Ambrosia Garden Archive
    • Purttying up my mission text


      I'm working on a mostly mission oriented plug (i.e. no new graphics, ships etc...) and am having trouble making the text look nice. Like knowing when to make new paragraphs, indentations etc... like how it is in Nova. Any advice on this subject would be apreciated.

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      "En gris rumpa är fläsk, rök den och det blir skinka."
      (A pig butt is meat, smoke it and it becomes ham.)
      ~ Sweedish Translation

    • Well for a mention in the read me, if you email the text to me I will make it gramatically correct etc for you if you wish...

      Alternatively you could just send me the plug when it's completed and I'll edit it from there, but that would only work if you were on PC methinks...

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      Never hit your mother with a shovel - It leaves a dull impression on her mind

    • Well, thanks for the offer, but I was realy just looking for any advice on how to break up blocks of text so that they appear more pleasing to the eye. I've been looking through some of the Nova DESC files, and it looks like they tend to space it out after each person speaks. For example:

      Quote

      As she is led away you feel a tap on your shoulder and you turn to see a man who is vaguely familiar indicating that you should follow him. You look at him closely and realize from the flows surrounding him that he is Geoff, somehow disguised.

      "If you're wondering why you don't recognize me," he says with the familiar voice of Geoff, "it's because I have had surgery to alter my appearance. I don't want to be recognized in public by that young lady and revealed.

      In a flash of inspiration you realize that this man is the mysterious Frandall, head of Rebel Intelligence.

      "How did you go in freeing the Vell-os?" he asks. You quickly relate to him the main points of your recent adventures and he looks pleased.

      "Excellent work!" he exclaims cheerfully. "This should mean that if she submits to a Vell-os trial, we can publicly disgrace both her and the Bureau.

      "Meet me in the bar in an hour," he continues brusquely. "Once I've passed all this on to the other leaders I should have another mission for you."

      But its not that exact, so I was wondering If theres some sort of guideline, or if its just based on aesthetics or what?

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      "En gris rumpa är fläsk, rök den och det blir skinka."
      (A pig butt is meat, smoke it and it becomes ham.)
      ~ Sweedish Translation

    • Break up the text when either the first person or the direct object changes. Also, alter sentence lengths dynamically to avoid eyestrain. But I was a history magor, perhaps someone with a better grasp on literature could supplant my information.

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      Drinking causes hangovers.
      (url="http://"http://www.freewebs.com/rmx256/index.htm")Kemet T.C. Website(/url)

    • It is basically just aesthetics. Space out different topics, different people speaking, after describing the scene etc. Just follow the rule that if it makes it easier to read, it's better.

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      Never hit your mother with a shovel - It leaves a dull impression on her mind

    • Good writing is about finding your own personal voice and writing it consistently.

      There are some basic rules about paragraphs which you can find in any guide to writing. But if you compare, say, a page of Fahrenheit 451 with a page of the Lord of the Rings you'll find that Bradbury and Tolkien have a very different approach.

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    • you are supposed to make a new paragraph everytie someone speaks. a paragraqph is one idea or subject. You can have a person tlak, then normal writing, then the same person talk again, but as soon as youi want a new person talkng, its a new paragraph. But really, a lot of it is just what feels natural, and what flows well.

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      www.freewebs.com/septcanmat/index.htm

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