Hello, I'm new to this and was initially happy to have found a software that didn't require coding. However, I've been running into huge problems with obviously the most basic things. For example, I've created a room with a person in it I'd want my player to talk to. I followed the instruction on ask/tell but when I play my game and type 'speak to' or click it my input simply doesn't show up! What the heck am I doing wrong??? I've been watching/reading many tutorials but I can't seem to find my mistake. Also, how can I force my NFC to reply to the play when he'd asked his question. I know I'm a beginner but usually I'm not dumb with computer stuff and all this causing me so many problems leaves me really sad and annoyed. :/

Also, how am I supposed to proceed after the conversation has ended? I mean, where can I write my next few paragraphs into, letting the reader/player know what's going on before any action of him/her is required again? I'm basically a common fanfiction writer so I'm rather confused by this very short message inputs instead of paragraph-lengthy text.

Furthermore, I wondered if there was an option that asks the reader to collect certain amounts of gold/liquid/whatever on a daily basis before he can go to sleep and move on to the next day where he again would have to collect an number of items etc. in order to proceed? Or idk grow wings after drinking some potion or so? I'm sorry if this sounds kinda dumb but I was basically hoping for this software to help me create a game like 'Corruption of Champions'. Is that possible with quest? Any help would be greatly appreciated! THANKS!

Not sure if this would be helpful to you, but search for the game 'Quest - Tutorials and Templates'. It's a "game" I made that, hopefully, is helpful in solving a wide range of common problems/questions. The things you are asking about are all covered in there. Take a look and let me know. If you still have issues, ask and I'm sure I, or others, will help out!

Best of luck!

There are broadly two ways of doing conversations in text adventures:
SPEAK TO BORIS
ASK BORIS ABOUT THE KEY
This page goes into more detail:
http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/ ... tions.html

Quest supports both, and it sounds like you have implemented the former, and are wondering why it does not work as the latter. Personally, I would use this library (I wrote it!) but you can only use libraries with the off-line editor.
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5510

You can make responses as long or as short as you like. If you are doing ask/tell, just add additional print script commands. For speak to, if you asdd it as a verb, set it to "Run a script" rathert than "print a message", then again you can add as many print script commands as you like.

The other stuff is certainly doable, but not straightforward. Can we sort the conversations first, then look at the other things. For all these things, it might be worth writing out an example play-though so we both get a better idea of what you hope to achieve. Eg:

>TALK TO BORIS
'Hi,' you say to Boris, 'I'm an adventurer.'
'Hi, that sounds dangerous.'
>SLEEP
You cannot sleep until you have collected 50 gold today.

First of all: Thanks to everybody who replied to my post! I'm sorry I didn't reply sooner, I don't often use internet via a computer so emailing me would be much appreciated since emails are forwarded to my mobile phone.

@XanMag: Thanks for your hint; I'll download your 'game' right away!

@Pixie: Thanks for the link to your library, it should work just fine since I'm working offline most of the time. Meanwhile I've used the 'verbs' version, somehow managing to get a response bulb (I much prefer that to typing a question etc since I think of maybe making this an app later on.) that makes the text I want pop up. So yeah, at least the conversation problem seems to be solved. )) (The 'run script' instead of 'print message' hint did the trick!^^)

As for the other stuff I'd like to achieve:

1) Basically, the player/reader is supposed to talk/fight/submit to several characters (can characters have levels?) while they can roam about ten rooms freely. Every time an interaction has ended, the player is rewarded with a number of gold/gems/whatever of which they'd have to collect a certain number every fictional day before they can retreat to a specific room and go to sleep. Hence, it would be great if there was a chance of giving both the player and opponents some sort of level system, including a counter for the player so he/she can see how many gems they have to collect in before they can go to sleep/level up (The sleeping room ought to be locked every day until the player has finished collecting). Like:

> TALK TO DEMON (Level 2)
'Hi, can I help you with...whatever?'
> You cannot interact with a opponent of that level yet. Collect all required gems/gold/etc. in order to proceed to level 2 and go to sleep in room X.

> TALK TO IMP (Level 1)
'Hi, can I help you with...whatever?'
'Sure, I'd need help with...whatever.'
> HELP IMP
Grateful for your help, the imp drops you a gem. You have 29 more gems to collect today.

Once the player has approached enough Level 1 creatures and collected enough gems, he/she can go to sleep and start the next day at level 2 and from then on can approach both level 1 + 2 monsters and so on.

A combat system would be nice but is not that necessary; the counting thingy would be way more important for my plans. Furthermore, an option for e. g. drinking potions that permanently change the players looks would be awesome like 'The potions you just used gave you wings.' So, when the player finds another potion, it would be great if the game could remember that the player already has wings.

Is anything of this possible? If so, are there any tutorials on that kind of thing? Please let me know. Thanks!!! )

dialogue/communication is not one of the easier things to do... so don't be disappointed in yourself. Not having stuff work and/or not being able to figure stuff out, is actually very common to programmers (at least ones like myself just starting to learn), laughs. Also, don't be afraid of coding, it's not as scary as it seems, and if/as you learn more about coding and get better at it, game making becomes much easier and faster.

I do understand though that lots of people want non-coding user friendly GUI~Editors, which quest provides. I on the other hand, wanted to learn to code, so upon finding quest, I immediately used it to start my coding lessons from not knowing anything at all about programming, and now I'm taking my first classes in programming and have been doing quite well thanks to quest, hehe.

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while this may be a bit too heavy for you, but since you're interested in jumping right into it, you're going to need to learn/understand about Attributes and the 'if' Script, as these two things let you do 90% (including your post's questions) of everything that you're going to want to put into/do with your game:

viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5559

and this is a really helpful guide too for starting out:

http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/ ... ation.html

and all the other guides:

http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/guides/

lastly, here's my own old combat code if you wanna take a look at and use for ideas (probably will be hard to understand the code but see if you can make sense of any parts of it):

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=3348&start=120#p22483

and lastly here's my old 'explore and travel' code sample game (this stuff is pretty advanced though):

viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5138

it works for that part of like the rpg type of game you want to make, not using exits, instead using actions/events to explore and travel

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and yay! a fellow rpg lover, hehe

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P.S.

I'd suggest you get in touch with ayonynn (I guess she changed from neonayon), as she's beens already trying to make/do the same type of stuff that you want to do, for her game, so she can be of a lot of help for/to you:

memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=7661

and here's the link for her game:

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=5423

she should be able to help you a lot, as she's just started to learn to code too.

being overwhelmed.... I knew that all too well when I started quest... I just went through most of the tutorial... and went to start making my game... only to find myself compeltely overwhelmed and confused... laughs. I got the tutorial, going through it step by step... but when I jumped into trying to make the game on my own, I was so confused, lost, and overwhelmed. It takes time to start understanding things and bringing down the overwhelming content you've been taking in, it's a lot of stuff !!

anyways, if you wanna see my own difficulties when I first started out for a laugh:

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=3348

I made an entire thread just for my own help-needing noob-ness, laughs.

as for your questions....

take a look at this link first, and see if it helps you at all (I'm not the best at helping/explaining/guiding though, sighs):

(ask if you got any questions or are confused by anything, Ill be happy in trying to help it make sense for you!)

viewtopic.php?f=18&t=5559
(scroll about halfway down... if you want to see the part on Attributes and the 'if' Scripting, which is the base of your questions)

for your questions, and understanding quest better.

Thank you for your many replies, HegemonKhan!

I don't know why but apparently I don't get any notifications when there's a new reply for me, so please excuse the delay!

As for the dialogue/communications thingy I came up with a solution that suits me just fine right now (at least one problem solved. ) and prevents me from having to use that Ask/Tell option.

Aww, thank you so much! ) I think it's only natural for a newbie like me to be constantly frustrated/disappointed when trying new things and not succeeding at all. And yes, I quite agree, a non-coding user friendly GUI-Editor would be just what I was looking for (and hoping for Quest to be). The thing is, I wouldn't even know where to start with learning how to code (admittedly I have neither the patience nor the understanding when it comes to 'general' coding, I need an understandable example code which I can morph into what I'm trying to achieve. *lol*) since this is all gibberish to me. XD Hence, I'm sure you'll understand my disappointment when I found Quest promising tabs and all and in the end it's way more than that. 'Drag and Drop' would have been a nice feature!

Yes, I've been reading the tutorial on 'If' scripts, also about the 'flag' stuff but...I don't get it. The tuts are mostly written too general for my understanding (apparently I'm a very visual person). I wished there was a version of 'Quest for Dummies' out there!^^

Also, thanks for your links, I will check them out as soon as I have a little more free time on my hands again. )

Yay, fellow rpg lover indeed! What's your all time favourite game apart from CoC?

Thank you so much for recommending ayonynn to me, I've just sent her an email! Her game looks awesome!!!

Thanks for the link, apparently I have to catch up on a lot of things! XD

I think a step-by-step tutorial would be very helpful, because in some tutorials I read things like 'Use this script: gibberish gibberish' and can't help but wonder: "What do you mean use??? Where am I supposed to use it??? What do I need to click to get...wherever???" See my problem? I'm hopeless.

Love your newbie thread by the way, I'm glad I'm not the only one being overwhelmed and kinda lost at the beginning.

see, if this is of help:

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=3872&hilit=fight+orc

otherwise, I can help you step by step

Again, let me know if you find the 'game' tutorial useful. If you have suggestions to the format or user-friendliness please let me know. I want it to be useful. Thanks.

Hi XanMag,

thanks for your reply. I'm afraid I've only scratched the surface of your tutorial, but still here are my suggestions so far:

I would love to be able to click on the things listed that show after typing 'room list'.

Also, it's a bit confusing that there are no examples in brackets or a short explanation in the overview, hence that would be VERY helpful. 'Move Objects' is pretty self explanatory of course, but I can't even begin to imagine what I could do with the 'First Time/Flags' command. To me this all a bit much to comprehend because and I wouldn't even know what to pick from the list since all those dot points don't convey anything to me and still leave me guessing a lot. I'd rather see a list like this (for better understanding of what I can do with those commands:)

- Here's how you set up a 24 h clock (player can't sleep until X time or have x amount of x collected etc.)
- Here's how you let your player choose and buy something from the shop
- Here's how you let your player get attacked by a baddie/attack the baddie yourself
etc.

See what I'm trying to get at? Connecting an example scenario with the overview and then describe what to do using all the gibberish stuff would definitely be useful to help people with no coding skill like me to chose what they're actually looking for from the list . I've been reading through the whole tutorial at the main site and, apart from a few tiny things, I'm not much the wiser than before (which is really frustrating) because the way it is explained is too general and doesn't answer most of my questions or help me with the stuff I'd like to achieve. Please don't take my suggestions as negative criticism of any sort, probably it's just me being too much of a visual learner (or just too dumb XD) to fully understand the thought process behind this software. XD

In general, easy to follow step-by-step video tutorials would be VERY helpful for newbies like me. Also, I'm sure I'm not the first one who's quite a bit overwhelmed by the complexity of Quest. Originally I had hoped for a software that's rather based on 'click object A' (a drop down menu pops up), choose from a list like 'Attack object B', 'Submit to object B' etc. but I understand that this is probably asked way too much. *wishful thinking*

Addressing your last item first... I think the large majority of the Quest users start as you have. I know I did. I think only those that have had some pretty intensive coding experience simply jump right in and just get it. So, you are definitely not alone with your first experiences. It's an ongoing learning process for me - I understand enough to make complete games,bu t I certainly still get stumped quite a bit still.

As for the second and third paragraph above, I totally get it and do NOT take it as an offense - it's why I asked! I agree the menu/intro bit needs reworked. In fact, I think The Pixie suggested a different layout as well, I just didn't get around to it and then forgot! That will be the first thing on my update list. Your suggestions have been helpful in imagining that update.

Your first point is an excellent one. I'll need to figure out a way to incorporate a clickable menu. That would be nice.

You can also download the .aslx file and open it as if it were your game. That way, you can see it in action AND see how it looks through the editor.

Anyway, thanks for your feedback. Please PM me if you have any other suggestions. They all are helpful. Also, if you need help with Quest, don't hesitate to ask. A few of us, I think, lurk and lurk waiting to answer new questions! Good luck!

a problem with game making/coding, is that there's many ways/designs of doing/making things, so that is why a lot of the help is more generalized, as for specific help, you need to convey all the details of what you want, how you want it, and etc, and then we can give you specific help, but then that's not going to be of help to anyone else. Also, unfortunately unless you know coding decently, generalized help isn't of much help either, as you don't know how to take it's concept/example, and adjust it to whatever you need.

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I'd really suggest trying to go through most of the original tutorial (on the docs site), and if you need help with any parts of it, ask/get help on it. Get done the original tutorial well, as it's the basics of using quest and slightly gets into the vital concepts of scripting and attributes.

Also, ask a lot of questions, as this can help you understand quest and all of the terms and concepts better, which will help you out a lot, as you start to understand quest's structure, and maybe even into its coding and its coding structure. The quicker you can get an understanding all of the terms and etc helps out a lot, as I can attest to (look at my 'help me noob HK' thread ... once I started to understand all of the terms and concepts a lot better, I was a lot less overwhelmed, and was able to learn faster)

Also, read as many guides and etc/posts/threads as you can too:

1. http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/guides/ (guides)
2. viewforum.php?f=18 (more guides: libraries and code samples forum-board)
3. http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/ (examining/exploring/navigating the doc helps a lot too... click on the stuff at the top of the page: scripts ~ functions ~ types ~ elements, and drill down into them)

next, do XanMag's 'tutorial and templates' tutorial game, as he too was frustrated that there's still a huge jump from the original tutorial into actually making your own game on your own, and thus he created this "game", as that bridge from the original tutorial to doing stuff on your own, for your own game making

after that, then it's learning how to do the scripting (mainly the 'if' Script) and Attributes, as these two things are the basics of game making, especially when used together, lets you do 90% of everything you want to do in/for your game.

then... you slowly move on to learning more advanced stuff and also becoming familair with all of quest's built-in stuff (studying/using the doc site).

needless to say, none of this is easy, you must be patient and dedicated, taking small step by small step, every time you're successful with learning something new, and/or getting something to work right/figured out, is a huge achievement. Slowly those small successes start to build up, and you start becoming more knowledgeable and capable game maker.

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unfortunately, this is the same for any game making, there's a learning curve no matter what software/engine is provided to you, and quest is one of the best. Quest let's you get into game making the fastest and easiest, but it's still not easy nor fast.

It's taken me 4 years to get at where I'm at now, and thanks to quest, I'm now taking programming classes as my hopeful major/career in being a programmer, and am doing pretty well, I am amazed at how much quest (and its community here: users/mods, Pixie and Jay are workaholics when it comes to helping out and/or providing more libraries and code samples for quest, and Pertex too, can really help out) has helped me with learning to code/program, hehe.

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P.S.

if you ever get interested in learning to code with quest, I'd love to help you out, as it's not as scary as it seems, and it makes game making so much easier and faster too. Though, coding isn't for everyone (well it can be, again it's not as scary as it seems, meh), and quest has an excellent GUI~Editor for non-coders, but you got to learn it, and the concepts and 'if' logic mentality/mindset required of game making.

@XanMag: Thank you for your encouraging words, I understand that I still have much to learn and will have to be patient.

I have downloaded your .aslx file and will play it as a game asap. And of course I'll let you know when I come up with new suggestions. ) Also, thanks a lot for your help (that also goes for all the lovely other folks who are willing to help!:)), I'm sure I will definitely get back to it!

@HegemonKhan:

I see your point. I will follow your advice and go back to the original tutorial (and the links you provided, of course), mainly focusing on the 'If' scripts and attributes since those seem to be the key to what I'm trying to achieve in the end. And yes, I already started playing XanMag's 'game, thanks for pointing that out.

I understand that I must probably be way more patient (dedication is definitely there. ) and I'm really grateful for your help and all the advice of the lovely people here on the forum! THANK YOU!


Wow, 4 years!? Now that's what I call dedication indeed! Awesome.

Thank you for your lovely offer on helping me to learn code, I will definitely get back to you about that once I'm ready to take that plunge.

it's the slowest (and most boring) at the start (for example, when I was going through the original tutorial it was really difficult to plow through it as most of the stuff was really simple and boring, and I wanted to jump into game making of course, but while doing the steps/lessons in the tutorial made sense and was easy, when I tried to do my own stuff for my own game, I found myself lost as I didn't really fully understand those things well and nor their scope/application, on top of being overwhelmed by all of the different things I had learned through the tutorial, getting them all scrambled and muddled up together, laughs), with learning all of the basics, as it's all new to you. But once you learn Attribute usage and the 'if' Script usage, your advancement/learning gets faster (and is less boring), though it's still a very slow process, just because there's so much to learn (and as you learn more, you're now learning harder and harder stuff, so it's more difficult, frustrating, and slow), laughs.