Utsukushii Planet - 2nd french demo released

[monele]

Yes, any choice between brackets was unavailable in the demo. And I guess it would be more of a teaser, really, since you don't even reach the main part of the game in it ^^;.
I'm glad you liked it ^.^. I'd love to release newer teasers all the time but I guess it would be strange XD... And I haven't done *that* much new stuff since, anyway. All I'll say for now is that I updated what character graphics I could (less placeholder art, yey!).

[monele]

Spent some time working on these this afternoon :










Can I say I haven't touched the story one bit ? ^^;... Nyaa, I'm so lazy when it comes to stories ~o~...

[Quin]

Ooh! In-line graphics. ^_^ I'd read about how to do them and thought, "Hey, that's kind of neat"... but I never saw them in action. You make 'em look good!
(Hopefully they'll be used sparingly, though... if you use them in the game like a 12-year-old uses emoticons in an e-mail, they won't be quite as cool the 237th time around...)
(And, yes, I realize the inherent irony in making that comment after unwittingly using an emoticon earlier in the same message...)

[papillon]

For a cutesy catgirl, though, overuse of emoticons could help fill in for the lack of voice acting.

It would be annoying if EVERY character did it, but if you have one "Nyan, nyan!" girl being overly-cute, the player can indulge or avoid as they wish.

[Alessio]

Neat! You're definitely boldly going where no RenPyer went before!
Small note: Could it be that Katania's neck is a bit short or her shoulders are a bit too high? It just feels as if she's dodging/pulling her head in a bit. Maybe it's just my impression?

[monele]

Ooh! In-line graphics. ^_^ I'd read about how to do them and thought, "Hey, that's kind of neat"... but I never saw them in action. You make 'em look good!

Thankies ^^. There are so many little gems in Ren'Py that no one uses, it makes me sad ;o;

(Hopefully they'll be used sparingly, though...)

Of course !!!!1!!1

For a cutesy catgirl, though, overuse of emoticons could help fill in for the lack of voice acting.

It would be annoying if EVERY character did it, but if you have one "Nyan, nyan!" girl being overly-cute, the player can indulge or avoid as they wish. Smile

My main concern is redundance with face expressions ^^;... As I see it, inline emotes could be used in a one-expression-per-character game to easily insert emotions.... or when a single message contains a change of expression :

A : "You're always so clumsy, argh blah!!"
B : "But.. I love you!"
A : "And you're so... #... uh, wait, what ? ^^;"

Neat! You're definitely boldly going where no RenPyer went before!

You mean, down the path of no-story, all-sparklies?

Small note: Could it be that Katania's neck is a bit short or her shoulders are a bit too high? It just feels as if she's dodging/pulling her head in a bit. Maybe it's just my impression?

Uhh, might be I guess ô_o.. Or you're thrown off by her sort-of-necklace... or I was when I drew it

[mikey]

Thankies ^^. There are so many little gems in Ren'Py that no one uses, it makes me sad ;o;

The story of those might well be, that they are requested for a game which never gets finished...

[PyTom]

The story of those might well be, that they are requested for a game which never gets finished...

At least for images-in-text, that isn't the case. IIRC, they were implemented at the same time I did click-to-continue, as I realized that the same mechanism could support both.

I think that the proposed use is probably a good one, as I would expect catgirls to be very emotional, and use alot of emoticons. Sort of like a teenager on AIM uses emoticons between every word.

Just remember, with great power comes great responsibility.

Great power. Great responsibility. And a great right hook.

[mikey]

One of the plus sides of having a lot of options is that you can plan your game with them in mind. If people ask for specific effects and features while making the game, they may not use their full potential (not that one would have to do that).

For instance having these bitmaps inside the textbox as monele demonstrated could be used as a primary feature by someone making an all-out comedy with the wide range of anime-like effects.

But it's hard to pick the few dominant features and I agree with monele that it feels like a waste. But often less means more, so...

[monele]

And who can do more, can do less . So it's not so much of a waste in the end I guess. Ren'Py offers things you probably won't even need, but it certainly isn't being a huge option factory either.
With all that's offered, the only things that might need work are speed of use and speed of creation (faster graphic engine and maybe tools or tricks to script things quicker). And even then, I know I'm asking for more than is truely needed

[Alessio]

I'd like to re-propose to PyTom to develop the one-click button that creates the plot, writes the whole script, and creates all graphics automagically. Although that brings up the question if the one who clicked the button can be considered as the author. ^_^

[papillon]

Well, if we get enough Alice graphics, and someone writes a Ren'Ai Mad Lib generator...

[monele]

Yea I second this... Well... I'll just need some plot writer but that would be some darn help to begin with

[PyTom]

With all that's offered, the only things that might need work are speed of use and speed of creation (faster graphic engine and maybe tools or tricks to script things quicker). And even then, I know I'm asking for more than is truely needed

Well, the engine is about as fast as I know how to make it, given the portability requirements it faces. As I figure out how to make it fast, or as new libraries come out to help me do so, then I will continue to improve it. (Annoyingly, I don't believe one can be sure accelerated OpenGL will be present on Windows.)

As to tips and tricks to script things faster... I'd appreciate suggestions. I don't see an obvious way to improve the scripting language... and I believe that graphical tools will almost certainly slow down the process, especially as changes need to be made to the script.

I'd like to re-propose to PyTom to develop the one-click button that creates the plot, writes the whole script, and creates all graphics automagically. Although that brings up the question if the one who clicked the button can be considered as the author. ^_^

Why is it that nobody proposes I take an all-expenses-paid trip to some tropical resort? But seriously, I'm pretty sure what you're asking is somewhat beyond the state of the art in computer-generated storytelling. (At least, that was what I gathered from some research I did into the area a few months ago.)

[monele]

As to tips and tricks to script things faster... I'd appreciate suggestions.

There's only one thing for now : it's about translations. Right now, it's really difficult to make a single game with two languages. My two current solutions are :
- make a clone of each scene for the second language and branch to the right one at the beginning. Problem : cloning scenes means cloning script means pain when some script has to change.
- use if/else testing the current language for each dialogue parts within scenes. It's mostly painful when there are one liners in-between script actions.

Possible solutions : determine languages in some order within an init block ($renpy.languages = ['FR', 'EN', 'JP']). Then you'd write dialogues this way :
tom "Bonjour","Hello","Ohayou"
menu a:
"Dire bonjour","Say hello","Ohayou something...":
actions...


Or we could use some new say tag :

tom "{lang=='FR'}Bonjour{lang=='EN'}Hello{lang=='JP'}Ohayou"

If condition is true, following text is display up to the next test.