#turtorials

The first thing I need to go over is a quick refresher of terms.

-Variables

-Python blocks

-Arguments and Keyword arguments

Variables are bits of code needed to remember previous user interaction or specific game objects.(like an affection meter or how many times they've seen a menu or pressed a button.) They are assigned using python functionality and are called up with either as a single line of code, with a dollar sign, or as a block with the "python" keyword.

Example:

$ strength = 10

$ met_kathy = True

Python blocks are coding blocks written using python functionality. You call them up using the keyword "python" and everything inside the block itself has to be written using python functions instead of the Ren'Py pseudo-code.

Example:

python:     Jenny_love = 0     Robert_love = 0     Daniel_love = 15     Sandry_love = 5

And finally, arguments and keyword arguments are related to the Class structure (and well functions too) in Python itself. I haven't really gone over either in any detail yet, and I'm not going to do so here, but when you see me copy and paste a Class definition from the documentation, the arguments come before the keyword arguments, and while the arguments are always needed to create an instance of a "Class" the keyword arguments are optional.

Example:

Character(name, kind=adv, **kwargs)

Where "name" is an argument you have to specify every time you instantiate a new character, "kind" is an argument where the default is chosen as adv mode(which is why in you have to specify nvl mode when you create a character for that mode) and then it takes any number of optional **kwargs, including(but not limited to) color, image, who_prefix, ect.

Now that that's done, I can get to the actual discussion of the function in question. What we're working with is the input function, that allows user to save a piece of custom typed date in the system, so it can be evaluated and manipulated later. In the example I'm going to walk you through, we're going to use it to give the player character a custom name, but you can also use it to "input" a code to unlock content or how I'm going to use it in the TMNT Dating Sim, to insert preferred pronouns.

Here's the definition of the input function:

renpy.input(prompt, default='', allow=None, exclude='{}', length=None, with_none=None, pixel_width=None)

I'll explain each of the *args and **kwargs inside. The prompt is what the textbox displays to the player. It needs to be a string, or text inside of two quotation sets. Preferably, it should be a natural sounding part of the narrative, but it can be as simple as "Type your name here." Or some such.

Now allow and exclude have to do with the characters the player can type. You can allow all characters, or tell the system to exclude numbers if you want them to type in a player name. Or you can just type in what characters are allowed. Whichever is easier. For example, if you only want them to type numbers, it's easier to just place those in the "allow" section. They would be placed in between quotation marks and each character separated by a comma.

The length is a number that tells the system the maximum number of characters the input can take. Good for making sure names stay within certain length bonds and your textbox continues to rock.

Finally, pixel width is how many pixels wide an input can be. Better than character length in some ways. That way you don't limit it to say "10" characters, but instead how much room it can take up max.(only a consideration for things that stay on the screen like the player character name in this example.)

Ok, now that that's explained, let's pull up a quick example. I'll post some screen shots and explain them, but a link to the entire usable code will be at the end.

Alright! So this is the top of the code, and I just wanted to highligh something before I move on. I'll be coming back to DynamicCharacters as a class some other time, but it's in there to allow me to easily change the name of the "narrator". In an example this short, it doesn't make much of a difference, but in a more 

complicated game, you better believe it will. The string used as the name in this case is a stand in. A variable in the same way that povname is. It's similarly assessed dynamically, so when I change it later in the script(as you can see highlighted in the full example I'll link to at the end) it changes the name.

Ok, onto the interesting stuff!

This one is a little small, but you can still get the gist of it. You can see me change the narrator's name in the game, and then there's the python block. Ok so let me explain that a little bit more.

First you call up the python functionality with the keyword "python" and then you indent because it expects a block. The first line is the name of the variable you're going to use to represent your pov character's name. As you can see, it matches the name of the variable you defined as the Character "name"(with a "shortcut" of sorts being "pov"). So that's one side of the equation. On the other side is the renpy.input function. This tells the system that the variable is an "input" by the user. There's the prompt string in quotation marks. That's what's actually displayed to your player.

The next part isn't really intutive, I know it wasn't to me the first time I did this, so let me explain. The strip function you see on the right side of the equation removes any extra spaces the player might have added by accident. But as you can see it's called povname.strip. This is because you are stripping the extra characters off of the povname variable. The variable which right before this you had the player input themselves.

So first they input the variable, then it's stripped of its extra spaces. You can only perform the strip() function on "povname" because it already exists as a variable in the system.(the first line).

The last part tells the system IF they just don't pick a name. Say they've played this before and they don't care, or maybe they just want to know what the default is, it tells the system to assign the "input"(povname) variable "Joshua". This way they can't go through your game with no name at all.

There's still more code after this for dealing with varifying the players name and such, but that's the basics.

You can find the entire code here, and it's been debugged and runs like a charm. Just copy paste everything to see it run. Here's the link!