Renpy To Light.vn Tutorial 【Basic #001】

Hi everyone! I'm Buchalatte, and I've been really interested in Light.VN for a while now. Great news – it finally has an English version!

This post is for anyone who's new to Light.VN, or for those who use Ren'Py and are considering switching engines.

Today's post will break down which Ren'Py tags correspond to their Light.vn equivalents, and how to use them in Light.vn.

Let's dive in!

Label ▶ Bookmark

In Ren'Py, we use labels to mark specific points in the story. This lets us easily jump to those points whenever needed, like grouping dialogue for better organization. Light.VN doesn't require a "label start", and its equivalent to labels is called 「bookmark」, which functions similarly.

In light.vn it also has a command called 「jump」 which can jump between different 「bookmark」

Scene Background ▶ bg

Now how to show background image in light.vn?

-> you can use the command 「bg」

• After clicking the button, a new folder will open.

• This folder will display all the images in your "bg" folder (where you'll need to place the images you want to use)
• Just double-click the desired image, and the code will automatically appear in your script:

~bg0 id0 bg/yourfilename.png | .fadein id0 300

• You can add subfolder to bg folder or your file name might be different so the code is not exact the same like this example

Important note: For the background image to actually appear in your game, you'll need to add .fadein after the bg command. Without .fadein, the image will be loaded but won't be visible.

Show Character Sprite ▶ cg

• Its very similar to how you show a background image
• In Light.vn, the command for character sprites is called 「cg」
• Just double-click the 「cg」 button, select the character image you want to use, and then choose its position on the screen
• That's it! The corresponding code will appear in your script, and the character image will be displayed on the screen.

• If your image size is too big or too small, you can conveniently use the 「zoom」 command to resize it
• The Live preview on the side / middle of the screen lets you see the image adjustments in real-time.

Play music ➡️ bgm

• Adding background music is also very easy!
• Just like other commands, you'll find the 「bgm」 button on the left sidebar.
• Simply click it, choose the music file you want to play, and voila!
• The corresponding code will appear in your script on the right side.

Light.vn lets you also play other audio elements beyond music. You can also use it for voice and sound effects.

~textbox_bottom 

~【？？？】
"・・・・・・

Menu ➡️ button + btnText

This is also a little more complex than Ren'py

Creating Choices / branches:

While Ren'Py uses the menu: command to display choices for players, Light.vn has a different approach.

Adding a Background Image:

Light.vn allows you to set a background image for your choice. There are two ways to do this:

1. Using the Button:
   • Click the button on the left sidebar.
   • Select the background image you want to use.

Note: This method only add the idle image path to the script right side. You'll need to manually write the hover and selected image paths using the file path method (explained below) if you want those version

2. Using File Paths:
   • Type the command touchableRes [idle file path] [hover file path] [selected file path].

touchableRes [idle image] [hover image] [selected image]
button [id / tag name of this button ] [position of this button] [action]

Adding Text to the button:

Now that you've set a background image, it's time to create your choices / add text on it!

You can 1. click on the button left side 「btntext」and choose the font you want to use or you can write something like below direct into your script file on the right side.

Here's an example:

btnText [button name] [font filename] [font size] "Some Text"

• There're many more things you can define but they will be covered in the following posts!

Pause ➡️ wait

Adding Pauses Between Actions and Dialogue

Light.vn, similar to Ren'Py, allows you to add pauses between actions or dialogue using the 「wait」 command. There are different ways to use this command:

• Specify a Duration: You can directly define a waiting time in seconds, like "pause 3" for a 3-second pause and in Light.VN its 「wait 300」 for a 3-second pause
• Enforce Uninterruptible Pause: To create a pause that the player cannot skip, you use "hard=True" in Renpy and in Light.vn, its called 「続行禁止」(sorry I didn't find the english command for it)
• Wait till movie finishes playing: In light.VN, you can use this command to do it 「movieFin」

There are more types of waits available in Light.vn. If you're interested, you can check them out in their official documentation (link is attached below)

Final: Ren'py Command ➡️ Light.vn Command

To make everything clear, I've made a list / table here to compare between each command from renpy to Light.VN:

So here's the second episode of this series, next post I'll talk dialogue in detail. So if you're interested in this visual novel engine, don't forget to follow our site!

Check next episode: