[LE] Newb question- Dialog modding at a High school- recommendation needed.

[ShabnamHoward]

Hi, I have been doing all my CK work for Fallout and have done my own NPC to NPC conversations in that environment. Some high school students expressed an interest in doing this sort of modding, but I ran into a road block as I live in a country where Fallout is restricted for children under 18. So here Skyrim is R-13, and so it seems to me I can just use that instead for homework assignments, then we just port the stuff to Fallout after they get all the voice acting details worked out for their characters.

 

It seems to me that if they wanted to do modding at home I can point them to vanilla Skyrim- that they don't need special edition- and then use the 32bit CK to do the dialog inputs, lip file creation, and so on. I am not sure how many folks will want to do that, but if they want the option, that's what I could tell them, right?

 

Or is there some reason I should recommend special edition?

 

 

[xWilburCobbx]

I am not an expert here, but I don't see why you couldn't use the original Skyrim AKA "Oldrim". Unless steam removed the legacy tools, and there is no other way to obtain them, that may pose an issue.

 

Unlike Fallout 4, Oldrim doesn't use Bethesda.Net that I am aware of. So I can't say for sure if there is a way to use the new Creation Kit with Oldrim.

 

Though if you plan on combining data, its a lot easier if everyone has the same version of Skyrim. Otherwise you could port over old (.esp) versions to new ones.

 

https://wiki.nexusmods.com/index.php/Porting_Skyrim_mods_to_Skyrim_Special_Edition

 

I am not sure if you can do the reverse though.

Edited July 29, 2020 by smashballsx88

[ShabnamHoward]

Oh lordy, I am glad I asked.

 

Thanks very much. I have played Skyrim a bit and watched a ton of youtubes of skyrim modding (because a lot of the techniques are identical), but I was ignorant of this basic fact about tools for Oldrim.

 

I want this to be as simple as possible for the non gamer/ no techie students, and so I think I prefer they do the relatively turnkey CK install from behesda.net. from the Specs, SE runs on fairly low end machines, so I expect this will not be a barrier.

 

If anyone else wants to add their two cents about possible speed bumps/ issues, I am very interested in any advice given. I understand that CK 32 bit is recommended. I will get up to speed on this environment in the coming month so when we get to that bridge I will not be as wholly ignorant as I am now. But the CK skyrim workflow looks pretty familiar, although a few FO4 features not important for this project are obviously missing.

[xWilburCobbx]

Well, my words aren't gospel. I have only worked with Oldrim for a brief amount of time, I have been doing most my learning on the CK since SSE.

 

These are things you need to watch for though, so I hope its not grim because Oldrim could save your students a lot of money.

[ShabnamHoward]

I understand, thanks. I am a quick study and will dry run the entire thing before I turn them loose. The lower cost platform was precisely what interested me, but CK can be infuriating enough without a lot of other variables, so I am pretty gun shy about it if Bethesda doesn't have normal support for it. Maybe I can get Oldrim to work in the future, but I will want to be pretty confident about the workflow before I even mention that this sort of platform is a possibility.

 

At this stage though doing it on a home computer was mostly an option I wanted to be able to offer to any hardcore types that might be in the bunch. Most work will be done on machines at school which will actually have FO4 engines with FO4 tools and CK. Most of the class is not about the actual hands on computer part. 90% of the work will be creative writing and studio time doing the voice acting. The CK part is just plugging in the dialog text and audio files.

[xWilburCobbx]

Leaving this part of the assignment completely optional is definitely your best bet in my opinion. From the sound of it, students without "techie" knowledge will probably struggle with CK.

 

CK was designed for the devs, so its not very intuitive. Especially the way CK handles, you just kinda have to know things about it. I always have to research how CK does anything from deleting unwanted forms to the relationship between master files and .esp(s).

 

Its one of the best modding software kits I have ever used, but thats a pretty low bar considering it doesn't even have a functioning sound engine!

 

My suggestion, is just maybe have a few copies of SSE and have your knowledgeable students help the ones who want in, build dialogue and stuff. I don't know how you want to conduct your classroom, you are the expert there, but that's my 2 cents.

Edited July 29, 2020 by smashballsx88

[ShabnamHoward]

Yep. the strugglers won't have to sweat it. I'll be sitting right there making them save often and not randomly click checkboxes to see what they do. All grousing aside, CK is still able to make more compelling stuff faster and with less technical knowledge than general purpose design suites like Unity due to the volume of quality youtubes out there that offer a paint by numbers approach to modding. Sure- such tools vendors aren't standing still- eventually they will achieve parity. And what happens at that point is unclear. Either the games wanting to encourage third party aftermarket items up the quality of their modding tools, or they lose any reputation they once had as as the most attractive game to mod. I'm glad its not my problem, and I don't have a favorite outcome on how it matures so long as the tools evolve sufficiently before I become completely senile.

 

Not really sure what kind of students I am going to get. My inclination is to give more combustibles to anyone who looks like they want and can handle more heat and light, while declining to pour gasoline on the flames only meant for a candle on a cake. I'll be happy calibrating to either- I am a parent volunteer for this project, doing it in conjunction with a more pro thing for a local museum.

 

As far as CK's tough spot as being a means to an end tool- Yep. But just as a bit of ancient history, photoshop began life as a utility and was sold as a touch up tool to be sold with scanners. The fortunate thing was that the Knoll brothers were actually very very good and passionate and careful about the way they made their tool.

 

That's no knock to the folks who built the CK tool. For the Knoll brothers, their product was the tool, not what the tool makes. But still, it is a little shocking to me the things I see- like no testing harness on the game or for the tools- that CK does not maintain basic UI discipline on things like setting focus to the pane where the user would expect focus to be. But I get that spending an extra ten minutes here and there on such fiddly bits are often ignored because the team is fighting fires in order to make a ship date of the actual product before Christmas. High severity bugs in the tool doesn't exactly get priority when the team doesn't have time to stabilize and eliminate all sev1 (eg CTD) bugs before ship. It is not a pleasant place for a dev manager, or any of her developers to be. Anyone who has been through these sorts of pressure cooker experiences are not enthusiastic about throwing stones.