With INDIE INTERVIEWS, I talk to the game developers hanging here on Cohost to learn more about new games you might love.
Sometimes, indie games are created by one or two developers, seamlessly delivering their vision through a small-scope project. Other times, they require communication and collaboration in small teams. The great thing about getting into indie dev is that you can do both! Recently I had a chat with BáiYù from @tofurocks, and I think it's a really informative one. We cover BáiYù's personal life and journey into development, as well as tips regarding using Ren'Py and being the "general odd jobs guy" on small teams. Take a look!
Introduce yourself for everyone here on Cohost! Who are you?
Hi! I'm BáiYù (he/they) and I'm the Lead Developer at @tofurocks and its publishing branch @ProjectEnso, as well as a freelancer with other teams such as VisuStella (social media manager), Fiendish Fiction (social media manager, general odd jobs guy), and the NSFW @SnaccPop Studios (Producer & Publisher). When I'm not listing off all my job roles, I'm just a dude with a cat named Mark Caitlyn.
Are there any projects you're currently working on? Tell us about them!
Hahaha ahhh, current projects... the list really does not end when you have your fingers in so many pies like I do LOL
Here's some of the more prominent ones:
- (R-18) The Groom of Gallagher Mansion, a spooky romcom VN about tricking a ghost into wanting to marry you and investigating the death of both his family and the dead man himself. Developed with SnaccPop Studios.
- (R-18) Lust Bounty, a lighthearted and extremely queer T4T VN about an omnibus/sex demon exorcising a monster inside a human by doing the nasty. Currently being rebooted, developed inside tofurocks.
- The Steam updates for (age restricted for heavy mental health themes) Talk To Me and Lotus: The Self-Made Witch, which I swear are coming soon:tm:
I promise you I don't really consider myself an erotic games developer 😭
How did you find yourself first getting into game development?
It's a pretty convoluted story, but I guess my tale began when I was in 4th grade and started the whole gifted-child-to-burntout-creative pipeline. I was such a voracious reader and liked to show off my 12th grade reading level comprehension by polishing off the entire Chronicles of Narnia series, as well as books like The Black Stallion, Mary Poppins, and tons of other British "classics" no one remembers. I had practically read through every fiction and nonfiction book in my school's library before half the year had passed... With no paper-printed stories left to read, I turned my attention to video games, particularly RPGs, on the GameCube and GBA.
I didn't actually start writing anything of my own until I was a Sophomore in high school (10th grade). But all the reading of various material and writing book reports I did as a wee child prepared me for a spectacular short story about two friends trying not to let a mutual crush ruin their friendship; my English teacher praised my writing highly, from dialogue to sentence structure down to the realism. Those remarks solidified my decision to pursue creative writing! I was so damn proud, and began dabbling in developing some VNs as a Junior (11th grade).
Unfortunately, due to some horrible circumstances involving my offline life, my major friend group and only support network falling out, and the inconvenient timing of GamerGate happening all at once, I had to erase my entire online presence from the general internet. I since rebuilt myself, and I think I'm in a slighty better position now.
Lotus: The Self-Made Witch is a game about witchcraft and potion-brewing. It feels like the fantasy genre is getting more and more popular over the past few years, even after people had an interest in these tropes for centuries. I'm a huge fan of witches and fantasy myself, and am always curious what attracts other people to that genre. What is it about magic that appeals to you, and how do you try to put your own creative stamp on it?
Hah, well, one of the book series I read on release that I didn't mention above was that one by the TERF bitch, you know the one. I will say that I was always more inspired by the vibe of Narnia; it was an escape from the oppressiveness of reality, or at least the boredom of children forced to live by adult rules, yet at the end of the day they still do have to deal with things such as conflict, war, poverty, inequality, etc. All important things on paper, no?
Except, it turns out I'm not cishet, and I didn't really grow up reading about or seeing many people like me who got to exist and be happy! Things like spirituality, mysticism, witchcraft, etc. are historically very queer just by virtue of what they are, so tying those things back to issues we face in reality is something I want to tackle more. I know Lotus itself is particularly short, but I think something that players can at least take with them once they're done with one playthrough is that even magic won't solve every issue. Horizontal and often petty violence is alive and well.
You have a lot of experience making visual novels. What are the toughest parts of the process for you? Are there pros and cons to using Ren'Py to make them?
Despite visual novels being touted as "relatively easier to make," they're still massive labors of love that take a lot of effort to coordinate! Like any other type of game, polishing the presentation is one of the hardest parts. In Ren'Py and the Naninovel plugin for Unity, it's tedious at best to ensure that the script of the game can be read in engine. Slapping in the backgrounds, music, and a few character sprites isn't difficult, but when you want to put in character expressions, SFX, and animations to play during certain lines, you have to go over the same sections of the game with a fine tooth comb or risk having a very static game. And your players will notice a lack of change in the same scene, especially since traditional VNs usually don't have other mechanics besides choices throughout the story.
As for the objective pros of using Ren'Py:
- Simple Python-like scripting language, easy for newcomers to pick up
- Will make you a pure VN out of the box
- Has standard quality of life features VN players expect
- Includes accessibility options built in, including automatic voiced text
- Years of development and community provides resources to make more than just a VN if you want (some people have made FPS and sidescroller modules, though I bet they lag like hell)
- Actual button you can press to build for Windows, Macintosh, Linux, and with some set-up, HTML5, Android, and iOS too
- Rapid development is easy
- Multiple programmers can work on different files simultaneously
- It's free
Cons of using Ren'Py:
- Easy to hack into compiled games and extract code and assets
- DRM to prevent the above is difficult to implement
- On mobile, implementing in-game ads for monetization is difficult to implement
- Console ports often will require you to work with a publisher for the devkit
- Modern support is often locked behind a Discord server, rather than made available on the LemmaSoft Forums
- Documentation needs a major overhaul
That all said, Ren'Py is still rather friendly to use, even disregarding my familiarity with it. I recommend it to most people who are interested in trying their hand at developing a visual novel for the first time. And for those of us looking to at least break even on game development, yes there are some high profile studios who use Ren'Py for the majority of their titles (Hanako Games, Studio Èlan, & Two and a Half Studios to name a few).
One thing I should also mention: I'm now having to port a game that was meant to be developed in Unity back into Ren'Py because my other programmers would have had to spend at least 15 hours rebuilding some lost progress, and I cannot for the life of me comprehend why Naninovel is so sluggish to work in when it comes to GUI prefabs or whatever.
You've done freelance work for other indie teams as both a Social Media Manager and Producer. I'm really interested in this (I do similar roles myself), and would love to hear more about what it's like for you. A lot of folks out there might not even know that indie teams sometimes use Social Media Managers or Producers, and might not have ever seen that as an option. What's that like, and how does one find opportunities like that?
Something I haven't quite mentioned yet in this interview but is important to note because it gives context to my entire life: I am a college dropout. I dropped out around that time GamerGate was in full force and I never had the chance to go back. What this means is that I'm entirely self-taught and, more importantly, did not have those connections you can get when you attend game development classes/school.
Re: Social Media Management
There's tons of resources out there now for various things, so I read up on articles by other marketing folks like Victoria Tran and Arimia to start applying to my own projects. Since I was one of the few people advertising my services as a social media manager, I was soon approached pretty often by several teams asking me to work for them and keep their accounts active. And I could for a while with most of them! But the reality is that a lot of the teams I'm no longer active with weren't able to provide me with a steady stream of content to post with.
One thing I want you other developers reading this interview is to realize that writing marketing copy and creating images to go with that marketing copy are two different skillsets, and you shouldn't expect your SMM to necessarily do both well by default. You also kind of need to let your SMM be familiar with the content you want them to post about, which means telling them what's going on with development and letting them play early builds if possible. Misrepresenting your game by accident often leads to upset players.
If you're willing to study the ever-changing field of social media and some marketing lingo+analytics interpretation, you might find less competition in job openings.
Re: Being A Producer
I actually never looked for a role as a Producer while job hunting, and the position I have with SnaccPop Studios was a referral. As for the things that Producers might do, they set out schedules and write documentation, assign tasks, get in touch with relevant parties to connect them to the resources they need to perform their jobs, etc. It's a lot of communication and soft skills since you're the glue of the team so to speak.
By the way, if you're working with a Producer or any team leader on their projects, please make their lives easier and report your progress in frequently. Producer roles are often senior positions since it's high stress and you need to be able to keep tabs on several moving parts. Honestly not sure how other people get their foot in the door for this one besides moving up inside a company.
Any general advice for aspiring indie devs out there?
Haha alright, here's the part where I make you all smart. Seriously go and play The Caligula Effect 2 if you are at all interested in making a fulfilling character-driven game, using symbolism and psychology to create compelling characters, creating unique RPG mechanics, weaving narrative elements into mechanics successfully, utilizing audio budgets effectively... the list goes on. It is an absolute must-play game with brilliant social commentary and you literally do not have an excuse not to pick it up since The Caligula Effect 2 is available on Nintendo Switch, PS4 (and soon PS5), Steam, and the Epic Games Store.
And if you really don't want to play the superior psychology-driven juvenile JRPG of all time, at least read Takuya Yamanaka's interview about creating media for "people who can’t find solace in mainstream media." A lot of Yamanaka-san's philosophies and approaches to game design are relatable to indies working on lower budgets, aka the grand majority of us.
One thing I've also learned after a while regarding marketing is what I call "brand awareness campaigns" and "fan retention content," which are hopefully self-explanatory. Most of us likely don't have a deluge of players who are aware of our games or brand quite yet, so you always have to do a few posts that reintroduce yourselves; it's not until you hit mainstream like Innersloth's Among Us and ConcernedApe's Stardew Valley that you could reasonably just do memes and flashy teaser trailers to get existing fans hyped up and new players curious enough to Google you; otherwise, these strats may not work across the board.
But regardless of how much marketing talk I might do, I honestly value sustainable organic growth more. This is something that Yamanaka talks about again in the interview I linked above with "the feeling of aggressively showing up for a less popular idol." No seriously, read that man's words and your galaxy brain will activate so many neurons.
Lastly, are there any indie games out there you've been playing recently? Any favorites to shout-out?
I did get the chance to play Rose From the Depths by my friends at Dulcia Games, and boy that ripped out my heart! But that's mostly it for recent titles. Admittedly, I've had my head down stuck in gamedev hell so I can't poke at Room6's ghostpia. I'm looking forward to when I'm able to play it though, hopefully soon.
Thanks so much BáiYù! I'm really glad to hear more about the producer/social media side of indie, since I feel like it's rarely discussed. For everyone else, you can follow their work on cohost at @tofurocks. You can also find their games on itch.io and wishlist their games on Steam! Until next time...go play some games!
