RMMZ Message Core VisuStella - Porting dialogue from MV to MZ

[MadChap]

EDIT : Problem solved by Proxxie_Desu on post #6.

Original post below:

Hello.

I am in the process of porting old projects from MV to MZ, and I've stumbled upon some problem that I thought could be fixed by plugin parameters, but I don't know how to do it.

If you used Yanfly's plugin in MV, you already know you could put on a window for the character's name. You only had to write "\n<Character's Name>" on the message window before writing the dialogue.

The thing is, since this function is now (finally) built-in in MZ, the code has disappeared and been replaced by \N[x] where you can show an actor's name inside the dialogue by entering the related number, which is a different function.

The problem is that my dialogue now all show the "\n<Character's Name>" command in-game, without the name box.

I tried to see in the parameters if there was a way to still maintain the old name window command, but I couldn't find such an option. Deleting and adding commands in each separate JSON files sounds like a hassle too, especially if the game has a lot of maps & text.

Do you know of any way to make the old commands work again?

Additionnally, and unrelated : Do you think there's an easy way for using MV's tools such as Mado directly with MZ? I don't think I've seen the devs talk about any integration of these tools yet.

Thank you!

 

[Proxxie_Desu]

It would probably be best to fully move over to the new way of doing things. I plan on writing a python script to change the MapXXX.json files directly to the new way of handling names once I get around to porting my game. Seems like it would be a pretty simple task for someone who's good with regular expressions. Hopefully someone will post one soon, I probably won't get around to doing my own for another month or so. Sorry I can't be of more help right now

 

[MadChap]

It would probably be best to fully move over to the new way of doing things. I plan on writing a python script to change the MapXXX.json files directly to the new way of handling names once I get around to porting my game. Seems like it would be a pretty simple task for someone who's good with regular expressions. Hopefully someone will post one soon, I probably won't get around to doing my own for another month or so. Sorry I can't be of more help right now

Well, you're giving hope, I guess that's already something, given how it seems like I'm the only one bothered by this, or at least talking about it.

Thank you for your input!

 

[Shaz]

\N[x] is a default of MV and just displays the name in the text box. This doesn't necessarily mean you want to use it in the name window. If you were to revert to that method, what would you do for a party where the player got to name several characters, then you wanted to use those names together in a text box?

Also, \N[x] doesn't cater for name boxes where the speaker is not a party member.

I haven't explored the replacement options in the message core, but there might be a way to make it look for the pattern you're already using. If not, I think the best thing would be to post in the VisuStella thread with a request to make the plugin recognize the old escape code for the name box. There will be a lot of people porting programs who are using this code and won't want to go through (either manually or via some additional plugin) and change them all.

 

[MadChap]

\N[x] is a default of MV and just displays the name in the text box. This doesn't necessarily mean you want to use it in the name window. If you were to revert to that method, what would you do for a party where the player got to name several characters, then you wanted to use those names together in a text box?

Also, \N[x] doesn't cater for name boxes where the speaker is not a party member.

I haven't explored the replacement options in the message core, but there might be a way to make it look for the pattern you're already using. If not, I think the best thing would be to post in the VisuStella thread with a request to make the plugin recognize the old escape code for the name box. There will be a lot of people porting programs who are using this code and won't want to go through (either manually or via some additional plugin) and change them all.

Asked on the thread! Thank you.

 

[Proxxie_Desu]

I created a utility that may work for you. I intend for it to be the base for converting my own project. I tested it a little, but only on a small number of simple maps, so please give it a spin and let me know if/how it works.

This utility does a few things, all of them (currently) related to Yanfly's message plugins:

• It converts nameplates from YEP format (\n<Bob>) to MZ's format
• It gives you the option to convert YEP-formatted bold and italics (\fi) to VisuStella's much more sensibly-formatted ones. Note: if you were sloppy in closing your YEP bold/italics, it'll throw errors (alerts) and refuse to work. The error tells you on what map and event it found the problem, but you'll only see the first one it runs into. I imagine this part will be very annoying when I get around to converting my project.
• It gives you the option to replace any YEP message macros you had with any text you like (including VisuStella macros). In case you used message macros for displaying nameplates (like I did) you also have the option of telling it that the macro is for a name. In that case it will put your replacement text in MZ's name area. Be very careful when using this (especially the non-name part.) Though intended for YEP macros, it actually just replaces text (in messages/dialogues). If you choose your string to replace unwisely, it could wreak all sorts of havoc with the output data. This is the part I've tested least, and it has the most potential to do craziness.

It shouldn't mess with the actual files you feed it, but I'd strongly recommend backing them up just to be sure. When it's done, you can click the download button and get a zip file of the converted maps. I'm not sure I got the synchronicity right, so you might want to give it a few seconds if you give it a large number of files.

I decided to do it in JavaScript rather than Python, since I'm not as familiar with Python, and I figured I'd need to make something similar to convert my players' save files once my port is done, anyway.

You can view my source here:
https://github.com/proxxie-desu/mapConverter

And download the zip here:
https://github.com/proxxie-desu/mapConverter/archive/master.zip

Just unzip it and open index.html. Then tell it what files you want it to convert (they must be Map***.json files), set your options and hit 'Convert'. Give it a few seconds then download.

Let me know if you encounter any issues; I'd like to have it well-troubleshooted (troubleshot?) for my own eventual use as well. If it performs well, perhaps I'll post a thread about it, I'm sure it would be useful to many (and more beta testers!). Though I don't want to field feature requests.

 

[MadChap]

I created a utility that may work for you. I intend for it to be the base for converting my own project. I tested it a little, but only on a small number of simple maps, so please give it a spin and let me know if/how it works.

This utility does a few things, all of them (currently) related to Yanfly's message plugins:

• It converts nameplates from YEP format (\n<Bob>) to MZ's format
• It gives you the option to convert YEP-formatted bold and italics (\fi) to VisuStella's much more sensibly-formatted ones. Note: if you were sloppy in closing your YEP bold/italics, it'll throw errors (alerts) and refuse to work. The error tells you on what map and event it found the problem, but you'll only see the first one it runs into. I imagine this part will be very annoying when I get around to converting my project.
• It gives you the option to replace any YEP message macros you had with any text you like (including VisuStella macros). In case you used message macros for displaying nameplates (like I did) you also have the option of telling it that the macro is for a name. In that case it will put your replacement text in MZ's name area. Be very careful when using this (especially the non-name part.) Though intended for YEP macros, it actually just replaces text (in messages/dialogues). If you choose your string to replace unwisely, it could wreak all sorts of havoc with the output data. This is the part I've tested least, and it has the most potential to do craziness.

It shouldn't mess with the actual files you feed it, but I'd strongly recommend backing them up just to be sure. When it's done, you can click the download button and get a zip file of the converted maps. I'm not sure I got the synchronicity right, so you might want to give it a few seconds if you give it a large number of files.

I decided to do it in JavaScript rather than Python, since I'm not as familiar with Python, and I figured I'd need to make something similar to convert my players' save files once my port is done, anyway.

You can view my source here:
https://github.com/proxxie-desu/mapConverter

And download the zip here:
https://github.com/proxxie-desu/mapConverter/archive/master.zip

Just unzip it and open index.html. Then tell it what files you want it to convert (they must be Map***.json files), set your options and hit 'Convert'. Give it a few seconds then download.

Let me know if you encounter any issues; I'd like to have it well-troubleshooted (troubleshot?) for my own eventual use as well. If it performs well, perhaps I'll post a thread about it, I'm sure it would be useful to many (and more beta testers!). Though I don't want to field feature requests.

Hello.

Thank you so much for being so quick and for sharing your work publicly.

I have downloaded your tool and used it on the 2 projects (70+ maps & 200+ maps) I was in the process of porting and I'm happy to say it worked flawlessly, quickly batch converting the dialogue from the old format to the new one and therefore solving my problem entirely.

I haven't checked all the maps but it seems to have worked for all the ones I did see. Did some playtesting, haven't run into any problem.

I haven't checked the Bold/Italic and Macro format options though, so I don't know if they are flawless too, but the tool did work and it is very useful. It definitely deserves a thread of its own, as I am sure it would serve many people.

Anyway, thank you so much, Proxxie_Desu for solving my problem and for helping the community. Cheers!