This is a list of

visual novel A , often abbreviated as VN, is a form of digital semi-interactive fiction. Visual novels are often associated with and used in the medium of video games, but are not always labeled as such themselves. They combine a textual narrative with sta ...

engines.

Digital Novel Markup Language

''Digital Novel Markup Language (DNML)'' is one of the first

scripting language A scripting language or script language is a programming language that is used to manipulate, customize, and automate the facilities of an existing system. Scripting languages are usually interpreted at runtime rather than compiled. A scripting ...

game engine A game engine is a software framework primarily designed for the development of video games and generally includes relevant libraries and support programs. The "engine" terminology is similar to the term "software engine" used in the software ...

s for creating visual novels, also known as

interactive fiction '' Interactive fiction, often abbreviated IF, is software simulating environments in which players use text commands to control characters and influence the environment. Works in this form can be understood as literary narratives, either in the ...

games. ''DNML'' was developed using C++ by a Japanese

programmer A computer programmer, sometimes referred to as a software developer, a software engineer, a programmer or a coder, is a person who creates computer programs — often for larger computer software. A programmer is someone who writes/creates ...

known by their Internet name, Karin. The initial release was in 1998. The programming structure is similar to

HTML The HyperText Markup Language or HTML is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It can be assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and scripting languages such as JavaS ...

, which made it easy to produce dōjin games. ''DNML'' was succeeded by software like ''NScripter'', ''KiriKiri'' and Ren'Py. There have been various attempts to create a more modern DNML interpreter. However the only known successful project is DNML Midori, a full reimplantation of DNML that has several features of its own. While it is free to use, it is not open source. As of 2021, it was last updated in 2019 and development seems to be concluded.

KiriKiri

is a scripting

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...

ese developer "w.dee", initially released in 1998. It is almost exclusively used with the ''KAG'' (KiriKiri Adventure Game System)

framework A framework is a generic term commonly referring to an essential supporting structure which other things are built on top of. Framework may refer to: Computing * Application framework, used to implement the structure of an application for an op ...

as a visual novel

. Usually, the package of the two components is regarded as the whole engine, and referenced with major version numbers. Thus, the current version is called ''KiriKiri2/KAG3''. It is available under the

GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a series of widely used free software licenses that guarantee end users the four freedoms to run, study, share, and modify the software. The license was the first copyleft for general ...

, though commercial licenses can be acquired if somebody wishes to expand the software without disclosing the changes. ''KiriKiri'' is often used as a more modern and expandable replacement of the older ''NScripter'' engine. It has been used in both

dōjin In Japan, is a group of people who share an interest, activity, or hobby. The word is sometimes translated into English as " clique", "fandom", "coterie", "society", or "circle" (as in " sewing circle"). Self-published creative works produced ...

and commercial visual novels, the most well known of which are TYPE-MOON's ''

Fate/stay night ''Fate/stay night'' is a Japanese visual novel developed by Type-Moon and originally released as an adult game for Windows on January 30, 2004. A version of ''Fate/stay night'' rated for ages 15 and up titled ''Fate/stay night Réalta ...

'' and ''

Fate/hollow ataraxia is a 2005 PC visual novel video game developed by Type-Moon, and the sequel to ''Fate/stay night''. The word "ataraxia" in the title is a Greek term for " tranquility", giving the title the combined meaning of "empty (or false) tranquility" ...

''. Another notable visual novel that is known to be implemented using this engine is . The '' Nekopara'' game series, available on

Steam Steam is a substance containing water in the gas phase, and sometimes also an aerosol of liquid water droplets, or air. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporizatio ...

, also uses a modified version of Kirikiri. For KiriKiri2 and Kirikiri Z's implementation of KAG there is a module called 鱧天 (Hamotem). which provides a myriad of plugins and a ready made template to build games on. As TyranoBuilder is to TyranoScript, there are several programs which create a graphical editor on top of the KAG script. The most well known of these is NVLMaker, which also has a cloud platform. Due to a lack of updates since October 2010, from 2013 onward the code has been forked and continued as .

NScripter

''NScripter'' is a visual novel

written by Naoki Takahashi. Due to its simplicity and its liberal license (while it is not

open-source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. ...

, royalty-free commercial use is permitted), it quickly became popular in Japan, and was used for a number of high-profile commercial and

titles, such as '' HaniHani'' and ''

Tsukihime is a Japanese adult visual novel created by the dōjin circle Type-Moon, who first released it at the Winter Comiket in December 2000. In 2003, it was adapted into both an anime television series, ''Lunar Legend Tsukihime'', animate ...

''. ''NScripter'' is closed-source and only available for

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for se ...

. A number of cross-platform clones have been written, the best-known being ''ONScripter'',README, ONScripter-EN source code, 20101010 release an example of

free and open-source software Free and open-source software (FOSS) is a term used to refer to groups of software consisting of both free software and open-source software where anyone is freely licensed to use, copy, study, and change the software in any way, and the source ...

implementation. Its popularity among the visual novel localisation community is attributed to the ease of modifying the engine to support languages other than Japanese. It strives to maintain compatibility with visual novels designed for ''NScripter''.README, PONScripter source code, 20100502 release ''ONScripter'' is based on the

Simple Directmedia Layer Simple DirectMedia Layer (SDL) is a cross-platform In computing, cross-platform software (also called multi-platform software, platform-agnostic software, or platform-independent software) is computer software that is designed to work in sever ...

(SDL) library, and can thus be used to run ''NScripter'' games on platforms supported by SDL, such as

OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and la ...

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, whi ...

, PSP and the

iPod The iPod is a discontinued series of portable media players and multi-purpose mobile devices designed and marketed by Apple Inc. The first version was released on October 23, 2001, about months after the Macintosh version of iTunes wa ...

. ''ONScripter-EN'' is a

branch A branch, sometimes called a ramus in botany, is a woody structural member connected to the central trunk of a tree (or sometimes a shrub). Large branches are known as boughs and small branches are known as twigs. The term '' twig'' usuall ...

of ''ONScripter'' that is maintained separately by the English-language community, for convenience and for ease of introducing enhancements that are suited to the community. ''PONScripter'' (abbreviation for "Proportional-OnScripter") is a

fork In cutlery or kitchenware, a fork (from la, furca 'pitchfork') is a utensil, now usually made of metal, whose long handle terminates in a head that branches into several narrow and often slightly curved tine (structural), tines with which one ...

of ''ONScripter-EN''. Its stated goal is to provide an easy porting target for translation projects, with emphasis on Western languages. ''PONScripter'' has made heavy modifications to the ''ONScripter-EN'' base code, and is deliberately backwards-incompatible. ''PONScripter'' was originally maintained by Peter "Haeleth" Jolly. Since September 2009, it is maintained by Mion of Sonozaki Futago-tachi, the ''

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni is a Japanese murder mystery dōjin soft visual novel series produced by 07th Expansion that comprises the first two entries of the ''When They Cry'' franchise. The series focuses on a group of young friends living in the ficti ...

'' translation group. ''KScripter'' is a Flash-based scripting engine that was inspired by ''NScripter'' but uses

ActionScript ActionScript is an object-oriented programming language originally developed by Macromedia Inc. (later acquired by Adobe). It is influenced by HyperTalk, the scripting language for HyperCard. It is now an implementation of ECMAScript (meaning ...

and

SWF SWF ( ) is an Adobe Flash file format used for multimedia, vector graphics and ActionScript.Open Screen Pr ...

NVList

NVList is an open source visual novel engine that runs on Windows, Mac OS, Linux, Android, and even online (through an applet). It is coded in the Java language, even though the scripts are written in Lua. It is being updated to this day on GitHub. It has all the functionality required for a Visual Novel, and more. It has support for resolution scaling and switching, along with pixel and vertex shaders.

Ren'Py

The ''Ren'Py Visual Novel Engine'' is a

free software Free software or libre software is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, n ...

engine. Ren'Py is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsPython, the programming language that Ren'Py runs on. The easy to learn script language allows anyone to efficiently write large visual novels, while its Python scripting is enough for complex simulation games. Ren'Py has proved attractive to western hobbyists; over 1000 games use the Ren'Py engine, nearly all in English. Visual novels, kinetic novels, role-playing games, simulation games, and many other games can be made with Ren'py.

Suika2

Suika2 is a free and open source visual novel engine. It is lightweight, compact, and portable by design. Games created with Suika2 can run on Desktop, Mobile and Web Platforms. Having Japanese and International language options, it is one of the few Japanese Visual Novel Engines supporting multiple languages out of the box. Its simple command based syntax allows for easy creation of Visual Novels, while its GUI system provides the framework for a robust visual experience. The provided Visual Debugger allows easy testing of scripts, and facilitates packaging of game files.

TyranoBuilder

TyranoBuilder is a commercial visual novel engine. Projects created in this engine can be compiled for use on Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, and browser-based web apps.

Geek & Sundry Geek & Sundry is a commercial YouTube and Twitch channel and multimedia production company. It was launched on April 2, 2012 by actress Felicia Day with Kim Evey and Sheri Bryant as part of YouTube's 100 million dollar original channel initiat ...

said it uses "a simple drag-and-drop system and the interface makes it easy to see how the scene will look as you change elements on the fly." The GUI is similar to

GameMaker GameMaker (originally Animo, Game Maker ''(until 2011)'' and GameMaker Studio) is a series of cross-platform game engines created by Mark Overmars in 1999 and developed by YoYo Games since 2007. The latest iteration of ''GameMaker'' released ...

, usually bypassing any need for scripting. TyranoBuilder acts as an interface for TyranoScript, a web-focused engine created in Japanese language (a partial English version exists). TyranoBuilder and TyranoScript use a syntax similar to the scripting language of KiriKirki, although less flexible. A unique feature of TyranoBuilder is its support for

Live2D Live2D is an animation software developed by Live2D Ltd. It can be used to generate real-time 2D animations, usually anime-style characters, using layered, continuous parts based on an illustration, without the need of frame-by-frame animation ...

. Robert Ciesla, author of ''Game Development with Ren’Py: Introduction to Visual Novel Games Using Ren’Py, TyranoBuilder, and Twine'' said, "TyranoBuilder one ups Ren’Py in the visual category, since it includes an impressive character animation system called Live2D. Said system may be implementable in Ren’Py, but probably not as easily." Asobu, an independent game development community and shared workspace, hosted a TyranoBuilder Meetup in Japan in January 2020. A small group of developers (including the 'Tyrano Game Festival 2018' 2nd-place winner, Takumi Kato) were in attendance, and the event corrdinator said there will be future events.

References

{{Video game engines Video game engines