Fallout 3/NV Dialogues

[OneWayVector]

Greetings FNV wanderers!

 

Is it possible to change the dialogue "text" from an external source during run-time?

 

For the purpose of (for example) linking a chat-bot to FNV, a means of generating dynamic dialogues on screen

could present their output to FNV directly.

 

I do note that there is a way of interacting with the file-system (in a small but meaningful way) as a means

of output and to come extent from the FNV as input. I am well aware of the limitations of dialogue reply options

(prompts) which are fixed number, but can be worked around to a certain extent...

 

Reading with great interest in anything remotely close,

 

OneWayVector

[A.J.]

I remember the multiplayer attempts of both fallout and skyrim had a working ingame chat

But I guess the biggest problem would be linking the external source, you should need to know how to handle these third party things

[OneWayVector]

Thanks for the suggestion A.J.!

 

Interesting, an in-game chat; but not a direct replacement / interface with the current dialogue system...

 

I can hazard to guess that syncronising in-game information with an ingame chat interface would be very challenging.

 

Pausing the game-world is not impossible, but message passing with other software may well require extensive

knowledge of FNV or hacking it.

[A.J.]

if you forget for a minute about NV, can you make your own chat? a working chat between computers? creating everything necessary to sync these datas in, for example, using some server, and periodically pull the informations from it as text files?

 

EDIT - PS: pausing the game world and do your own business is pretty possible. For example, in our logbook you have both the modes, realtime and paused game

[OneWayVector]

Looking up the wiki for vaultmp.com, and I think it is a possibility with a loop-back port from a local server (on the same computer).

 

The next issue would be the syncronisation of both text, in-game values and more infuriating the selection of actor target for 1 to 1

simulated communication, or target(s) for simulated broadcasting.

 

Damn will have to see if there are any related function call-backs...

 

Which may well lead to Events / Quests / Topics are passed not just text...

 

Edit: Might as well add that this will chew more CPU and some more precious cycles from the game engine then before... 

Edit Redux: Might have to scale back and get just text done first...

[A.J.]

if you forget for a minute about NV, can you make your own chat? a working chat between computers? creating everything necessary to sync these datas in, for example, using some server, and periodically pull the informations from it as text files?

 

If you can manage to do this, the GECK part is doable.

 

But then, why someone would want to chat on a single player game?

There's steam chat, you can even play in window mode and use any other kind of chat, etc.

Now this probably could be done as proof of concept... but on a practical point of view, what are the pros of a mod like that?

[OneWayVector]

Simulating broadcasted communication was my original intention...

 

When pairing text and GECK data, communicating with groups become possible and the processing of AI decisions of animation calls, actor values, pseudo Dialogue tree can separated from the game Engine.

 

I would imagine a scenario:

 

- Walking up to Cottonwood Cove as a Male Courier for the first time with a holstered Red Glare launcher; and approaching two Legionary Recruits and Legionary Decanus.

 

- The Courier gives a brief Neutral greeting.

 

- The two Recruits would unholster their weapons and change their stance (animation) and the Decanus would reply (Not as a 1 to 1 communication in Dialogues) curtly waving animation.

 

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I would imagine the means in which this might occur:

 

A> To start before the Courier has communicated, there would be constant polling of a fixed distance for NPCs near the Courier, an identification of the type of NPCs, passing this

      information at a lower polling rate to the Program.

 

B> Pre-defined animation calls, and Actor values on demand are available through a script interface for GECK. The Program has the targets, they just need to trigger its decisions

    at the next call-back like the VaultMP OnPlayerChat?

 

Would this be something useful?

 

Edit: Going to work on this for now... and mark it as resolved but I will appreciate any further suggestions.

[A.J.]

oh. I'm sorry but I really make it very hard to understand what you mean in your previous message.

Mainly, I don't understand what everything wrote before is connected with that scenario: if you control the Courier, and the two legionaries are npcs, it can already be done on GECK...

[OneWayVector]

Hey A.J.,

 

In regards to the Legionary scenario, it can certainly be done by GECK exclusively...

 

- Make a UI with pre-defined emotes (that can be key-bound - I must note you have done this in part )

- A script as an interface to (on a simple level) call the animations after getting the ActorIDs (Again you have done something like this as  )

- Another interface to a system that tracks the various NPC characteristics

- Link up the animations to the NPC characterisitcs

- Another script (possibly) to queue, process and time animation requests (If needed).

 

Something like this might be possible...

 

Edit: Your Idles and behaviours  mod livens up the wasteland with its character, but I think its full potential IMHO requires persistent NPC changes in their character in response to your animations.

[A.J.]

Edit: Your Idles and behaviours  mod livens up the wasteland with its character, but I think its full potential IMHO requires persistent NPC changes in their character in response to your animations.

 

Well, what you wrote is more or less what I have in mind for that mod (mmh, the first 2 steps, maybe). However, the quantity of reactions won't be exagerated. They'll have reactions only in some specific cases. The reason why I would prefer to not abuse of these mechanics is because potentially you could change the behaviours of some key characters, this could lead to a serie of bugs in vanilla quests. NPC AI can be charming but hard to handle, I prefer to not risk too much.

 

Some innocent examples are obvious: you act angry with someone, he could decide to attack you, you kill him, he was a key npc, it will fail his quest - it's FINE, because you(player) can easily understand that you did something wrong. But there are some cases which are much more subtle. For example, I'll give the player the ability to scream, to call someone far away. Potentially, there are remote possibilities where this could cause issues. Imagine a quest where you are supposed to talk to someone in jail. To prevent this, to prevent that you talk in a wrong moment, they could simply put the npc too far away. Then, when the quest stage is right, they'll change the npc package and move it near the jail door, so that you can talk to him (it's just an example-this reminds me skyrim...). Now, if you have the ability to scream to interact with someone far away, potentially you can talk to him even in the wrong quest stage. If that stage wasnt' "protected" with proper conditions, this could lead to a break in the questline.

[OneWayVector]

Working around quests, yes that could be difficult...

 

I did note that t3589 uses VATs to check if the NPC can see the Player Character, but alternatively could distance be measured in the cell?

<Looks like something I will take a good look at soon... well after Pillars of Eternity  )

 

More importantly, if an NPC is in a quest, should they be ignored?

or the other option would be FormLists of Quests that NPCs participate in that are essential to the game and simply exclude those NPCs.

 

This could certainly limit the number of NPCs that can be affected by the animations but the original game might be preserved... (Not perfect but somewhere I can look up).

 

Strictly, my intention would was not the ability to scream at the whole cell, but to select NPCs from the cell. The criteria might be arbitrary (radial limits over distance) but never the actually apply packages / force animations to all cell NPCs. I know that does not include problems with killing off NPCs, but NPCs that are moving around could be excluded, since there are plenty of idle NPCs around.

 

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Speaking of Skyrim  Its a good time to stare at the potential of Bullet Physics instead of Havok as HDT-SMP is being introduced slowly. I know BlaBla / His Orange-ness with the work on CITRUS hopefully in the future include the Bullet Physics instead of Havok...