Running Conversations and Hot Tubs
So Everything is Permitted's central facet is the fact that you're hunting for the mole that betrayed the Federation, the Wargods and Laporte. To add some story hints to the mission, we would have the mole have a conversation with Steele. The conversation would activate a signal monitor on the player's ship to draw the player to their target. To make things a little tricky for the player we added a "decoy" transport. A transport that just has boring normal traffic so the player has to look for the right conversation while they are hunting.
The whole messaging system was pretty complex, hitting an 4096 character limit on events early on in development (this was lifted, allowing the insanity to continue). We had to check to make sure the player had hacked the comms subsystem on Artemis, make sure that its our turn to talk, make sure that one side hasn't talked too much, make sure the player's ship has power, make sure that the player hasn't revealed themselves, make sure that the mole wasn't dead (there was a point where killing the mole without raising any alarm would have Steele talking to a vaporized transport) and etc.
Anyway, writing foreshadowing and intriguing dialog is not my forte. That was Battuta's. But I had to write something for the running conversations so that I could make sure everything was working. When I need to make sure good dialog gets written, I just write very bad dialog so someone will just rewrite it.
Here are the original test conversations... Hot tubs and bananaphones!
Running conversation between Mole (MM) and Atreus (AM)
$Name: MM1
Yo, Steele, my main man. Waaaazzzzuuuup?
$Name: AM1
Not much my homie. Just sitting back, having a few brewskis. How waz your flight man?
$Name: MM2
This is one podunk ride you sent to pick me up bro. No hot tubs or anything!
$Name: AM2
Hey lady, we need to keep is real ya'know. Those u-fies go for my pimpin' hot tub corvettes
$Name: MM3
But G, you said I'd be jiving with the best. This ain't anything but the best!
$Name: AM3
Just chill yo. You get your hot tubs when you give me this project thing to me.
$Name: MM4
No no man. I get my hot tub first, then we talk.
$Name: AM4
C'mon sister. You know how much those hot tubs cost. I can't just throw them away to any ol' mean mother hubbard!
$Name: MM5
What'd you call me?!
$Name: AM5
Aw man, I'm sorry. I just wasn't thinking. Ya know what I'm saying?
$Name: MM6
Don't give me that bro. This ain't no sucka party now is it?
$Name: AM6
Look, let's just get this all down. I got hot tubs on here. Just gimme something here. I've got the big boss on hold, I need to give em anythin'!
$Name: MM7
Alright G, fine. You wanna know?
$Name: AM7
Yeah! Tell me sister!
$Name: MM8
It's called... Jambalaya..
$Name: AM8
What.
$Name: MM9
You heard me. It's the most badass jambalaya recipe this side of Ross 128!
$Name: AM9
Tell me more!
$Name: MM10
Well you see the secret is...
$Name: AM10
Just a sec, I really gotta take this call.
Running Conversation between aRtemis station (RM) and Transport (TM)
$Name: TM1
RING RING RING RING
$Name: RM1
BANANAPHONE
$Name: TM2
I've got this feeling, so appealing,
$Name: RM2
for us to get together and sing. Sing!
$Name: TM3
Ring ring ring ring ring ring ring
$Name: RM3
banana phone!
$Name: TM4
Ding dong ding dong ding dong
$Name: RM4
donana phone!
$Name: TM5
It grows in bunches
$Name: RM5
I've got my hunches,
$Name: TM6
It's the best!
$Name: RM6
Beats the rest!
$Name: TM7
Cellular, modular, interactivodular!
$Name: RM7
Ring ring ring ring ring ring ring
$Name: TM8
banana phone
$Name: RM8
Boop-boo-ba-doo-ba-doop!
$Name: TM9
Ping pong ping pong ping pong ping
$Name: RM9
panana phone
$Name: TM10
It's no baloney, it ain't a phony
$Name: RM10
My cellular bananular phone!