Time Display
Hi, so I want to implement an in game time system (I'm using Harlowe).
Basically I want certain actions (hanging out with people/exploring/etc) to take up time and there are only so many hours in a day before you rest and at certain days certain things happen. Now, I know how to make the day counter go: When you 'rest' the day counter goes up. It's also displayed when you're in the bedroom.
My problem seems to be the time. I want it to be in the header on the far right corner.
In my startup page, I have
On a seperate page labeled time I have
Before you comment, yes, I know 5&6 are evening but that's when most of the characters are supposed to be off work.
My problem is, this doesn't work.
My header is supposed to constantly display a link to inv/relationships/stats/etc and then the 'time'. I tried this as
Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong or how I can do this better?
Basically I want certain actions (hanging out with people/exploring/etc) to take up time and there are only so many hours in a day before you rest and at certain days certain things happen. Now, I know how to make the day counter go: When you 'rest' the day counter goes up. It's also displayed when you're in the bedroom.
My problem seems to be the time. I want it to be in the header on the far right corner.
In my startup page, I have
(set: $days to 0) (set: $turn to 0) (if: $turn >= 8)[ (set: $day to $day + 1) (set: $turn to 0) (print: "It's getting late so you decide to go home and get some rest.") (goto:Home)]
On a seperate page labeled time I have
(if: $turn is 1) [(set: $time to "Dawn")] (if: $turn is 2) [(set: $time to "Early Morning")] (if: $turn is 3) [(set: $time to "Morning")] (if: $turn is 4) [(set: $time to "Afternoon")] (if: $turn is 5) [(set: $time to "Evening")] (if: $turn is 6) [(set: $time to "Evening")] (if: $turn is 7) [(set: $time to "Sunset")] (if: $turn is 8) [(set: $time to "Midnight")]
Before you comment, yes, I know 5&6 are evening but that's when most of the characters are supposed to be off work.
My problem is, this doesn't work.
My header is supposed to constantly display a link to inv/relationships/stats/etc and then the 'time'. I tried this as
(if: (passage:)'s name is "inventory")[<!--Do nothing-->] (else-if: (passage:)'s tags contains "donotshowinventory")[<!--Do nothing-->] (else:)[ [[Inventory|inventory]] [[Relationships]] [[Stats]] [[Tablet]] (print: $time) ]
Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong or how I can do this better?
Comments
This is significantly more complicated than it needs to be. Generally, if you have hooks whose job is to do nothing, there's a better way to do it. It doesn't matter all that much, but it is wasteful and confusing to have empty conditions. Why not just:
As to the main issue, it might be a few things:
1. Could it be that $turn is 0? I imagine you're setting it to 1 in the 'Home' passage, but we're not seeing that here.
2. You say that a separate passage called 'time' takes the $turn variable and sets the $time value accordingly. I imagine you're (display:)ing that passage somewhere, but where? That code needs to run for $time to be anything--maybe display it in a header-tagged passage?
3. The code in your startup-tagged passage has a similar problem. Is it being called anywhere else? Passages sort of behave like functions--they need to be invoked for their code to run.
4. Minor issue: why aren't you using (elseif:)s?
My suggestion would be to try something like this:
::init [startup] { (set: $days to 0) (set: $turn to 0) (set: $time to '') } ::header [header] (display: 'time')\ (unless: (passage:)'s name is 'inventory' or (passage:)'s tags contains 'donotshowinventory')[ [[Inventory|inventory]] [[Relationships]] [[Stats]] [[Tablet]] (print: $time) ] ::time { <!-- note the elseif statements --> (if: $turn is 1)[ (set: $time to "Dawn")] (elseif: $turn is 2)[ (set: $time to "Early Morning")] (elseif: $turn is 3)[ (set: $time to "Morning")] (elseif: $turn is 4)[ (set: $time to "Afternoon")] (elseif: $turn is 5 or $turn is 6)[ (set: $time to "Evening")] (elseif: $turn is 7)[ (set: $time to "Sunset")] (elseif: $turn >= 8)[ (set: $time to "Midnight") (set: $day to $day + 1) (set: $turn to 0) (goto: 'Home') <!-- this (goto:) will fire before the player has a chance to read the (print:), so just include it in the 'Home' passage; also, you don't need (print:) to write some text -->] } ::Home (set: $turn to 1)\ It's getting late so you decide to go home and get some rest. blah blah blah, etc.This code is in Twee format; '::' denotes a passage, and the format is ::(passage name) [(tags in the brackets)].
@deadcheese & @Chapel: Instead of using Collapsing whitespace markup to reduce any unwanted output generated by a startup tagged special passage you should use CSS like the following in your Story Stylesheet area to hide it completely.
tw-include[type="startup"] { display: none; }note: the above technique also works for the Harlow 2.x series.At a guess (I'm not a Harlowe coder):
Might need a -1 in there if the arrays are zero based. You'll also need to range check $turn before you make the lookup (setting it to 1 if it's set to 9).
Noted. Thanks for the tip.