[Ohrrpgce] Game data

[James Paige]

I don't know if you have been following the mailing list discussion, but 
Mike is working on a binary XML-like format for arbitrary data callled 
RELOAD. We will be using RELOAD format for various purposes as we see 
fit, but one of those possible uses is to allow you to add arbitrary 
free-form data to your game that you can manipulate with plotscripting. 
It think it is pretty much exactly what you are looking for.

---
James

On Mon, Nov 24, 2008 at 10:55:15AM -0800, Adam Perry wrote:
> Okay, this is a thought-in-process, so bear with me and please tack on
> your suggestions.
> 
> As plotscripting becomes more advanced, the things we can do with it
> also become more advanced. Right now, I'm writing a "total remake"
> script that will hopefully allow users to easily create Dragon
> Quest-style battles. One of the largest obstacles in doing so is the
> lack of interoperability between the game file and the script. I'd
> like to be able to reference arbitrary internal game data from the
> script, but currently the only way to store that arbitrary data is in
> textbox format.
> 
> Let's take a simpler (albeit fictional) example. Suppose I have a quiz
> game where I display a question and four randomly-sorted answers. I
> can store all the text for these in textboxes, and it sort of makes
> sense in this context, since that's all textual data that requires
> little processing. However, suppose I want to create a game around it,
> one that uses dialogue. Initially, I decide that I'll reserve the
> first 100 textboxes for questions and the rest for dialogue, but it
> later becomes obvious that 100 questions was insufficient. My script
> becomes hackish because I'm intermingling two types of data.
> 
> In the case of the DQ scripts, it's a lot of data to store. Here's a
> sample text box storing data for an attack:
>  Slow                                // name
>  ${S0} fires a laser at ${S1},       // description
>  cutting ${S4} speed in half!        // desc cont'd
>  S5 I6 P13 vi                        // appearance, whatever
>  A0 %50 SS e                         // cut one enemy's Spd by 50%
>  P10                                 // this costs 10% of max PP
>  FU D                                // fail versus undead, don't display damage
>                                      // no chaining, either
> 
> Now, this is functional to be sure, and you might even be able to make
> out what the abbreviations mean in this case. But it's very ugly.
> 
> Here's what I'm proposing: an "Extra Data" editor. Something that can
> be accessed and perhaps altered via plotscripting. You'd be able to
> set up sets of data -- in the other example, I might set up a
> "questions" data type that consisted of five strings that I'd call
> "question, answer A, answer B, answer C, answer D." I could then fetch
> them via plotscripting:
> 
> question id := random(0, max question)
> get game data string (game data:questions, game
> data:questions:question, question id, 0)
> get game data string (game data:questions, game data:questions:answer
> a, question id, 1)
> get game data string (game data:questions, game data:questions:answer
> b, question id, 2)
> get game data string (game data:questions, game data:questions:answer
> c, question id, 3)
> get game data string (game data:questions, game data:questions:answer
> d, question id, 4)
> 
> More generally,
> get game data (data bank, data field, entry id) returns an integer
> get game data string (data bank, data field, entry id, string id) sets
> string #string id to the appropriate value
> 
> Maybe "set game data" functions as well, but altered data wouldn't be
> able to be saved (at least not in the current SAV format). I'm less
> concerned about the ability to alter the game data.
> 
> Does this make sense? I'm sure the idea of arbitrary data types is not
> foreign to any of the developers, but hopefully I've presented an
> adequate use case.
> 
> --
> "Today is victory over yourself of yesterday; tomorrow is victory over
> lesser men" -Miyamoto Musashi.
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