Hello everyone, so I’m new here and also new in making IF. So I come into this dilemma where I make a few branching choices and in these different choices, the MC will meet a few different characters. So, the problem is that, some of this character may not be able to be included in some of the other route and may cause the player to miss out a few character that may be important later on. So, should I make a circumstances where at the end of the route, the mc will meet with those character that the player miss out? But I’m afraid that it will make the story a bit choppy, or cause the player to feel forced to go a certain way.
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This comes down to a structure and design issue. The specific thing you’ve mentioned can be remedied with loops, and with “branch and bottleneck” structure.
A simple loop means the player can make choices, but each one re-directs back to the same node to choose again or make a different choice. In this example, the player must confirm when they are done talking to two characters. The game loops them back until they choose the link that continues the story.
Branch and bottleneck essentially allows you to have branching structures that separate, but at some point every branch will come back to one node which can offer progression or perhaps link back to start another branch before the bottleneck.
If you have a situation where you want to make sure the player sees certain branches, you can provide a link that only appears when certain conditions are met.
In this example, each character has several branches, but the snarl bottlenecks at the "A fun day!’ node where the player has the choice to proceed, or go back and choose a different way through the structure.
There are more complicated things that can be done, but this is the basic structure to avoid a complete time cave where every choice only moves the story forward.
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Thank you for answering! But let me provide some information regarding my IF first.
So the MC is essentially an isekai protagonist who’s essentially just transported into another world. The scenario is a newly introduced character seems to notice mc in distress/happiness and wanted to help.
The route here is either run away because the mc is scared, or interact with that character. If the mc chooses to interact, they will be introduced to that character, but if the mc runs away, they will be introduced to a new character.
So the mc can’t really go back to an initial state as this scenario is a real time event where the time move forward.
Once again, thank you for answering and providing assistance!
This really comes down to what you want to write. Do you want the player to be able to play through the whole of the story without ever meeting one character or the other? You can do this, but you will end up writing a lot of conditional text—it could end up as essentially two versions of every scene. That will add up fast, especially if you introduce more choices than continue to affect every later scene in the same way.
Rather than think about what follows on “logically” from your very first scene, think about what story you actually want to tell. If you’re excited about writing the version with character A and equally excited about writing the version with character B, you can bite the bullet and do all the work of writing two versions of every scene. But if you really want to tell the story with character A, change your scene so that the player never has the option of meeting character B instead.
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A character is a lot of work. Dialogue etc, graphic maybe too. Any significant character must be a plot invariant that you meet them. Make it look like choice, but if they walk away, find a way to make them meet. Perhaps in the next scene.
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Thank you! I’ll put them all in mind. Better get creative then I guess.
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