Discussion between Unity and Ren'Py

[rodrigosarri]

Hello everybody, How are you?

A colleague and I started a disagreement about some things about Ren'Py and Unity for adult games (VN).

The main points of the discussion are:

Would you register (name, email and country) to play an adult game?

Would you like to receive a game update in a single installation instead of having to download the game whenever a new version is released?

With Unity it would be possible to do these two things, but not with Ren'Py, because Re'Py today has no "connection" to the Internet and has no intention of having that in the future. If the answer to these two questions is yes, I must follow the development of the adult game on Unity, if not, Ren'Py will be the option.

 

[Xanado]

Generally I don't play games that have registration and online connectivity without an actual online game mode. I would not play your game if it did have those features, sry.

 

[riktor]

no i would not register, and renpy games can be updated without downloading the whole game again if the coder goes about things properly. they can also use online features since most python modules can be imported. beyond that I mostly prefer VNs and unity is just the wrong tool for such things. More resource intensive and more difficult to make cross platform releases.

 

[freedom.call]

No and No. I don't play Unity games at all because of the 'online stuff'. If devs can't make games without the game engine connecting out from my PC I'm not your customer.

 

[rodrigosarri]

No and No. I don't play Unity games at all because of the 'online stuff'. If devs can't make games without the game engine connecting out from my PC I'm not your customer

Even if it is to better serve the customer? With bug fixes and making content available faster and you don't need to be a Mega subscriber to download faster?

 

[rodrigosarri]

without downloading the whole game again

Although it is well developed, a large content of two months of work, perhaps using 1080p renders, the download would have 2 or 3 Gb. Is that okay? You would practically have to be a Mega subscriber to get the game or hold on for 8 hours or more to download.

One detail, the game would be offered for free and people with a registered registration of Patreon would have benefits within the game.

 

[riktor]

Although it is well developed, a large content of two months of work, perhaps using 1080p renders, the download would have 2 or 3 Gb. Is that okay? You would practically have to be a Mega subscriber to get the game or hold on for 8 hours or more to download.

One detail, the game would be offered for free and people with a registered registration of Patreon would have benefits within the game.

if you mean 2 to 3 gb of new content for each game update that would need to be downloaded regardless of the engine used. The only difference would be whether that happened before or after launching the game and both options are workable in renpy if your coder is worth their salt. As for mega, I have no issue downloading 5gb from them in less than an hour and i am not a subscriber, that aside though there are many other hosting options available.

 

[Doorknob22]

No and No.
1. We've been receiving great service without registering, why would need to now? What problem do you intend to solve? What pain are you taking away?
2. I don't mind downloading the whole thing every now and then. 2-3 GB is not a big deal nowadays.

 

[rodrigosarri]

downloading 5gb

I believe that to download 5Gb per day you need a registration, right? The same registration that you refuse to do to play a game for adults (that was a joke, I don't want to "fight").

 

[riktor]

I believe that to download 5Gb per day you need a registration, right? The same registration that you refuse to do to play a game for adults (that was a joke, I don't want to "fight").

no registration required. just use megatools to download instead of the web browser

 

[rodrigosarri]

1. We've been receiving great service without registering, why would need to now? What problem do you intend to solve? What pain are you taking away?

2. I don't mind downloading the whole thing every now and then. 2-3 GB is not a big deal nowadays.

1 - The game would be distributed free of charge, however, with benefits for the 3, 5, 10, 15, 30 ... dollar payers. For each type of payer a different monthly benefit, I don't think offering wallpapers or the "vote for the story" feature is cool for a $ 30 game a month for a game in development while Steam offers full games for that price. I wanted to customize and do something different for the players, something that made sense to pay this amount and benefits in the game would be the most correct from my point of view.

2 - Maybe you have a high speed internet and no problem with that. Not all players can enjoy this and I think it is more interesting, you open the game and something appears on the screen: "There is a new update for the game, do you want to update?"

 

[rodrigosarri]

No and No.

Another observation, not everyone has english as their native language, it is not always simple to look for game updates.

Using the internet, even if the translation was done by the players (as I saw with some games), it would be much easier to make it available in-game for other languages in an update. Having the registration of the players and their country, it would be easy to notify you when a translation has been made available in your native language.

 

[freedom.call]

Even if it is to better serve the customer? With bug fixes and making content available faster and you don't need to be a Mega subscriber to download faster?

I can only answer for myself obviously, yes even if that. Unity sending stats or whatnot is one thing, having to connect to private servers in order to update or maybe even having to stay connected to play is a massive NO for me. I'll be alright.

 

[CLDꝜ]

Personally I would not play an adult game that requires registration to play and to update.

FYI; For a game to be accepted on F95zone, the players needs to be able to download the whole game from this website, and it should be possible for them to install, launch and play the game while being offline. Including a updater for the game is accepted, but if the updated version isn't published as a full download and/or a downloadable patch, we won't promote the game to Latest Updates either.

 

[LadyLilith-3D]

In terms of (adult games), you're going to be hard-pressed to find people willing or excited at the idea of (1) registering to play and (2) needing internet. I could see having (connect to get updates) as an option but not as a requirement to get said updates or to play the game. Should be a fallback option of being able to actually go get the updates somewhere as well. You will lose out on a player base going this route without a doubt.

 

[xtl]

It's clear where this is going - server side authorization to prevent pirating the game. That or data mining.

For the first one, I understand where you're coming from (artist wants money for his work, obviously), but the thing is it won't increase sales. It will push people away from the game, registration is an unnecessary hindrance that doesn't solve any problem. You still need to download all these assets.
If your updates have size of ~3GB you're either doing something wrong or your game will add massive amounts of content in every single patch. You're wrong if you think people with slow internet aren't willing to download a file this big - see WoW back in 2004-2006.

As for the second, it's something I expect whenever I register an account. Since it's an adult game, I wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole.

 

[rodrigosarri]

Personally I would not play an adult game that requires registration to play and to update

The registration as I put it would be just: name, email and country and no other information (you could even lie that if you want) and for payment purposes, Patreon would be used.

Game updates could be monthly. I understand that it would avoid you having to search for the game or wait for someone to publish, as soon as the updates went to the server, all players could download whether they were paying or not.

A critical error that prevented the game from having a good experience, once reported, it could be resolved in one day and then updated within the game's own client.

 

[rodrigosarri]

In terms of (adult games), you're going to be hard-pressed to find people willing or excited at the idea of (1) registering to play and (2) needing internet. I could see having (connect to get updates) as an option but not as a requirement to get said updates or to play the game. Should be a fallback option of being able to actually go get the updates somewhere as well. You will lose out on a player base going this route without a doubt.

They would only be for updates of new content or bug fixes and to make backups of your save, besides being able to share on other platforms, play on the PC and continue on Android for example.

You could play the whole game offline

 

[fidless]

The game will get "cracked" and people prefer renpy because unity for vn is just bad. Unity VN plays badly, wonky. Always.
Menu's, messages boxes, they just work weirdly and not smoothly.

 

[rodrigosarri]

It's clear where this is going - server side authorization to prevent pirating the game. That or data mining

Reading the comments I am noticing this great resistance. However, even games like Nutaku need a registration to play.

Yes, certainly avoiding piracy is a point, but it is not the essential, my goal is clearer, it is to offer players a better experience if they pay X or Y monthly.

Wallpapers are cool and stuff, but what for? Decorate my laptop screen that I will open at my job and my employer see?

Voting offers the opportunity for the player to dictate the pace of the plot, but what if I how to develop already have a whole plot?

If I want to offer translations into languages other than english, even if they are done by the fans, do I have to offer them in files that are only to be changed in the next release?