History SoYouWantTo / MakeAVisualNovel

*** '''Long''': The upside is that you will have plenty of time to develop all of the characters at once through their interactions and [[WorldBuilding establish the setting]]. The downside is that a few of the individual character routes may suffer because you don't get enough time to focus and develop on a single character and make up a good plot related to that person. ''Hoshizora no Memoria'' in particular suffers from this problem.

The first place to start is the engine for the VisualNovel itself. While it's certainly possible to handle all this stuff yourself from scratch, there is a wonderful open source VisualNovel engine known as UsefulNotes/RenPy. It's easily accessible even to someone with almost no coding experience, and comes with numerous helpful tutorials to get you started. You can also use [[https://www.episodeinteractive.com Episode]] if you have a mobile device and want an easily understood coding system and/or pre-made character models that are customize-able with and include many animations.

* '''Substance over Style''': Nothing can save a VisualNovel if the story it tells is DarthWiki/SoBadItsHorrible. Bad art can be counteracted with good music, bad music can just be muted or be counteracted by good art, but no good visuals or audio will save a bad story.

* ''VisualNovel/ClassOf09'', for basically being an outright ''satire'' that's comparable to TheAbridgedVersion or a CrackFic but for Visual Novels.

* '''List of Cliches that are extremely common in visual novels''': GroundhogDayLoop, IllGirl, RapeAsDrama

** '''Final Route''': If you decided to have one of these, that means you stored UpToEleven amounts of pure build up.

* '''Character Sprites''': Each major character in your theoretical VN will probably need at least half a dozen sprites. While it's recommended for beginners of any kind of story to avoid using LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters, this is especially important for a medium like visual novels. The ''Franchise/WhenTheyCry'' series can get away with its art because the facial expressions of the characters in the ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' series are considered awesome. (Faces are what people focus on the most.)

The first place to start is the engine for the VisualNovel itself. While it's certainly possible to handle all this stuff yourself from scratch, there is a wonderful open source VisualNovel engine known as UsefulNotes/RenPy. It's easily accessible even to someone with almost no coding experience, and comes with numerous helpful tutorials to get you started. You can also use [[https://www.episodeinteractive.com Episode]] if you have a mobile device and want an easily understood coding system or/and pre-made character models that are customize-able with and include many animations.

* '''Yes''': How will the routes tie together? Will you use a JigsawPuzzlePlot like ''VisualNovel/Remember11''? Have them all lead up to a climactic final route with the TrueEnding like in ''VisualNovel/LittleBusters''? Share the same fundamental Aesop like in ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo''? Of course, you could make them have no relation to each other whatsoever like in ''VisualNovel/KiraKira'', but they all better be individually good. Just please don't tack on the routes just for the sake of making every possible character date-able like in ''VisualNovel/GSenjouNoMaou''.

** '''Relevance''': Make the gameplay reflect the Genre of the VisualNovel as a whole. For example, if the VisualNovel is in the horror genre, then give it some gameplay that involves running away from {{Eldritch Abomination}}s such as in ''VisualNovel/ShikkokuNoSharnoth''. If it's a war story, then there better be StrategyRPG elements like in ''VisualNovel/EienNoAselia''. If you want to make a mystery genre VN, AdventureGame elements would go well with it like in the ''Franchise/AceAttorney'' series. If it's a PornWithoutPlot game and you feel like adding gameplay then... You get the idea.

* '''Yes''': How will the routes tie together? Will you use a JigsawPuzzlePlot like ''VisualNovel/{{Remember11}}''? Have them all lead up to a climactic final route with the TrueEnding like in ''VisualNovel/LittleBusters''? Share the same fundamental Aesop like in ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo''? Of course, you could make them have no relation to each other whatsoever like in ''VisualNovel/KiraKira'', but they all better be individually good. Just please don't tack on the routes just for the sake of making every possible character date-able like in ''VisualNovel/GSenjouNoMaou''.

* ''VisualNovel/DiesIrae'' for both showing the strength of good voice acting, sound-effects and a strong soundtrack with the proper kind of tunes, used when appropriate to sell emotion or grandeur. It's prequel, ''[[VisualNovel/DiesIraeInterviewWithKazikluBey Interview with Kaziklu Bey]]'', continues this trend on top of displaying the strength of good prose even in more verbose works.

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!!The Terrible
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** '''Diverging Routes''': A common way to split them is by centering the individual plotlines around a specific RomanticInterest. That being said, don't be afraid to have a HeterosexualLifePartner route like ''VisualNovel/{{Clannad}}''.

** '''NVL''': The best format if you want less of a focus on the visual aspects and more on the actual writing, as text covers the whole background and forces the reader to actually read rather than look at the background images. Part of the reason why ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' can get away with its relatively lame art is because it uses this particular style. It is also the best style to use if you tend to be very descriptive in your writing or enjoy StreamOfConsciousness internal monologues like [[Franchise/{{Nasuverse}} Kinoko Nasu]]. Some visual novels that normally use the ADV style like ''VisualNovel/SharinNoKuni'' or even ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo'' switch to NVL to highlight important moments and to describe them in detail.

* '''SoundEffects''': As with any audiovisual media, a well placed sound effect can have a great impact. They are especially important in action-packed stories like ''VisualNovel/{{Demonbane}}'' or ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''.

*** '''Long''': The upside is that you will have plenty of time to develop all of the characters at once through their interactions and [[WorldBuilding establish the setting]]. The downside is that a few of the individual character routes may suffer because you don't get enough time to focus and develop on a single character and make up good plot related to that person. ''Hoshizora no Memoria'' in particular suffers from this problem.

* '''SpecialEffects''': Sure, they may not seem important, but a few well-placed special effects can go a long way. Visual effects books cannot use ''can'' be used by visual novels. A flash here or falling snow there, can easily enhance the amount of emotion of any given scene. Even something as simple as moving a sprite left or right or the way the text is shown on the screen is important! ''Quartett'' is a great example of sublime visual presentation of the story text itself and use of visual effects to evoke emotion, and ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' is a great example of using these effects to [[PaintingTheMedium Paint The Medium]] even using them as a plot point.

The first place to start is the engine for the VisualNovel itself. While it's certainly possible to handle all this stuff yourself from scratch, there is a wonderful open source VisualNovel engine known as UsefulNotes/RenPy. It's easily accessible even to someone with almost no coding experience, and comes with numerous helpful tutorials to get you started. You can also use [[https://www.episodeinteractive.com Episode]] if you have a mobile device and want an easily understood coding system or/and pre-made character models that are customize-able with include many animations.

* '''SpecialEffects''': Sure, they may not seem important, but a few well-placed special effects can go a long way. Visual effects books cannot use ''can'' be used by visual novels. A flash here or falling snow there, can easily enhance the amount of emotion of any given scene. Even something as simple as moving a sprite left or right or the way the text is shown on the screen is important! Quartett is a great example of sublime visual presentation of the story text itself and use of visual effects to evoke emotion, and ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' is a great example of using these effects to [[PaintingTheMedium Paint The Medium]] even using them as a plot point.

* '''Forced Reading''': Ypu can hijack the player's control of the reading speed and force him to read at your own pace such as in ''Deardrops'' or certain SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome concert scenes or certain ''VisualNovel/MuvLuvAlternative'' fight scenes. It gives the creator more control over how the player will experience a scene. Just don't use them too much because it can break the immersion of some players.

Okay, so you want to make a VisualNovel. Great! You are about to add a new work into the newest medium of art! Oh, and before you ask, DatingSim =/= VisualNovel. Romance-focused {{Visual Novel}}s and {{Dating Sim}}s do have similar plots, but the former is more akin to a novel while the latter is more akin to a {{RPG}}. While those works have their own section at SoYouWantTo.WriteADatingSim, this section will cover visual novels in general regardless of the genre. Yes, there are {{Visual Novel}}s of every genre. Regardless of the genre you plan to make the VisualNovel in, this guide's goal is to assist you. So here we go!

The first place to start is the engine for the VisualNovel itself. While it's certainly possible to handle all the technical stuff yourself from scratch, there is a wonderful open source VisualNovel engine known as UsefulNotes/RenPy. It's easily accessible to someone with almost no coding experience, and comes with numerous tutorials to get you started. But selecting an engine is just the foundation, and the process of creating a VisualNovel is still the process of creating a story. You can also use [[https://www.episodeinteractive.com Episode]] if you have a mobile device and want an easily understood coding system or/and pre-made character models that are customize-able and include many animations. Website/CloudNovel is also an easy way to get into making a visual novel.

So visual novels are just electronic books with fancy anime pictures and music, right? Not exactly. While many can undeniably be described as that, others like ''VisualNovel/MuvLuvAlternative'' have SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome so prominent they have action scenes akin to movies. [[IncrediblyLamePun Alternatively]], there are those that are like interactive manga such as ''Quartett''. Text and dialogue are undeniably the most important aspects of a VisualNovel, but do not neglect the visual or even audio aspects of them. Presentation is important, after all.

Another aspect you need to consider is how "gamelike" you want your VN to be. Visual novels straddle the border between a game and a story, and individual ones can lean more in one direction or the other, from kinetic novels with no interactivity to ones that incorporate complex branching plots or detailed minigames.

* '''Backgrounds''': While many people don't care if you just take real pictures and use a watercolor filter to save money on backgrounds since it is a common tactic of many amateur visual novels, they are still important. It's a lot of work, but hand drawn sprites just look better on hand drawn backgrounds. Furthermore, with self-created backgrounds, you can create your own unique atmosphere. Just look at ''VisualNovel/SekienNoInganock'' with its fancy and artsy backgrounds which complement the text and the characters.
* '''Character Sprites''': Each major character in your theoretical VN will need half a dozen sprites. While it's recommended for beginners of any kind of story to avoid using LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters, this is especially important for visual novel makers. Well, the ''Franchise/WhenTheyCry'' series can get away with its art because the facial expressions of the characters in the ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' series are considered awesome. (Faces are what people focus on the most.)
* '''Computer Graphics''' or [=CGs=] for short: These are still images made to appear when certain scenes occur. These images are best used to convey events that cannot be shown accurately simply by moving the character sprites such as a FirstKiss, a DyingMomentOfAwesome, a TransformationSequence, baking cookies, and of course, sex, or make the importance of a scene obvious such as a SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome or a PlotTwist.
* '''SpecialEffects''': Sure, they may not seem important, but a couple of well-placed special effects can go a long way. Visual effects books cannot use ''can'' be used by visual novels. A flash here or falling snow there, can easily enhance the amount of emotion any given scene can enhance. Even something as simple as moving a sprite left or right or the way the text is shown on the screen is important! Quartett is a great example of sublime visual presentation of the story text itself and use of visual effects to evoke emotion, and ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' is a great example of using special effects to [[PaintingTheMedium Paint The Medium]] and to use them as a plot point.
* '''Ways of presenting the text''': There are multiple ways, but the two major ones are ADV (short for Adventure Style Game) or NVL (short for Novel Style Game). There are advantages and disadvantages to both major styles.
** '''ADV''': The more common style. Basically speaking, all the text of the visual novel is put into a dialog box in the bottom of the screen. While this forces the writer to focus on a script-based format with minimal space to describe the setting or character actions, the background images or [=CG=]s can do that for you since a picture is worth a thousand words. This type of style leads to a visual novel with a large emphasis on the visual aspects of the VisualNovel, so it is a terrible style to use if you suck at drawing and are more used to writing in pure prose. A common pitfall is for an amateur prose writer to attempt this style simply because it is the most common one (and the default style of Ren'Py).
** '''NVL''': The best format if you want less of a focus on the visual aspects and more on the actual writing since text covers the whole background and forces the reader to actually read rather than look at the background images. Part of the reason why ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' can get away with its lame art is because it uses this particular style. It is also the best style to use if you tend to be very descriptive in your writing or like StreamOfConsciousness style internal monologues like [[Franchise/{{Nasuverse}} Kinoko Nasu]]. Some visual novels that normally use the ADV style like ''VisualNovel/SharinNoKuni'' or even ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo'' have a few brief NVL scenes to highlight important moments and to describe them in detail.

* '''BackgroundMusic''': The major reason why a visual novel can get away with a lower quality of wordsmithing than traditional novels is because of this. Other than {{Grammar Nazi}}s, nobody cares if a phrase is a tiny bit awkward if SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic is playing in the background. The background music has to complement and enhance the text it is behind. Describing a soothing SliceOfLife scene? Then use calming music! An action scene? HeavyMetal, of course! A PlotTwist goes great with OminousLatinChanting, and so on. You could also try using SoundtrackDissonance to complement BlackComedy or MundaneMadeAwesome.
* '''SoundEffects''': Like in any audio/visual media, a well placed sound effect can have a great impact. They are especially important in action based visual novels like ''VisualNovel/{{Demonbane}}'' or ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''.
* '''Voice Acting''': If you are a professional who can hire professional voice actors or have good amateur voice actors then please you can add voice acting. Good voice acting can enhance a VisualNovel.

* Do you want to add game mechanics to your VN? If not, skip to the major bullet point. If, for whatever reason, you do, then read on.

** '''RuleOfFun''': If you're going to have gameplay, then it better be fun. No one cares how symbolic the MiniGame is if it's not fun.
* '''Forced Reading''': Yes, you can hijack the player's control of the reading speed and force him to read at your own pace such as in ''Deardrops'' or in certain SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome concert scenes or in certain ''VisualNovel/MuvLuvAlternative'' fight scenes. It gives you, the maker, more control over how you want the player to experience a certain scene. Just don't use them too much because it can break the immersion of some players.

* '''No''': You could always make a KineticNovel or LinearVisualNovel. There's nothing wrong with focusing all of your effort onto one plotline and making it good. ''VisualNovel/MuvLuvAlternative'' is one of the most highly rated visual novels despite being a LinearVisualNovel.
* '''Yes''': How will the routes tie together? Will you use a JigsawPuzzlePlot like ''VisualNovel/{{Remember11}}''? Have them all lead up to a climactic final route with the TrueEnding like in ''VisualNovel/LittleBusters''? Share the same fundamental Aesop like in ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo''? Of course, you could make them have no relation to each other at all like in ''VisualNovel/KiraKira'', but they all better be individually good. Just please don't tack on the routes just for the sake of making all the girls date-able like in ''VisualNovel/GSenjouNoMaou''.

*** '''Choices''': You need some, but not too much. Furthermore, make them intuitive or at least solvable with some thinking. ''VisualNovel/KaraNoShoujo'' is known for GuideDangIt for having too many and too unintuitive choices.

You know the writing techniques for prose and poetry some people use like GratuitousIambicPentameter, Repetition, AddedAlliterativeAppeal, Allegories, Symbolism, and so on? Use them! Just because VisualNovel readers are more lenient on wordsmithing because of BackgroundMusic doesn't mean that you shouldn't try to have good wordsmithing. Incidentally, the Japanese version of ''VisualNovel/SekienNoInganock'' uses very poetic writing, but its fan translator had to use prose for the FanTranslation.

* '''The Protagonist''': Let's break down various archetypes, from the sliding scale of morality. Pick one that fits your story best.
** NiceGuy: Your visual novel will be most likely in first person point of view, and thus NiceGuy archetype is the sensible choice. And he has his own unique flaws as well. Common for Romance Visual Novels.
** TroubledButCute: Similar to the nice guy, but with flaws, they may have some hidden things about them that are unsavory or make them somewhat unlikable.

** VillainProtagonist: An outright bad guy. Despite being the polar opposite to the NiceGuy, it's actually much harder to write about one, as you're writing about a DesignatedHero anyway.
** BlueAndOrangeMorality: As dangerous as the VillainProtagonist, but they aren't really evil as much as being of an alien mind.

So visual novels are just electronic books with fancy anime pictures and music, right? ''Wrong!'' While many can undeniably be described as that, others like ''VisualNovel/MuvLuvAlternative'' have SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome so great they have action scenes akin to movies. [[IncrediblyLamePun Alternatively]], there are those that are like interactive manga such as ''Quartett''. Text and dialogue are undeniably the most important aspects of a VisualNovel, but do not neglect the visual or even audio aspects of them. Presentation is important, after all.

The first place to start is the engine for the VisualNovel itself. While it's certainly possible to handle all the technical stuff yourself from scratch, there is a wonderful open source VisualNovel engine known as UsefulNotes/RenPy. It's easily accessible to someone with almost no coding experience, and comes with numerous tutorials to get you started. But selecting an engine is just the foundation, and the process of creating a VisualNovel is still the process of creating a story. You can also use [[https://www.episodeinteractive.com Episode]] if you have a mobile device and want an easily understood coding system or/and pre-made character models that are customize-able and include many animations. CloudNovel is also an easy way to get into making a visual novel.

* ''VisualNovel/DiesIrae'' for both showing the strength of good voice acting, sound-effects and a strong soundtrack with the proper kind of tunes, used when appropriate to sell emotion or grandeur. It's prequel, ''Interview with Kaziklu Bey'', continues this trend on top of displaying the strength of good prose even in more verbose works.

* ''VisualNovel/DiesIrae'' for both showing the strength of good voice acting and a strong soundtrack with the proper kind of tunes, used when appropriate to sell emotion or grandeur. It's prequel, ''Interview with Kaziklu Bey'', continues this trend on top of displaying the strength of good prose even in more verbose works.

* VisualNovel/DokiDokiLiteratureClub, both for its masterful handling of depression and for its metafictional storyline.

Another aspect you need to consider is how "gamelike" you want your VN to be. Visual novels straddle the border between a game and a story, and individual ones can lean more in one direction or the other, from kinetic novels with no interactivity to ones that incorporate complex branching plots of detailed minigames.