- Jun 7, 2020
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What are y'alls opinions on Renpy games?
- Thread starter mlkey
- Start date
- Oct 9, 2022
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You are supossing well. Unity can do all that Ren'py do with just no effort at all. I guess the day somebody makes a worthy tutorial series, people will not even discuss this anymore.
About the OP, I see ren'py language a bit convoluted. But I respect any game using it. If it helps authors to express themselves I welcome it.
I don't like VNs.
I hate ren'py.
Ren'py as a engine for making VN's is fine, but my problem is this and this. Instead of the developer accepting the fact that what they are making is ultimately a book, they overextend and start creating a "game". Of course, with such limited capabilities (you can do more in rpg-fucking-maker), you get half baked gameplay that only serves to hook in certain tags.
I hate ren'py.
Ren'py as a engine for making VN's is fine, but my problem is this and this. Instead of the developer accepting the fact that what they are making is ultimately a book, they overextend and start creating a "game". Of course, with such limited capabilities (you can do more in rpg-fucking-maker), you get half baked gameplay that only serves to hook in certain tags.
- Oct 28, 2018
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I feel like there are a lot of RPGM games that should have been renpy games because of poor game design. Fleeting Iris for example has top tier writing, but the routine of walking around the map is incredibly tedious. It's amplified by how much of the early game is linear before the branches start to diverge. Yeah, you could keep saves at branches, but that kind of meta gaming is a workaround and not a solution. RenPy also has built-in features for skipping read text, making replays much more enjoyable.
I think the only real negative to RenPy is the low barrier to entry means there are a lot of awful RenPy games that sour the pot for the good ones.
I think the only real negative to RenPy is the low barrier to entry means there are a lot of awful RenPy games that sour the pot for the good ones.
These aren't mutually exclusive. You can have detailed visuals that map to good writing. But if you have a character in view doing one action, and the text is describing something else entirely, IMO that actually degrades the presentation. Visuals, done well, can enhance text and make it so you can have implicit information behind the text (show, don't tell), e.g. a character says one thing but shows an emotion that suggests they are lying about what they said means that you don't have to TELL the reader that the character is lying. The reader can intuit it and feel like they are cracking the case themselves, rather than being given the answer. For most people, this is a much better experience than continuously dumping exposition.
- Nov 15, 2020
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I'm not a coder but I have not seen a Unity VN which implements all of Ren'py's standard functionality as well as Ren'py does.
That includes games/VN's which do claim to have a "professional programmer" as part of the dev team.
- Sep 21, 2020
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I'm completely neutral towards Ren'py games, however I can't stand the uncanny valley doll models the devs use most of the time. Anime characters are fine, high quality 3d animations (such as Noname55 or someone else) are fine as well. But why do they always use the ugly 3d models? I'm not sure if it's Daz 3d? Horrible!
- Sep 4, 2017
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Because it's the easiest solution if you want to make a game.
Making a game require to create an incredibly high number of scenes and/or animations, all of this while having to be fast enough to keep a decent updates pace if you want people to support the project.
It's all about finding the best compromise between producing quality content and making it at a good pace.
People that are trying to optimize EVERYTHING are just going to sink into a time-consuming loop and their project will barely make progress.
People that are highly skilled 3D animator, have no reason to start a game project over simply making short animations or one-shot static scenes. It's way too much work for little to no gain.
- Oct 9, 2022
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I myself thought many times to make a full course about it and upload it into a webpage like udemy or similar... Neverthless, for now, I want to release for free my own take into adult games here first (not a VN and developed using Unity); thus I have no time for anything else...
Time will tell, I guess.
I like it.
If only because i can use unren and see if the game has any worthwhile scene before i waste several hours of my life.
That said.
I dont care the engine it runs on.
Just that it is fun.
And lets face it.
Visual novels are abominations that shoudnt be populair but are.
If only because i can use unren and see if the game has any worthwhile scene before i waste several hours of my life.
That said.
I dont care the engine it runs on.
Just that it is fun.
And lets face it.
Visual novels are abominations that shoudnt be populair but are.
1. Thanks for mentioning my game and being a DIK in the same post!
2. I don't mind you trashing my game, but DIK
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every month on Patreon alone, and is also sold on Steam and Gog. Are you sure it's the best example of how "Renpy is bad for making games"? I mean, I never played it but are all these thousands of paying players unable to see what you can?
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I like renpy because it's easy to program for and comes bundled with a premade UI that works well for VNs. Most if not all game engines can be customized to have a UI that is good or bad, but if the default option is bad or nonexistent then a lot of the games using that engine will probably have a terrible customer experience.
I generally dislike RPGM because the UI for almost every game I've tried on that engine is horrible. I have seen 1 RPGM game that had a good UI though so it's not like it can't be done. By contrast most Renpy games have the default UI, which is ok. It's not good. It's not bad. It's ok.
And then there are games like Being a DIK that go above and beyond to make the UI feel really polished. Personally, I find the gameplay lacking in that game but his UI is second to none from all the adult games I've played.
If you're making an FPS game you wouldn't use Renpy, but for most other types of adult games it works great.
I generally dislike RPGM because the UI for almost every game I've tried on that engine is horrible. I have seen 1 RPGM game that had a good UI though so it's not like it can't be done. By contrast most Renpy games have the default UI, which is ok. It's not good. It's not bad. It's ok.
And then there are games like Being a DIK that go above and beyond to make the UI feel really polished. Personally, I find the gameplay lacking in that game but his UI is second to none from all the adult games I've played.
If you're making an FPS game you wouldn't use Renpy, but for most other types of adult games it works great.
- Aug 29, 2020
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Yes, BaD really is a good example of "Renpy is bad for making games". If you don't know, the gameplay is random minigames, QTE's and "search for 3 pixels" segments. The developer sees gameplay as work, rather than something that should be enjoyable.
That may even support my point even further. If BaD is one of the top-dogs of Renpy games, that means its bare-bones game mechanics are some of the best Renpy has to offer. And of course, this isn't the kind of thing you want to put on a podium.
Anyways, I never said "Renpy is bad for writing stories". While choosing the engine may cripple any sort of complexity a game would have, it is good enough for writing a novel or book. And that's probably what all those Patreon supporters are paying for.
COuldnt agree more, i mean there ARE SOME exceptions like Sweet Home by Codepink. Speaking of.. where the fuck is codepink? His drawing skills are top notch imo.
- Jul 30, 2017
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You acknowledge some Ren'py games are golden; high quality, so perhaps the real issue is the competence of the majority of porn game developers, not the engine. If that's the case, I totally agree with you.Personally i dislike them heavily. Im sure theres some golden ones out there but the majority just make me go
Ren'py is great for VN's. It can be turned into an intricate sandbox, but that requires a lot more coding; although it isn't that bad, there's lots and lots of code examples EVERYWHERE. I personally love Ren'py for VN's & Sandbox using 2d or pre-rendered 3d art. For a 3d adventure porn game, then Unreal Engine or Unity is ideal.
The worst is when someone tries to use Unity or Unreal Engine to make a Ren'py style game using 2d or pre-rendered 3d art, that makes no sense, lol. It's like dude, just use Ren'py. But if they're using actual 3d assets, then yea UE or Unity ftw.
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- Jun 3, 2017
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- Nov 15, 2020
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Guys, this discussion is all over the place.
Everybody can complain about something.
Lack of animations, too much animations, wrong animations, don't like the still pictures, don't like Daz3d, don't like real porn, don't like VN's, don't like stupid mini games.
All of that might be valid.
But we are talking about Ren'py, which is mainly a program with which to create VN's, and it's up to the developer to fill the visual part of the "visual novel" with some kind of "art", which can take any form and which can be as good or bad as the dev can make it, or as the player perceives it.
But that is not the discussion.
If you dislike VN's, then by all means avoid Ren'py.
If you dislike Daz, Koikatsu, drawn art or any other kind of "art" then by all means look at the preview pictures and decide it it might be something you like or not.
The reality is, that most adult VN devs are guys with a day job who like making some kind of art and who have some kind of idea for a story. For most of these, it will remain just a hobby with which they might make a few bucks on the side but nowhere near enough to be a job. For me, that works. A lot of it is garbage, some of it is kind of bad but still worth playing, and there are some occassional masterpieces. For me, the ability to search from this incredible number of VN's for something worthwhile is what makes it fun.
Everybody can complain about something.
Lack of animations, too much animations, wrong animations, don't like the still pictures, don't like Daz3d, don't like real porn, don't like VN's, don't like stupid mini games.
All of that might be valid.
But we are talking about Ren'py, which is mainly a program with which to create VN's, and it's up to the developer to fill the visual part of the "visual novel" with some kind of "art", which can take any form and which can be as good or bad as the dev can make it, or as the player perceives it.
But that is not the discussion.
If you dislike VN's, then by all means avoid Ren'py.
If you dislike Daz, Koikatsu, drawn art or any other kind of "art" then by all means look at the preview pictures and decide it it might be something you like or not.
The reality is, that most adult VN devs are guys with a day job who like making some kind of art and who have some kind of idea for a story. For most of these, it will remain just a hobby with which they might make a few bucks on the side but nowhere near enough to be a job. For me, that works. A lot of it is garbage, some of it is kind of bad but still worth playing, and there are some occassional masterpieces. For me, the ability to search from this incredible number of VN's for something worthwhile is what makes it fun.
Too much unnecessary clicking. If its still images it should just be a hentai comic. If its animated scenes it should just be a hentai movie.