What are the best practices for writing dialogue in an animated video game?

2 Structure your dialogue

Once you have a plan, you need to structure your dialogue in a way that is easy to follow, understand, and interact with. You can use different techniques to structure your dialogue, such as branching, looping, or linear dialogue. Branching dialogue allows the player to choose from different options and affects the outcome of the conversation. Looping dialogue repeats certain parts of the conversation until the player triggers a change. Linear dialogue follows a fixed sequence of lines without any player input. You should choose the structure that best suits your game genre, style, and tone.

3 Test your dialogue

After you have written your dialogue, you need to test it to see how it works in the game. You can test your dialogue by reading it aloud, recording it, or using text-to-speech software. You can also test your dialogue by playing it in the game or using a dialogue editor tool. Testing your dialogue will help you identify any problems, such as spelling, grammar, punctuation, logic, flow, or tone errors. It will also help you get feedback from other people, such as your team members, testers, or players.

5 Avoid common pitfalls

Writing dialogue for an animated video game can also involve some common pitfalls that you should avoid, such as having too much or too little dialogue. Too much dialogue can overwhelm, bore, or distract the player, while too little can leave them confused, unsatisfied, or disinterested. Additionally, you should be careful to avoid writing unrealistic or unnatural dialogue, as it can break the immersion, credibility, or believability of your game. Similarly, generic or clichéd dialogue can make your characters, story, or game feel bland, dull, or unoriginal and predictable.

6 Learn from examples

One of the best ways to improve your dialogue writing skills is to learn from examples. You can learn from examples by playing, watching, or reading other animated video games that have good dialogue. You can analyze how they use dialogue to create compelling characters, stories, and gameplay. You can also learn from examples by studying the scripts, dialogue trees, or dialogue systems of other animated video games. You can see how they plan, structure, test, and polish their dialogue. Learning from examples will help you get inspired, motivated, and educated on how to write dialogue in an animated video game.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?