Hi,

I was wondering if someone could help me, as a 'layman', in choosing the right thing to start working with. I have an idea for a game but I'm not a full-time programmer. I have done some programming in my life so the knowledge and ability to learn is there. However, I am not up to date with all the latest programs and languages so I am unshure what the best choice would be for my idea - both in user friendlyness (I am time bound) and possibility (of the programming or language doing what I require).

The central point, and therefore programming, of my game would probably be the dialogue tree. I need a game maker or programming language that can handle or allow me to do this. It should be able to handle a dialogue tree, with constants as well as variables, and percentages. To explain: imagine a game like Tradewinds (Google if you don't know). I would however just like a more dynamic dialogue tree and randomness inserted. For example:

Pirate game, you are the captain of your own ship. You click on the port Cape Town to sail to it, when you do this it runs the dialogue tree in the background. For a journey you have a couple of different groups of missions (or things that can happen): 1.Raids, 2.Lost, 3.Discovery, 4. Delay due to storms, 5.Smooth sailing. They each have a chance of occuring - lets say 30%, 5%, 5%, 10% & 60%. This time group 1 (Raids) comes up. Underneath this group you have 2 types: 1.Pirates, 2.Rival faction - 50% and 50% each. The computer calculates that this time it was 1. Pirates. So it pops up the message: "During your trip you are raided by pirates." and then you have your choices (the dialogue tree): "1.You decide to fight. 2.You decide to flee. 3.You decide to dump some of the cargo and then try to flee.". You can then make your choice - you choose 1. It then pops up the message "You decide to fight the pirates and win" (this is calculated in the background based on your ship stats for example).

Then after a successfull win, it jumps to another group in the tree, for example: Loot. It goes to, lets say: 3.Pirates. Underneath this section there are more groups: 1.Gold, 2.Weapons, 3.Treasure - 60%, 30% and 10%. Lets say you strike the third - treasure. Underneath Treasure you have a list of new missions, of which one is randomly chosen. It then pops up the description: "You find a chest that you can not unlock. It has the description "T.S. Smith, India" on it. You decide to keep it for later.". Now you gain a new mission, and when you visit India again it pops up you continue that story. etc.

Imagine the exact same for example but for dialogue. You walk into a pub at one of the ports, beneath "pubs" there are the groups 1.Brawl, 2.Quest, 3.Overheard, 4.Nothing - 15%, 15%, 10%, 60%. This time group 2 gest chosen. Beneath 2.Quest there is a list of quests and one is randomly chosen. "A man walks up to you and sais: "I have news of a treasure hidden somewhere in the Canary Islands. I would sell it to you for 500 gold. You interested?", your choices: "1.Yes, 2.No, 3.Beat it out of him". etc...

This is the main feature of the game: a "random" story generator/dialogue tree. That not only incorporates percentages but also allows for the updating of constants or aspects in the rest of the game - in the pirate loot you gain weapons that you add to your own and this icreases your firepower by 1 to 63 out of 100 for example.


Is there a game maker that I could use to easily create someting like this? One that has such a dynamic dialogue tree?
If not, could anyone suggest a good or the best/easiest programming language for doing this in?
I did think that Interactive Fiction makers might be a good start but even there one finds quite a lot and not very clear descriptions on what each one is capable of.

The platform would be windows. Visuals would be minimal at best - perhaps a picture of each port and the worlmap or something - the focus is the dialogue.If it is the best it can even be browser based/html programming. could maybe turn it into an online game or something.

Any help or suggestions regarding this would be most welcomed.

Thanks in advance.

You could try any of these:

Game Maker
Construct
Multimedia Fusion 2

Game Maker has some pretty simple GML features if you wanted to use code only.

Trying to think of a nice way to say this where you would not be offended or discouraged, but can't really seem to find a way to soften the blow.

That game has pretty much already been made, it was called Sid Meier's Pirates.

Sorry about that.

theTroll