April 2023's Writer Support Thread

My list is, in no particular order (…that’s a lie, it’s the order in upcoming games threads)

Released:

  • Stars Arisen
  • Royal Affairs
  • Fernweh Saga
  • Fallen Hero: Retribution

Upcoming:

  • Hexfinder
  • Lies under Ice (even if I keep reading "Lice under Ice)
  • Heavens’ Revolution
  • Blood Moon
  • I, The Forgotten One
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Definitely looking forward the most to I, the forgotten one. It’ll be joining a growing list of games which I’ve painfully had to wait a few days to buy it at full price because I wish to support the author. A list which includes; Royal Affairs, Lords of Infinity, Wayhaven 3, to name a few.

On that note, is it angels, or is it devils guiding my actions? This is something I’ve been wondering since my beta reader asked me “the hell is wrong with you?” After reading a certain extract from my upcoming update to my WiP.

I know it ain't the 15th yet, but here's the extract in question.

You ask the train driver if he would be able to stop the train. You have a plan forming in your mind about luring Kaito to the engine carraige.

A look of terror appears on his face. “What? Stop the train? I would never! It is against regulations to halt the operation of the Shinkansen anywhere other than a designated station! I simply cannot just stop the train in the middle of nowhere!”

You shrink slightly, in the face of this man and his overwhelming dedication to train regulations. “Of course, my apologies.” You say to him.

OoOoOoOoOh, Train lawssss…” Kage mocks you over comms.

I think i may have a bit of an obsession with trains.q :smile:

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To be fair to you, in Japan the trains really DO run on time, to the minute. If a train is late, they have to distribute paperwork with the justification as to why that particular train is late.

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I guess my goal for this month is to continue writing at least a 1000 words per week. Work, school, and bjj all get in the way of me and my story. It’s my first, and I barely understand choice script. But so far it’s been fun.

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My list:

Released:
New Witch in Town
Stars Arisen
Royal Affairs (obviously)
Changeling Charade
Flight
Relics 3

Upcoming:
Atlantis
Star Crystal Warriors
Hexfinder
Bread Must Rise
Lies Under Ice
Heaven’s Revolution
Ghost and Golem
Bootlegger
Platinum Package
Unnatural 2
Blood Moon
Their Majesties’ Pleasure
Vampire’s Kiss
Shadow Heart
Devil on your shoulder
Souls Unguarded
Maverick Hunter: Scandalous Mission(???)
Tea and Scones (???)
Keeper 3 (???)

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Well, I’m nearing the end of Royal Affairs and I recently finished playing Noblesse Oblige (both of which I enjoyed tremendously, they made me want to replay CdlC). But honestly, I’m way behind on my COGs. I think the last one I played before NO was the first part of Lux: City of Secrets (from the Evertree Saga, technically a HG).

I have a whole bunch of games in my backlog that I’m looking forward to finally playing, but when I’ve gotten through those, I should really have a look at the upcoming games thread(s).

Edit: Oh, there’s a game set on Europa! I wanna change my answer.

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I’ve had a very nice writing time today as I unexpectedly had the chance to do a bunch of coding on the new game. I really like coding because it stretches my brain in good ways, and helps me see the bigger picture before getting into the details of the writing stage. (For example: I realised after coding a set of scenes that there was a perfect moment for some flirting and/or hurt/comfort that I could put in. Hooray!) I’m partway through coding Chapter 2 and am definitely realising that it’s going to be a chonky one; I’m also going to need to do some careful difficulty balancing to make sure I don’t run into the problem I had with Royal Affairs where at first, some stats were wildly more useful/powerful than others.

Also: Platinum Package by Emily Short, which I’ve been quietly doing some work on over the last few months, is now officially in beta - so I’m looking forward to jumping into responses to playtesting. It’s always an exciting time seeing what more people think about a project!

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This is awesome.

My birthday is on the 16th of April.

Yes, I know this is random.

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Are you working on a new game?

Yes I am, it’s in the Crème de la Crème setting with a new protagonist who’s an adult. It takes place in the republic of Teran, which hasn’t been talked about a huge amount in the earlier games (it’s not as geographically close to Westerlin as other places) but there are a few references to it here and there.

It’s an absolute joy to be working on, both because I’m proud of what it is so far and because it’s lovely to be making something with new-project-momentum. I hope it won’t be too long before I can talk about it more!

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I hope that too! :slight_smile:

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Im gonna start a couple of small projects as a side hobby cause honestly just writing normally is a bit eh, wanna spice it up

Is there anything I should know before I get into the meat of choicescript?

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Organization is super important. It’s easy to get lost in different branches and choices if you’re not keeping track of things. Do yourself a favor and write up an outline or excel sheet laying out the basics!

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Here are my two most used resources for my games:

  1. This website allows you to code and play test the game from the same place. And if there’s an error that occurs while playing, it will show you the exact line of code that’s the problem.
    Pros: You can pick up right where you left off when you closed the website.
    You just click the “download” bottom when you’re ready
    Con: only one game per web browser

https://choicescriptide.github.io/legacy/ide/main.html#

  1. This is a pretty good guide for coding. It doesn’t have everything, but it has a lot. And it explains everything really well

https://retowers.neocities.org/CSGuide/CSGuide

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That guide is how I learned ChoiceScript! Definitely recommend. Also do a lot of code-diving - looking into the files of my favorite games and seeing how those authors did things was immensely helpful as well. Here’s how to see it, if you’re wondering.

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Gotten the basics down on stats names and the rest of the foundations, thank yall very much!

Now the only thing I gotta figure out is why the scenes “dont exist” in the runtime error and how on earth I can plan out so much with just scenes labels and goto :sweat_smile:

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I really like coding because it stretches my brain in good ways, and helps me see the bigger picture before getting into the details of the writing stage.

I couldn’t agree more! I get tired of writing, I start coding; I get tired of coding, I start writing. I think that’s what I like about writing interactive fiction specifically. You’re sort of forced to reassess the direction you’re headed on a regular basis.

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Alrighty ran into one final issue from the looks of it. Have the standard finish and set up the next scene in start up scene list but it says the file isnt there. Checked and yep its my code, is there a certain kind of header you have to put on a new scene?

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Show what the startup file has as your scene list…

Remember, all scenes in a project should be listed in that scene list.

Edit:

Be sure your spaces and indents are proper

*scene_list
    startup
    training

Also check capitalization.

*scene_list
startup
training

Only ones I have in the entire project are those two. and choicescript_stats of course but that isnt included iirc

already have, both are correct and have the right indentation.

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