what SpacePirate was referring to when he mentioned chars, since I don't see empty dialogues popping up.. hmm..

Good luck! Go with long dialogue! Long live description!!

-K

Yeah, it figures that I play online text rpgs.

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The Best way to break up descs is to make use of all three of the dec boxs: the mission offer, the mission breifing and the load cargo. Plus if your mission is a continuation, you will have the dump cargo and the mission completion boxs to! Even if you don't have and cargo, but specify where the cargo is loaded and dumped the box should still come up (I haven't tested this, so maybe a should before i start ranting about it...).

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