When you write a game do you finish ‘startup’ and ‘choicescript_stats’ first before get to the real story or working on both of them at the same time side by side?
What’s states?
I planned my work originally and then am updating startup as it progresses and I realise different parts that will be required. As I’ve been writing I’ve found that different parts I planned arent working or they need more bits added so it’s always changing
I see, so just have some basic start up and start working? when I said states I mean ‘choicescript_stats’
Some commands (like *create) only work in startup.txt. You can start writing the actual story in that file though. ChoiceScript doesn’t have any problems with that. If you need a certain stat in a later chapter/.txt file you’ll either need to use a .temp variable or go back to startup.txt and create the stat there.
What I am trying to ask is how I should organize my working schedule. Should I try to finish ‘startup’ by putting everything in it first, then working on ‘choicescript_stats’ then finally get to the story after all main state is finish or I should just work with all 3 at the same time?
Don’t really know but some people prefer to write stuff and code stuff as they go. Some have it easy to write then code. Whatever would work for you is fine, but I think writing the story with the codes as you go will make it easier than writing the codes before the story. Make sense?
Write the code as you go along. Work out a basic plan for your stats but then as your fleshing out the story you’ll make changes and will need to go back to the stats and startup to add them.
You can’t predict the changes to your code so there’s no point trying to complete stats and startup.
Do the basics and get writing is my advice
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In all my (failed) attempts to get a CS story off the ground, I’ve always built a basic layout for my Stats Page first. To me, it seems like the logical place to start, even if its just a few lines or an ‘if’ block that hides stats until Player Creation is finalized. Of course, working on the startup scene goes hand in hand with this.
I figure out the brief outline of the plot, what stats would work with the story, create those in startup and choicescript stats (keep in mind you can always add or remove things later), then begin on the story. It’s probably easier to code as you write but everyone is different.
I am not a programmer, but I know a few people who are. I asked one of them for advice, and he told me that it would be best for me to have a few stats as I could reasonably manage. He said I should probably decide my stats as late in the process as possible, ideally after I have plotted out everything else.
For my first game, my plan is to plot out the various branches in the story (it will be short), identifying points of success and failure for ability and skill checks. Once I have a solid sense of what sorts of things the MC is doing to overcome the game’s obstacles, I’ll derive an array of stats that fits the choices I’ve plotted out. Hopefully, this will result in balanced stats, without any one stat overshadowing the others.
That’s my plan, anyway, and I’ve never done this before. It might turn out to be completely impractical.