'Ren'Py Analytics'?

[DaFool]

I was just wondering that there are a lot of work-in-progress games. While we can check these out, I'm pretty sure there should be a lot more announced in blogs that I never even heard of. In addition, I won't be surprised if some hardcore blogger decides to do a game on their own.

The thing is, how to organize all that? No one will mention any planned game unless it's their own game, they're working on it, they're a friend of the creator, or they just thought that it was worth mentioning.

Is there a way to come up with some sort of program that's similar to google analytics, or else the usual monitoring tools for webpages? Some dynamic page which is non-biased that just comes up with today's ren'py (or 'visual novel') projects in one convenient list sorted by date modified or hit access.

Is this even possible? This isn't meant to be Lemmasoft-centric, because while its encouraged that people announce their games here, they have their own communities they'd rather interact with as well. But at the same time, I want to aggregate all non-oriental visual novels to make the genre strong and provide more choices that ones which we list.

[PyTom]

I tend to do this, by looking at my server logs from time to time. For example, I found the game Snipe Me, Author-Tan, and resolved to post about it here. Now I have.

I believe that I have found the vast majority of Ren'Py games that exist. There is one game that we don't have listed on the wiki, but that's mostly because I won't list bestiality games on the wiki. Full stop.

[DaFool]

Also, someone wake me up when the RenAi Blogger game is complete... I'm too lazy to filter through all the blogger posts (not that I dislike the scene, I used to enjoy their podcasts from awhile back). (Same goes with Katawa Shoujo, Flight of Twilight, etc.)

[DiGiKerot]

For example, I found the game Snipe Me, Author-Tan, and resolved to post about it here. Now I have.

I had actually contemplated posting about the game here myself, but with it essentially being a mess of injokes with a bunch of hastily compiled mini-games thrown in, I figured interest beyond those who would stumble across it during their regular activities would be minimal at best.

I do have a slightly less cliquey project ongoing, though I ended up putting on the backburner whilst I got Author-tan out of the way. That one I will announce if/when I have something to show, but since that's a larger scale project that Hikki Quest or Author-tan, that'll likely be a while.

[mikey]

I was just wondering that there are a lot of work-in-progress games. While we can check these out, I'm pretty sure there should be a lot more announced in blogs that I never even heard of. In addition, I won't be surprised if some hardcore blogger decides to do a game on their own.

The thing is, how to organize all that? No one will mention any planned game unless it's their own game, they're working on it, they're a friend of the creator, or they just thought that it was worth mentioning.

I think this is a general problem now - I'm not going to poke the subject too much I hope, but a few very simple overviews and lists (simple wiki pages with a name and a link) could go a long way. Games from this community, other OELVN games and so on - Ren'Py games have an advantage, since they almost naturally pop up - by linking back to the renpy homepage or simply asking for help. Others need active searching or accidental stumbling upon. But even if a game is found and a link posted, it doesn't get organized in the simplest way, and soon it will be lost.

And there is a lot to learn from those games, some have demos - remember Untouched, Town Heat etc? But also community-created things - some are in the wiki, but today I was thinking about Renairody and other things - the RenTarot thread disappeared in the depths of the forum (and it was a lot of work) and since it is not featured in any "community dashboard", only those who know... will know. As it is now, I feel that a lot of information and work is not necessarily lost, but getting overlooked.

Also, someone wake me up when the RenAi Blogger game is complete... I'm too lazy to filter through all the blogger posts (not that I dislike the scene, I used to enjoy their podcasts from awhile back).

Hmmm, the last time before dropping my list (a few weeks ago) I checked the ratio of unfinished to finished games, and quite surprisingly it was much the same as 9 months ago.

From 360 started projects, 21% were completed back then.
My latest information was that from 630 started, 22% were completed.

So the ratio is quite consistent - but it's inevitable that the growth of projects is like a storm, almost double in the last 9 months. I also think however that the ratio has been kept up by finished microgames, otherwise I think that in general it would have gotten down somewhat considerably. And there was a huge increase in blog-announced games, but I suppose this is not surprising - but it contributes to high project counts.

(Same goes with Katawa Shoujo, Flight of Twilight, etc.)

Shira-Oka... 4th year of being public. And none of the large publically-announced game projects has ever been completed. Except for Fatal Hearts, of course, but that's a special case.