How to create a Dialogue System in Unity | RPG Style | Unity + Ink Tutorial 2025

Video Description

This video covers one of the many ways to go about creating an dialogue system in Unity with a focus on features critical to RPG-style games. This system uses Ink, which is a narrative scripting language for video games that integrates nicely with Unity. The dialogue system we create will focus on the below 3 features. 1. Let the player make choices that branch the dialogue. 2. Enable us trigger things in the game directly from the dialogue 3. Allow us to show dialogue conditionally depending on what’s happening in the game. For other common dialogue system features not covered in this video (portraits, typing text, etc…) you can view the appropriate video from the previous Ink+Unity dialogue system tutorials I created as linked below. This system builds off of a project created in some previous tutorials; however you do not need to have seen those previous tutorials to understand the dialogue system we build in this one. The previous tutorials for this project come from the quest system playlist linked below. I hope this helps and best of luck! 🙂 ► QUEST SYSTEM PLAYLIST (that this video is part of) All videos I've done for the Quest System series can be found in this playlist. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyTJLDGcT64&list=PL3viUl9h9k7-oX3Sz8VvyKCIN24XOXNZR ► PREVIOUS INK + UNITY DIALOGUE SYSTEM PLAYLIST For other common dialogue features, such as portraits, typing text, and more, see the appropriately named videos in the below playlist. This is a previous series I did on Unity+Ink as further explained by the “My Previous Ink+Unity Series vs This Video” timestamp in this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSRpcftVyKg&list=PL3viUl9h9k78KsDxXoAzgQ1yRjhm7p8kl ► INK WEBSITE & DOCS Website (install the Inky Editor from here) https://www.inklestudios.com/ink/ Official Ink Syntax Documentation https://github.com/inkle/ink/blob/master/Documentation/WritingWithInk.md Official Ink+Unity Integration Documentation https://github.com/inkle/ink/blob/master/Documentation/RunningYourInk.md Unity Asset store Integration Plugin https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/integration/ink-integration-for-unity-60055?srsltid=AfmBOopBXpiMtpNnPtuStua_CCmaQYGsIQ1hVAmuLcFgc4k3ritC83lQ ► OTHER RELATED RESOURCES Excellent video for an introduction into Unity Events https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx0Lt4tCDE0 Excellent video on Unity's new Input System https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5WsmlEOFiA&t Unity Lifecycle methods documentation https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/ExecutionOrder.html Excellent video on Unity Prefabs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EH5epbeX3ek Excellent video covering the basics of Scriptable Objects https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPXvoWVabPY ► TIMESTAMPS 00:00 Intro 01:18 My Previous Ink+Unity Series vs This Video 02:43 How it’s going to work (Disclaimer) 03:06 How it’s going to work (Ink + Unity) 04:51 How it’s going to work (Foundation & Choices) 07:39 How it’s going to work (Triggering Actions) 08:00 How it’s going to work (Conditional Dialogue) 09:00 Ink Editor & Syntax Overview 15:12 Project Overview 17:16 Ink Unity Integration Plugin Installation 17:42 Creating our first Ink file 19:12 Entering Dialogue 22:35 Traversing the Ink Story 24:50 Input Race Condition Explanation 25:40 Race Condition Fix (Quick & Dirty) 26:21 Race Condition Fix (Better) 28:34 Freezing the Player 29:08 Creating the Dialogue Panel UI 33:28 Implementing Choices 42:31 Blank Panel Issue Fix 43:55 Triggering Quests 46:55 Conditional Dialogue 53:19 Notes on Data Persistence 54:10 Supporting multiple Ink Files 56:47 Outro ► GITHUB PROJECT The '4-dialogue-implemented' branch contains the code by the end of this tutorial. https://github.com/trevermock/quest-system ► MUSIC The backing music for this video is by Panda Beats. Website: https://pandabeatsmusic.com/ YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@PandaBeatsMusic Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejGmSTVKJrU&list=PLPEwKpHq_H2Csme-WtKAON7ha7E4bRhxx ► DISCORD Come ask questions, suggest a video topic, or just hang out! 📱Discord ➔ https://discord.gg/99gcnaHFf9 ► THE PATH OF REN Wishlist my passion project, The Path of Ren, on Steam! 🎮 Steam (The Path of Ren) ➔ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1619920 ► SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS Follow my current project! 🦋 Bluesky ➔ https://bsky.app/profile/shapedbyrain.bsky.social 📷 Instagram ➔ https://instagram.com/trevermock/ 🕑 TikTok ➔ https://tiktok.com/@trevermock 🌐 Website ➔ https://shapedbyrainstudios.com/ ► SUPPORT Any support is much appreciated! I may receive a commission on any assets purchased using the below Unity Asset Store link. 🛍️ Unity Asset Store Affiliate Link ➔ https://assetstore.unity.com/?aid=1100lrxm5 ☕ Buy me a coffee! (Ko-fi) ➔ https://ko-fi.com/trevermock #gamedev #dialogue #unity