JavaScript Visual Novel Engine: Using Flags

Some visual novels have paths that diverge and then rejoin. You need to be able to keep track of which paths have been taken in order to come to the appropriate ending. (Click the picture to see it at full size).

In the summary, you want four possible endings:

• Reader chose path A two or more times: very good ending
• Reader chose path B two or more times: good ending
• Reader chose path C two or more times: very bad ending
• Reader chose each path one time: bad ending

To accomplish this, you set a flag, a variable that keeps track of the number of times a path was chosen, for each path.

At the beginning of the novel, set three user variables to zero:

setVars, {flagA: 0, flagB: 0, flagC: 0}

And then, every time you get to a choice point, you add one to the appropriate variable. For example, if the reader chooses path A, you do this:

setVars, "novel.userVar.flagA = novel.userVar.flagA + 1"

Then, in the summary, you can use a series of ifStatements to figure out what to do. You can see a complete example of flags here.