hmmm maybe there's a 'clock' function in some of the Ren'Py assets floating around the web?
and then when a dev is going to just 'Lego' together assets with a script, the whole is somehow mixing it up, because of some line expecting a function where actually a image is called, or something like that.
i'm not that deep into Ren'Py, but shuch things have happened with other platforms in the past, mostly with devs assembling something from pre-made parts instead of sitting down and coding it from scratch. common slip-up when you're not really familiar with the actual programming.
just assuming here, don't pin me on it!