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title: Dialog description: The Dialog tool. Write what sprites and items say as text with an Insert menu, or build it from blocks: choices, conditions and actions.

Dialog

Dialog is what sprites and items say, and the text of endings and exits. Pick a sprite or item and Dialog shows its dialog. Write it as Text, or build it from Blocks.

Dialog in Text view: the gardener dialog, said by gardener, with its script and the Insert menu

Pick a dialog

You picked Dialog shows
A sprite or item with dialog Its dialog, with Said by …
A sprite or item without dialog Write what … says, which makes one
A tile Tiles do not talk
Nothing The dialog menu: pick any dialog
Control Does
Dialog menu Opens any dialog in the game, including exit and ending text
Text, Blocks Switches view. Both edit the same dialog.
New dialog Makes an empty dialog nobody says yet
Copy dialog Copies this dialog
Delete dialog Deletes it after asking. Whoever said it has nothing to say.
Name The dialog's name in menus

Text view

Type the text. Long text is split into pages of three lines; the player presses a button to go on.

Insert… puts a ready-made piece of script at the cursor, or around the words you selected:

Insert Writes
Wavy text, Shaky text, Rainbow text {wvy}…{wvy}, {shk}…{shk}, {rbw}…{rbw}
New page {pg}
Say lines in order {sequence …}: each line once, then the last one again
Say lines round and round {cycle …}: the lines in turn, forever
Say lines in any order {shuffle …}: a random line each time
If a variable is… A branch on a variable
If the player has an item A branch on an item count
Change a variable, Show a variable {a = a + 1}, {say a}
Go to a room {exit "0" 8 8}
End the game {end}
…and every block below

The full language is in Dialog scripting.

Blocks view

Each part of the dialog is a block with its own fields. Move blocks with the arrows, remove them with ×, and add more from the Add a block menu. Choice blocks have Add option, and If blocks Add a condition and Add otherwise.

Dialog in Blocks view: an If block with text, effects, a new page and actions inside

Group Blocks
Dialog Text, New page, Wavy, Shaky, Rainbow, Colour 1, Colour 2 and Colour 3 text, Draw a tile, Draw a sprite, Draw an item
Choices Say lines in order, Say lines round and round, Say lines in any order, If a variable is…, If the player has an item
Exits and endings Go to a room, End the game, Lock or unlock the exit
Room and sound Change the palette, Change the avatar, Play a blip, Play a tune
Items and variables Set how many of an item, One more of an item, One less of an item, Show how many of an item, Set a variable, Change a variable, Show a variable

Fields that name something, like a room or an item, are menus of names, so you never type an id.

Problems in a dialog

When a script refers to something that is not there, like a room you deleted or a variable nothing sets, Dialog lists the problem in amber under the text. See Problems.