Becoming Bilingual

Dev log for Project Amethyst from 7/24/18 to 8/7/18

Welcome to my first real dev log for Project Amethyst. Here I will be establishing the formula that all subsequent update will follow.

What have I been working on since the last update?

I spent the first few days of development getting the overworld mechanics and basic controls set up. That took me about two days and after that I spend a day getting a very rudimentary dialogue system set up. This system was purely for testing the UI elements of the system and getting that classic JRPG typewriter effect working. Once that was functioning as intended, I needed to decide what I wanted to tackle first. There are three major systems in the game: dialogue, combat, and inventory; and I felt that getting dialogue out of the way was the best bet. Thus I spent the next week watching tutorials and Lynda training on C++ and how to use it in Unreal. By the end of last week I had a fairly solid understanding of Unreal's use of C++, but I was far from being able to create a dialogue system like the one I found here. I made the firm decision not to use any store assets (at least for systems) and write everything from scratch myself when I started the project and I won't abandon that rule so quickly.

What's next?

Starting today I am hunkering down and coming up with my own dialogue system. I really don't need anything that complicated, just a simple branching system that can access game-wide variables and states. I expect this to take me at least a week, maybe longer, but hopefully not more than two. I will give a detailed breakdown of how I did it in the next update, assuming it's done by then.

What obstacles have I encountered?

The major obstacle these last two weeks was the classic lack of knowledge. C++ is brand new to me with the only saving grace being prior knowledge of C#. As of this moment I don't anticipate needing C++ to create the dialogue system, but I'm sure it will come in handy eventually. Another minor obstacle was the seven million check boxes across Unreal's camera and spring arm assets. It took me the better part of a day figuring out which boxes I needed on or off to get the camera to function as intended.

That's it for now. I hope these logs give you a better understanding of how I work and solve problems. I look forward to doing a whole breakdown of my dialogue system next time. Thanks for reading!