Vega Strike Forums

The discussion of mission formatting and data representation has come up again and so here I come with a new thread. The current mission script format is difficult for non coders to deal with or to even create anything with. So, we need an easy to read (and build) way to create new missions so that the writers can just punch in the dialog and a few other mission related variables and be done with it. At least for simple non-campaign missions. Campaign related missions will, on the other and, need some way to tie together and become a non-linear (kind of like a choose your own adventure book) set of missions. Though we can not have this fork into a large number of possible story endings.

Someone somewhere said it best, the very begining of the story should set the stage for what kind of character you will become. Trader, pirate, smuggler, military.. but alas, this will need to be worked out by the story writers. All we need to concern ourselves in this thread is the best way to make life easier for the writers. So, ideas, thoughts? I will post a few things after awhile going over the current python related functions etc. For now... I hear my little demons in the background causing chaos.

No activity huh? I see this as two separate but related (possibly nested) editors. One is a mission editor where you set mission specific items (start, fixer icon, pay, type, objectives, requirements, etc.) the other is a campaign weaver where you set the starting mission/other interaction then success failure paths in kind of a drag-and-drop environment. It also would be nice to include a "player choice" bracket that the player's selection picks the mission script.

Like an activity diagram, user choices are just two active state transitions within the campaign graph. When the player triggers one, state changes, and the other transition ceases to be active.

State diagrams, thus, make a very good data model for the campaign

A Mission editor should be made to work like FRED in Freespace 1/2. I would envision a system where you can physically drag/drop wings/units etc directly onto a 3d area and setup complex scripting etc in a graphical way. Maybe base it on Fred's design but rather allow for each fred style mission to take place at a waypoint in vegastrike.