Oolite Bulletins

How about a spacer bar in every station where you could interact with game characters in other ways than with the laser? It could be a screen with four or five names:

Ittbe Reinreson, a human colonial twit
Itbe Lo, a sensual blu furry feline
Zaoner Ilalzaer, a rugged bug-eyed bird
Le Abma, an honest looking lizard

When you select one of them they'll say some random yada like: "Y'know I was out thar, peacefully mining transparisteel at Xexeti when suddenly I get attacked shum damn medical boat! Can you beleive it?"

Then you would have a few options:
* "Yeah, tell me about it", which would bring another harangue
* "I just realized that I don't really want to talk to you", which would bring back the menu with bar patrons
* "Share a beer with X", which sometimes results in shady transport offers or other deals. Maybe something like "This is a fine planet and all, but the food isn't up to par! Why, I'd even pay 150 cedits per tonne of Tezaedean goat steak, and what wouldn't I do for some Orraran Zast brew..."

Of course, when you've shared beers with too many people, your ship will be very hard to steer for a few minutes, darting this way and that. The risk of crashing into the station is "not insignificant", as my local GalCop officer informed me the other day. :^)

The contents of the discussions could be expanded with oxp's. I'm shure people here would come up with hilarious statements for the spacers to say.

This sounds like an excellent tangent... I'd be happy to write scripts i.e. some 'conversation' OXP. But I think this would involve enormous code stuff

Do you really think so? Granted, it wouldn't be a line or two, but most of it should be a matter of reusing existing code.

But I'm no coder, so what do I know.. :^)

Thought I should throw it out here and see what happens.

I used to write an Elisa-like program (which does pseudo-dialogue) and while it involved quite some thinking, the actual code was quite compact (had to, 64kb computer)
So I guess, esp w/ dajt's new parser, this would be eminently possible.

Imagine having a conversation with a Thargoid!

Human: "Whadda ya know, Thargs?"
Thargoid: "We'll use your weird icebergs for our burgers!"
Human: "Icebergs, eh?"
Tharhoid: "Eat bat, human snail-fish!"
Human: "Hmmm.... whatever"

Look out, the Thargoids are back... They're aphasic and pissed off!

BOOOM.... "Sorry for the mess" Han Solo

More likely Human-Thargoid interaction

EAGLE 5 wrote:

BOOOM.... "Sorry for the mess" Han Solo

More likely Human-Thargoid interaction

Best scene in Serenity.

"I'm unarmed" *sits down*
"Good" Draws gun and shoots

Lucas is a pussy.

Rxke wrote:

I used to write an Elisa-like program (which does pseudo-dialogue) and while it involved quite some thinking, the actual code was quite compact (had to, 64kb computer)
So I guess, esp w/ dajt's new parser, this would be eminently possible.

Oh good, a volunteer.

It doesn't even have to be as advanced as Eliza, just a set of phrases with a few variables.
At least to begin with. If many people submit conversation oxp's, there would be quite a lot of variation anyway.

persons encountered should be random though.

Except for when you fly a ship with more than 1 crew...then you would expect to share a few pints of Leezan slugjuice (TM) with your friendly crew on occasion.

Could be fun for mission encounters too...
as usual a stranger approughes you and proposes a deal, you refuse and things get hairy when you realise the being is a fierce, not a harmless, feline. Luckilly your crew is there to pull the sharp-clawed alien off you before too much damage is done...etc

Talk to men of low moral fibre (pirates)

:^)

Buy 'personal protection gear' to increase your chances of surviving failed contract negotiations with uncouth tradingpartners...or even just to increase the odds of not failing them:

Point modified plasma-torque at other party, then say:
"you don't need to see our licence..."
(ie Yedi-mind trick)

Ahruman wrote:

Oh good, a volunteer.

it creeps me out when you start talking about yourself in the third person!

Seriously: two weeks holiday, and... I'm prolly dropping out for this year (because can't get thesis finished in time and my medication does weird things with my head /TWITCH/

So maybe, maybe, if there's interest in this? (I've got other things to do, so I won't promise)

My first question: this would be an OXP, w/o a 'mission' perse, but how to set this up bulletproof that it doesn't interfere w/ other ongoing 'real' missions?

(Hmm... On second thought: I guess I'll find that out myself quite easily, ne'er mind)

ok, is there enoug interest in something like this?

Can OXP's interact with each other? For example if someone wants to make a mission OXP that involves talking to someone at the bar.