How do I use side images instead of name tags

[Trollified]

In renpy, I can assign side images instead of using the characters nametag so its comes out much smoother.

The reason I want to do it is because I have scenes where there is a full CG and I want to still have dialogue come in clearly with the expressions of the characters.

[jay_rab]

I have never used renpy before could you clarify what a "side image" is and what its function is within a visual novel?

[Moboxer]

I think he means character faces on the side of the message box.

[Trollified]

truth. the character's face on the side of the text bar instead of their actual name

[jay_rab]

Originally posted by Trollified:

truth. the character's face on the side of the text bar instead of their actual name

So in tyranobuilder would this currently be like triggering the character with the "join scene" and just having characters join the scene when they are speaking and then having them leave the scene when its another characters turn or am I still not understanding correctly?

[Earl Grey]

I believe they mean something like this: http://gyazo.com/3b3d4dfbab85945e2c70c448abfc5d81

The best way I can think of pulling this off right now is to shorten the edge of the text box and add each character portrait as an image of it's own and have it display each time that character speaks.

[Trollified]

sounds taxing. Jay Rab, please get this on the top of priorities for new features. It is one of the things that makes renpy so damn awesome. You can really make the text more appealing.

It also is an amazing way of continuing conversations while a CG is up or video. You can still see character expressions even though they are not on the sceen.

In renpy, you set up a macro of sorts in your declaration section for a side image.

Renpy would automatically match the side image with the most similar name.

For instance, if you have 8 expressions for your main character, when you wanted to show happy X, it would also automatically assign the smaller happy image because it has "happy" in the name.

So when your main character was not on the screen but still talking, it would show his face next to the text without any additional coding.

[Verfalne]

(I don't know much about coding, but I'd love to know how to create a thing where when the player is speaking, the side image appears and the text box automatically shortens to make room. Then when the speaker is someone else, the side image disappears and the text box adjusts back to its normal position.
Even better, if you could change the side images' expression like a normal sprite O:

[jay_rab]

Originally posted by ciel0nn:

(I don't know much about coding, but I'd love to know how to create a thing where when the player is speaking, the side image appears and the text box automatically shortens to make room. Then when the speaker is someone else, the side image disappears and the text box adjusts back to its normal position.
Even better, if you could change the side images' expression like a normal sprite O:

The simplist way to do this is from the game settings if you go to message window and under the position tab you can make the text box smaller and then use a join scene that is directly next to the text box to be the character side image.

This was done with one of our game jam entries: https://img.itch.io/aW1hZ2UvMzY3OTkvMTYwMzE1LnBuZw==/original/58kF2F.png
Were the image and border are all one image and the different expressions for that are just the other pictures of the characters.

To be more dynamic in regards to actually changing the size of the text box mid game you would need to use the http://tyranobuilder.com/tyranoscript-tags-reference/#position tag in tyranoscript.