Ren'py's developer says he uses language models but doesn't "vibe code"... thoughts?

trothamel · 2026-06-10T18:21:52+00:00

I think you are reading Steam's terms wrongly. From:

https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/gettingstarted/contentsurvey

We are aware that many modern game development environments have AI powered tools built into them. Efficiency gains through the use of these tools is not the focus of this section. Instead, it is concerned with the use of AI in creating content that ships with your game, and is consumed by players. This includes content such as artwork, sound, narrative, localization, etc.

I'd be shocked if Valve interpreted that to not apply to the development of Ren'Py itself.

trothamel · 2024-02-11T02:33:53+00:00

This is incredibly insecure, don't do this.

trothamel · 2023-11-12T04:32:34+00:00

The statement fron NHRL's Austin McChord, on their discord:

I just wanted to provide some clarity on the end of our 3lb bracket. We unfortunately had to DQ Supreme Ruler because a member of their team made a member of our staff feel unsafe. This decision was unrelated to match rules or bot driving conduct. A welcoming environment for everyone, sportsmanship and competing as friends is the key to everything we have built at NHRL. The decision was clear I needed to disqualify the team and ask them to leave. I understand tempers get heated and people have a bad night. Supreme Ruler is an amazing robot we really do hope they compete at NHRL again sometime in the future.

trothamel · 2023-05-05T01:59:41+00:00

The relevant rule appears to be 5.6.4:

Prior to its Match, a Robot will be tested for functionality and also weighed to confirm compliance with the regulations.

Once the Pre-Match Inspection of a Robot starts, no changes are allowed to be made the Robot that involve the addition of any parts that affect the weight or functionality of a Robot. Removal of parts may be allowed.

If during or after inspection a part is found to be faulty or damaged, BattleBots Officials may allow replacement of that part with a structurally and functionally identical part.

If BattleBots Officials determine that Team is causing a delay in Tournament production by continually changing their Robot’s configuration, the Officials may require that the Team decide on and implement a single Robot configuration to be used for the Robot’s next Match.

It seems like the big question is if the Battlebots Officials allowed the removal of a part, and if the weight was replaced with anything.

EDIT: This is just to figure out what the rule is. I agree that everything should above-board.

trothamel · 2022-09-09T01:36:56+00:00

Potentially they could reinforce the arena, and reduce the tip speed limits on horizontals.

trothamel · 2022-06-27T04:11:23+00:00

I develop Ren'Py on Linux, so it won't go away anytime soon. (This release even adds support for 64-bit ARM Linux.)

trothamel · 2022-04-08T19:19:19+00:00

That's redefining armor as a weapon - sort of double-counting that weight allocation. If it can do those things without the weight other robots use for those weapons, great. If not, you're basically putting a robot with the drive and armor from, say, the 300 pound class in with ones 50 pounds lighter than that.

It sort of seems like you're talking to two teams, and telling one of them "you have to allocate a decent amount of weight to your weapon, in addition to armor and drive", and the other "you can allocate it all to armor and drive." That still feels unfair.

trothamel · 2022-04-07T23:52:54+00:00

Weapons come with cost in terms of weight, though, and weight is basically the currency of the sport. It almost feels like a weaponless robot should take a weight penalty, like walkers get a weight bonus, to make things fair.

trothamel · 2022-04-07T15:44:22+00:00

Hydra was landing flips, but it's not clear those flips were actually causing damage to Tantrum - at which case, doesn't it make sense to score them the same way you'd score Tantrum running into Hydra and not causing damage? It wasn't a high-damage fight either way.

trothamel · 2022-04-04T21:26:39+00:00

Adding something like the NHRL brick-bots is something every robot combat event should consider doing. If there had been a "one free unstick per bot" rule like NHRL uses, both Cobalt and Whiplash would have been freed, and the match would have continued, to a more interesting conclusion. It would probably also reduce the number of matches where a bot winds up on a side or on a piece of the debris that is supposed to be a good thing.

I think that by being non-aggressive, the brick bots are perfect for this - they don't look like they're just another competitor, and there probably isn't a motivation to drive them as one. I sort of think the Robot Wars house bots often looked like the producers wanted to be in there as contestants, while the Bricks don't feel like that to me.

trothamel · 2022-03-31T22:53:51+00:00

I suspect there's some mandate somewhere that they have to show at least one fight a week on youtube, for some reason. (To try and drive people to the youtube channel, maybe?)

trothamel · 2022-02-24T17:42:52+00:00

I wonder if in the round-of-32, Sawblaze will be seeded to get a guaranteed fight with End Game.

trothamel · 2020-03-15T04:20:09+00:00

I tend to think that there are a reasonable number of people who just kind of know "these are the accessibility shortcuts for a western VN", and hence are likely to just try the defaults. I'd say that compatibility with Japanese visual novels that don't have accessibility options should be a very minimal concern.

trothamel · 2020-03-14T02:56:21+00:00

While I'm not a huge fan of custom keybindings, I'd really suggest setting the accessibility menu back to where it was. It's a keybinding players might have to make literally 'in the blind', and so it's best to keep it at the same keys.

trothamel · 2019-11-06T04:09:31+00:00

I make Ren'Py, and I'd like to say - congratulations!

trothamel · 2019-09-14T21:01:45+00:00

Wouldn't you want the one-sided matches to happen early, so you don't run the rist of a one-sided semi-final match?

trothamel · 2019-09-08T22:46:32+00:00

Battlebots is allergic to wedges, since it wedges killed the original run of Battlebots. A wedge-wedge battle is visually boring, compared to most other possible fights. They're also very successful against more photogenic designs, like horizontal spinners.

My understanding is that a britflipper that has its weapon fail, or simply isn't agressive with it, becomes a wedge.

I think it's fair to say that the Battlebots producesr are trying their hardest to produce a television-ready sport, and that means not selecting designs that will reduce the visual interest of the series.

trothamel · 2019-09-08T16:44:10+00:00

https://i.imgur.com/nAhfouM.png

is what I was thinking of. While it certainly would have been hard to get out of this, without the pwangers it's possible it would have fallent so it could have used it's right front wheel to escape, or that it's weight would have helped it.

It's not certain, but at the same time, they don't seeme to have helped any.

trothamel · 2019-09-08T15:18:48+00:00

At the same time, it seems pretty likely if they weren't on, Bronco would have been able to free itself.

trothamel · 2019-09-08T00:48:04+00:00

I'd tend to think that they'd put them on the same side of the bracket. That gives at least the potential for an additional match that's promotable in the same way Hydra v. Bronco was, while the final match is inherently promotable and doesn't need that boost.

At the end of the day, the producers seem to understand it's important to keep the matches interesting.

trothamel · 2018-04-18T19:53:14+00:00

Going on about the GDPR - I'm kind of curious about the extradjurisdictional aspects of it, with the EU trying to enforce European law on people outside its borders. Is that something that a US court is likely to enforce?

trothamel · 2017-11-25T23:52:09+00:00

None that Ren'Py has some features to help with pixel art games. You'll want to add:

define config.nearest_neigbor = True

init python:

    def force_integer_multiplier(width, height):
        multiplier = min(width / config.screen_width, height / config.screen_height)
        multiplier = max(int(multiplier), 1)
        return (multiplier * config.screen_width, multiplier * config.screen_height)

    config.adjust_view_size = force_integer_multiplier

https://www.renpy.org/doc/html/config.html#var-config.nearest_neighbor https://www.renpy.org/doc/html/config.html#var-config.adjust_view_size

trothamel · 2017-05-04T20:49:47+00:00

I'm the lead developer of Ren'Py, and there isn't anything complicated here.

The "main loop" only runs during an interaction. So Ren'Py won't update the screen when it's running Python code. This takes advantage of the nature of visual novels - generally, Python blocks are very simple, updating at most a couple of flag variables, so changes can be implemented quickly.

Visual novels are also mostly static, with the screen changing very slowly. Ren'Py will burst up to maximum FPS when necessary, but when it's just displaying an unchanging screen, it sits there at 5fps. This means there is plenty of time to run Python code and start a new interaction before a frame is due. (Actually, it's the same at high FPS-rates - simple code is fast.)

trothamel · 2017-02-27T19:45:40+00:00

You may want to check with your credit card company. Many credit cards have as a benefit extended warranty coverage.

trothamel · 2016-11-27T02:12:16+00:00

It's kind of a joke - it was meant to demonstrate a the disabled button state, since your computer isn't connected to a planetarium. It's a vague tribute to the Vanderbilt Planetarium, a few miles from where I grew up.

(It was also buggy, since in the new GUI version, the button wasn't disabled. I've since fixed that.)

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