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Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 10:01 pm
by Spiky Caterpillar
PyTom wrote:I've heard reports that it has, but that was a while back. The only problem would the CPU and memory usage, but iLiad has less of both.

Netbooks are a better choice for most actual use.
Current OLPC report:

Ren'Py itself and vanilla visual novels seem to run OK on my OLPC. The OLPC default distribution does not do resolution changing, so everything will be displayed at the OLPC-native 1200x900, letterboxed as needed. Animations are somewhat laggy. Science Girls' battle sequences don't work (they will often hang after an attack; rolling back and trying the attack again will usually get around it. This happens on both 6.8.0f and 6.9.0e, but it may be a bug in my code rather than in Ren'Py - I'll see if I can isolate it properly.)

Scite was sluggish, but usable. JEdit is being absurd - the loading splashscreen sits there frozen, only advancing when I start and stop other applications.

Testing it on the OLPC did remind me of one thing I'd been wondering - is there a recommended way to make Ren'Py redraw the screen from within an animation? Ideally, I'd have my TransitionAnimations force screen redraws when the attack animation is completely imagedissolved in, so
I can be assured that _a_ frame will be rendered the way I want it.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Sun Mar 22, 2009 6:30 pm
by delta
well, we can pan sound smoothly over time now, which is kind of nifty in some circumstances, but, erm... why is this not possible for the volume, where it's much more useful?

I managed to hack it somewhat, but I'd rather not have to do stuff like importing renpy.audio.audio and abusing config.periodic_callback ...

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 4:04 am
by karppaul
About making RenPy-online, I've been bearing plans for online-VN engine for couple of years and I was planning to start development this summer. But my idea excepts using client-side technologies like flash or silverlight, and of cause it can't be a pure port of RenPy, may be some light-version.
I might be missing smth, but what about JAVA? It can be used for on- and off-line playing.
For netbooks: RenPy runs well on my Acer Aspire One(linpus lite inside), except some problems with sound. Display is very suitable for VN-playing.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 5:01 am
by jack_norton
Honestly if you don't use flash for a online VN I don't see any point in having it online.
The only advantage of flash is that you can play it straight on without downloading / installing anything. And ads money from flash games surely isn't a motivation to make online VN :)

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 5:38 am
by Jake
karppaul wrote: I might be missing smth, but what about JAVA?
Firstly, Ren'Py is written in Python - the solutions PyTom's looking at involve him not having to port all of Ren'Py to another language; he's considering Silverlight in light of IronPython, a .NET Python implementation.

Secondly, if you check the JEdit thread, you'll see that several people currently using Ren'Py don't have Java installed, and several more complain that it takes ages to start up. Hell, I have a pretty modern machine, and Java apps still take too long to start for me, I hate to think what it's like for a five- or ten-year-old computer. Which Ren'Py presently runs fine on.

(Maintaining a port of Ren'Py in a second language would almost literally double the amount of work, particularly for languages with libraries so different as Python and Java.)
jack_norton wrote: The only advantage of flash is that you can play it straight on without downloading / installing anything.
Not entirely true - you still need to download and install the flash plugin. It's just that some computers come with it pre-installed... it's not all of them.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 5:59 am
by jack_norton
jack_norton wrote: The only advantage of flash is that you can play it straight on without downloading / installing anything.
Not entirely true - you still need to download and install the flash plugin. It's just that some computers come with it pre-installed... it's not all of them.[/quote]
Yes but is a very high percentage. If you target flash 8-9, it's about 90-95% of pc/macs. Silverlight or java unfortunately aren't so well-spread (I'm not a fan of flash by itself BTW just reporting the statistics).

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 6:27 am
by karppaul
Jake wrote:Firstly, Ren'Py is written in Python - the solutions PyTom's looking at involve him not having to port all of Ren'Py to another language; he's considering Silverlight in light of IronPython, a .NET Python implementation.
There is a jython. I never used it, may be it's a bad option, can you tell?
jack_norton wrote:Honestly if you don't use flash for a online VN I don't see any point in having it online.
The goal is to make games light, portable and totally online, without downloading any client. If you don't use visual effects and advanced game scripting - javascript + server-side scripts are enough to make VN. Even some visual effects can be supported.
Jake wrote:I have a pretty modern machine, and Java apps still take too long to start for me
Yea, I don't like java-apps for that. But I don't see flash has any bigger advantages. Still java is a default option for mobile-platforms.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 6:45 am
by Jake
karppaul wrote: If you don't use visual effects and advanced game scripting - javascript + server-side scripts are enough to make VN.
If you don't use visual effects and advanced game scripting, then HTML is enough to make a VN. You'd have to move to a new page whenever you changed the characters who were displayed in a scene, let alone moved to a new background, but it's doable.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 7:03 am
by karppaul
Jake wrote:then HTML is enough to make a VN
Well, even minimalism must be limited.
I think it is better to use some ajax, but the whole system has to be well-planned to prevent technical problems like server overload.
I think thats already an offtop, and if someone wants to discuss online implementations - we should create another topic.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 7:43 am
by Preludian
my 2 cents, OpenLaszlo is the answer, but without the look and feel and behavior like RenPy it wouldn't serve me a lot.
Imagine being able to play the game in a somewhat light version at the office (secretly, but it's soo addictive ;) ) have the save games online, go at home and continue playing at home with all effects and sounds, automatically synchronizing the save games.
So, where ever you have a browser you can play. I like this idea....

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 7:55 am
by DaFool
I sort of dislike browser-based games, I just don't like the lack of immersion compared to a game which can be set to full screen and you're giving it undivided attention. To me, a browser game is not really the 'main course' of an experience... it's only to serve as an ad to something else. I would hope to think that we consider VNs to be 'main course' experiences instead of something to skim then throw away.

Nevertheless, I still fully support any work that goes towards better browser integration.
Jake wrote: Secondly, if you check the JEdit thread, you'll see that several people currently using Ren'Py don't have Java installed, and several more complain that it takes ages to start up. Hell, I have a pretty modern machine, and Java apps still take too long to start for me, I hate to think what it's like for a five- or ten-year-old computer. Which Ren'Py presently runs fine on.
Hmmm, it looks like I upgraded to a Core 2 Duo in time (and by the way, OSX comes preinstalled with Java, and it seems to start up instantaneously there compared to Windows + Java runtime in the background) Not to mention being able to use .NET and OpenGL programs much better.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 8:00 am
by jack_norton
An advantage of flash is that you can go fullscreen from browser. I don't know about other systems.
A HTML/Ajax VN engine would work indeed :) shouldn't be even particularly hard to write I think.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2009 8:42 am
by karppaul
jack_norton wrote:A HTML/Ajax VN engine would work indeed :) shouldn't be even particularly hard to write I think.
Sooner or later I'll try writing server-side code (python, wsgi), but I'm not good at client-side to write interface. The good thing - client-side can be written much later, after server-side is tested.
It's not hard, it requires some spare time, and I don't have lot of it.
Preludian wrote:Imagine being able to play the game in a somewhat light version at the office (secretly, but it's soo addictive ;) ) have the save games online, go at home and continue playing at home with all effects and sounds, automatically synchronizing the save games.
So, where ever you have a browser you can play. I like this idea....
thats the idea.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 7:43 am
by killdream
jack_norton wrote: A HTML/Ajax VN engine would work indeed :) shouldn't be even particularly hard to write I think.
I was writing one back then, but since I had to rewrite every single line to make it compatible with the M$ IE .-. I stopped working in it. Though, there's was so much things to change (like the compiler module that have so much memoryleaks .-. it was functional).

But... if you don't plan to use fancy effects, with adjustable resolution and a compiler (I don't know why ever I made one, but well...) I think it would be easier.

Re: Ren'Py Roadmap

Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 8:12 am
by karppaul
killdream wrote: I was writing one back then, but since I had to rewrite every single line to make it compatible with the M$ IE .-. I stopped working in it. Though, there's was so much things to change (like the compiler module that have so much memoryleaks .-. it was functional).
But... if you don't plan to use fancy effects, with adjustable resolution and a compiler (I don't know why ever I made one, but well...) I think it would be easier.
What platform/language did you use?
Actually, I started development, but had to halt it due to lack of time.
What I'm intended to dev - is an online-VN-engine that'll use renpy-like scripts. There would be some kind of a compiler that will produce serialized callable objects that'll return javascript code(or jason or xml or some other format).
This engine will support only some basic renpy-statements like init, label, menu, call, return and of cause, some manipulations with graphics. Anyway, If I'll proceed with this development, I'll start a new thread on the forum.