From Sawyer's LiveJournal post

 

http://www.parisgdc.com/conf/conf.php?lang=en&conf=78

 

Leaving the Door Open: Developer Facilitation of End-User Content Creation

GAME DESIGN TRACK

 

INTENDED AUDIENCE / This presentation is intended for developers of any discipline interested in promoting the creation of end-user content for their games. Knowledge of engine and tool development may be beneficial for attendees.

 

TAKE AWAY / Attendees will gain insight into the difficult decisions involved in supporting end-user content creation during, and after, the development a stand-alone product.

 

DESCRIPTION / Many developers are learning that one of the best ways to generate excitement about and extend the life of a product is to support the creation of end-user content. Even early decisions about a project

Once again I have to bow before our ultimate Stalker-san

 

*bows*

Goodness. You are one hell of a stalker ninja.

 

Good find. Hopefully, there will be some sort of end-user content for the PC users for any Onyx engine based games.

I see what they did there, naming their engine after a pokeman.

I notice the Bioware guy's doing a session on not using Excel for writing dialogue. Maybe they flipped a coin for it?

He must have some kind of meta-search engine, which cross references google finds with names in a database that he maintains...

 

There is no other rational explanation

 

Nice find. They seem to like colourful rocks

I eagerly await the Mudkip engine that will power Aliens 2.

I notice the Bioware guy's doing a session on not using Excel for writing dialogue. Maybe they flipped a coin for it?

It's funny he's doing that talk, because when I saw him (I think) speak at GDC San Francisco, I kept thinking, "Why doesn't someone give a talk on dialogue tools?" Excepting Obsidian, BioWare, and a few other companies that I know of, most companies write their strings in Excel. Lunatic barbarism. It's not like string databases and front ends are that hard to set up.

 

String/dialogue editing will be part of my talk. The NWN2 editor's string editing capability is actually pretty terrible, but the cascading tree-based dialogue editor is pretty darn good. Onyx's dialogue editor (which we are using for Aliens) is flowchart-based, which I personally think is very nice.

Flowchart? That sounds pretty awesome. I'm guessing that posting a screenie of the dialogue editor would be asking too much.

 

 

Would it be possible to implement such an editor in NWN2's toolset?

It needs a bit more work before it will be presentable. Just imagine a Visio flowchart, where each node or reply is a shape and all nodes and replies are connected by lines that auto-sort themselves. Links to pre-existing nodes go to "ghosted" nodes so the flowchart doesn't become a big mess.

 

I don't know if it would be possible to implement the Onyx dialogue editor into the NWN2 toolset. I actually think that the NWN2 toolset's dialogue editor is pretty good. Onyx's dialogue editor is an experiment of sorts.

That sounds very ergonomic

 

Are there different types of nodes? Like different nodes for different dialogue line categories, for example.

 

And is it possible to connect nodes across different conversations. What about connecting dialogue nodes to item appearances, and other similar triggered events?

I notice the Bioware guy's doing a session on not using Excel for writing dialogue. Maybe they flipped a coin for it?

It's funny he's doing that talk, because when I saw him (I think) speak at GDC San Francisco, I kept thinking, "Why doesn't someone give a talk on dialogue tools?" Excepting Obsidian, BioWare, and a few other companies that I know of, most companies write their strings in Excel. Lunatic barbarism. It's not like string databases and front ends are that hard to set up.

 

String/dialogue editing will be part of my talk. The NWN2 editor's string editing capability is actually pretty terrible, but the cascading tree-based dialogue editor is pretty darn good. Onyx's dialogue editor (which we are using for Aliens) is flowchart-based, which I personally think is very nice.

 

Hmm, nice to hear. I love working with trees and it's good to see you guys using custom-made data structures, though I kind of assumed that every company did.

 

Someone resking that to black and add kewlz Obz mark and you have your new logo for the engine

Done!

Damn forum background color

 

Maybe a little brighter color then, let's choose this onyx color instead

 

edit: nvm, my screen had problems

Edited April 22, 200817 yr by Xard

[quote name='H

Thanks H

It might be an exercise in futility, but I wonder if any of the developers could tell anything about the Onyx engine (without giving anything away about the Aliens game)? Features, POV's, scripting, any toolset, anything really.

 

Would it be suitable for something like The Black Hound?

I think Josh said something about flowchart-based dialogue earlier on. Don't know if that's a part of Onyx.

Something about Slam! Duh-Duh-Duh

Head tracking is in Onyx and it owns. Aliens will own.

 

Adam Brennecke made it happen.

Head tracking is in Onyx and it owns. Aliens will own.

 

Adam Brennecke made it happen.

 

 

I hope it is better implemented than it was in Oblivion. It was so mechanical in that game that it looked totally fake. The only time a head needs to point directly at you is when you initiate conversation. HAving a head autmatically start tracking when you get within a certain distance is a poor way to do it. If you can make it more event specific, say if you are acting unusual and then people start to track you, that woudl be OK. But if not better not to do anything beyond orienting head direction during diaslogue.

And here I was thinking he was talking about disembodied heads rolling around the floor.

Head tracking is in Onyx and it owns. Aliens will own.

Gameplay video or it didn't happen.

Head tracking is in Onyx and it owns. Aliens will own.

 

Adam Brennecke made it happen.

Awesome. This is better than the crates...

 

Off topic: Any chance of getting this head-tracking awesomeness into NWN2, by the way? While having dwarves stare at my character's crotch is very flattering, it can be a little creepy.