Adult games giving people carpel tunnel

[anne O'nymous]

Can you imagine the lewd scenes, a screen full of ooos, ahhhs, yeah right there....
and hiding behind the wall of smut text is the pretty pictures you can barely see

I fail to see your point :

Ren'py default dialog box, the only thing needed to achieve this is those two lines :

init python:
    gui.text_size = 25

Ren'py default dialog box, with four lines of customization :

init python:
    gui.text_size = 30
    gui.dialogue_width = 1600
    gui.dialogue_xpos = 200

And like I said previously, 80% of the games using Ren'py keep the default dialog box. So they'll not hide more of the screen by having a dialog as long as the one of your example ; and they don't hide less by having one sentence only dialog.

 

[Hones]

I fail to see your point :
View attachment 392504
Ren'py default dialog box, the only thing needed to achieve this is those two lines :

init python:
    gui.text_size = 25

View attachment 392512
Ren'py default dialog box, with four lines of customization :

init python:
    gui.text_size = 30
    gui.dialogue_width = 1600
    gui.dialogue_xpos = 200

And like I said previously, 80% of the games using Ren'py keep the default dialog box. So they'll not hide more of the screen by having a dialog as long as the one of your example ; and they don't hide less by having one sentence only dialog.

Hmm that doesn't look bad some text overlap with the menu but yeah OK if that is what the OP is suggesting devs do I don't see any issues.

 

[Untolddead]

Hmm that doesn't look bad some text overlap with the menu but yeah OK if that is what the OP is suggesting devs do I don't see any issues.

Yeah that's what I'm saying. I'm tired of games with short sentences that don't use the whole dialog box. This is an example I found quickly. This has three small sentences like this the same image and three short sentences in a row of girl talking. That's two extra pointless clicks. I've seen far worse but I just jumped into a random game. (I don't tend to keep bad games)

For example a game will use the same image with the same person talking like this. "Hi" click, "I'm glad to see you" click, "You are hot" click, "want to have sex?" click, "or no?" click, Then it'll switch to the person your talking too and do the same.
That's the kind of stuff I'm talking about...

 

[Untolddead]

Aw man, how else am I supposed to pad out my game? Joking, joking. I use 1-2 sentences per screen and I play my own game. I do it because it doesn’t cover too much, and I have a high render per sentence ratio, which necessitates this practice. Other reasons, as if you needed more, include the pacing, flow and rhythm or the dialogue,

If you're using a bunch of different images I don't think it's as big of a problem. I'm talking about games that use the same image render and then like exposition for 20 clicks and things like that. If you are going to do that I'd even prefer the cover screen as some one mentioned earlier. Renpy allows you to hide the dialogue box any ways.

This post is Meta, and this paragraph is too short.

There's a sweet spot when it comes to the amount of text that is easily 'consumed'. Some may think it's determined by the number of sentences, thoughts or bits of significant information, but it's simpler - it's about 3 lines of text (probably like this paragraph).

Doing a google search should give you some articles about text justification in print and the perfect font size and element layout for web pages that should optimize retention and readability - people have written a lot of smart words about it, but it comes down to the fact that readers don't like to skip to the next line of text, especially when there are many long lines of text. Newspaper know this, that's why there are many columns of short lines with clear paragraphs and headlines in print. Google knows this, that's why search results look as they do. I know this, that's why I'm gritting my teeth trying to make this paragraph needlessly long, but if I've done it right - You should clearly see by now that a wall of text can be far worse then having to click a few more times. But maybe not as bad as the typewriter effect, y'know, when letters appear one at a time. Seriously, stop that.

If more games used the three lines of text rule you talk about I wouldn't have made this post. I don't want a literal page of dialogue on every screen just less screens with no image changes with single digit word counts for like 10 clicks.

 

[fidless]

I've used mouse x something software to bind click/space to the mouse wheel. Though most jap vn have this feature by default. To forward text by scrolling. Works wonderfully.

 

[HopesGaming]

The golden rule of making people interested in your characters' dialogues- make it short and compact.

Sure, long paragraphs and in an nvl style will gain the attention from the people that love to read a lot, but the majority tend to press the ctrl button if it's too long. And this is especially the case for adult games where it's ctrl to the adult stuff even if the story would have made them really loved it.
That's why I always recomend- short dialogue, split it (sorry op) and not make it in one big paragraph. Lure them in at the start, and follow up with an interesting start to hook them up. Only use big paragraphs in important story element-time (twists, reveals, important information). This also gives the effect of interest to people since they are not used to the long paragraphs and hence pay attention to it once it appears.

But I think the main issue that the op may have is not the splitting of the paragraph itself, rather it's that some authors tend to write 'too much'. Sentences that could be done in 1-2 lines are in 3-4+ and they then split those up in short dialogues for it to not feel convoluted. It's rather a problem with failure of making it compact than splitting (imo)

 

[Volta]

More than four lines deep per click is too blocky, too many clicks is an annoyance, there is a happy medium to be found but dialogue that zips back and forward means lots of clicks, try using the enter key on your num pad, let you pinky drive.

 

[Untolddead]

The golden rule of making people interested in your characters' dialogues- make it short and compact.

Sure, long paragraphs and in an nvl style will gain the attention from the people that love to read a lot, but the majority tend to press the ctrl button if it's too long. And this is especially the case for adult games where it's ctrl to the adult stuff even if the story would have made them really loved it.
That's why I always recomend- short dialogue, split it (sorry op) and not make it in one big paragraph. Lure them in at the start, and follow up with an interesting start to hook them up. Only use big paragraphs in important story element-time (twists, reveals, important information). This also gives the effect of interest to people since they are not used to the long paragraphs and hence pay attention to it once it appears.

But I think the main issue that the op may have is not the splitting of the paragraph itself, rather it's that some authors tend to write 'too much'. Sentences that could be done in 1-2 lines are in 3-4+ and they then split those up in short dialogues for it to not feel convoluted. It's rather a problem with failure of making it compact than splitting (imo)

That makes sense. I guess it's the same problem a lot of rpg maker games have. Where the developer thinks they are making an epic open world game but instead build a huge empty maze.

More isn't always better especially if the words are empty. If it's interesting you won't even notice how many times you click if it's garbage and you're like just show me the sex for fucks sake it's no good. I like good characters and writing.

 

[Elsa-owo]

To make it simple: compacted text in little characters can be harder to read. It can't come too close to the border either, for aesthetic raisons. And if more place is taken by the text, there is less place for art.

(Now, it can be interesting to see a visual novel with more text displayed, as long as the art is drawn with that parameter in account. I hate it when they just put the text on the picture.)

By the way, I find using a keyboard less tiring than using a mouse, for visual novels. Some of them also have a really useful "skip" button. But not all, unfortunately. What can make "clicking" really boring when you want to play another path. =,(

 

[215303j]

It depends on your story. Is it even interesting to read what is written?

E.g. Melody, nice game, good looking models, good story.
But unfortunately I happen to be not interested in rock/pop music at all.
Given that about half the dialogue is about music, I tend to skip a lot.
Again, nothing against the game or the story in itself, just "wrong" subject matter.

The DeLuca Family on the other hand, I find the story very interesting and I don't skip text at all.

The standard trope young MC with mom and 2 sisters going about their lives, well, who needs text anyway...

But generally, in a game with a moderately interesting story, I do prefer 2-3 lines per screen over walls of text on one screen. And I am a fast reader...