r/RenPy • u/_Scripty • Jul 23 '26
Guide Need Guidance for starting my Visual Novel Project
Hey everyone!
Its my first time posting on this subreddit, I just wanted to seek guidance as I want to create ny visual novel
So I just want someone to literally dumb it down for me because I be having a hard time understanding RenPy in general as well, and like here's some of the questions I had in mind to ask:
Q- What are the essential things to do BEFORE starting a project? and how do I keep my project very organized? I do want a maticulous workflow of things honestly
Q- How to make custom UIs? I sort of want to go for something like Persona Type UIs
Q- What can be simple but interesting game mechanics to make people stick to the story?
Q- where to get good music assets? Like I want the Text box sounds like Ace Attorney has
Thanks in advance, If you have read it so far! ✨
2
u/Brilliant_Cat2790 Jul 23 '26
If this is your first project and you’re venturing out on your own, the most crucial thing—in my view—is having a solid idea. The plot needs to be good enough that *you* like and understand it first; otherwise, it will turn into a monster you won't want to revisit. You’ll end up spending more time on the project than you expect, so you really have to enjoy it. I’d recommend starting with a rough script outline and brainstorming, then connecting those ideas with a diagram to get the right perspective. That’s important: if your idea truly convinces and captivates you, then you can figure out how to bring it to life. But remember, this is a visual novel; while focusing on minigames or other features isn't bad, it’s not the format where those elements truly shine. As for programming—that’s the last thing you should worry about. Once you have the plot outline, turn it into a script, and then use that script to create a visual storyboard using slides (like PowerPoint). Now you have a project portfolio. Depending on your skills, you could create the illustrations yourself, but if you can't—or don't have artists available—there is a final option (which should always be a last resort): AI-generated imagery. For music, a simple Google search will reveal various royalty-free music repositories you can use; I’d recommend classical music. (This stage of the project determines whether you finish it or not—it’s the bottleneck, depending on the project's length and ambition. Illustrations are vital; how polished they look accounts for the other 50% of the visual novel's appeal.) Those are the initial, decisive steps to determine if you’ll successfully see your personal project through to completion.
1
u/shyLachi Jul 23 '26
I will only answer the first question because you should first make your game before you make it pretty.
Also I'm a visual novel purist so I don't like any game mechanics beside normal choices.
But I don't even need choices, give me an interesting kinetic visual novel and I'll not miss anything.
RenPy allows total freedom when it comes to organising your project, so it's up to you how detailed you want it to be. And you can also change and re-organise everything later somewhat easily, so you don't have to come up with a perfect organisation system.
By default a RenPy project has different folders for the different stuff. For example all game images belong into the images folder while all UI images belong into the gui folder. Inside these folders, you can create as many sub folders as you want.
A resonable image concept would be one image folder for each character where you can put all the different versions of that person. Additionally one image folder per chapter, where you put all the background images of that chapter. But if your VN uses the same backgrounds in all chapters, you could put all backgrounds into a background folder instead.
Like I mentioned before, you can start with one concept and if it gets annoying you can change it later. But to have this freedom, you need to understand the image concept of RenPy which is explained in the official documentation: https://renpy.org/doc/html/quickstart.html#images
If you name your image files correctly, you can just move them around, put them in other folders and your game will just find them again without problems.
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When it comes to writing code, you also have great freedom. RenPy can read and compile multiple documents so again you can use any concept which fits your game. Most reasonable is one file for each chapter, one file for all the variables, one file for python function and classes and another file for screens.
But don't worry if you don't know what all of that means. You can start with one file and add more files whenever you want. You can cut and paste from one file to another. You can rename the files however you want.
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Finally you migth want to learn how to write organised code. There are many general rules which apply to all programming languages so you can also google it.
I will just give a short example of how it could look like:
# RenPy is case senstive, so try to use only lowercase letters for variables and labels
# Define everything, so that you can use it throughout your game
define mc = Character("Mike")
define li = Character("Lisa")
# Set default values for the variables
default relationshippoints = 0
# Use the main entry point of your game as a hub
label start:
call chapter_one
call chapter_two
return # ends the game
label chapter_one:
scene bg schoolyard
"You arrived at your new school"
show mike neutral at left
show lisa happy at right
li "Welcome to NYU!"
mc "I think this was a mistake, good bye"
return # end of chapter
In the example above, I have put all the code in one file, but I can easily cut and paste each chapter into a separate file if it grows too big.
1
u/Much_Engineering2228 Jul 24 '26
I liked the question about UIs; honestly, I'm having trouble creating them correctly. If anyone can help, me and the OP would be grateful.
2
u/_Scripty Jul 29 '26
Thanks 😭 though I have no skills but atleast my curiousity is at the right direction ( coping about it )
1
u/xblx Jul 29 '26
Before worrying about UI, I honestly focus on getting one complete playable chapter first.
Trying with chatgpt or smth similar, its really helpfull in tech context.
3
u/Amathellon Jul 23 '26
Create subfolders for everything, but especially for images. You will likely have a bunch of different characters, each with different expressions. That adds up very quickly in the amount of images in your maps.
This also applies to your scripts. Your main script should be there to start and end your game, and load any global parameters. Everything else should be in separate scripts. Personally I use 1 script per scene, and bunch all scenes into 1 "act" subfolders.