Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 06/07/2026Well I hope that tester thing was some use; if it's still missing things like that I can maybe look at improving it if you have breaking examples? One thing I've learned is feeding the coverage tests with random changes the *game* might make to your vars is very useful. 100
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 06/07/2026Oh I see - misread your post! Honestly so many bugs in so many narrative systems are things I wish we had ways to track down at compile/build time but as a discipline we're not great at making tools for it. 150
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 06/07/2026Ah, but it also throws a big warning about in the editor. (I went back and forward about this and didn't want a hard crash.) 130
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 06/07/2026I have learned to hate generated TTS. :-) The writer knows if the line is supposed to be comic, or sarcastic, or whatever - TTS just won't get it. 090
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 06/07/2026I've made a new dialogue system. It's open source, has a friendly editor, and runs on Unreal, Unity, Javascript, and Godot. You can find it at patterkit.dev And I've written too much text about it over here: medium.com/@wildwinter/...patterkit.devPatterKit - Write it, play it, test it, ship it.An open toolkit for dialogue and branching narrative in games. Your writers author in a calm, code-free editor; you drop one small file into Unity, Unreal, Godot, or the web and play it. 23424115
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 17/06/2026There are definitely tools that split on silences but that's not useful as you it won't know where your lines end. I'm sure there's some sort of "recognise words" tech solution now, but I don't know it. 100
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 17/06/2026Honestly I have always used tools like Audacity or Reaper; attaching file names to sections of the master wav. That also lets you process everything in one place, and easily review different takes and export to a folder of named files. 110
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 06/06/2026I wanted to collect some stuff into index cards so I could get back to them. And share that with Rachel. Digitally. Partly because I have a poor memory. A simple card database. God help me, I even missed MS Access. So I built one. You can use it, if you like. wildwinter.medium.com/wildcards-wh...wildwinter.medium.comWildcards: Where’s my simple card database?TL;DR: God help me, I actually miss Microsoft Access and FileMaker. I built Wildcards: a fast, local-first way to keep information on… 021
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 30/05/2026I appear to be in Birmingham. Is this a good or a bad thing? 130
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/05/2026Hi there - I've fixed something and replied. One proper bug, and one thing that I think was unclear. (And I briefly got distracted by a red herring!) Hope it all makes sense - check Github. 110
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 14/05/2026I did make some tweaks to the comment export for voice scripts - might be worth a look in the new release? If not, drop an issue on Github to tell me what's going on from your PoV -samples are good! 210
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 12/05/2026Depends which excel you mean! Maybe put a bug/issue on the GitHub? 010
Reposted by Ian ThomasAndy Walsh @englishscribe.bsky.social · 09/05/2026Happy Saturday - potential opportunities. I'm putting together a database of writers for potential upcoming roles. IF these opportunities go forward, they would be freelance contract roles. The work would take place on GMT/GMT+1 time. If interested please read the whole thread before responding. 16239
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 04/05/2026A tiny thing - but the game-subtitles tool I created can now drop in word-wrapping breaks for compiled Ink JSON content (in the preprocessor). Probably only of interest to a very few! github.com/wildwinter/g...github.comGitHub - wildwinter/game-subtitles: Subtitling tool for games which preps lines for subtitles and then helps dynamically display at runtime.Subtitling tool for games which preps lines for subtitles and then helps dynamically display at runtime. - wildwinter/game-subtitles 070
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 02/05/2026"Mar-vel at the tess-se-la-tion of my fi-nest che-dar cheese..." (What, no one else thinks of Gilbert and Sullivan while trying to put away food in the fridge?) 000
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 19/04/2026I mean I knew both of those, but details had faded. (And Bob Hoskins is soooo good.) 010
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 19/04/2026Things I have been enjoying this weekend after forgetting how good they are: * Who Framed Roger Rabbit? * All tracks by System of a Down 140
Reposted by Ian Thomasinkle @inkle.co · 08/04/2026This week on the Game Narrative Kaleidoscope Podcast: Veteran narrative designer @wildwinter.bsky.social takes us on a wild tour of the boundaries of story design and LARPs. One for all, and all for one! Check it out here: www.inklestudios.com/kaleidoscope... ... or any-podcast-place! 03813
Reposted by Ian ThomasIan Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 28/03/2026I got annoyed that my pipeline tools might fail when writing files into Perforce, Github or any other repo. So here is a tiny open-source library that handles checking out, adding, and deleting files for whichever version control system happens to be in place. wildwinter.medium.com/simple-versi...wildwinter.medium.comSimple Version Control LibTL;DR — a tiny agnostic wrapper around version control systems, so your game tools don’t have to care which one the user has. Find the code… 021
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 28/03/2026I got annoyed that my pipeline tools might fail when writing files into Perforce, Github or any other repo. So here is a tiny open-source library that handles checking out, adding, and deleting files for whichever version control system happens to be in place. wildwinter.medium.com/simple-versi...wildwinter.medium.comSimple Version Control LibTL;DR — a tiny agnostic wrapper around version control systems, so your game tools don’t have to care which one the user has. Find the code… 021
Reposted by Ian ThomasAntonio Freyre - Merlino Games @merlinogames.bsky.social · 14/03/2026important 1230231135
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 14/03/2026I've been using Logic Pro and Final Cut and Affinity on an 8GB M3 MacBook Air with no problems. 010
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 14/03/2026Well, Microsoft codesigning sucks for individual hobbyist developers. 000
Reposted by Ian ThomasIan Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 09/03/2026Game Subtitles - what to do if your text is just too long? I've created a tool to make this easier - paginating and hyphenating where it needs to, in a variety of languages. In the vain hope that maybe I won't have to worry about it ever again! You can find it here: medium.com/@wildwinter/...medium.comGame Subtitles — but my text is too long!TL;DR — a solution to take care of subtitle text so you don’t have to. 083
Reposted by Ian Thomasinkle @inkle.co · 09/03/2026PSA: a lot of people asked for an ebook edition — and we’ve been able to put one together! And with hyperlinks, of course. 315161
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 09/03/2026Game Subtitles - what to do if your text is just too long? I've created a tool to make this easier - paginating and hyphenating where it needs to, in a variety of languages. In the vain hope that maybe I won't have to worry about it ever again! You can find it here: medium.com/@wildwinter/...medium.comGame Subtitles — but my text is too long!TL;DR — a solution to take care of subtitle text so you don’t have to. 083
Reposted by Ian ThomasNed Hartley @nedhartley.com · 03/03/2026Greg Davies: Great task, well done. Didn‘t eat a thing. Persephone: Thank you. Alex Horne: Ah. Well. Let’s take another look at that pomegranate. 111529319
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 04/03/2026Note that I totally failed to hit the brief here and so said more than one thing. Ah well! (Good stuff in this book. Lots of good juicy crunchiness, in fact. From a lot of familiar names!) 060
Reposted by Ian Thomasinkle @inkle.co · 04/03/2026📖 THE GAME NARRATIVE KALEIDOSCOPE ❄️ is out NOW! www.inklestudios.com/kaleidoscope 100+ essays on writing & narrative design, with articles from the writers of Baldur's Gate 3, Control, Call of Duty, Prince of Persia, Tomb Raider, Sam and Max... ALSO the Kaleidoscope Podcast with 2 full eps! 19656321
Reposted by Ian ThomasThe Ken In Yellow @kenlowery.bsky.social · 15/02/2026Ah, shit... woke up in a mysterious and abandoned location, and I've lost my memory. I hope a series of gradually escalating challenges positioned between me and escape can instruct me how to open doors, use my powers, and double jump. 1524550
Reposted by Ian ThomasIan Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 17/02/2026I've collected some tools and articles here, as it's all getting a bit messy. storytools.sestorytools.seStory Tools - Narrative Design Tools & ArticlesHelpful tools, libraries, and articles for games narrative pipelines. Made by Ian Thomas. 073
Reposted by Ian ThomasIan Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 17/02/2026New feature for Dinky (the dialogue Ink editor) - record scratch audio for each line while in the editor, and be notified when it goes out of date. medium.com/@wildwinter/...medium.comDinky Feature: Scratch AudioTL;DR —in Dinky you can record temp audio for each line of your script. 171
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 17/02/2026I've collected some tools and articles here, as it's all getting a bit messy. storytools.sestorytools.seStory Tools - Narrative Design Tools & ArticlesHelpful tools, libraries, and articles for games narrative pipelines. Made by Ian Thomas. 073
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 17/02/2026New feature for Dinky (the dialogue Ink editor) - record scratch audio for each line while in the editor, and be notified when it goes out of date. medium.com/@wildwinter/...medium.comDinky Feature: Scratch AudioTL;DR —in Dinky you can record temp audio for each line of your script. 171
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026One think I have learned though (in other projects) is that the compiled Ink is useful, but combining it with the raw source file gives you way more useful data. 100
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026Sure - it's still baby steps and will undoubtedly have missed a bunch of edge cases. I think if you're trying to introspect the Ink structure itself there are maybe better versions out there. 110
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026Horses/courses, and I'll continue noodling away at things which make my life slightly easier. :-) Definitely not saying "This is the way!" because for many people or even different projects, it's not. But the more that's in the ecosystem, the better, IMO. 000
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026Ink as a flow tool I really like, though. And the runtime side of it is really good, way better than some solutions that try to fill a similar gap and have different authoring approaches. I'm not a fan of node-based myself, really. But I have other people who much prefer to consume things that way. 100
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026These definitely use Ink in different ways for different reasons, some of which restrict its inherent power. And there are other solutions and other engines out there. 100
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026And having a bunch of tools in the toolbox are handy. It's why Ink-Tester exists, to do some brute force "did this line ever get hit?" analysis. And why Ink-Localiser exists, which only makes sense if you don't glue together lines. And why Dinky exists, to deal with spoken dialogue lines. 100
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026Interesting feedback on "but this doesn't make sense for use with Ink" and that's true, for a bunch of 'proper' uses of Ink it's not necessarily useful. Mostly this is me noodling to see what tools I can build, but a lot of ways Ink is being used now is not necessarily what Ink was designed for. 110
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026Updated - tested the new version with 1000 knots and 1500 stitches and it seemed to survive. 000
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026For example, we use Ink for spoken dialogue. Which it *really* wasn't designed for. 000
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026By which I mean - a lot of people are using Ink to solve problems it wasn't written for as we're often short of better solutions. The thing I made is to address some pain points caused by that misuse. 110
Ian Thomas @wildwinter.bsky.social · 15/02/2026Ink is made for non-graph, for sure. But we definitely have use cases (and I know others do) where it's not being used like that, as it's a better solution for more basic narrative logic flow than a lot of other things. A misuse of Ink, really, but because it *is* being used, this helps. 110