Yadda Bla Bla Bla Bla

Dialog systems tend to be as complex and as varied as inventories. Once you've created one, others are easier to make. Giving the player choices, branching dialog, or changing variables from the dialog system all make it more complicated. Little One's dialog system is just going to be a direct info dump. There will be text, and a done button when you are finished reading.

Godot has two of my favorite nodes ever, EVER!. The resource preloader contains assets for later use so you don't have to write all the paths out. The rich text label is a force unto itself. With BBCode, word wrap, scroll bars, and metadata links, you only need this node for dialog output. Text can be set as a meta-link that can pass a value via a connected signal. You can then do various things depending on the meta value passed.

My main dialog output setup consists of a panel with the rich text label as the child. The panel has the script, but the rich text label does all the work. I usually set a custom font since Godot only has one tiny, terrible font. The meta link is underlined by default, but I add BBCode color and center it to make it more visible. Several meta links can be added to the dialog and consist of the data passed and each attaches to the next text or BBCode string added.

The worst part of a dialog system is actually creating the dialogs. I'll be using a preload script with dictionaries and functions to randomly select text strings. Day zero will mostly consist of hints and tips for the game. Just make sure that if you pause the scene, you don't pause the dialog output.

I usually connect a signal from the player to the NPCs and from the NPCs to the player. If you have limited NPCs and everything is grouped correctly, this can be done at the start of the level/game. If the NPCs are numerous or randomized, this can be done when you interact with the NPC. Just remember to check if the signal is connected, godot doesn't like reconnecting existing signals.

With this basic setup I signal the NPC (and pass a value so only that NPC answers) to talk. The NPC then gets the text and signals the player with the required information. Now the player passes the data to the dialog system to format and output the text. I've started just calling a function from the dialog system in the player's script. Since I've learned that you can just call the functions from a node's script I might connect and use signals far less.

Direct-calling functions might replace generated signals, but it cannot replace all signals.