Online free tools?

[Eternalfire]

Does anyone know any good online and free tools that you can use for plotting a game? Similar to bubbl if anyone has used that? If not do you guys have any recommendations on an other approach i can take for plotting a game?

[Zaroukae]

I use Twine to plan my games out beforehand.

[FairyGodfeather]

I planned to see if Chronicler would work if I ever do get back to making games.

[Tool] Chronicler - ChoiceScript Visual Code Editor

Chronicler is a visual code editor for ChoiceScript. It allows you to design your novel in a flowchart layout, and have the CS code generated for you! Incorporating all the advice from good forum users such as yourself, I am developing Chronicler into what I hope will become one of the most popular tools for both beginner and veteran novelists. Where you can focus on writing your story rather than scrolling through long sections of code. Chronicler Online Announced! All further efforts on Ch…

Before, I used a combination of paper and pens to write things down. I then used Twine to get a rough outline and moved on from there to code in chociescript.

[ballmot]

Is chronicler good for actually developing a game though? Or should I just organize my ideas with it?

[FairyGodfeather]

I’ve not actually tried Chronicler out yet. It’s on my list of things to do. You could try it out and let us know? I was just judging from the screen shots.

[ballmot]

Oh, I was just asking because I never had any good experiences with those fancy visual coding tools, they always let me down because of bugs or limited features, but I’m going to give Chronicler a try, thanks for replying.

[FairyGodfeather]

Chronicler’s being made by a forum member, @BenSeawalker . Even if it doesn’t work out for you, if you let him know what you think. If it has bugs, or features that you want, just tell him and I’m sure he’ll sort them out. If I actually had a project to work on I’d definitely be fiddling about with it myself.

[Eternalfire]

@Zaroukae

Twine honestly doesn’t seem bad, but not the most detailed, but i would not mind using it at all if i don’t find anything better. Thanks

@FairyGodfeather

Just downloaded it. First impressions, it is a little tough on the eyes but it surely gets the job done. A little too complex honestly though (as in the developer has put in a lot of work) .

@ballmot It does seem to help with the coding quite a bit, but i’d rather do it manually. It seems pretty good for organizing ideas.

[ballmot]

@Eternalfire
I just downloaded it and opened the dragon example file… That is simply overwhelming xD Too much stuff happening at the same time.

I’m going to stick with the good old CDE, my code would be impossible to organize visually without me getting horribly lost, but that tool might be useful for those who are new at choicescript.

Edit: By the way, I’m not saying that Chronicler is bad, my code is just too messy

[Eternalfire]

it’s the best i can find, i wouldn’t say i would use it for coding, but twine is too simple, at least for me.

What is CDE???

[ballmot]

@Eternalfire
Choicescript Developement Environment

[Eternalfire]

Ah it seems pretty much only for coding, (correct me if i am wrong) there don’t seem to be any features for organizing a game like bubbles and all.

[ballmot]

Yeah, that is why I use it, makes coding slightly easier for me.

Finding tools for organizing an interactive game is not that easy, but there are many tools for organizing novels, a quick google search should offer you many options, and some of them are 100% free.

Links:

Inkle (For interactive stories!)
yWriter5
LitLift
BOS
Scrivener (30 days trial)

[FairyGodfeather]

Okay I did a search of the forum for previous flowchart posts. @Ballmot’s already posted a lot of good links though.

I also found links to
yEd - Graph Editor (no idea the price of this)
http://sm.axmasoft.com/ (isn’t free I don’t think?)

And @CrumblyHeadGames made a useful post here

Flowchart style game design

Twine is nice, and fun to write with. But I had the same problem as you, I always wanted to see my stories as I wrote them. Here are some gorgeous ones to inspire you: http://outspaced.fightingfantasy.org/SVG_Flowcharts/main.html - There’s all the fighting fantasy books there, as well as my favourite series, the Virtual Reality (which remind the most of Choice of Games). I wrote a piece of software to help generate these kind of diagrams - try it out if you want, it’s free and at http://www.c…

[Eternalfire]

Thanks everyone. I think i’d stick with either twine or Chronicler, they are both pretty awesome.

[MutonElite]

There is a free program (voluntary donations) called masterplan, that’s meant for GM’s of 4e D&D campaigns. But you could use it for writing as well. You get like a road map where you can connect parts, so you get a nice overview of the flow, then you can detail what happens at each junction inside of it. And inside each junction, you could add yet another road map, etc.

http://masterplan.habitualindolence.net/

[Eternalfire]

Will definitely check it out, thanks

[dashingdon]

Found another online tool that may be useful, has a free option too: https://realtimeboard.com/features/

[BenSeawalker]

@Eternalfire What do you mean about it being tough on the eyes? Any suggestions to make Chronicler better will be most welcome on my thread. (:

@ballmot Well, your code can’t be any worse than the generated code Chronicler produces. XD

• I’m working on improving that as we speak.

[Eternalfire]

It’s just that the bg color could be a little lighter maybe even completely white. But this is completely my personal opinion. I know many people prefer darker colors with lighter writing as-well. It isn’t a big change that is necessary but if you do wish to make such small tweaks maybe you could make an option to change the bg color.