Dialogue and logic - Writing for Video Games - page 77

Edwards: I heard that you witnessed the shooting.
Wilks: That so? // Nervous, but puts on brave face
Edwards: Just tell me what happened!
Wilks: Get lost! I didn't see nothing!
// Edwards looks angry - he should have handled it better
wilks_shooting = true;

}
else // Subsequent times

{

Edwards: Tell me about the shooting!

Wilks: I got nothing to say.

}

The problem we have created here is that talking with Wilks appears to be a
dead end unless the player can find some way to leverage the information
from him. It could be that another character in the game offers the oppor-
tunity to do this and gives the player information which helps resolve this
conflict. Because you want to create scenes that respond to the information
the player character holds, make them as naturalistic as possible and minimise
the need to repeat sections of dialogue, the level of complexity can begin to
rise swiftly. Expanding on our example, the player gets the leverage he needs
from a character called Johnny. Because he could have talked to Johnny either
before Wilks or after he talked to Wilks, this must be taken into account
when thinking through the logic and constructing the scene.

Edwards: Hey, Wilks. // Greeting used every time

if(wilks_johnny == false) // Not spoken to Wilks about Johnny

{

if(wilks_shooting == false) // Talk about shooting for first time

{

Wilks: What's up?
Edwards: I heard that you witnessed the shooting.
Wilks: That so? // Nervous, but puts on brave face
Edwards: Just tell me what happened!
Wilks: Get lost! I didn't see nothing!
// Edwards looks angry - he should have handled it better
wilks_shooting = true;

}