Version 0.8.9

Bugs and fixes:

• Fixed a rendering bug introduced in 0.8.7 for canvases that uses masks.
• Fixed crash bug when using the Show Menu action.

General:

• Added support for autoplay.
• Implemented volume settings.
• Added object traits: Autoplay indicator, Skip indicator
• Enabled ability to append text with Set text actions.
• Implemented core support for pixel shaders.

Novelty Editor:

• Added ability to remove assets from the library.
• Implemented checksum controls for more reliable save confirmations.
• Included a sample set of pixel shader effects.
• Minor UI changes.

NoveltyML Designer:

• Added ability to change editor font.

NoveltyML:

• Added <Label> to Button.

Scripting:

• Added script access to project settings: Settings
• Added script functions: Novel.IsSkipping(), Novel.IsAutoPlaying(), Novel.GetSettings()
• Added Novel.OnInit event

Version 0.8.8

Bugs and fixes:

• Fixed infinite loop during parsing of an incorrectly typed script event.
• Fixed random data being displayed during the first frame of a video.
• Removed support for multisampling. Thise broke the rendering of characters and objects on some computers while never adding much visual fidelity in the first place.
• Fixed crash when running invalid an script.

General:

• Reduced the number of simultaneous videos from 3 to 1. Disabled the channel property.
• Added Change layer visibility action.
• Added Change object visibility action.
• Added ability to localize stand-alone games.
• Added support for 16 bit depth stencil buffer.

Novelty Editor:

• Removed the now obsolete menu item Edit->Make background.
• Implemented previewing for Show menu actions.
• Added ability to comment pages.
• Improved the project settings dialog. You can now customize skipping and default behaviors.

Novelty Designer:

• Updated to reflect the changes of NoveltyML.

NoveltyML:

• Added Gradient object type.

Scripting:

• Updated Angelscript engine to version 2.19.1
• Added Novel.OnEnter and Novel.OnExit events.

Version 0.8.7

Bugs and fixes:

• Fixed a video memory leak as well as other related rendering bugs.
• Fixed a bug where dollar-sign variables in scripts would get parsed incorrectly.
• Fixed bugs where transitions would render incorrectly more often than not.
• Fixed a bug where a pasted action would not refresh the property inspector.
• Improved the rendering of objects and transitions.

General:

• Pages can now have textures as backgrounds.
• Dialogue actions can now append text to an existing paragraph.

Novelty Editor:

• Added Actors and Backgrounds folders to the Asset library.
• Double-clicking on an audio asset in the library will now play it.
• Added word stepping in the Action mode (Ctrl+arrow keys).
• Various other UI improvements.
• Added Spacebar+Click to pan.

NoveltyML:

• Added "background" meta class.

Scripting:

• Updated Angelscript engine to version 2.18.2
• The "self" attribute used in scripted events has been renamed to "sender". self will remain a reserved keyword and the script engine will accept it for a few more versions ahead (i.e. your scripts won't break, yet).
• Added Scene method CreateObjectFromNML letting you create objects from raw NoveltyML.

Version 0.8.6

Bugs and fixes:

• Fixed issues with rendering video.
• Made images render more accurately.
• Fixed bug where the stand-alone would crash after exporting with "Compile content into executable" enabled.
• Fixed bug where Novelty could crash after running the Designer.
• Fixed issue where the processor usage would spike when the Novelty window wasn't active.
• Copying and pasting layers now works.
• Copied objects now maintain their correct order.
• Fixed an issue with global layers.
• A page's backgound color is now respected in game state thumbnails

General:

• New text rendering implementation. Text objects can now display both bitmap and native fonts with equal capabilities. The native text object is kept for backwards-compatibility and as an alternative.
• Added ScrollCanvas and Slider object types.
• Added property binding.
• Added Show story log trait for displaying story logs.
• A border's corners are now sized correctly if the border is smaller than the source texture.
• Added ability to rename actors with a Get user input action.
• Deprecated the Show object at action.
• Added support for antialiasing.

Novelty Editor:

• Added a start-up screen for displaying live news & help topics.
• Rewrote the Action window and Action catalogue. Put the latter in a separate window.
• Imported GIF-images now maintains their transparency.
• The object traits menu has been partitioned into categories.
• Removed the need for holding Ctrl to resize certain objects.
• Users must now hold Ctrl to zoom and pan the scene during play (or else it may conflict with scripts).
• Added option to copy external resources (videos) when exporting stand-alones.
• Added "Create object from NoveltyML" to the Create menu.

NoveltyML:

• <Template> has been renamed to <Prefab> with added support for screens.

Scripting:

• Added OnMouseWheel event.

---

Version 0.8.5

Bug fixes:

• Fixed crash bug with interactive menus with conditions.
• Fixed minor bug where the Ctrl-key would occasionally appear to remain pressed.
• Fixed bug where deleting multiple actions would keep the property inspector from showing action properties.

General:

• Greatly improved the Novelty scripting interface.
• Added 'Preceding page' to list of destinations in some actions.
• Change visibility actions now defaults to fading when a scripted transition isn't avaiable.
• Dialogue actions can now display text in multiple text objects with the Show dialogue trait.
• Added option to disable scripts in pages.
• Internal variables are now stored in game saves. Scripts that are running when the game is saved will resume when the game is loaded.

Novelty Editor:

• Added integrated help to script editor. Position the caret on a keyword and press F1 to look it up.

Scripting:

• Updated Angelscript to version 2.17.2
• Some class members have been changed into properties. (See: Members vs. properties)
• Some scripted events can now be written in a global scope.
• Object events OnEnter and OnExit have been changed to OnCreate and OnDestroy.
  Consequentially OnEnter and OnExit is no longer being passed an Object handle (self).
• The value argument that was passed to OnShow and OnHide events has been renamed to progress.
• Added a new OnParagraph event for manipulating dialogue paragraphs before they're displayed.
• Types that have been added or modified: array<T>, BlendingMode, Button, Camera, Chapter, Color, Image, Mask, MouseButton, Novel, Object, Page, Scene, SceneLayer, ScreenPage, Set, Text, Vector2, Vector3, Vector4, Video, UID
• Object handles now need to be explicitly cast to the corresponding subclass before accessing type-specific methods.
  

  Old syntax:
  Object@ o = GetObject("Sumomo");
  o.ChangeState("Crying");
  New syntax:
  Set@ s = GetObject("Sumomo") as Set;
  s.ChangeState("Crying");
  

• Added keywords: as, foreach
• Deprecated global functions: ShowObject, HideObject, CreateObject.

---

Version 0.8.4

Bug fixes:

• A crash bug which occured when applying a dialogue trait on a non-text object.

General:

• Added ability for Camera actions to act on individual layers rather than the entire scene.
• Added (missing) opacity value to Set color action.

---

Version 0.8.3

Bug fixes:

• Asset dependency bugs.
• Object selection bug in editor.
• Fullscreen mode works now.
• Rendering bug with color gradient page transitions.
• Various memory leaks.

General:

• Major improvements to the core graphics engine.
• Added "Screens" to novel structure. A Screen is an ad hoc page that can be brought up on top of other pages.
• New object traits: AnimateTextureX, AnimateTextureY, GameStateInfo, GameStateThumbnail.
• New actions: Change object color, Set switch.
• Removed need for an external Config.xml file for stand-alone games.
• Removed need for Visual Studio 2005 redistributable to be installed on the machine.
• Rewrote game state system (load/save games)

Novelty Editor:

• Added Author mode to the Action window.
• Added automatic option for portraits in dialogue actions.
• Added ability to save and restore workspaces.
• Added custom background color for pages.
• Added option to compile content into stand-alone executable (no external nvz-file).

NoveltyML Designer:

• Changes to reflect NoveltyML additions and changes.

NoveltyML:

• Added SmartCanvas object type.
• The contents of a Set state is now rendered as a SmartCanvas instead of a Canvas.
  You can still get the original rendering by using the "new" CanvasSet object type.
• Added class attribute to <Meta> tag.
• Inline animations in images must now be defined within an <Animation> tag.
  Old syntax:
  <Image name="My image">
      <Frame rect="0,0,100,100"/>
  </Image>
  New syntax:
  <Image name="My image">
      <Animation>
          <Frame rect="0,0,100,100"/>
      </Animation>
  </Image>

Scripting:

• Updated to Angelscript version 2.16.3.
• Added debugging functions.
• Fixed a bug where Object.SetEnabled wouldn't do anything.

---

Version 0.8.2

Bug fixes:

• Inaccurate rendering of nested Native font text objects.
• Animated text appearance glitch.
• Flicker glitch when using a Fade action.

General:

• Click and hover sounds for buttons.
• New clickable hotspot objects.
• New camera controls.
• New actions: End novel, Transform object, Resize, Scale, Rotate, Mirror, Flip, Enter actor, Withdraw actor, Rename actor, Seek video, Adjust camera, Reset camera.
• Added portraits
• Improved hardware support

Novelty Editor:

• Undo history is now cleared when playing in editor to avoid crashes.
• New actor feature with cast manager.
• Coordinates for transform actions (Move, Rotate, Scale, etc..) have mouse controls.
• Added ability to change font on bitmap font text objects.
• Various UI improvements.
• Added ability to load/save script files in Script editor.
• Video objects returned to objects folder in Asset library.
• Added character portrait functionality.
• Added inline NoveltyML editor for objects.

NoveltyML Designer:

• New model editing mode.
• Now respects <![CDATA[]]> tags (XML-convention).

NoveltyML:

• Scripts can now be entered directly between <Script> and </Script>
• Added type attribute for Audio assets.

Scripting:

• Added method: Object.IsMouseOver()
• Added global function: HideCursor(bool)
• New scripted events: OnMouseClick, OnMouseRelease, OnMouseMove, OnMouseEnter, OnMouseLeave, OnKeyDown, OnKeyUp

---

Version 0.8.1

General:

• Removed graphical glitch that affected large Set and Canvas objects.
• Improved support for older/lesser hardware

---

Version 0.8

Bug fixes:

• Fixed dependency bug with animations that uses more than one texture.
• Editors now logs into separate log files.
• Fixed specific scripting bug which would cause a compile error when there was none.

General:

• Added support for playing video. (New <Video> object type, actions and script functions).
• Improved user experience when attempting to run Novelty on unsupported hardware.
• Default NoveltyML-extension is now .nml, not .xml.
• Designer and Editor now associates with .nml and .nov-files respectively.

Novelty Editor:

• Properties in the property window are now organized in collapsable groups.
• New custom combo box controls for some properties for a better user experience.
• Audio-folder in asset library renamed to include Video.
• Now prompts for saving before shutting down.

NoveltyML Designer:

• Designer now hides the otherwise mandatory <Resources>-tag.
• The <Requires>-tag is no longer required and has been removed from the language (ironic, I know!)
• Added controls for loading and playing Video (for accurately previews of <Video> objects).
• Added option to auto-preview object based on caret position (enabled by default).
• Added most recently used (MRU) file list to File-menu.
• Enabled windows to be closed.
• Added about box.

NoveltyML:

• New <Video> object type.

• New %-operator for setting relative values.
  Example:
  position="100,50%" (x is 100 (pixels), y is 50% of parent's height)
  opacity="50%" (same as to opacity="0.5")

• Removed object attributes: parent-size and parent-position.
  Old syntax:
  parent-size="100%,100%"
  New syntax:
  size="100%" (single percentage for n-dimensional values will apply for all dimensions)

• Object pivot point can now be set relatively to object's current dimensions.
  pivot="50%,25%"

• Added tile attribute to Image, Canvas, Mask for custom repeating (tiling) of textures.

• Canvas' canvas-size can now be set to "auto" for automatic sizing.

• Changes were made to <Mask>-tag to make it more straight-forward to use.

• Object behaviours is now called Traits and only valid within <Traits>-tag.
  Old syntax:
  <Behaviour type="spin" speed="2.0"/>
  New syntax:
  <Trait>
  <ConstantRotation speed="2.0"/>
  </Trait>

• Object attribute rgb has been renamed to color and now supports string-based colors.
  Old syntax:
  rgb="1,0,0"
  New syntax:
  color="1,0,0" or color="Red" or color="#FF0000"

• New <Shape> resource type for defining custom shapes.

• Asset names are now case insensitive.

• Removed Sway behaviour. Use AnimateRotation instead.

• Image rect attribute renamed to clip, accepts 2-dimetional coordinates.
  Old syntax:
  rect="0,0,150,150"
  New syntax:
  clip="0,0,150,150" or clip="150,150"

• Image texture attribute can now be set to "null" in case you do not wish to use a texture resource. The object will be blank (white) but can still be shaped, colored, masked, etc.

Scripting:

• Upgraded script engine to Angelscript 2.15.1
• Added script funtion: Object.SetColor() (Object.SetRGB and Object.SetRGBA are deprecated)
• Added script funtion: Object.SetEnabled() (only applies to Buttons)

• Due to Angelscript language changes, you must now use the is-operator when comparing handles with null.
  Object@ obj = GetObject("My object");
  Old syntax:
  if (obj == null)
  From now on, the condition above will always fail. Here is the new correct syntax:
  if (obj is null)
  or (is not null)
  if (obj !is null)