Failed to load: Error: Unrecognised tag 'displayverbs' outside object definition

I am a novice Quest adventure editor. I did extensive editing to my game, saved, then quit Quest last night. I come back to this message when I attempt to Edit:

Failed to load game due to the following errors:
Error: Unrecognised tag 'displayverbs' outside object definition

I just work with what the program gives me. I did not make any edits in code-view during last night's session. When I attempt to Play the game, I get this error (not exactly what I see in error message, but what it outputs when I use the "Copy error details to clipboard" button):

System.ArgumentNullException: Value cannot be null.
Parameter name: value
   at Microsoft.Win32.RegistryKey.SetValue(String name, Object value, RegistryValueKind valueKind)
   at Microsoft.Win32.RegistryKey.SetValue(String name, Object value)
   at GameBrowser.RecentItems.SaveRecentList()
   at GameBrowser.RecentItems.AddToRecent(String filename, String name)
   at TextAdventures.Quest.Main.ctlPlayer_AddToRecent(String filename, String name)
   at TextAdventures.Quest.Player.AddToRecentList()
   at TextAdventures.Quest.Player.SetGameName(String name)
   at TextAdventures.Quest.Player._Closure$__179-0._Lambda$__0()

I can open the file in a separate text editor. What should I be looking for to troubleshoot this problem? Why won't this open in the editor for me to fix this problem?


From the error, I'd quess that there is a bit that looks like:

      <displayverbs type="stringlist">
        <value>Look at</value>
        <value>Take</value>
      </displayverbs>

that isn't between a <object and the corresponding </object>.

If you can open it in a text editor, I'd suggest searching for <displayverbs and see if you can find one that doesn't come between <object and </object>. Either delete the displayverbs block, or move it into an object.

I'm not sure how that can happen in the editor, but Quest is more than a little flaky when it comes to loading files that aren't structured exactly as it expects.


Thank you, mrangel! That helped me identify the problem.

I had to resort to deleting them one-by-one through trial and error because I was having difficulty determining what was different about the 'displayverb' occurrences, starting with my most recent objects. I isolated it to an ingame object (the deletion of which let me open the editor just fine) but I wanted to understand what the problem was so I started deleting individual codes of lines. Oddly, the 'displayverbs' code on this object looked fine, but by removing the 'displayverbs' code, I changed my error message:

Object reference not set to an instance of an object

I looked at other lines which might be causing this issue in this particular object. After a little more trial and error, here was the problematic code:

<game type="int">0</game>

The object in question is a video game console, so I set an attribute called "game" to an integer output that would go up every time the player Used it. In practice, each integer value would correspond to a new scene to play out. What I didn't realize was that I changed the nature of the gaming console with this attribute. In fact, I didn't even end up using this mechanic, so I forgot about it after finishing my round of edits last night. This was all done entirely through the editor. Oops!


K.V.

I think the next version of Quest will prevent errors like this.


nice find of the cause of the error!

as now know, be careful of using the built-in/reserved/special words, as you know well that it causes problems/issues (over-riding/over-writing the built-in functionality and/or confusing the quest parser/compiler/translator/etc), lol


as 'game' is used as a special/reserved/built-in for a special and required Object, the 'game' Game-Wide Settings/Controls And Publishing Info Object):

http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/asl_requirements.html

http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/aslx.html

http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/elements/game.html


<game name="NAME_OF_YOUR_GAME">

  <attr name="gameid" type="string">RANDOMLY_GENERATED_HASH_STRING_FOR_ONLINE_QUEST_WEBSERVER</attr>

  <attr name="version" type="string">YOUR_VERSION_HISTORY_DOUBLE_(DECIMAL/FLOAT/FLOATING_POINT)_NUMBER</attr>

  <attr name="description" type="string">THIS_IS_SEEN_ON_THE_WEBSERVER_FOR_PEOPLE_TO_LOOK_AT_ABOUT_YOUR_GAME_IN_DECIDING_WHETHER_TO_PLAY_YOUR_GAME_OR_NOT</attr>

  <attr name="category" type="string">CATEGORY_OF_YOUR_GAME_AND_SEEN_ON_WEBSERVER</attr>

  <attr name="author" type="string">YOU</attr>

  <!-- ETC Attributes -->

</game>

Just to clarify as I don’t understand code all that well...

Could the problem have been the attribute named “game”? I know there are certain names you want to avoid using because it interferes with Quest’s language.

Just curious...


Yes! I am new to the software, so it was a big oversight to use "game" as the name of my attribute. In my case, Quest did as Quest does and read the attribute as I wrote it. In the end, I didn't understand clearly what I wrote, leading to this problem. Be careful with your code, inside or outside code-view!


Lesson learned, right? I never name anything too simply. I almost always throw a number or some yoda-like phrase that there is no way in heck Quest will read and interpret in some codey fashion!

I’ve done that MANY times. 😮


This is why Quest should save those names as <attr name="game" type="int">; so that when loading it, it knows it's supposed to be an attribute. Because when it sees <game>, it doesn't know if it's an attribute named game, or an actual game object. Other names that could cause a similar problem include script, object, exit, template, attr, and function.

I vaguely recall suggesting some edits to the Quest core a while back that could solve this problem; but not sure if those changes will be incorporated.


K.V.

I think the next version of Quest will prevent errors like this.

https://github.com/textadventures/quest/commit/de368ca7369cd8600f589702caace5ad846cdd5b


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