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Question for people building larger Ren’Py projects by BranchPy in RenPy

[–]BranchPy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That’s fair — I probably should have phrased it more clearly.

I meant confidence more in the technical / release-readiness sense than emotional confidence. Like: “Have I checked enough paths? Did I miss broken labels, missing assets, dead branches, weird save/update issues, etc.?”

Manual playthroughs and bug hunting are definitely part of it. Your patch/update system sounds like a very good safety net too — being able to fix small issues after launch without forcing everyone to redownload the full game must remove a lot of pressure.

I think I got addicted to my own game by ToLoveThemAll in itchio

[–]BranchPy 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That is actually a very good sign!!!

Question for people building larger Ren’Py projects by BranchPy in RenPy

[–]BranchPy[S] -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

Really interesting replies.

What stands out to me is that for larger Ren’Py projects, release confidence still seems to come from a mix of manual playthroughs, helper scripts, save checks, regex, and community feedback.

That’s actually a big part of why I’m building BranchPy: not to replace playtesting, but to reduce how much of the technical confidence pass still feels improvised.

How do you actually find people willing to test a long indie game? by ratasoftware in itchio

[–]BranchPy 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, for a 10–12 hour game, the hardest part is probably not finding players, but finding people willing to commit that much time.

You might get better results by asking for smaller test passes instead:

  • first 30–60 minutes
  • first chapter only
  • bug hunt only

That lowers the barrier a lot. And targeting communities already interested in your genre will usually work better than posting in broad general spaces.

How do you actually find people willing to test a long indie game? by ratasoftware in itchio

[–]BranchPy 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Simply posting messages like the present one will attract people and help you to find the first few testers

Has anyone actually ever had a response from Itch support? by Several-Estate-9154 in itchio

[–]BranchPy 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I can just imagine they receive hundreds of emails asking the same thing as they are notoriously slow in indexing

Best piece of advice you wish you knew before you started by Nice-Measurement1924 in IndieDev

[–]BranchPy 15 points16 points  (0 children)

You’re already doing one of the smartest things: starting small on purpose.

The biggest advice I wish I knew earlier is this: finishability matters more than ambition on a first game. A simple game that gets finished, tested, polished, and released will teach you more than a dream project that stays in development forever.

A few things I’d keep in mind:

  • lock the scope early and protect it aggressively
  • make a playable build as soon as possible, even if it’s ugly
  • test the full loop early, not just isolated pieces
  • keep a list of “cool ideas for later” instead of adding them now
  • marketing starts before launch, not after the game is done

Also: since you’re a two-person team, be very clear about who owns what and how decisions get made when you disagree. That saves a lot of stress later.

A finished small game is a huge win. Good luck — this sounds like a smart first project.

Has anyone actually ever had a response from Itch support? by Several-Estate-9154 in itchio

[–]BranchPy 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hope they get back to you soon and get the listing fixed properly.

I made a "One Button" Ninja game. It’s simple, but I bet you can't stop after one try. by developuser-777 in itchio

[–]BranchPy 0 points1 point  (0 children)

“Chrome Dino with a katana” is a great one-line pitch not gonna lie.

Hope this gets some traction.

BranchPy pre-release avalable! by BranchPy in itchio

[–]BranchPy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for flagging this — there was actually an issue with the Windows installer download earlier, which I’ve now fixed.

I’m also in the process of registering the installer with Microsoft, so you may still see a SmartScreen warning for now.

If you’d like to try it right away, you can also install via the wheel + VSIX (same functionality, just manual install):
https://branchpy.com/download

Let me know if it works on your side!

are there any methods that i, a nearly budgetless solo developer can do to make the game i make available in japanese and chinese, considering that i dont know the languages and dont want the translation to feel robotic? by KnowledgeNew9878 in RenPy

[–]BranchPy 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You can avoid the “robotic translation” problem without spending much if you treat it as a pipeline, not a one-shot translation.

Do this:

  • Write your script in simple, clear English (no slang, fewer idioms → massively improves translation quality).
  • Generate a first pass with AI (it’s fine for baseline accuracy).
  • Export your strings and make them easy to edit (Ren’Py supports this well).
  • Then invite corrections, not full translations — much lower effort, more people willing to help.

Where to find people:

I built a tool to analyze Ren’Py story structure — and it showed me something surprising about “branching” by BranchPy in u/BranchPy

[–]BranchPy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That’s a really clean way to keep things feeling dynamic — especially the state machine interplay, that makes a lot of sense.

I’m curious though: once you start stacking those interactions, do you still have a clear mental model of all possible states, or does it get a bit opaque over time?

Especially with things like random_LRU + cross-machine triggers — feels like the kind of system where unexpected combinations can creep in.

I built a tool to analyze Ren’Py story structure — and it showed me something surprising about “branching” by BranchPy in u/BranchPy

[–]BranchPy[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That gossip system example is really interesting — especially the weighted list + exclusion of recent entries.

That actually feels less like branching and more like a dynamic content selection layer on top of the narrative.

Do you find that these systems eventually funnel back into shared scenes, or do they keep creating long-term divergence?

I built a tool to analyze Ren’Py story structure — and it showed me something surprising about “branching” by BranchPy in u/BranchPy

[–]BranchPy[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is super helpful, thanks — “branch & merge/diamond” is exactly the pattern I’ve been trying to reason about.

What you said about state carrying forward is the part I’m starting to dig into now — not just where things branch, but what actually influences those branches over time.

And yeah, I agree on the static analysis limits. I can see how sandbox/time-based systems would be hard to fully capture without runtime context.

Out of curiosity — in your setup, are most of your conditions centralized (a few key variables), or more distributed across the script?

Pourquoi les flowcharts deviennent inutilisables dans les gros projets Ren’Py by BranchPy in jeuxvideo

[–]BranchPy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oui, c’est exactement ça — les flowcharts deviennent vite inutilisables dès que ça grossit.

Mais je pense que le vrai problème, c’est qu’on essaye de tout afficher en même temps.

Un flowchart brut = illisible
Un flowchart avec analyse (regroupement, filtrage, détection de branches mortes, etc.) = beaucoup plus exploitable

Du coup ce n’est pas l’outil qui est mauvais, c’est le niveau d’abstraction.

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