WIP Playtesters Needed for Romance Dialogue Mod (Sam, Elliott, Sebastian)

Discussion in 'Mods' started by glowy, Feb 6, 2017.

  1. glowy

    glowy Title Not Found

    UPDATE (7/2017):
    This mod is still alive and well! Thinking this thread wasn't going to gain any more attention paired with the fact that I finished up Elliott's dialogue, I made a new post about the mod with updated information about how I'm conducting playtesting. There are now feedback forms for each character that I'm asking testers to fill out, because it will really help me keep things organized.

    I also made a blog to host the progress of the mod on -- please check it out!

    UPDATE (5/5/17):

    Hi, everyone...! I'm so sorry I dropped off the map for a while there. I'm a student at DigiPen. That's explanation enough for my disappearance if anyone knows what that school is like. :'D But if you don't know: essentially, I had absolutely 0 free time for a few months there.

    Anyways, now school is over! And I'm mostly free until September! So that means I'll be working on this again, yay!! I've been playing my Elliot file, and he's at six hearts now. I'm using a cheat to remove the 2-gifts-a-week limit so that I can get through the romances faster and start writing dialogue ASAP. I'll update again once I've written Elliot's dialogue!

    As for Sam's, I've tweaked his and Kent's dialogue some more based on the suggestions everyone has given me, and have updated the spreadsheet and xnb's with the changes (so the download links have been updated). I'd love it if people could playtest some more! I'll officially publish Sam's dialogue on the Nexus if there are no major complaints after a few weeks. (I've never made/uploaded a mod before, so bear with me, please! @_@)

    I think now, my biggest concern is the bug with Kent's question line that @Feathered Sparks reported, where he doesn't ask the question and acts like you've already answered the first time it comes up. I just tested the line for myself in my game, and this bug does not happen for me. I'd really like to see if it happens for anyone else, because I have no clue why it would happen.

    Check out the instructions section below for, well, instructions and the download and spreadsheet links. Thank you!

    [Original Post]
    Hello again! For those of you that don't know, I'm currently making a mod that enriches the romances of the game by adding lots of new romance-centric lines for all the bachelors/bachelorettes, since I found Stardew Valley a bit lackluster in the romance department. As I'm an aspiring narrative designer for video games, I thought it would be something not only fun for me to do, but also to perhaps get my work some publicity.

    I'm at the point now where I'm ready for playtesting, for Sam specifically. I have 15 new lines of dialogue for him -- 7 dependent solely upon heart level and then 8 season-specific lines (also require heart levels). I also added dialogue for his parents, Jodi and Kent, for when they become your in-laws (3 lines each + an answerable question for Kent). None of the new dialogue replaces any old dialogue.

    Instructions
    If you'd be willing to playtest, here's a link to download the xnb files. To install, remove the "_dialogue" from the file names and drop them into your Stardew Valley\Content\Characters\Dialogue folder, replacing the old ones. Of course, always remember to backup your original files, but if something happens the files are super easy to return to original if you know how to use XNB Node -- all my added dialogue is at the bottom of each yaml file clearly separated from the original lines, and it's just a matter of deleting all my stuff and repacking it.

    The data I'd like to collect from playtesting is as follows:
    • Typos
    • Anything difficult to read/understand
    • Lines that clash with canon facts and/or are out of character
    • Any bugs
    • General opinions and feedback
    If you could tell me exactly which line(s) you tested/experienced in-game, that would be wonderful.
    Here's a link to a spreadsheet containing all the lines, in case you need it for reference.

    Thanks in advance! Feel free to ask any questions if you have 'em.​

    Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to go romance Sebastian and Elliot so I can get started on their dialogue! c:
     
      Last edited: Jul 13, 2017
    • Coolwyngs

      Coolwyngs Giant Laser Beams

      Looking good, I am not the greatest speller but I will be happy to test this for you.
       
      • glowy

        glowy Title Not Found

        Thanks so much! I'm looking forward to hearing your feedback. :D
         
        • Feathered Sparks

          Feathered Sparks Big Damn Hero

          Hmm... In-law dialogue as well, you say? Because I'm not currently "dating" Sam in any of my games, but I'm married to him in my main one and can playtest the in-law dialogue if you'd like.
           
          • glowy

            glowy Title Not Found

            Sure! Anything helps! I'm married to him in my main file as well and so I've tested some of the in-law dialogue, but not all of it, and I want to move on to other files so I can get started on writing dialogue for other marriage candidates. Also I'd like objective views on my writing. So, yes please! :)
             
            • Feathered Sparks

              Feathered Sparks Big Damn Hero

              All right, so I've played through a week with the in-law dialogue and I think I've gotten most of Jodi and Kent's new lines. It looks great for the most part, and I've thrown my specific experiences and thoughts into a spoiler tag (in case anyone wants to experience the new lines for themselves) below.

              So far I've gotten Jodi's "I blinked and there went his whole childhood" and "Is Sam pulling his weight around the house" lines, and both sets look good mechanically-speaking and sound very in-character for her. Great job! (I haven't gotten her Wednesday dialogue yet, but I'm pretty sure it was raining that day so it was probably only because she used her rainy day dialogue instead. Based on the spreadsheet that one looks good as well, but I'll let you know if something weird comes up when I do get it in-game.)

              I've also gotten all three of Kent's new bits of dialogue, but the Sunday dialogue that the spreadsheet says is supposed to give me a question didn't come up as one. Instead, he just told me that he hadn't been a part of Sam's life and then went on to say that he was going to give up because I had a stronger bond with Sam anyway. Looking at the spreadsheet, it seems like this is supposed to be what he says if I gave him a negative answer previously... but it was the first time I got that line at all.

              Additionally, I'm not really sure the first part of that question/line is 100% in-character. I really like the idea of a dialogue/question where Kent is concerned about reconnecting with his son, but from some of the things both Sam and Vincent say, it sounds like he was very much a part of their lives before he went to war. I would recommend that instead of talking like he was never close to Sam before, he instead say something like "It's no secret that I've lost touch with the boys since I've been away," and then tie it back to Sam and the fact that he's moved out when he asks the question/gives the post-question response.

              As for his other two, the "Jodi hardly knows what to do with herself" set of lines looks great (I especially like how it comes up on the same day as her lines where she's basically still trying to "mother" Sam), but I do have a small concern about the third one. It's really just a matter of changing the wording a bit when he mentions that Sam got married "so soon after getting back" -- it wasn't an issue on my game, because I specifically waited until Kent got back before getting married, but some people marry in year 1 and would have already had their wedding before Kent came home.


              Anyway, those are my thoughts. I'm enjoying this mod so far, and I'm actually kind of tempted to add in the Sam file and romance him again on a new save, haha. (I'll probably playtest Elliott's dialogue when you have that one done too, because I'm in the process of romancing him on one of my current saves.) Just out of curiosity, do you have any plans to add in-law dialogue for Vincent? Or would that be harder to add since he doesn't seem to have any such dialogue (and so presumably isn't "flagged" as an in-law) to build off of?
               
              • glowy

                glowy Title Not Found

                Thank you so much, that feedback is GREAT!

                Good to know that there's a bug with Kent's question. It's weird because I actually tested that one myself, except I made it trigger on a Saturday (bc Sat was the next day in my game and I was too lazy to wait a day haha) and it worked fine. Maybe I missed something when switching it over to a Sunday trigger. I'll go ahead and check and test it again myself!

                As for the question's wording, that's a good point and I really like your suggested line; I'll incorporate that if it's cool with you! (Worth mentioning at this point that I'm definitely going to give a shoutout to all my playtesters in the description when I put the mod up on Nexus + anywhere else, and I'll give specific credit when I use suggestions.)

                For the "so soon" line, yeah, I was trying to keep it a bit vague because I know people get married at different points? I personally got married to Sam right before year 2. Should I reference how objectively young Sam is rather than framing it against Kent's return?


                omg I would be delighted if you romanced Sam again with my mod, but of course that's a big undertaking so I wouldn't blame you if you didn't haha! And yeah, definitely keep an eye out for when I post Elliot's stuff! I still have a ways to go for him (just starting on befriending him; I'm actually on the cusp of two hearts right now, but it's bEEN RAINING FOR 3 DAYS AND I CAN'T ENTER HIS HOUSE TO GIVE HIM GIFTS I'M SO FRUSTRATED) but I'll be furiously playing it when I have free time.

                I would love to add in-law dialogue for Vincent, but yeah that's exactly it, he doesn't have a tag that lets him acknowledge you're his brother/sister in-law. The same thing goes for the parent in-laws talking about your kids when you have them. There is the option of me making that dialogue without the trigger, but that means players would have to specifically go in and replace Vincent/Jodi/Kent's dialogue files when they get married/have kids, then re-replace them with the original dialogue files if they moved to a different save... which is a little awkward and potentially tedious. I'm planning on releasing this mod with basic dialogue like it has right now, and then doing the other option if people let me know that they actually want it.
                 
                • crashautumn

                  crashautumn Scruffy Nerf-Herder

                  I'm aiming to romance Sam in my newest game. I'd love to have some added 'oomph' to romancing him, so I'll DL and let you know what I think! Super excited for more in-law interactions
                   
                  • Feathered Sparks

                    Feathered Sparks Big Damn Hero

                    Sure, you're welcome to use that line!

                    Yeah, I had a hard time thinking of how that "so soon" line might be made more general as well. Tying it to Sam's youth like you said or saying something about how soon/quickly he got married in general should work, though!


                    Oh gosh, I get what you mean about romancing Elliott. It's not bad once you get to 2 hearts with him, but those first two were hard, haha.
                     
                      glowy likes this.
                    • glowy

                      glowy Title Not Found

                      Awesome, thanks! I'm excited to hear what you think! :D
                       
                      • shane train 22

                        shane train 22 Title Not Found

                        I haven't downloaded the file and tested the dialogue out yet but having looked at the spreadsheet the line about the flower dance where he says he bets you'll look cute in your outfit seems a bit weird considering that the farmer doesn't change their clothes for the dance but other than that these lines seem really good.
                         
                        • KATpwnd

                          KATpwnd Scruffy Nerf-Herder

                          I've gone through the texts and they are so sweet! Can't wait for the Sebastian add on :3
                          I'll try this one in the next few days as well since I've wanted to try romancing Sam anyways.
                          But I really think this is a great addition as I think that character interaction sometimes feels too 2d.
                           
                          • springacres

                            springacres Phantasmal Quasar

                            I just went through the dialogue in the spreadsheet and from what I've seen, it looks pretty spot-on! I'm solidly on the Shane train in my current game and don't want to start another just yet, though...
                             
                            • 0Sailor0

                              0Sailor0 Void-Bound Voyager

                              I'm glad that you're working on some dialogue for Elliott ^^ (I never see any for him)
                              Anyway the dialogue for Sam looks good so far, so I'm looking forward to the other bachelors/bachelorettes.
                               
                                glowy likes this.
                              • Puffjiggly

                                Puffjiggly Scruffy Nerf-Herder

                                I'll Look into the Dialogue for sure~!! I'll come back to this post later with my outcome since i'll be working on sam later and testing out a few things in my own modding pack I'm working on for sprites~!
                                 
                                • glowy

                                  glowy Title Not Found

                                  I understand, haha! Even the feedback for just reading the stuff over is helpful. Thanks!
                                   
                                  • glowy

                                    glowy Title Not Found

                                    Thanks so much!! :D Sebastian's dialogue will closely follow Elliot's; I have a profile started up for romancing him too. I look forward to hearing your feedback~
                                     
                                    • glowy

                                      glowy Title Not Found

                                      That's a good point. I'll rewrite that line! I have a good idea of what to replace it with. Thanks~ c:
                                       
                                        shane train 22 likes this.
                                      • TheZhongKui

                                        TheZhongKui Void-Bound Voyager

                                        So far, this mod is looking really good. I am romancing Sam in this playthrough and this, plus the fact I made a personal mod for Sam to look like a metalhead boosted his cuteness by 100%! I am just wondering if you will add extra dialogue for Sam's lil brother, whose name I never remember.
                                         
                                        • daniannapants

                                          daniannapants Void-Bound Voyager

                                          I am curious about this metal head mod. Do you have any screenshots you can show? I really enjoy seeing how other players reinterpret characters.
                                           

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