[Sub] Game Tester's Tool Kit, Devices to make testing quicker and easier Options

[Alt_Jack]

Most of the events I make are simply to make testing my games easier (or awesome-er). So I figured I should put some here to make it easier for other people to test aspects of their games quickly and easily. The most important thing is the switch box you can access only in test mode by hitting F9. You can also create a switch called "game test edit" to make it more obvious, and a parallel process event so you can open it anytime. An off switch at the end of the event is also recommended.

ALL OF THESE REQUIRE THIS SWITCH TO WORK

I'll update it periodically (triple post, anyone?) and people are welcome to share their own testing-specific tools.

[Show/Hide] Ghost Mode

you'll need: a common event, a switch, and a parallel process event.
Create a common event called "Through"
Then create a switch called (you guessed it) "Through"
make a condition branch that says:

If switch "Through" is ON
Show choices: ON, OFF
if ON:

And this is where it gets tricky.

Player move Route:
$>Through ON

TURN "WAIT TIL COMPLETION" OFF BEFORE CLOSING THIS. It'll screw up everything.
Then create its anti-thesis

if OFF
Show Move Route-Player
>Through OFF

Then it's "branch end"
Then put in "control switch Through- OFF"
This turns it off when you're done.

Now create an Parallel Trigger event that serves no obvious purpose (like a waterfall effect, a sign or a random civilian). Open up the page for this innocuous event and put in "call common event: Through". Next time you're play-testing, hit F9 and it'll bring up a list of switches, including your "through" switch. Assuming you did everything right, turn it ON, then exit the menu. A box should pop up saying "On/Off" and should be the super-awesome result of the work you just did. Again, assuming you did everything right, it should turn itself off after you make your selection. You character will walk through everything (just like they would if you were holding Ctrl) until you hit F9 again. You'll notice the switch is off again! Click it on again and select "Off" and it'll be back to normal.

[Show/Hide] Chapter Skip

Create a parallel proces event
create a condition branch "if switch Game test edit"= ON (and a command that turns it off at the end), but without the "else" function
create a number input function for a variable like "Chapter number"
then create another condition branch "if variable [chapter number] = XX" then transfer player to a location at the beginning of that chapter.
create a similar conditional branch for each chapter, so when you enter the number it'll send the player to that chapter

This post has been edited by Alt_Jack: Aug 23 2010, 05:01 PM

[sasofrass]

Cool - I'll for sure use this! Before I was just adding teleports everywhere, and this seems a lot easier.

[Alt_Jack]

Cool - I'll for sure use this! Before I was just adding teleports everywhere, and this seems a lot easier.

It is. This'll save you hours of time on testing. The only problem is adding the Condition Branch (if variable BLah = X transfer player to Blah) every time.
The theme (choice box->condition branch->variable-->change) remains the same, though. You need to put it somewhere innocuous, though.

[Show/Hide] inventory changer/ultimate cheat

This one is long. It changes party gold, items, levels...everything. Hence the couple hundred choice boxes and redundant variable.

Show choices: gold, party, items
when gold-enter input # for variable GOLD- increase gold by variable GOLD
when items- (same deal. if the variable is this, give that item)
when party
show choices-Level, armor, weapons
when level
show choices (list of party members. 4 boxes, 4 party members. Convenient, eh? )
select a party member
input # for variable-LEVEL
change level of party member to variable LEVEL
when armor (same as items)
when weapons (same as items, armor...etc)

This is obviously shorter than it's likely to be. You can just use some Call common event stuff so that you don't have a list box as long as your arm. It'll effectively call up, through a series of choice boxes, everything you could possibly need to change anything about your party. Hell, you could even throw in yet another choice box for a movement edit that makes your player walk faster (see Ghost Mode for an idea of how this works).
You just need to do the parallel process/F9/switch nonsense at the top, otherwise you'll have blown a good half hour on this with no way to call it up.

[Show/Hide] Kill Switch

when this switch is on, any event that is linked to this function is erased. Good if you have some events lying around you don't want to go through, like cut scenes or enemies.
Create an aptly-named switch called (guess what?) KILL
Then create a 2nd event page for each event you want the killSwitch to affect
pg 2.
switch: kill ON
movement: [same as page 1]
activation: parallel process
priority-same as
erase event
this will simultaneously erase every event that has this as their 2nd page instantly

This post has been edited by Alt_Jack: Aug 12 2010, 12:17 PM

[Alt_Jack]

This new one is a bit of an upgrade on the transfer event, and can be integrated (with some craftiness) into the Chapter Warp. It's a precision transfer, that let's you choose where on which map you'll go

[Show/Hide] chapter skip 2.0

Create the usual parallel proces event

create a condition branch "if switch Game test edit"= ON (and a command that turns it off at the end), but without the "else" function
create 3 switches: chap. map, X Co and Y Co
text box: select chapter 1-XX
input number for variable chap.map
text: input number for X Co-ordinate (horizontal)
input # box-X Co
text: input number for Y Co-ordinate (vertical)
input # for variable Y Co
Transfer player-direct designation
Map ID= chap map
X=X Co
Y=Y Co

this sort of assumes that you only have 1 map per chapter. You could have a text box (check off "batch" to make it fit) that shows the Map ID beside the area name.

[Alt_Jack]

This is for those long blocks of text (instructions, comedic arguments, etc). You don't need a parallel process for this.
When you turn this switch on, it'll just skip to a pre-set point in a discussion to by-pass superflous dialogue.
For our purposes, we'll say someone's talking to you.

[Show/Hide] Text Skip

Create a switch called "skip" (or whatever)
Create a condition branch at the top of the event page that says "if switch skip is on"
then create a label near the end of the text that says "end"
in your condition branch, put "jump to label: end"

Use F9 to turn the switch on, and it'll jump to the line of text after "end"

[Alt_Jack]

Okay, so you've created a secret warp tile on the first level, disguised as a pile of grass that takes you to the final boss (your welcome for that idea, BTW), but then realise you're still level 1 and must beat the giant zombie dragon with stick that does 4 damage.
Well, try this:

[Show/Hide] Automatic Update

you'll need: a blank event. Yeah, just one.
create an event
set it to autorun (so that it starts when you get there, no switch needed)
change weapons (or items, armor, etc)
Change party ( hey, where'd you guys come from?! )
Change level (you can also use a number input variable function, like the one above, for this)
Party Restore: all (this restores the health to all the party members, so that their health will be at the level it should be rather than L1 )
erase event

the 2 final commands (restore health, erase event) are essential to not screwing this up. The restore balances out your health and the erase command eliminates the event pretty much as soon as it activates, much like how your computer makes auto-updates for programs when it boots up. This ensures that it works in the background, then quietly slips away; it works as soon as you set foot on the map, then erases itself. You'll be equiped before you even think to check the menu to see if the changes activated (but probably should).