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[RealScaniX]

Humor and scary go very well together

Yes, it can work out pretty well. I hope it will in this case, too. ^^

[Thaumaturge]

A nicely-unexpected twist to the interaction, and some good lines, I think! (I especially liked "A good cutting tool will always come in... ...pieces?".) ^_^

As to devlogs, I'm touched that you think so of mine! I will say that I honestly don't know what makes for a well-received devlog--indeed, it's perhaps worth noting that you seem to get a decent response here with your current approach.

That said, if you want to try a new approach, then I encourage it! Whether doing so proves better or worse, you'll hopefully have learned from it, and will at the least have had a new experience in it! ^_^

[RealScaniX]

A nicely-unexpected twist to the interaction, and some good lines, I think! (I especially liked "A good cutting tool will always come in... ...pieces?".) ^_^

Thanks!
I often add the first silly thing that comes to mind when adding stuff. Most actions will have unique lines, so I will just add something and edit it later if necessary. Currently there are over 600 messages in the list (used for localization), but not all of them are dialog lines. Some are button texts as well.
Good to know that I can use this one like this. I just need to translate it well. ^^

As to devlogs, I'm touched that you think so of mine! I will say that I honestly don't know what makes for a well-received devlog--indeed, it's perhaps worth noting that you seem to get a decent response here with your current approach.

That said, if you want to try a new approach, then I encourage it! Whether doing so proves better or worse, you'll hopefully have learned from it, and will at the least have had a new experience in it! ^_^

Yes, agreed. I will give it another thought or two.

[RealScaniX]

The bench vice is used in the "key repair" puzzle & maybe in a secret puzzle.
The animation is done per code to be slightly different each time & can hold objects of different sizes. The handle has some pseudo physics to react to gravity.
 
The current puzzle is a good example of how complex adventure gameplay is when multiple objects with several possible states each are involved. I think I will write something more about this when the whole puzzle gameplay is finished.

[JobLeonard]

Oh yeah, handling all potential interactions is one of those difficult game design challenges

[Thaumaturge]

Very cool!

I'm guessing that for the impression of the handle sliding under gravity you just determine which side is lower and slide it downwards, likely with speed modified by angle from vertical?

As to puzzle-building, indeed, the states and responses for such a thing could get rather numerous and rather complex rather quickly, I daresay!

(Funnily enough, I don't think that I have anything that quite complex enough to stand as an example of this in A Door to the Mists, although the potential is there!)

[RealScaniX]

Thanks!
 
Yes, there is a threshold (I think it's even a bit too low as one of the angles in the video is too horizontal to make it slide) and afterwards the speed depends on the "verticality" (I'm just using the y component of the forward (z vector) of the object in unity) and gets faster the closer it gets to the endpoint (I was too lazy to add a proper acceleration ^^).
That part happens after the cutscene, so you can grab the handle again (like in the video) while it's still sliding and the handle is moved outwards towards the closest distance (if not close enough to it already, meaning >0.9 or < -0.9), then turned.
 
The interaction gets complex as I want as many distinct messages as possible, not always "that doesn't make sense".
Do you know the adventure "Edna & Harvey: The Breakout". It had a unique message for EVERY possible action.
I'm not going that far, but I'm trying to give at least different messages per item and try to add some helpful hint here and there.
 
I have gathered a list of actions to check for this puzzle:
(head and bottom are two fragments of a key)
   - use head on bottom in door
   - use head on bottom in inventory
   - use glue on head in inventory
   - use glue on bottom in inventory
   - use glue on bottom in door
   - use pliers on bottom in door
   - use pliers on head in inventory
   - use pliers on bottom in inventory
   - use head on clamp
   - use bottom on clamp
   - use glue on clamp
   - use glue on bottom in clamp
   - pickup bottom in door
   - pickup bottom in clamp
   - use bench vice -> pickup key bottom (or whatever is in there) again before adding new item
 
And as always, you need to come up with reasons why an action that seems correct to the player does not yield the expected result. Xd

[Thaumaturge]

I've heard of "Edna and Harvey", but not played it myself, I'm afraid. Having a distinct response for absolutely everything is impressive, however! O_O

And indeed, that's an impressive list of responses that you have there!

And further, I do agree that it's preferable to have distinct messages for interactions, especially where they might seem reasonable to the player. If feasible, that can significantly enhance the game, I daresay, both in apparent responsiveness and in providing information to the player.

In A Door to the Mists I've tried to respond to reasonable-seeming actions ("Use the sword to dig up the tiles")--but I'll confess that I do rely on a default "that doesn't work"-sort of message. ^^;

[oahda]

That level of responsiveness is really interesting, I’m imagine it’ll make the game feel really alive!

[JobLeonard]

Also the bane of completionists that want to try every interaction!

[RealScaniX]

I have standard answers, too. It's a list of a few messages for pickup, examine and combine actions when nothing more specific exists. There are message files in a certain format:
 
hammer[door|door.*]
    A key would be more efficient.
hammer[bentNail]
    That nail isn't cooperating anymore.
hammer
    That doesn't need to get hammered.
|   Do I want to make an impression that badly?

That's an example of combine messages with item[usedOn] where both parts allow wildcards. Intendation controls what lines belong to the condition and an | at the start of a line marks a line (or all following lines) as alternatives that are cycled through.
 
I'm finishing the glueing and repairing sequences and then I'll do a complete list of possible actions and the responses according to several conditions.
 

Also the bane of completionists that want to try every interaction!

The thing is: In adventures, you always end up in the "try every item on everything else" state when you run out of ideas or do not understand the puzzle. Getting a "That makes no sense" each time is frustrating the player even more.
 
Oh, how I hate this sentence. Xd
Use lighter on torch! -> "That makes no sense."
ARRRGH!
 

[JobLeonard]

It almost sounds like someone should make a formal grammar for programming adventure games

[RealScaniX]

It almost sounds like someone should make a formal grammar for programming adventure games

Don't tempt me. I've already wasted anough time on those files with wildcard matching and alternatives and...

conditions:
 
fruitbowl.apples
    :579:A bowl of fresh looking apples.~!waxapple.taken,!waxpear.taken
    :577:A bowl of tasty wax fruits.~|waxapple.taken,waxpear.taken
 

and message construction:
 
can.kitchen
    :472:That's just a can of >
    :473:Ravioli >|Pineapple >|Soup >
    :474:or something...
    :475:I cannot make out the label.
 
The numbers are just the ids for the localization, | inside of a message will split it by | and then use one of the parts randomly and the ">" means that the next line should be appended.
I wanted to make messages even more dynamic, but I think I will get problems when translating those.

[Thaumaturge]

It almost sounds like someone should make a formal grammar for programming adventure games

Isn't that more or less what things like Ink (and maybe Twine) are? Ink I do believe is middleware; Twine I'm not certain about, but I feel like I might have seen mention of it being used so.

And I think that there may be others, besides!

[RealScaniX]

It almost sounds like someone should make a formal grammar for programming adventure games

Isn't that more or less what things like Ink (and maybe Twine) are? Ink I do believe is middleware; Twine I'm not certain about, but I feel like I might have seen mention of it being used so.

And I think that there may be others, besides!

Mmh... didn't think of full interactive story engines. I thought more about a grammar to describe the adventure gameplay without the game engine.
 
I think there are some of those out there, yes. Twine is pretty popular. Inform7 not so much, but quite interesting.
 
For foreign skin, I've written my own markup like language to construct gameplay using paragraphs with links that support conditions and variables etc., so you can do an inventory.
https://scanix.itch.io/foreignskin
 
And with GEfIS I tried doing something like Inform7 where you could define objects and actions using normal english language (there is more about it, but I cannot describe it).
https://gefis.scanix.de/
(BTW: The demo game is the second version of a game based on the "Darkness" story)

 

[Alain]

I missed the video of the vice before. It looks amazing and the physics do not look pseudo at all. I tinker in my tiny basement workshop in real life from time to time and the way you descripe the level of detail of the interaction in your key repair puzzle sounds like something I'd love to play.

[RealScaniX]

I missed the video of the vice before. It looks amazing and the physics do not look pseudo at all. I tinker in my tiny basement workshop in real life from time to time and the way you descripe the level of detail of the interaction in your key repair puzzle sounds like something I'd love to play.

Hi! Thank you, that's reassuring.
 
I've finished all the animation sequences (done by code again) for it, so I "only" need to add sounds and then I want to do a video about the whole thing.

[Thaumaturge]

I thought more about a grammar to describe the adventure gameplay without the game engine.

But you'd surely want something to interpret that grammar, to turn it into gameplay. To that end, it seems to me that an actual piece of middleware saves a bit more work, providing both a grammar and a means of using that grammar.

[RealScaniX]

I thought more about a grammar to describe the adventure gameplay without the game engine.

But you'd surely want something to interpret that grammar, to turn it into gameplay. To that end, it seems to me that an actual piece of middleware saves a bit more work, providing both a grammar and a means of using that grammar.

To make it alive? Yes, of course. There could be an international language to define adventure gameplay, though. Used by multiple engines then.

[Thaumaturge]

There could be an international language to define adventure gameplay, though. Used by multiple engines then.

But is that not what Ink, at least, is? After all, it's middleware, and so can presumably be slotted into another engine. One should be able to use it with Unity, or Panda3D, or Unreal, etc...

(In fact, the website for Ink even mentions Unity integration.)

I'm not sure about Twine, offhand. I feel like I may have heard of it being used with non-interactive-fiction games--but I might be mixing it up with Ink, or some other thing.