: WYSIWYG-type editor for dialog? I'm writing dialog for my game in a format kind of similar to screenwriting. I have dialog, mixed with a little "action", like this: John: Can you pass me
I'm writing dialog for my game in a format kind of similar to screenwriting. I have dialog, mixed with a little "action", like this:
John: Can you pass me the salt?
Sally: Sure!
ACTION: Sally passes the salt
However, I don't want to keep writing down the names like that, especially if the names change later.
I want to know if there's a software where I can just write down the dialog without the characters first, select the text, pick a character from a dropdown, which then marks the text that belongs to that character in a format where the dialog and the character saying that dialog is kept separate.
Or, alternatively, the program recognizes while I'm typing who I'm writing the dialog for (it looks for a line beginning with "John: " for example) and it automatically puts it in the right format.
I know this seems very specific, but my main concern is mainly to keep consistency between all the different dialogs and to keep character info and dialog separate.
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I think I know what you mean - I've found from experience that it's rather onerous having to type names and colons over and over again - it really disrupts the flow of my thoughts when I have to do that.
There are a couple of solutions that I've tried myself:
I type a block of names and (if necessary) an action line and then copy and paste them several times. I then end up with a template that I can fill in without getting distracted. This generally works well if the conversation ping-pongs back and forth in a regular way. It will look like this (before it gets filled in):
John:
Sally:
ACTION:
John:
Sally:
ACTION:
I use repeated characters for each name/colon/space block. For example 'John: ' would be 'jjj' and 'Sally: ' would be 'sss'. Then, when I've completed the section/scene/session I just do a find/replace (e.g. 'John: ' for 'jjj'). The beauty of this method is that 'jjj' or 'sss' is quick and easy to type and does not disturb my flow. This method is good for irregular conversations involving more than two characters. You would (prior to the find/replace) type it directly like this:
jjj Can you pass me the salt?
sss Sure
aaa Sally passes the salt
I don't know of any software that can do what you ask, but I hope that you can benefit from my experience in this matter.
Good luck going forward.
There's a software for screenwriting called Trelby.
It has features such as properly aligning actions, headers and lines and, what I find most useful, it remembers character names you've previously used and will auto-complete for you (maybe also locations, but I'm not 100% sure about that).
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