Dialogue system

[redmedved2]

In my dialogue system, there are many character events and for each one there is a variable that defines its dialogue. By default, the characters have dialogue variables equal to zero. But as you progress through the story, different variable values can be assigned to characters in quest events. And so, if the character's dialogue variable is 1, then dialogue 1 will happen when you interact, and then the variable will become zero again.

Example: So you can go through the quest, in it, you were told to talk to Karl, Karl's dialogue is now 1, you interact with him, he asks you to talk to Mike, which means that the dialogue variable for Mike becomes for example 5, and the Karl variable returns to zero. And so on.

Once upon a time I created this system and thought it was cool and working, but now I realize that it only works for a linear story. So I would like to ask you how you can organize a dialogue system with characters in the open world, where for each individual quest the character can give you a separate line and advance the quest. When each quest follows the previous one.

But if you do 2 quests at the same time, in both of which you need to talk to a character, the system will break. If the first quest gave the variable a value of 4, and the second quest gave it a value of 6, then when you interact with the character, dialogue 6 will be played, and then the value will be 0 again. You will never see dialogue 4.

I would like to know how you can make a working dialogue for a game with a nonlinear quests system in which the characters can play several lines from different quests.

 

[Andar]

you would have to use quest-specific variables instead of actor-specific.
this will use a lot more variables and make the dialoge events more complex, but you can't have everything without a price.

 

[ShadowDragon]

each NPC require it own variable, and using variables, it can be a pain,
I have ULS system that it can use it own variable but also NO variable
and based on it's level which you can set to interact for different dialogues,
this is NON-Actor database structure but through JSON for more control.

this way, it's easier to setup dialogues if you prefer, but there are other
methodes as well, I think everyone use their own way.