Coding BDTH (SPOILERS!!!!!!!111)

[Ben]

I'm moving the "stove" discussion to this thread, with the warning up top, so that people who want to actually, you know, enjoy the final product won't have their joyous experience squashed like a kitten by this discussion.

With regards to coding gas (and I too forget all the Hugo syntax), I was thinking that there'd be a global variable denoting whether the gas was being let forth into the apartment or not, and then a global variable for "ventilationLevel" which would be lowered or raised by opening/closing windows, doors, and other objects which I won't mention in this thread.

Once the gas is turned on, a timer starts, and after the timer gets through about five clicks, the player starts getting the appropriate description of how "gassy" it is in the house, based on the ventilation level.

Also, any time the ventilation level changes, the timer starts again. Once the timer is up, it then updates the description of the "gassiness" for the player.

The timer might only have to be a small number, like "3". I just don't want the player to get instant gratification. Actually, I'd prefer that the player got no gratification, but the sponsors have expressed some concerns about that.

Also, about the stove... In an absolutely perfect world, it's got a dial on it that goes "OFF, LOW, MED, HIGH, LITE" (or maybe just OFF, LOW, HIGH, LITE, or maybe just OFF, ON, LITE.) If the player turns it to LITE and actually makes the stove start getting hot, then there's none of this gassy stuff going on. Attempts to cook things, of course, will no doubt be met by appropriately condescending and hateful messages. But in order to really get the gas going, the player has to just turn it to "HIGH", without lighting it. (*)

If you had other thoughts, please let them be known.

Thank you.



(*) And in fact, maybe the order of the dial should be: "OFF, LITE, ON", so that if the player just goes, "turn dial to right", he'll never get happy... the player actually has to "turn dial to ON" (or to "HIGH") or his dastardly combustible plan will never come to fruition.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Let me ask you this.

How crucial is the "lite" versus "on" thing? I ask because if you have two variables ("off" and "on") you can use the switchedon or switchedoff attribute. If there are three then it means approximately one more line of code to use something else.

However, if the stove is just switched on or switched off, then a level of player frustration is eliminated. Namely, the effect of, "aahrhghg!!!! I TURNED the motherafhhfsdaiung stove on, but no GAS apeparehrhed!!!" When in fact they turned it to "LITE" and not "ON." So they were wrong, moo-hoo-hoo-ha-ha.

Actually, if the stove wasn't an example of an object that I plan on placing on the archive or something, I would just give you the finger and make it on/off. But since it is, I think I will map different levels of "being on" into it. So forget I asked a question in this. Nevermind. Nevermind!!

[Ben]

"On/Off" I don't think is sufficient, only because turning a stove on should NOT cause it to start releasing gas. The gas should be getting burned up, and thus making the stove hot.

If indeed a stove worked like that, I would blow up my apartment every time I reheated a slice of pizza.

If your understanding of stoves differs from mine, I am delighted to entertain your perspective.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I'm not going to mess with a guy who implemented DENSITY.

So. Off - Lite - On it is!

[Ben]

(Oh, and when it's on "Lite", it should continue to give out a clicking sound. Like this: "click, click, click, click...")

This is great! Now that I'm not coding it anymore, I can demand whatever I want and then complain if it doesn't get done!

[Kent]

I’ll abstain from the OFF-LITE-ON debate except to encourage the use of object properties instead of global variables where appropriate. Not that Hugo is in any way super-strict in terms of object-orientation, but I always find it easier for transplanting objects into other games, toying with them in isolation, etc.

[Ben]

Jesus, look who thinks he's a Hugo expert all of a sudden.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

This, right here, is why Hugo is one of the greatest languages of all time. (This is not me starting an IF debate, because what I am about to say would work for Graham and MJR as well. I'm talking about languages as a whole.) If I go to a LISP forum and casually mention how I am gleefully running around using for loops instead of foreach, there is a very low chance that John McCarthy is going to pop up and give me proper advice. Especially since the man is 73 years old and there's an equal chance that whatever advice he would give would be unsent because his bowels were acting up and he didn't get round to hitting the "submit" key.

Y'know, I was toying around with doing an AGS game (that Sierra-type programming language that came out a little while back) or an ultimately-emulated Atari 2600 game for my next thing, but the likelihood of being able to bounce ideas off the language creator would kind of be on the low side. Er, especially concerning the Atari 2600 thing. If I ever have a daughter, I hope she finds a man who treats her as well as Kent treats his Hugo programmers.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

(Oh, and when it's on "Lite", it should continue to give out a clicking sound. Like this: "click, click, click, click...")

This is great! Now that I'm not coding it anymore, I can demand whatever I want and then complain if it doesn't get done!

Also!!!!!!

I had to finish up One of the Bruce's PDF manual for the Lord of the Rings game by today because he's going to Jagfest tomorrow. There's a pretty good chance that it will be on AtariAge tomorrow, so I'll link it if it's indeed posted. But anyway, as he had a strict deadline and the only deadline that BDTH has faced me with is, "it'd be nice if you got the stuff you said you'd do finished before Ben flops over dead due to looking directly into the angry face of the "Safeway-Brand © "Safeway" Vodka" blood godling, I had to get that all set first. But now BDTH has my complete attention, so hopefully this baby is one that can be put to bed ASAP.

[Ben]

Also, is there some way we can work a cemetary scene into the end of the game somehow?

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I don't know if that will work from a narrative standpoint, but I am in fact currently changing the "house" you have created so far to a "bar." You may wish to change the name of the game to "Burning Down The Bar," I dunno (that might mess up the BDTH abbreviation we've been going with) -- your call.

[Lex]

Y'know, I was toying around with doing an AGS game (that Sierra-type programming language that came out a little while back) or an ultimately-emulated Atari 2600 game for my next thing, but the likelihood of being able to bounce ideas off the language creator would kind of be on the low side. Er, especially concerning the Atari 2600 thing.

I played with AGS for two weeks when my family was in France, and there wasn't anything else to do (Scots can't go out in the heat, our shoulders steam).
The system is easy to learn for the basics, and if you want to do anything groovy the documentation is there - and the bit I really loved is the incredible simpleness with which one can implement conversation. This is what could make a really good Point & Click Robb Sherwin game. With all the conversation branches, etc. that you like.
I actually wrote a many-many-page script and a bunch of puzzles for implementation in AGS, never got round to it though. It was actually a Parrish-class Hatefest, so maybe I should tear that up.