What I Want In A Text Box

       I need an efficient speech bubble system like you see in tons of RPGs for my games. Unfortunately there are not many templates for one floating out there (either that or I can't find them) so I need to make one for myself. I need to make something that separates text into 3 or 4 lines, allows for color coded words like you see above, and automatically extend the number of pages based on how many lines of text are required. I'd also like it to spit out each character one at a time with a beep matching either a male, female, really high, or really low pitch.

      I'm skipping out on certain things that seem really difficult to pull of for the time being like shaking letters, bold & italics, changing fonts, auto language adjustments, and varied font size. If I do this properly, I may be able to add those features in as I get better at this whole game development thing (or meet someone who's good at it and wants to work with me).

       It'll take up a large chunk of time but this is worth the effort. I can reuse and refine this textbox system for use in the absurd amount of games in my mind. I better be careful now to make a strong and cleanly coded foundation or else I risk making a mess for myself and any people I decide to work with.

New OBS Video Recording Software

     After putting out a call for help on the development video side of things my buddy Cybermagus showed me Open Broadcaster Software. It's an open source tool made for livestreams and Let's Plays and it works like a dream! It records just the computer audio and ignores the mic input just like I wanted and comes with an adjustable screen resolution and window size adjuster. In addition there' tons of customizable options that will let me do much nicer development videos and even game trailers in the future!

    See a Recording Test Video I made for it on YouTube!

E3 2014 is Over... Back To Work!

     E3 was a rejuvenating experience. I feel proud to be a game developer and want to push myself to reach a point where something I made can stand tall next to other games at the convention. With it behind me, it's time to get back to work and there's plenty to do. This week will be all about making stuff I need to be ready for making a text box system through next week. I need an NPC, a treasure chest you can interact with (don't worry about saving it's state just yet), and writing down exactly how the speech system will work on paper before coding anything. Let's see what I can accomplish by tomorrow...

Status Report #42

I knew next to nothing would get done all week.

     Talk about an unproductive week. Nearly nothing got done but come on, E3. I was busy connecting to the rest of the gaming world and taking in the whole show. Things should ease back into work mode starting today. I still have a whole text box/speech system to figure out.