TAA_BookMenu (v1.6.7)

taaspider · 2018-12-08T07:20:39+0900

TAA_BookMenu - v1.6.7 Created by taaspider Terms of Use Any plugins developed by taaspider are free for use for both commercial and noncommercial RPG Maker games, unless specified otherwise. Just remember to credit "taaspider". Redistribution of parts or the whole of taaspider plugins is forbidden (which also includes reposting), unless it comes from the official website (linked within the post). You are allowed to edit and change the plugin code for your own use, but you're definitely not allowed to sell or reuse any part of the code as your own. Although not required to use my plugins, a free copy of your game would be nice! Introduction When we create a game, we usually create a whole new world rich in lore and details, and want to make it all available to the players, so that they can understand every single detail we develop. However, just dumping it all in lengthy dialogues usually bore and scare most of the players, who will simply give up on your world. A common alternative used by many AAA games is to minimize dialogue and exposition, and provide additional details through in-game books. This plugin aims to provide just that for your game: a book menu where the player can read up additional lore when he feels up to it. You can place books throughout your game, providing a bit more of context for hungry players as they progress, and keeping exposition to a minimum. Features Creates a main menu command gathering books the player discovers throughout your world, letting them read whenever they want; Allows the dev to call a detached window and show the contents of a book outside the menu; Input your game books into the engine using either the Plugin Manager or an external JSON file; Compatibility with multilanguage plugins that uses multiple external files for text; Allows the dev to setup background images for both scenes separately, with options to use different images for each window or a single image for everything; Allows you to include inline images along with the book text. The image can be used with its original size, or proportionally resized through a special escape code. Use inline trailing images to give a nice finishing touch to your books! Scroll book text by cliking (PC) or touching (mobile) the arrows or swyping up and down; Have book contents change as the game progresses; Mark newly added or recently changed books in the book menu so your player knows when there's new information available; Solar_Flare also developed a nice add on for this plugin, which allows books to be loaded from external text files (one file per book). I recommend checking it out here. Screenshots Spoiler How to Use WARNING: This plugin requires RPG Maker MV 1.5.0 or above! Please make sure your RPG Maker MV software is up to date before using this plugin. First of, download the plugin here. There's a bunch of parameters that allows you to customize each of the scenes (the detached book window and the book menu). The plugin's help section describe most which are not self explanatory, try taking a look there if you feel lost. One important thing though... you have to set up your books before you can call them inside your game. There's two ways of doing that: inside the Plugin Manager itself or using external JSON files. The plugin can only work with one of this methods at a time, so you need to chose which one you want at the "DataSource Type" parameter. I'll enclose the instructions for each case in spoiler tags below to make it more readable. You can also test the plugin using my sample demo project. It was built with MV, but you can open it with MZ as well (just open the game.rmmzproject file and you're good to go). Spoiler: Plugin Manager as Source There's two main parameters to configure: Category Order: List your book categories in the order you wish them to appear in the menu command. If you don't wish to display categories, input at least one entry here and choose to hide categories in the Menu List Window options; Books: Here you'll have to list all the books you want to make available to the player. Each book have the following attributes: Title Title Color Text Variable Text List Visible Text List Category Id Custom Background Custom Background Mode The book category parameter must be one of the categories listed in the Category Order parameter. The Id is used only to order the books under each category. If you leave all Ids equal (0), the plugin will use the order it reads the books from the editor (usually the order you input them). Title Color is an optional parameter that allows you to set a custom color ONLY on the title section of the scene. So that it will appear with the default color on the list section of the menu, and the custom color on the title window. If you want a custom color on both windows just use color escape codes. If you want a book to have a custom background (overriding the global settings), just select an image for the "Custom Background" parameters. Leave it blank to go with…

I think this plugin is exactly what I need! It looks lovely. I've been messing around, and am finding that it has many features, but working with it is rather overwhelming, my brain isn't handling it well.

I was wondering, the demo link leads to a 404. Is there still an (MV) demo available I can look at with examples of list, books, and chapters within books? Working with the list and books so far isn't the hardest thing, but I have no idea how to add a "book within a book", or maybe "category within a category" though the plugin settings seem to indicate I can do that. There's also a lot I don't understand when writing the text of the books itself. Just in general, a demo would help me SO much.

EDIT: I found the demo a page back, my bad!