Ren'Py

Many enthusiastic people would want to try their hand at creating a visual novel, or they just have a great story in mind that would be even better told as an interactive game.

Ren'Py is a visual novel development kit that allows you to put your story in motion, providing you with all the necessary tools. The application gives its users everything they need, but at first, with so much information and elements to be considered, it might be a bit overwhelming, especially if you are trying to create a multi-path novel.

The Ren'Py launcher offers everything you need to start creating a project. But before you do that, it would be highly recommended to check out the provided tutorial. It is a great way to understand how the engine works and how you can better use the plethora of features the development kit provides.

After you get the hang of things, you can start creating your project. Name it, select a folder, where everything you need will be generated and placed, pick the accent colors, set the desired preferences and you are good to go.

From the same launcher, you can access and edit all the necessary files. The first file in the Edit section is called script.rpy. Here, you will add your game script and declare the characters of your story. You have examples in the file to guide you in creating your scenes as well.

There are three other files accessible in this section. The options.rpy file, where you can customize the games, the gui.rpy, where you can adjust your menus, text and dialogues, and the last one, which is called screen.rpy, where you can modify the screen styles, among many other things.

Ren'Py is a complex development kit for both novel and life simulation games. It allows you to outline the stories just as you imagined them, by adding dialogues, images, transitions, music and sound effects, video playback and even minigames. All this is topped by the fact that you can tweak each part to your very own liking.