Ren'Py's Public Image

[lordcloudx]

looking at the sketch. I think just changing the hair and eye color to be as close as possible to the original would work wonders.

[Nafai]

*boggles at the sheer amount of posts*

I thought for a moment someone had revived an old thread. Then I saw that this started what, 2-3 days ago?

Anyway, I come late to the party so really don't have much more to say.

* New Webpage and Eileen: Both are looking very good. ^_^

* Demo/Intro Thingie: While an updated Eileen simple demo gets a thumbs up from me, there was some discussion awhile back as to a comparison between an Original 'game' that doesn't actually talk about Ren'py directly but plays as a straight up game/VN as opposed to something more like the Original Demo which 'breaks the 4th wall'. I think a fun and happy medium could be had if aside from the Original game, a 'commentary' version was released, which basically would be the original gamebut with another character (Eileen perhaps) popping up in the scenes and showing us what was going on 'under the hood' so to speak. (Maybe even interacting with the characters from the original game for laughs)

[Alessio]

Actually, upgrading an already released game should be as easy as dropping an image into the game folder

Not really, menu design and sound engine probably won't work as-is in a new version, they'd need to be redone. (Edit: If anybody thinks upgrading G!MB to the newest version would be of use for promoting Ren'Py (not sure about that) then I'd of course do it.)

Make at least the text black (plus it should be a bit easier to read).

I agree with that. Otherwise, very good job so far!

First draft of the new Eileen

Wow, very nice! Good points from monele, Jake, and lordcloudx. As soon as the final colors are used, it'll look more like Eileen, I'm sure.

this is what I instantly thought of when someone said "Ren'Py Logo" a couple of days ago

That's a good one, much better than mine. But I guess we'll have to wait until the 'new' Eileen design is finalized.

the original gamebut with another character (Eileen perhaps) popping up in the scenes and showing us what was going on 'under the hood' so to speak.

Good idea! Maybe playing through the original game again might be a bit boring if we're talking about a 60-minutes-story, but an extra chapter with a peek behind the scenes would definitely be a nice addition. Games could be prepared for the release of "behind the scenes" bonus packages (since Ren'Py is able to check for the existence of files), so that interested authors would just have to drop one additional .rpy file into the GAME directory for it to work.

[RedSlash]

looking at the sketch. I think just changing the hair and eye color to be as close as possible to the original would work wonders.

I agree. Match the hair colour, give her the blue shirt. I think her pink hair is one of the main factors that makes Eileen stand out as Eileen. So as long as you match the colours then even if the style of art has changed, she should still be able to stick out as Eileen.

[ShiraiJunichi]

Actually, upgrading an already released game should be as easy as dropping an image into the game folder

Not really, menu design and sound engine probably won't work as-is in a new version, they'd need to be redone. (Edit: If anybody thinks upgrading G!MB to the newest version would be of use for promoting Ren'Py (not sure about that) then I'd of course do it.)

I don't know when the feature was introduced, but dropping a "presplash.png" file into the game directory will show that image while Ren'Py is loading.

When an official logo is chosen, I think it would be a nice idea to include an image with the logo, named "presplash.png" with every distribution of Ren'Py- then a game will credit Ren'Py without any modification.

[RedSlash]

When an official logo is chosen, I think it would be a nice idea to include an image with the logo, named "presplash.png" with every distribution of Ren'Py- then a game will credit Ren'Py without any modification.

I like this capability, but I think every user should be given a choice of whether include the logo or not.

Anyways, on the topic of the logo, this may be a bit over the board, but after finalizing the logo, I think it can be animated (like a short 3 second animation) to give it a much more professional touch to it. Should be easy for some of the flash artists here. Just another thought.

[Jake]

I like this capability, but I think every user should be given a choice of whether include the logo or not.

Well, the way ShiraiJunichi suggests, the user would have the option of removing it before distribution - just that the default behaviour would be to show the logo.

[PyTom]

I concur that people should opt-in to promoting Ren'Py. IMO, subtler is better. A simple credit is probably enough... I would just like to be sure that credit informs people of what Ren'Py is.

(Hey folks... checking in for a bit between panels at Otakon.)

[lordcloudx]

I like this capability, but I think every user should be given a choice of whether include the logo or not.

I agree with RedSlash too. Sort of like an honor system on the game-maker's part. After all, I believe that no one really wants to force-promote ren'py (I made that term up) like the way some websites use forced voting.


btw, I didn't know about that presplash.png. Not like I've downloaded ren'py in a while anyway.

[mikey]

I concur that people should opt-in to promoting Ren'Py. IMO, subtler is better. A simple credit is probably enough... I would just like to be sure that credit informs people of what Ren'Py is.

Though if I have to be honest, I dislike putting webpages or the words "free" into credits that are in (or inside) the game. Perhaps if the credits are at the very end, maybe, but generally links and license-related things (being free of charge is also related to that) should go to the readme. Otherwise the words strike you a lot, and it can all have this different feel all of the sudden.

So IMO it's okay to put in the information that the game was made with a specific engine, or using other resources like morguefile, but the links to morguefile and that it has free images are something for the accompanying files (or a special credits section in the game) rather than something that should be tightly integrated into the game as such.

The difference between "photographs: Morguefile" and "photographs: free photos at http://www.morguefile.com" in an intro sequence is what I'm thinking of. Of course, note again, that I am not against mentioning the website or the license (free).

Well, that's my thoughts.

[PyTom]

Sure, words like "free" are perhaps value loaded (if accurate). But the big change I'm suggesting is changing the suggested formula from:

"Powered by Renpy"

to

"Made with the Ren'Py Visual Novel Engine"

which I think is a fairly unobtrusive way of letting people know what Ren'Py is.

[mikey]

That's a fair formula. Perhaps if people made a dating sim with it though, the words "visual novel" could be a bit out of place, but generally I think if the words "engine" and "Ren'Py" are in the credits, it will do the job of informing as well as giving credit.

Anyway, I've never used "powered by", because it never really fit well with me and with the style - I hope that was okay ^_^, I tried to style the credit wordings appropriately and I always used "engine" and the name, "Ren'Py". In addition to that, personally I will always want to put a person behind everything as well, so I also credit the engine's maker - which is not required, but it's required for me

So in the end, I think/hope I've credited appropriately, even though it wasn't the suggested phrase.

[RedSlash]

I personally like "Powered by Renpy". "Made with the Ren'Py Visual Novel Engine" to me is a bit long and boring with the usage of words to me.

...which I think is a fairly unobtrusive way of letting people know what Ren'Py is.

I don't think that it is completly necessary to clarify what exactly ren'py is esp. since there's google. If you think about software that says "Powered by apache" or even "Powered by phpBB" (look at the bottom of this board), they aren't necessarily immediately obvious what they are until you google it. Usually it'd be good to accompany those phrases as a hyperlink to the main site.

[PyTom]

mikey>>> It's the thought that counts, rather than the precise wording.

RedSlash>>> The problem is, without mentioning what Ren'Py is, people don't know why they should search for it. It's a chicken and egg problem, I think.

Game-makers may also want to mention this forum in READMEs and on web pages, as a place where people can go if they want to learn how to make games like <your game here>. (This is just a suggestion, and it's up to each creator to decide if they want to adopt it... I think most already do.)

[monele]

I've changed my "powered by Ren'Py" to what you suggested, PyTom, but it's true that it's long. I'm thinking now that if what we want is make people aware of Ren'Py after playing our games, we should do it maybe outside of the game. You let them play it, just giving the "Ren'Py" hint here or there (beginning, credits). Then, you talk about it in the ReadMe. Some section called "You want to makes games like this too ?" for example, where we quickly explain that it was actually done with a free engine. Then give URLs and stuff.
Games with a website could also advertise on it, obviously. It's a place where it's less strange to make some advertisement.
Just to say that I'll probably go back to "powered by Ren'Py" for now, and wait for a possible logo ^^