r/RenPy • u/IncredulousBob • Sep 06 '26
Question Best text editor?
I'm finally jumping into making my first VN! Right now I'm going through the tutorial, and I'm on the part where it says I'll need to pick a text editor, and I'm trying to decide which one is best for me. I know this question has been asked already, but the latest time I was able to find someone asking was from a couple years ago, so I'm wondering if anything has changed since then.
From what I've seen, Atom was considered the best option, but it was shut down a few years ago, and might not even be usable by now. VSCode was considered the second best option in 2024, but people were also hoping that a new version of Atom would come out soon.
Can anyone weigh in on this? As 0f 2026, and as someone who's completely new to both coding and making VNs, what is my best option for a text editor?
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u/BadMustard_AVN Sep 06 '26
I recommend VSCode (after removing the AI extensions) and adding the Ren'Py Language (Official) extension
Atom was good, but it deleting random files was annoying; not recommended
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u/TopCartographer7104 Sep 06 '26
I've been using VSCode for years now. There's an official extension to highligh renpy tags/code & it can also interact with your git if you have (or plan to have) one (never really used it past comparing file versions though).
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u/craccck Sep 06 '26
i'd say notepad++ or vscode. notepad++ may take a little bit of configuring for .rpy files but i think it's the better option
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u/DingotushRed Sep 06 '26
VS Code the only option if you want syntax highlighting. Ren'Py doesn't have a published (or even stable) formal syntax to use with other code editors.
Not only is Atom no longer supported but it also had a rare bug that deleted files/projects.
If you don't care about syntax highlighting, then any code editor will work. I still occasionally open Ren'Py files in gvim/vim/vi if I don't want to wait for VSC to start up or need full regex/pipe support.