Resources

Here are some resources I've collected! They're primarily for developers, but users may find something of interest here. The stuff on this page is not made by me, unless noted otherwise!

This stuff is gathered here partly for my own reference, and partly to help other folks getting into the hobby that are looking for information. There is a lot to explore here! And there's a lot more stuff out there on the internet. I'll probably add more to this page over time.

Note: if some of these links don't work, they may be directly linking to a file. You can try right clicking the link and choosing "Save link as...". Please let me know if any of the links here end up broken!

Websites

AYAYA Wiki - This wiki is the documentation for YAYA, and has lists of functions, guides, and more! It's entirely in Japanese, so you may need to run it through machine translation.
Here are some pages of particular interest:
Glossary - A glossary of ukagaka terms on the Ukagaka Dream Team Wiki!
SSP BTS - The Bug Tracking System for SSP! You can report bugs or request features (within reason) here! Make sure you read the instructions on the page carefully; they're available in English if you look.
Ukadoc (English translation) - Ukadoc is the official documentation for SSP, and includes information on things like SHIORI events, SakuraScript, surfaces.txt, and more! It is, itself, a guide on how to make ghosts. The Ukagaka Dream Team has taken on a project to translate this resource into English, and that is the version I've linked here.
Here are some pages of particular interest:
Ukagaka Dream Team Tumblr Blog - A blog run by the Ukagaka Dream Team. We try to reblog posts with newly released ghosts, and we answer questions about ghost dev and ghost usage!
Ukagaka Dream Team Discord Server - A Discord server run by the Ukagaka Dream Team! We chat about ghosts, help with ghost usage problems, help answer dev questions, run events, and more!
Ukagaka Dream Team Wiki - A wiki documenting English ukagaka! It covers all English ghosts, all ghosts by the Ukagaka Dream Team regardless of language, and general ghost information in English. There's a lot to see, and anyone can edit!
Ukagaka Webring - This is the webring that's linked on my front page! You can generally find people's personal sites for ukagaka here. A nostalgic way to explore the community!
Zarla's Ukagaka Walkthrough - This is a full walkthrough for making a ghost! If my guides don't cover enough for you/don't gel with you, maybe give this one a go! With this tutorial, everything is pretty much laid out for you and you'll primarily be replacing dialogue. There's some other information here as well. This was the first English resource ever for making ghosts, so it's been around a while and is sometimes out of date. But it's how I got started making ghosts!

Tools

Coordin - This handy little program will help you make box collisions super quickly! Drag and drop your surface into it, drag and drop to make a box, and the coordinates will be copied to your clipboard so you can paste them immediately into surfaces.txt!
easydelete - A program to quickly add many files to delete.txt! Made by Pommy.
Image Coordinate Clicker - Made by an acquaintance of mine, after I was musing about the possibility of a program that would let me quickly click points on an image to get coordinates for polygon collisions. If you're making polygon collisions for your ghost, this may make it easier! Just make sure you set the delimiter to commas.
png2pna - A program that can make batches of pna files for your pngs. This is mostly outdated now, as there's no need to use pnas for anything but thumbnails these days, but if you have need of them it will make the process much easier! Made by Pommy.
SEED - Shiori Event Emulator for Developers. You can use this to emulate SHIORI events and send them to your ghost!
Tama - A debugger for AYA and YAYA. This is an invaluable tool for any dev using AYA or YAYA. If you don't have it yet, do yourself a favor and get it.
Also of interest:
- Tama (Umeici) - The original version of Tama. It has some bugs, but if the new version doesn't work for you, this one may.
- Dark theme settings file - A little modification made by me, which changes Tama to a dark mode! Simply replace your tama.txt with this one while Tama is closed.

Plugins

Balloonmaker - A handy plugin you can use to create a basic balloon, using a GUI within your ghost's balloon!
Discord Rich Presence - Display what ghost you're using as your Discord status! Some ghosts may even have special interactions with this.

SHIORI

Akari - C based, apparently very useful for creating SAORI.
AYA (文) - C based, extremely simplified. Very outdated though, I recommend using YAYA, listed below.
Kawari (華和梨) - A SHIORI with a focus on "entries" and writing flexible dialogues with those entries. Some English ghosts are just starting to pop up that use this!
Misaka - I don't know much about this one, but it apparently is suitable enough for making English ghosts in.
Perl Shiori - PERL based.
Phiori - Python based, but unfinished as far as I know. Apparently has some issues where ghosts share space in memory, or so I'm told.
Satori (里々) - One of the most popular SHIORI for its simplicity to write in, especially using the Japanese IDE Satolist2. Sadly, not suitable for English ghosts, as English commas are treated as code.
YAYA - C based, extremely simplified. The continuation of AYA, providing bug fixes, security upgrades, and many new features. This is my SHIORI of choice, and most of the stuff I make will be in YAYA or catering to YAYA.
Yuhna - A SHIORI that comes with a GUI editor! The GUI is in Japanese of course, but theoretically, you could put together a basic ghost without needing to touch the code, much like you can do with Satori.

There is a list of various SHIORI here, besides the ones I've listed. This list seems to cover smaller SHIORI that are mainly used to make existing programming languages act as SHIORI. These tend not to see as much use, probably because ghosts are often made by folks that aren't super into programming! So languages made specifically for ghosts that are simplified tend to be more popular.

Baseware

Windows

CROW - Character Requested Operation Ware. Windows only, Japanese only. Has also long since stopped updating, and in fact, the download is no longer available on its homepage. However, you may be able to find it bundled with some old Japanese ghosts.
MATERIA - The first baseware. Windows only, Japanese only. Has long since stopped updating.
SSP - The standard for ukagaka. Windows only, though you may have some success running it through WINE. Available in multiple languages, including Japanese and English. At the time of writing, still actively maintained and adding new features.

Mac

Some folks with Macs have found success using WINE or WineBottler to run SSP. I have no experience with this, but you may want to try it as other options may be terribly outdated even if you can get them working.

NiseRingo - Ukagaka for Macs. I don't know anything about this.
PlayonMac+SSP - Something to get SSP working on Macs? I don't know anything about this.
Ukagaka on Macs - Ukagaka for Macs. I don't know anything about this.

Other

As above, if you're running Linux, some folks with Linux have found success using WINE or WineBottler to run SSP. I have no experience with this, but you may want to try it as other options may be terribly outdated even if you can get them working.

Ikagaka - A web-based baseware in JavaScript, which I believe is meant to be used to put demo ghosts on your website? One day I'll explore this more.
NINIX-AYA - Ukagaka for Linux. I've heard some folks have gotten this working with some difficulty, but found it lacking in features.
Ukagaka for Android - Ukagaka for android phones. I have tested this myself and it does work, in an extremely limited capacity. I could not get it to save data between sessions, and many features and events are missing. I'm sure someone could make some simple ghosts for this, but most of mine probably won't work well with it.