Progress Report (March)

Henlo ewerynyan.

If I were a more optimistic person, I would say that March was good - but I am who I am, so I’ll settle for calling it passable. I did achieve the month’s ultimate goal: porting the dialogue system into the new project. Though, ‘porting’ isn’t exactly the right word, since I essentially rebuilt it from the ground up. I took some inspiration from the old system (which was a mess), but if you were to compare the two, you’d see just how different they are under the hood.

Here’s an overview of the month’s progress: 

- Implemented the dialogue system. This includes not just the core functionality (with some extras) but also a complete overhaul of dialogue branches/nods, and a custom tool for easier editing. From what I can tell, the system should be robust enough to allow me to import the dialogues from the demo project without a hitch. And if any adjustments are needed later, adding new features should be simple. The mode may still be a little rough around the edges (this will only become clear once I try implementing real dialogues, not placeholders with black silhouettes and colored rectangles for backgrounds) but overall, I’m more or less satisfied with the result. The only thing I can think of that I didn’t include but is commonly present in dialogue systems is a button to replay the voice line (on the dialogue mode UI and in the backlog). While I’ve added proper support for voices (I can even calculate how much seconds should be added to the game time or how quickly the text should be appearing based on the voice clip’s length), I have serious doubts that the project will ever include voiceovers;

- Improved the error/warning notification window. This improvement includes an elaborate script for dragging UI elements with configurable boundaries within the main canvas. The window can be triggered by switching the language to Russian while in the dialogue mode. Since the test dialogue nods aren’t translated, the notification window will appear to alert the user. I’ll likely remove this warning later, but for now, it serves as a reliable way to trigger a warning prompt;

- Fixed a visual glitch with the health and stamina fill bars. Resolving it required significant changes to the script’s logic to ensure a clean and manageable fix. The fill bar scripts are now more refined, and the bug has been eliminated;

- Made slight adjustments to the logic of hint boxes. There was a minor flaw in how hints functioned, which has now been corrected;

- Integrated the notification system into the project. I’m awfully content with how it turned out this time. In the demo project, that system - like most others - was a mess. Now, it runs smoothly with just two relatively small scripts, one of which simply stores a collection of strings. Not only does this system allow for triggering custom notifications, but it also enables modifications to standard ones. For example, I can now include the item’s name in the ‘Item Added’ notification if I want to, which is a nice touch;

- Enhanced the backlog system by properly storing entry timestamps. Now, entries can be displayed in different formats: a trimmed version without a timestamp [> entry], one that includes the hour and minute [(xx:xx) entry], or a detailed format with hour, minute, and second [(xx:xx:xx) entry]. Switching is done by pressing the scroll button. On that note, I also converted the calendar, coins, and scroll images into buttons - though I primarily needed the scroll, as I couldn’t find a good spot for a separate button on the panel;

- Made various smaller tweaks and fixes across correlated parts of the code;

- Oh, and I realized I forgot to switch a certain boolean in the settings window script, which made it impossible to save any changes when exiting the application. I've no clue how long that issue was there, considering it’s been some time since I last touched the settings.

I’m dreading April because this month, I’ll be working on the items, inventory, and trading systems. In the demo, these were arguably the most unstable systems, with bugs still popping up even near the demo development completion. I fear it even more than the combat system porting, despite the latter being more complex and involving more interconnected parts. I refuse to believe I’ll have it all done by May - but I’ll give it my best shot.

I will see you then.