Scenario Questions & Answers Forum 11-20

( Gamer )
(Persona #2 is in use by Serge, auto-selecting the next available for you!)
Q11: Is there a way I can change the program caption to match the name of my game?

( Topaz )
A11: Greets Gamer:

You can insert your own custom 320x224 bitmap screen by having the following left-justified in your opening Sprite Message:

Where "Logo"is the name of your bitmap file located inside \REALM\ . If you don't want to do it this way and want to have text from the Messenger show your logo in the center on a black background, that's a bit more work.

See the instructions below which also show how to start a NEW GAME directly on top of a Sprite Message you created.

To do it just with text, you can start off in the map editor pressing [ENTER] on the

which is at

on the sample Suzi's Quest included default in the system, which means Map #03 at X=05 and Y=28. You can tell that you are on the right spot cause your Info Icon will change to this

. This girl's face denotes where the player starts. Pick it up by pressing [ENTER] when you are on top of it, and bring it to a nice blank map, like #05 which is empty. Drop it by pressing [ENTER] again but one step away from where you want the opening title to appear. Press [ENTER] one step away from it and select adding a sprite there, and type out 5 nice lines. Then select the menu at the top in the Sprite Messenger with [ESC] and change Location to "Middle-No-Frame." When this is executed, 5 nice slow lines of text will appear in the center of the black screen (provided you don't have any non-black tiles within view of the center of the map view, and they will appear without the window flavor borders. Pick back up

in the map editor, put it directly atop the new Sprite you just made. You're done ! When you start a NEW GAME, right where the

is will be where the player starts out, and since you have a Sprite Message there, it will be run immediately.

Use the

to select a new NAME for the player too. That might not have been understood in my earlier instructs and other RPGMakers won't let you change the player's name??
Yeeph !

Hope This Helps ! (PHEW!) You kids are keeping me busy !

( Wanderer )
Q12: When I try to install Scenario RPG Maker I get the report:
This program runs in MS-DOS mode (real mode), which this version of Windows does not support. You can attempt to run this program in an MS-DOS window as follows:
Right click the icon for the program, click properties, click OK, and then click YES in the dialog that appears. Restart the program. Or contact the programs manufacturer for an updated version.

I follow the instructions up to the 'and then click OK' bit, and nothing happens, what should I do?

( Topaz )
A12: Greets Wanderer:

It is sad to say that Windows 2000, Windows ME, and Windows NT handle DOS differently then Windows 3.1, Windows 95, or Windows 98.

You need someone with a good background in both Windows 95/98 and Windows ME/2000 to run the program I wrote:
"Isolate Error For Windows 2000" you can download by clicking HERE.

If they can get that program to run, have them send me the information so I can make

compatible with these non-DOS platforms.

Hope This Helps !

( Paul )
(You need to pick a persona for yourself, there are 40 now)
Q13:Hey i am new to this whole rpg designing thing, i am good thugh, i have played Dungeons and dragons for quite sometime... anyways here is mi gotta know question: how do u make sprites interact with the game, like sell things, ask u questions, and most important! How do u make an sprite have u do sumthin for them like say
this man lost his shovel and if u find it and bring it back to him he give u a reward. i wanna make mi game life like as it can be and u can't blame me for this (i think) anyways i would be greatly joyful if u could answer these questions for me. Thanx for your help!

( Topaz )
A13: Greets Paul:

It's pretty simple to do your Find-Shovel example. I've posted a sample world called "Answers" You can download it by clicking HERE.
I'll post any detailed answers to questions in this world file to assist other Worldbuilders, all in one map region if possible, and allow me to write working examples of answers to all of your questions.

Hope This Helps !

( Tristan )
(Persona #6 is in use by Kove, auto-selecting the next available for you!)
Q14:Hi, ive just started using scenario. When I start my game i cannot move anywhere! Why is this? And, how do I create a startup image for when starting the game to say what it is!

( Topaz )
A14: Greets Tristan:

You cannot move ? Make sure that your NUM-LOCK light is not lit, then you can use the arrow keys there. If you want to use the other arrow keys just right of the CTRL key that is okay too. I have made a sample Title Screen in my Answers world file in the 2nd frame.
If you are still having trouble, you can Forward binary attach a copy of your world file and I will look it over to find the difficulty.

To insert a 320x224 full image is easier. Just build one, save it as a 24-bit or 8-bit bitmap. Make sure it is no more then 8-letters long for the filename. Have a copy of it inside your \REALM\ directory. Then do the following in any Sprite Message:

Which will fade in the 320x224 bitmap screen of Logo. You can put all the artwork, credits, and anything else you want on this bitmap using your favorite paint program.

Hope This Helps !

( Paul )
Q15: Its Paul again! Hey thinks for answering my qeustion! But i have another problem i tried to open that file download you gave me, it downloaded succesfulley. but when i unzipped and open it all of the characters (letters and numbers) were messed up and funny looking symbols. How do I look at it and see the right letters and words? It would be another huge help. but other than that issue i have the whole scenario thing pretty well mastered (i think), my only problem is that i need an bigger range to builf stuff on i run out of room cuz' i make mi world too big! haha thanx again!
Paul

( Topaz )
A15: Greets Paul:

You are not supposed to unzip any of the ".WRL" files yourself manually, that is for

to do.

as you know (or should) uses these small icon symbols as commands. You can see the name of a command or select a new one by pressing [TAB] when you are in the Sprite Messenger. Use the arrow keys to navigate around the available commands. Here are the commands explained briefly for Mr. Grubbes Sprite:

This is the Position Icon. When reached, it tells the Player which side of the target they need to be facing. If there is no arrow key following it, it defaults to put the player beneath the target with the target (if a Sprite) to be facing down while the player faces up.

This is the Pause Icon. Cause it looks like

Paws. It tells this Sprite Message to pause exactly 1/4 of a second before continuing any animations, that is all.

This is the Face Icon. It tells the Focus which direction to face. The Focus by default is the player, but if this

is chosen then the focus becomes the target.

This is the Spin Right Icon. It's a simple special effect to twirl the Focus clockwise all the way around until it is facing the same direction again.

This is the Leap Icon. It tells the Focus to jump either in place or a direction. If there is no arrow key following it, then it will just jump in place. If you put several of these together then the jump will appear agitated and impatient.

This is the Lock Icon. It is very versatile and by itself it says to LOCK this current Sprite Messenger page as the new one to run when this Sprite Message is run again. If it is followed by a "+" , then it will LOCK the NEXT page to run.

This is the Terminate Icon. By itself, it means to Terminate the current Sprite Message and run no further pages. If there are two beside each other it will bypass any checks for Merchant as well. If there are three together it will UNLOCK all pages and not run this Sprite Message again.

You should also know that in the Sprite Messenger, you can conduct an inquiry and jump to a label based upon it being a TRUE statement. Look at page 9 in the Sprite Message for Mr. Grubbes and you will see

which means that IF this statement is TRUE, in this case, the flag is lit, then goto the label, which very simply is "GOTIT"

Page 10 has the label "GOTIT" and since page 9 has the Termination Icon, it will not reach page 10 unless the player does indeed have found the shovel.

This is the Play Riff Icon. A Riff is very similar to a MIDI or Music file with the exception that once it is finished playing, it will return to the prior song it was playing this, so RIFFS by nature are very small; no more then several seconds in length. The name followed by it tells the name of the RIFF song to play. RIFFS are listed in the Filebox for Songs with a "$" before their name. This particular RIFF of "item1" is a quick riff to show Good Job for finding the Shovel !

This is the Backward Icon. It tells the Focus to continue to face the direction they already are but to take one step backwards instead of forwards. That is all.

This is the Play WAV Icon. It says that when the end of this page is reached to play a sound effect, in this case, the clinking "purchase" sound.

This is the LitBulb Icon. It will "Light" up any flags and create new ones. If the first character in a flag is

then it will show up in the player's inventory.

This is the Mask Icon. It is unfinished and may change in definition over time. For now, it tells the Focus for a visible Sprite to become invisible.

This is the Play Song or Play MIDI Icon. A Song, unlike a Riff is expected to be longer, and once it is finished playing will start over from the beginning and play itself again.

With these tools, you can see how

differs from other RPGMakers and how best to take advantage of the many Sprite Icons used by Worldbuilders.

If any other Worldbuilders out there (that's you!) have questions about the usage or ways to make use of the Sprite Icons in Scenario, just write here to let me know and I'll be glad to explain them.

Hope This Helps !

( DrWyrm )
Q16: Hello, for the first time. I would just like to say that i have never used a program like this before, but it dosen't matter I thank you for writting the program up. even though there are others out there, witch I'm shure I'll explore. I'm glad that yours was the first.

Q17: my question and problem though is that I'm having a little trouble with the transports in a certain map 0 i can't get rid of it to testplay or lay a tile down. Can you help? or do you need more info? thanx.

( Topaz )
A16: Greets DrWyrm:

Hey ! I really do appreciate the praise ! Sometimes that is all us programmers have to go on. You may find other RPGMakers out there but hopefully, mine will be one of the easier to use. That is it's main focus, ease of use and especially for non-programmers.

Hopefully in time, this will promote more worldbuilder productivity and posts to the

Station.

A17: New Scenario v0.092d should not have this problem. You can pick up any of the two transports by pressing [ENTER] when you are on top of them and move them away. You cannot make them go away completely. You can however scoot them far away off of the map that they won't be seen. If this is a problem, you can always use Map #1 as your outside map, just make it wrap-around, and there is no difference.

Hope This Helps !

( Cinco de Chocobo )
(Persona #8 is in use by Wren P., auto-selecting the next available for you!)
Q18: Was the engine written in C++\Open GCL or what ?

( Topaz )
A18: Greets Cinco De Chocobo:

was written in prototype programming language GFABasic with little to no support whatsoever for it. I learned how to lock a window, that is, to plot dots on it so when you move the window or overlap it with another, it will remember the dots beneath it, and how to pick up rectangles and drop them. The rest is my own programming.

GFABasic was designed for businesses and I am like the only gamewriter in it save for 2 others in the world. Everyone else

uses GFA for it's business and financial commands and data management STUFF. In this, GFA must have a large amount of space for variables and source code. This then is another reason I chose it to write

in. My program is a bit over 10,000 lines as it is now.

GFABasic is also a Windows 3.1 language ! <grin> Don't believe me ? You can run

in any Windows 3.1 platform. Why am I not using GFA32 for Win98 ? Because it's solely in German and doesn't program at all the same way you can in GFA16. I don't want to fight that learning curve and I have no way to translate it besides.

Hope This Helps !

( DrWyrm )
Q19: Wow! I really did not expect a response so soon. Thanx and thanx for the info. But I noticed another problem when I make a warp on top of stairs (EX. from down stairs to up or vice versa.) When I go to use the warp and go up or down stairs the whole game locks up. the music plays and the stair noise goes on for ever untill I hit Ctrl Alt Delete.

Q20: And it would be great if you could explan the process of importing my bitmap files into the realm file. Is it done through dos? if so how? And when I went to download the v0.092d it said the site was unavailable you might want to check that. Thanx again and I hope my Questions are not to Anoying.

Dr.Wyrm

( Topaz )
A19: Greets DrWyrm:

No, your questions aren't annoying. Far from it, I'm quite delighted someone has such an interest in my program !

Although my engine is getting bopped hard from people downloading it, you and only a few others are the only ones who are asking questions and leaving comments about it. Thanks. (Smile)

To answer your first question, I just checked current

v0.092d, it does not have this warping repeat problem. You can download direct that version by clicking HERE.

If you are still having troubles, you are welcome to send me a working example of the warp error HERE.

A20: Importing a bitmap is pretty easy. You can even use your own Persona if you like since any imported image can be of any size and

will adjust it to fit for what it needs in all cases. A bitmap of 48x48 pixels, however is an exact fit. Download your persona by clicking HERE. Right click your mouse on it and choose "Save Picture As..." Then click in the 2nd field for "Save as type" and select "Bitmap (*.bmp)" . Save a copy of that picture now in your \REALM\ directory.

If you are running your

v0.092d from "C:\Scenario" then your path to save it would be "C:\Scenario\realm\" . Save it as "face15" minus the quotes, making sure that it is saved as a Bitmap. Then run

.

Hit [ESC] to bring up the menu. Select Player, Portrait, hit [ENTER] and now look 4 colums across and 3 down. You will see yourself as a portrait now.

If you compress and close this world file, your portrait will be saved with the world file as well and while you may be tempted to import a new image for every single tile, portrait, critter, combat backdrop, and sprite, it does add to the final size of the world file when compressed. To move/delete/copy this import image, just shift it from your \REALM\ directory.

Hope This Helps !

( If you would like to link me, please use this picture, it's just under 10k )