Gold standard for Demo games

[sunday322]

So im working on a game, and dont have much experience, could you please tell me how much game should be polished for 0.01 Demo version release?
Should there be sex scenes or just teasing artworks? Is it necessary to have somewhat stable story of the game?
how many characters should there be? and how long should game be

and from player perspective, what makes a great game for You?

 

[Doorknob22]

Gold standard? I don't know, but you might find my post here and the rest of the discussion in the thread useful. Try to aim for at least 30 minutes of play and at least some sexiness (not necessarily sex scenes) and hooks to keep potential players interested.

Or just create "knock-their-socks-off" art and then people will notice no matter what. But KTSO art is hard, so I'd go for plan A.

Good luck!

 

[anne O'nymous]

So im working on a game, and dont have much experience, could you please tell me how much game should be polished for 0.01 Demo version release?

While it's less true nowadays with many players waiting few updates before testing a game, the first release should at least cover those points:

• What's the story about
  Obviously without telling everything, the player should have a good idea regarding the story. Whatever the story will be, as long as the player know what to expect. It can be, "coming back from college, the MC discover that he want to fuck his mother and sisters", or, "while wandering into the forest, MC uncover a long time lost artifact. Alarmed by its power, the government want to destroy it, while to secret organization want to use it for their own profit". This don't really matters.
  Even when trying the game later, it's the content of the first release that will define if the player is interested or not. Whatever if you planed for the story to become interesting with the time, with a big mystery and all, if the starts is boring, the player will never know it because he'll never reach this point. And at the opposite, a player who enjoyed the simplicity of the initial story can be confused, or strongly dislike the complexity and mystery that you add later.
  
• Who the main characters will be
  Once again, no need for too much details, but we should know them, or at least know that they exist.
  Be noted that by "main characters" I don't mean Love Interest. MC's best friend, that will help him all along the story is a main character, as well as the villains' boss. And as I said, depending on the story, just knowing about their existence can be enough. The MC can perfectly say at some time that things will be easier in two weeks when his best friend will come back and then be able to help him.
  
• Have a good overview regarding MC's personality
  Worse than a story that take a turn that we dislike, a MC that turn out to be purely hateful, to our eyes, is a big turn off.
  Here too, there's no need to dive too deep in the personality, but the player need to know if he's macho, misogynist, weak, dumb, playful, or whatever.
  
• What the main game mechanism(s) will be
  Is it a Kinetic Novel, a Chose Your Own Adventure VN ? Is there free roaming section, grinding, mini games ?
  And, of course, this should be done through an effective example, because the way it will insert in the story, as well as the way it will be handled/coded, is also an important factor.

TL;DR:
At the end of this first release, the player need to know if the game can potentially interest him or not. And that there no bad surprises hidden behind the scene.

 

[Winterfire]

So im working on a game, and dont have much experience, could you please tell me how much game should be polished for 0.01 Demo version release?
Should there be sex scenes or just teasing artworks? Is it necessary to have somewhat stable story of the game?
how many characters should there be? and how long should game be

and from player perspective, what makes a great game for You?

Don't be in a rush to release, think of yourself as a player... Would you want to play a demo when there are many solid releases everyday, and even completed games?
I do not know what kind of game you are making, but I'd drop the whole "demo" idea entirely and just focus on making a solid first release. If you rush, you risk of making something bad and broken, and most people won't be coming back.

 

[sunday322]

Don't be in a rush to release, think of yourself as a player... Would you want to play a demo when there are many solid releases everyday, and even completed games?
I do not know what kind of game you are making, but I'd drop the whole "demo" idea entirely and just focus on making a solid first release. If you rush, you risk of making something bad and broken, and most people won't be coming back.

yea im not rushing, its more of a side project on free time and im re-doing all my previous artworks and characters for the game.

And of course its not gonna be 3 min game demo, but i need some kind of feedback on what players want and i'll focus on that

Or do you think i should ditch the feedback and just make the game as i see from my own perspective? (at least until its somewhat presentable)

 

[sunday322]

While it's less true nowadays with many players waiting few updates before testing a game, the first release should at least cover those points:

• What's the story about
  Obviously without telling everything, the player should have a good idea regarding the story. Whatever the story will be, as long as the player know what to expect. It can be, "coming back from college, the MC discover that he want to fuck his mother and sisters", or, "while wandering into the forest, MC uncover a long time lost artifact. Alarmed by its power, the government want to destroy it, while to secret organization want to use it for their own profit". This don't really matters.
  Even when trying the game later, it's the content of the first release that will define if the player is interested or not. Whatever if you planed for the story to become interesting with the time, with a big mystery and all, if the starts is boring, the player will never know it because he'll never reach this point. And at the opposite, a player who enjoyed the simplicity of the initial story can be confused, or strongly dislike the complexity and mystery that you add later.
• Who the main characters will be
  Once again, no need for too much details, but we should know them, or at least know that they exist.
  Be noted that by "main characters" I don't mean Love Interest. MC's best friend, that will help him all along the story is a main character, as well as the villains' boss. And as I said, depending on the story, just knowing about their existence can be enough. The MC can perfectly say at some time that things will be easier in two weeks when his best friend will come back and then be able to help him.
• Have a good overview regarding MC's personality
  Worse than a story that take a turn that we dislike, a MC that turn out to be purely hateful, to our eyes, is a big turn off.
  Here too, there's no need to dive too deep in the personality, but the player need to know if he's macho, misogynist, weak, dumb, playful, or whatever.
• What the main game mechanism(s) will be
  Is it a Kinetic Novel, a Chose Your Own Adventure VN ? Is there free roaming section, grinding, mini games ?
  And, of course, this should be done through an effective example, because the way it will insert in the story, as well as the way it will be handled/coded, is also an important factor.

TL;DR:
At the end of this first release, the player need to know if the game can potentially interest him or not. And that there no bad surprises hidden behind the scene.

i dont have much experience with hentai games , but i think story is more on "unique" side.

Main characters - nothing special, but i will try to add a big variety of stereotypes(eg MILF,Teacher,Waiter,Cheerleader,etc)

"a MC that turn out to be purely hateful, to our eyes, is a big turn off." - that might come in hand,thanks. Im still not sold on MC yet, since i almost never self insert when i play video games. Actually MC was the hardest character to make yet,there are just way too many options and its hard to choose one.

I dont know what its called but the game genre will be similar to Summertime saga.

one question- is animation a "must have" for 2d games? its just im the artist and it will take way too long to try to do all of the artworks AND animate them (later i could just pay animators from game's funds if it works out , but on the other hand learning animation is also good)

Do you think having GREAT 3-4 animated sex scenes is better than having 10 GOOD non-animated(but still with alternative versions) artworks?

 

[DorianGreyEminence]

i dont have much experience with hentai games , but i think story is more on "unique" side.

Main characters - nothing special, but i will try to add a big variety of stereotypes(eg MILF,Teacher,Waiter,Cheerleader,etc)

"a MC that turn out to be purely hateful, to our eyes, is a big turn off." - that might come in hand,thanks. Im still not sold on MC yet, since i almost never self insert when i play video games. Actually MC was the hardest character to make yet,there are just way too many options and its hard to choose one.

I dont know what its called but the game genre will be similar to Summertime saga.

one question- is animation a "must have" for 2d games? its just im the artist and it will take way too long to try to do all of the artworks AND animate them (later i could just pay animators from game's funds if it works out , but on the other hand learning animation is also good)

Do you think having GREAT 3-4 animated sex scenes is better than having 10 GOOD non-animated(but still with alternative versions) artworks?

For me personally, animations are only a plus to the game if they are fucking spectacular. Otherwise, at best I just don't care or, as is often the case, they can turn me off completely. I might power through if other things are very on point, but its frequently a HUGE detractor for me if they are anything short of amazing. I'd rather good stills than mediocre animations.

 

[Wankyudo]

Or do you think i should ditch the feedback and just make the game as i see from my own perspective? (at least until its somewhat presentable)

Yes. The thing about crowd feedback is a lot of time it's too many cooks in the kitchen. People have ideas and people will want to see their ideas implemented in your game which will create animosity and negativity when you tell them that it doesn't work with your project or that it's not something you want to do.

If it's a side-project, then just do it the way you want to do it and then push out a 1.0 when it's done. People who like it will like it, people who don't won't. Just how it works. If something ends up bugging out, you hotfix it at the time of.

 

[M$hot]

IMO, I would love it if my first release got one of those 'wow? X size, lot of content or poorly optimized?' kind of comments, knowing I fully optimized it. You get 1 shot at a first impression, and if the first impression is luke warm at best, people won't give it another shot unless it's the very slowest of release days. And if you make a bad first impression and pick up a bunch of 1 and 2 star reviews, even if the quality skyrockets after, I think seeing a 1.9-2.3 star rating will deter many people from even letting you make a first impression.

Regarding WHAT you put in the game? You may be working on it for months or years, which is already a grind that takes 100s to 1000s of hours, so whatever you are working on should be what would be your favorite game on this site if you came across it. Your kinks are probably not my kinks or vice versa, so what I would like to see wouldn't match at all closely to what you like.

I've asked the same question before, and I got the same answer. It's meant to be a game for yourself, that you end up sharing. If you let others sway you, that's not being a good dev, that's just how you open the floodgates to having everyone throw their personal kink at you, until eventually the story, setting, models and fetishes won't match what your initial idea was. Truly, the only exceptions as far as I know are Rule 7 and actual gore (E.g: No touching toddlers, no beheading gifs), otherwise if it's within legal limits and the forums rules, you shouldn't let anybody else have a say in what you develop.

But very simply, first impression means you have to give us an impression, a teaser, a hint at what the story, writing, stability and visuals will be like. Maybe a weird suggestion, but watch back the pilot episode of some of the shows you really enjoy, the ones that made you go 'ooh, quickly, let me watch the next episode to see how this continues' and check, how did they hook you? Was it their premise? their cinematography? (Graphics) Did they load the cast with only model tier actors? Maybe it was the dialogue?
Figure out how they hooked you, try and give your initial release the same posibility to hook your audience.

Just my 2 cents, I've been working on a 0.1 for like 5 years now, so take anything I say with at least a shaker of salt

 

[kintarodev]

I totally disagree with post #2: 30 minutes of gameplay can be even a full game. I am surprised they said so having even a dev tag...

If it's a side project and you don't aim for a perfect release, just do it short. It's either relying on your own insights as a dev; o relying on community's feedback

 

[Winterfire]

I totally disagree with post #2: 30 minutes of gameplay can be even a full game. I am surprised they said so having even a dev tag...

If it's a side project and you don't aim for a perfect release, just do it short. It's either relying on your own insights as a dev; o relying on community's feedback

Maybe they said so exactly because they have a dev tag?

I've made short games in the past, including a hour long game, so I agree they are valid, however...
You wouldn't ask OP's question if you didn't plan to have a longer game than a 30 minutes one.

 

[Cosy Creator]

My 0.1 was generally well recieved for its length (40,000 words, 1700 renders). I was very happy with that reception, but I did end up thinking that doing a longer one has some drawbacks too, especially if it's your first game.

The main issue was simply that I learned a lot from player feedback after the 0.1 release, not only what the players want me to focus on improving (primarily graphics), but also some good tips/tools/mods/guides that I simply didn't know exist and never found on my own. The result of this is that I think I've greatly improved the quality of my more recent updates, to the extent where they're very noticeably better than the 0.1 content, but going back and redoing 1700 renders from my long 0.1 is a huge task that I don't have time for while developing new content to meet player demand.

As for sex content, my 0.1 only contained a handjob, but that didn't seem to put anyone off. This probably depends on the type of game you're going for though, do you want it to be slow burn?

Good luck with your game!

 

[kintarodev]

Maybe they said so exactly because they have a dev tag?

I've made short games in the past, including a hour long game, so I agree they are valid, however...
You wouldn't ask OP's question if you didn't plan to have a longer game than a 30 minutes one.

I was going to jump with my answer... but then I remembered that in the past I made some analysis and I came to the conclusiont that 250 words in a VN are around 3 minutes of gameplay (I searched for my notes, didn't find them, so take this as a grain of salt). Thus the goal would be around 2500 words, which could be around 4 kind of well developed scenes. I don't do renders anymore so I don't know how many it would take. In any case, I guess it's kind of possible...

 

[Winterfire]

I was going to jump with my answer... but then I remembered that in the past I made some analysis and I came to the conclusiont that 250 words in a VN are around 3 minutes of gameplay (I searched for my notes, didn't find them, so take this as a grain of salt). Thus the goal would be around 2500 words, which could be around 4 kind of well developed scenes. I don't do renders anymore so I don't know how many it would take. In any case, I guess it's kind of possible...

300 words are 1 minute of gameplay, I find it easier to round up and takes into account faster readers (or those that might skip the various "ahhh" in porn scenes).
The "real" average is 200-250 words = 1 minute.

Also, 2500 words aren't 4 well developed scenes... I had some blowjob scenes and other "smaller" scenes being 600 words.
A well developed scene would be at least 1000 words.
This is true only if you make a descriptive porn scene of course, some games do not do this, so it is not always true.

My 0.1 was generally well recieved for its length (40,000 words, 1700 renders). I was very happy with that reception, but I did end up thinking that doing a longer one has some drawbacks too, especially if it's your first game.

That's a crazy solid amount of content for a 0.1. Well done!

 

[rk-47]

2 things by the end of the demo:

a really nice sex scene with one of the characters

a cliffhanger regarding the story to draw the player into the overall story

 

[Meaning Less]

You need to have enough to give people a taste of everything they should expect to see more of, simple as that.

Avoid leaving placeholders behind and avoid releasing without the core gameplay mechanics.

 

[拼凑的断音]

 

[sunday322]

IMO, I would love it if my first release got one of those 'wow? X size, lot of content or poorly optimized?' kind of comments, knowing I fully optimized it. You get 1 shot at a first impression, and if the first impression is luke warm at best, people won't give it another shot unless it's the very slowest of release days. And if you make a bad first impression and pick up a bunch of 1 and 2 star reviews, even if the quality skyrockets after, I think seeing a 1.9-2.3 star rating will deter many people from even letting you make a first impression.

Regarding WHAT you put in the game? You may be working on it for months or years, which is already a grind that takes 100s to 1000s of hours, so whatever you are working on should be what would be your favorite game on this site if you came across it. Your kinks are probably not my kinks or vice versa, so what I would like to see wouldn't match at all closely to what you like.

I've asked the same question before, and I got the same answer. It's meant to be a game for yourself, that you end up sharing. If you let others sway you, that's not being a good dev, that's just how you open the floodgates to having everyone throw their personal kink at you, until eventually the story, setting, models and fetishes won't match what your initial idea was. Truly, the only exceptions as far as I know are Rule 7 and actual gore (E.g: No touching toddlers, no beheading gifs), otherwise if it's within legal limits and the forums rules, you shouldn't let anybody else have a say in what you develop.

But very simply, first impression means you have to give us an impression, a teaser, a hint at what the story, writing, stability and visuals will be like. Maybe a weird suggestion, but watch back the pilot episode of some of the shows you really enjoy, the ones that made you go 'ooh, quickly, let me watch the next episode to see how this continues' and check, how did they hook you? Was it their premise? their cinematography? (Graphics) Did they load the cast with only model tier actors? Maybe it was the dialogue?
Figure out how they hooked you, try and give your initial release the same posibility to hook your audience.

Just my 2 cents, I've been working on a 0.1 for like 5 years now, so take anything I say with at least a shaker of salt

"pilot episode" was a really good point, but its really hard to implement tho, because you want the story to keep going.
i really liked how they ended a story in "zombie's retreat" and started working on second game

 

[sunday322]

I totally disagree with post #2: 30 minutes of gameplay can be even a full game. I am surprised they said so having even a dev tag...

If it's a side project and you don't aim for a perfect release, just do it short. It's either relying on your own insights as a dev; o relying on community's feedback

Good point , its more of a experimental type of project for me, to learn sprites,animations,backgrounds, perspective , and overall working on a project, but still i will try my best