Talk: Authentic Horror in Visual Novels

Itch.io, Twitter

I’m an independent game creator who has created anime-inspired games such as “The Trials of Goodbye”, “No Longer Human”, and “If You Stay.” I am currently working to develop a longer psychological horror game that will be published in 2025. Previously, I have been featured on Indiepocalypse and was an exhibitor for Super FESTival 2023. 

Talk: A Guide to UX and UI: Making Your Game Appealing and Readable

BlueSky, Itch.io, Twitch

Over nearly the last decade Mattie has worked as a graphic and web designer in different industries, making websites, marketing material, and event designs. When they were part of a mass layoff in 2022 for the second time in two years they decided to apply all the knowledge they’d gained into making games. As an artist and a writer they fell into Visual Novels when they realized most of their ideas for games were at least partially of that genre. Titles they have helped launch include: Satan is an Astronaut, Chiamour, Boyband Hell, Inamorata, and more. With Satan is an Astronaut coming to it’s final release Mattie’s looking to the future and looking forward to getting back to working on their soft amare game, The Celestial Waltz.

Talk: How To Draw Your Own Backgrounds (With Minimal Artistic Skill (That Look Good))

Applesplosion (she/her or they/them) is an artist, programmer, game developer, and world-
building enthusiast on a mission to help visual novel devs have better backgrounds. She has
created backgrounds for a number of visual novels, including This Party Sucks, Cafe Guile, The
Child of Frankenstein, and several more that are in development. She was also part of the
development team for Almond Ridge and Conspiracy Sleuth.

Talk: Ren’Py 3D Stage and Camera Tutorial

BlueSky

Justinn is a Ren’Py resource creator and serial visual novel jammer of 5 years, including a 2nd place finish and Best VFX award for the Annual Spooktober VN Jam. Currently, they are preparing to release the Ren’Py Photo Mode add-on, finish their alien yuri Winter Jam game, and move DDLC:RPG out of their project backlog.

Talk: The artists you need are all dead! Public-domain on visual novels

Diego is a writer and narrative designer from Galicia (Spain). He has been working in the videogame industry for the past 10 years. He worked as a writer and narrative designer in games like Summer in Mara, Elementallis, and Creatures of Ava, among others. He also worked in marketing for Chibig, Fictiorama, and Raw Fury. Currently, he’s the creative director of Ao Norte, a studio he cofounded. They are making their first game: Tiny Garden.

In his spare time, he tries to make tiny games on Twine, Ren’py, and GB Studio. Since nobody wanted to work with him and he didn’t know anything about art, he had to resort to public-domain art.

BlueSky, Itch.io

Talk: Creating Visual Novels in Godot – What are we waiting for?

Runa Winters has been creating indie visual novels since 2017 and currently serves as a Lead Programmer, Production Manager/Director, and Lead Writer on several ongoing projects. Originally working in Renpy, Runa shifted her development to Godot in 2023 and in 2024, she released 4 VNs all created within Godot. In addition to directing project teams and coding in Godot, Runa also co-hosts Say it in Red, a Visual Novel podcast and book club. Her past titles include 77 Oleander Avenue, JimmyQuest, Conversations with a Skull, Good Lord! Everyone at the Reunion For My Religious All-Girls School Is a Trans Man… And They’re Hot?!, and the demo for Bridgewater Deepwood Access Radio. She’s currently writing Crimson Waves on the Emerald Sea: Amaranthine Moon and continuing development on BDWA Radio.

Talk: Prune Your Branches: Writing Choices Within a Limited Scope

Since releasing their first game “//TODO: today” and co-founding the Indie Dev Duo “Boys Laugh +” (or BL+ for short) in 2017, Felix has worked on and shipped VNs of various styles and genres.

Telling stories with interesting and meaningful branching has been a focus throughout all their projects, most recently the theater inspired, queer fairy tale “Brassica – A Marry Tale” which toes the line between being a heartfelt comedy and a self-aware dialogue between audience and performer.

Talk: How to find & contact voice actors without publishing a casting call

YouTube, Steam

Bamboo Calculator is the developer of World Without Reason, handling the writing, coding, voice casting, direction, art, and design of the game. In early 2023 he began work on his first visual novel and documented what he learned on his YouTube channel.

He has worked with eight voice actors over the course of World Without Reason‘s development, and has some key takeaways from his experience shipping his first game.

Talk: Make your visual novel readable: Good UI for your textbox

BlueSky Website

KigyoDev (or just Kigyo) is a solo developer, taking care of the writing, programming, and graphics of his games since 2019. He studied philosophy and computer science, with a pronounced interest in ethics and human-computer interaction.

His largest and most ambitious project so far is Artificial Selection, a multi-route mystery with escape room puzzles. Aside from that, he likes to keep brushing up his skills by making free game jam projects like Locke(d), Artificial Fashionista, and more!

Talk: Effect animation is real, but it can’t hurt you: Crashing into After Effects for anybody with an anybody

Nai is the owner of the DevTalk visual novel development community, a programmer and visual novel enthusiast. She is not an artist or a visual professional in any regard. So what is she doing giving this talk? Because what Nai is more than anything else is an anybody, and she will demonstrate how an anybody can create awesome visual effects for their visual novels.