Adding storylines to scenarios and campaigns

[Perzival12]

5 hours ago, Vantha said:

It depends on what a cutscene is for you. Dialogue and cinema paths (predefined camera movements such as in the cinema demo map) aren't tied to each other, either one of them can be shown on its own, but also both at the same time. What they have in  common is that both show the the two black bars at the top and bottom and there's a way implemented to synchronise the two systems. Then there's what I called "cutscene mode", which disables visual overlays like territory borders, health bars and selection rings -- the mode is always enabled during cinema paths and optionally during dialogue (it can be specified).

Could you add support for showing character portraits? That would add some personality to text-only dialogue, and would allow conversations/advice from different characters at once (for example, in addition to "General Grievous", your commander, and "Quentius Tretayus", your advisor, you could have "Enemy Soldier", who shouts "AAAAAHHHHHHH" ad you collapse a tower or kill the enemy commander or whatever.

[Vantha]

20 hours ago, Thalatta said:

I guess the question is, when this happens, can you still play? I imagine it would be nice to keep doing so while listening to some dialogue.

When cutscene mode is enabled, then no, that's kinda the whole point of cutscene mode. When it's not enabled, on other hand, you can, but only to some extent since the HUD (selection panels etc.) is hidden. You can give gather and attack orders, for example, but not train units or research techs. Admittedly, this is a limitation, but it's the best solution I managed come up with, the in-game HUD itself is already pretty cramped in my opinion.

 

16 hours ago, Perzival12 said:

Could you add support for showing character portraits? That would add some personality to text-only dialogue, and would allow conversations/advice from different characters at once (for example, in addition to "General Grievous", your commander, and "Quentius Tretayus", your advisor, you could have "Enemy Soldier", who shouts "AAAAAHHHHHHH" ad you collapse a tower or kill the enemy commander or whatever.

Yeah, as shown in the second half of the demo video, this is possible. Currently, the unit's displayed name (e.g. "Champion Infantry Pikeman") is used in combination with its in-game portrait. Would be possible, though, to extend it to allow customising those too.