I’ll list my ideas from most to least practical, all would be used, but creating all of them might not be possible.
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This might be already available, but the ability to change fonts, or even upload our own. Whether it’s to distinguish hand writing, or computer text, crappy ads with Comic Sans whatever. It’ll add more immersion. Maybe with a custom font uploader so the same few texts aren’t re-used. This is with the caveat that is should be able to be turned into regular, or dyslexia if it becomes a problem, like the Red Dead 2 notes. I’m surprised COG doesn’t even have this feature with their talk of inclusion. I need to get tested still, but people, myself included definitely suspect I have some form of Dyslexia, or it’s numerological equivalent atleast. So that would be useful, but not a deal breaker.
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More freedom with images, and pictures. Where instead of putting a picture into text, you could have a picture, and then put text on it, and/or the ability to click text directly
So you could do it as a graphic novel, picture book, a fake website, or even adventure games.
Examples where this would help
-Graphic novel styling could be useful for pretty much any supers game, or sword and Scorery etc.
-Picture book wouldn’t have been used by any so Choice Script game, but what about living books games? Look them up on YouTube, because something like that but with more interaction could definitely be possible.
-Fake websites, in Zombie Exodus safe house there is a throw away joke while searching the zombie forums, where some guy is scamming people with fake sunglasses. What if we could set up a way to actually click the link, and get taken to a fake website, or even a parody of Reddit where you can up/down vote. Even if this didn’t do anything it would still be cool. Like flushing video game toilets. If there were directly clickable text a similar thing could be created with just the sunglasses.
If it’s just links you could still make fictional links with this, preferably with some sort of search bar. I know there’s a detective game that does this.
Adventure games. Wayhaven Chonicals, or anything to do with puzzles would benefit from being able look at a picture and look for, then click on puzzle elements.
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Maps, not the most important one, because the above could probably do a serviceable job at it, but the ability to put markers on a map would be useful, whether it’s your location, or Frontlines, even if not maybe it could be just a world map that could change based on player choices, or at the very least just be something you could zoom in/out of and get more info. With links it could combine to make fictional atlas/encyclopedia combos. It would be a lot of work, but how much they do should be up to the authors. Also on the map if there was a way to move the ability to maks an action game might put too much stress on what’s supposed to be easy to program, but if there was the ability to put in CRPG type combat, or even just walking around moving things would be a very nice addition.
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Better audio/video. The only COG I know about that has audio is the WIP by @122B (which is a very good one that you should check out.) But there should be the ability to add music, and better sound FX. Page turnings, or effects from your choice of weapons. You could possibly even turn these into interactive audio book / audio dramas (maybe not dramas, but if theres a better term I don’t know it.)
If there was a built in voice synthesizer it could be possible to say your name, or authors could do what Bethesda did with Codsworth. Probably on a smaller scale, likely just the prefab names.
With Video you could include short clips, I’m thinking of both the talking heads from Fallout 1/2 so you could see/hear the major characters. The other are in world videos. Like News segments that are filmed and put in the game, and are clipped together from others to reflect your choices. So you could have "our top story tonight (check sex variable.) Local man (robbery stopped- TRUE.) Stops robbery, With (check stats.) His incredible strength. (Pork bought-FALSE) In other news local BBQ restaurant goes out of business.
- Is the ability to add player skill/mini games. Tools to create mini games, or pre-made ones for skill checks would be a welcome, and optional addition. For pre-made games even just a copy of the timing from Hercules: Birth a hero would be good, this could used for pretty much anything. From lockpicking to hacking. It would be better to have multiple options, or even better the tools to make our own. If it is just the timing, please don’t make it a static yes/no. That way different numbers would be possible. Another pre-made game could be pipe dream, most well known as hacking from bioshock. Not the best game on it’s own, but it is versatile, and mental. Some sort of dexterity game where you can’t touch the sides maybe. You could also steal Bethesdas lock picking/hacking. These are more limited, but the hacking could be more versatile. Such as saying the words to a spell. Though the brackets are quite computery, maybe some sort of hangman type game, with some default list of words, but with the ability to set tries, and give different effects for different amounts of/time guesses, so guessing on the first try/guess could do more damage, or hack better. The list of words should be configurable for length, and thematic purposes, maybe an option to turn it into a scrambler puzzle.
These would definitely be persuasive in switching over, because there’s just more readers on Choice Script, so it would need to be something that could make up the difference in order to justify the switch. I hope you can do it because Choice Script certainly has problems, and I want nothing more than for it to become obsolete so we can go onto better things.
I am currently accepting donations of souls, virgin blood, goats, and first borns so that the sacrifice is good enough for the blessed machine. Together we can get a better engine.
