OpenNovel

OpenNovel is a very portable and commercial-ready game engine for visual novels.

This project is a fork of Suika2 and Polaris Engine. The OpenNovel development team received a delegation of the copyright from the original author of Suika2 and Polaris Engine.

Install and Run

Sample games are included in the latest zip.

• Windows
  • Download the latest zip file and extract it.
  • Copy onengine.exe to a sample game folder and run it.
• Web-based
  • Visit https://apps.opennovel.org/viewer/
  • Select a sample game folder.
• Linux
  • Type the following:

  git clone https://github.com/suika2team/suika2.git
  cd suika2
  sudo apt-get install build-essential libasound2-dev libx11-dev libxpm-dev mesa-common-dev libfreetype-dev libpng-dev libjpeg-dev libwebp-dev libvorbis-dev libogg-dev libbrotli-dev libbz2-dev libz-dev libgstreamer1.0-dev libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-dev
  ./configure
  make
  sudo make install
  

  • Enter a sample game directory and run onengine.

Gaming Platforms

OpenNovel supports all of the following right out of the box!

Desktop

Platform	Version
Windows	XP or later
macOS	10.13 or later
Linux	Ubuntu 16.04 or later

Mobile

Platform	Version
iPhone	iOS 13 or later
iPad	iPadOS 13 or later
Android	Android 10 or later

Web (HTML5/Wasm)

Platform	Status
Chrome	OK
Chrome Android	OK
Safari	OK
Safari iOS	OK
Edge	OK
Firefox	OK

Gaming Consoles

Platform	Version	Other
Unity	2022.3	Custom DLL required

Minor Platforms

Platform	Version	Details
FreeBSD	11 or later
NetBSD	9 or later
OpenBSD	7 or later
Solaris	11 or later	Sound implementing

Compatibility List

Platform	Graphics	Sound	Video
Windows 11	Direct3D 12	DirectSound 5	DirectShow
Windows 10	Direct3D 12	DirectSound 5	DirectShow
Windows 8	Direct3D 11	DirectSound 5	DirectShow
Windows 7	Direct3D 11	DirectSound 5	DirectShow
Windows Vista	Direct3D 11	DirectSound 5	DirectShow
Windows XP	Direct3D 9	DirectSound 5	DirectShow
macOS	Metal	Audio Unit	AVFoundation
Linux	OpenGL 3.0	ALSA	Gstreamer
FreeBSD	OpenGL 3.0	/dev/dsp	Gstreamer

Development Platforms

You can develop visual novels on your favorite desktop OS our engine support. In addition, we provide an integrated development software for Windows 11 and 10.

Also, there is a Web-based game viewer which runs on Google Chrome or Chromium. Visit https://apps.opennovel.org/viewer/ and run your game.

Portability

• Firstly, the Core of our engine is written in ANSI C and it's very comformant to the standard.
• The Core is able to be compiled with most C compilers including GCC, Clang and MSVC.
• Secondly, we port our Hardware Abstraction Layer to each platform in a platform's native language.
• We have access to the full functionality of the platforms via their native languages.
• Therefore, the combination of HAL + Core brings high portability and functionality to our engine.

Editor Application

The Windows version of OpenNovel has a simple, easy-to-use, and light-weight editor application. It has three advanced features:

• On-the-fly playback
• Editing scripts by clicks
• Exporting games by clicks

Please use the editor with your favorite text editor.

Build

Host Build

./configure
make

Windows Cross Build

./configure --host=windows
make

Support and Contact

Please send an e-mail to info@opennovel.org anytime.