- Apr 14, 2018
- 609
- 857
LONG PREAMBLE, BUT VALUABLE CONTEXT FOR THE POSITION I'M TAKING. GOOD READ & GOOD INFO TO KEEP IN MIND, BUT IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ IT ALL, SKIP TO PREAMBLE OVER.
Bit late to the conversation on this one, though I just now came upon this thread. I'm not gonna lie, that's a bit of a tough needle to thread. The reason being is because the first cornerstone principal that you have to account for is this. On here, just like in everyday real life, you have a mix of smart, mentally & emotionally stable & well balanced people that actually appreciate works of quality mixed with people that are exceedingly dumb, mentally & emotionally unstable & unfortunately are exceedingly entitled, narcissistic & clueless about anyone but themselves. Now, while this point won't have much direct bearing on the work itself, it is important to keep in mind regarding the reception of your game. Now, while in reality, the smarter, more stable people are to some extent the majority, with the less desirable folks being in the minority, (more or less), they are certainly more vocal as they typically lack the general intelligence, Emotional balance & social aptitude to, well... know better.
For example, just take a stroll through the confidently incorrect or not how girls work subreddits. Some classics that have been memed to death are the, (comically more than 1), guys that post "women don't actually enjoy sex, I know because I've been with plenty of women & none of them enjoyed it", lacking the basic common sense & self awareness to realize they just publicly said for all to see, "I can't get a woman off". Another great classic being, (again more than 1), guys posting that women can't piss because urine is stored in the balls, which they don't have". You get the point.
I should also clarify that when I say things like being smart, mentally & emotionally balanced & socially competen
t, at least in relevance to this area, What I mean are possessing the character traits of being sociable, self awareness, not being narcissistic / self absorbed, Being able to perceive & interact with others, (especially women), in a normal & healthy way.
Now the reason why this is important is because it's key in understanding the main draw of these types of media & the concentration of these 2 overarching groups of people in this community. See, we all know that the main purpose & appeal of adult VNs & porn in general is stuff to jack off to.
Most smart, well balanced & competent guys are typically better at obtaining & maintaining real relationships, as such, they are less interested in general in adult content, as they typically are for the most part getting their sexual & emotional needs fulfilled with their actual relationships, plus those relationships are where they invest most of their free time. Now, having said that, do some of them also enjoy adult entertainment like this? Sure. I'm one of them. I'm all for some good spicy content in a good story. Some have kinks that are great in theory, but not not so much in reality. However, we are in the minority.
So from there, let's look at the rest of the community. Now, I imagine that a large contingent of that remainder also consists of guys that are also smart & well adjusted, but due to things like social anxiety, low self image & lack of confidence, struggle significantly to get relationships & use media like this as a substitute for sexual stimuli. However, in that larger group, you also have tons of incels, Red / black pill / MGTOW idiots & others that fall solidly in the dumb, unstable & socially inept category. These last types are the ones that you typically see being most vocal & narrow about what they will & won't accept in games they they are getting for free & not really contributing in any substantial way to, (did I mention they were dumb)? Anyways, these people make up the majority of this community because, for obvious reasons, they have significantly less, (often zero), success in any kind of sexual relationships with real women, so this kind of media is what they utilize for their sexual gratification. Not pointing this out to make any judgement calls on anyone, just pointing out what we already know.
Now the reason for all this seemingly unrelated preamble is this. When it comes to the NTR fans vs NTR haters back & forth,
most people TRULY don't care. There's tons of people of the mind of "NTR isn't really my thing, but I mean if the rest of the game is good, I'll give it a shot. Especially if it's avoidable, or if the game has more to offer than just that." Likewise, there's tons of NTR fans that say "I like NTR, but if the game has other routes that are different, That's cool too". These are the usually silent, sane, rational bulk of those sub-communities. They are not the people you see in the back & forth comments. No, those are the unhinged, unstable & stupid ones that make up the bulk of the visible noise. The ones that you see going out of their way to either shit talk, or say they are passing on a game, just because it features some NTR comment, especially in cases where it's avoidable, you have to wonder, "Dude, you're THAT fragile that the avoidable risk that bad choices in the game might lead to a bit of NTR? IN A FUCKING GAME? REALLY?"
As for their pro-NTR counterparts, The are just as, if not more unhinged, almost cult-like. See, for them, Writing an interesting NTR themed story isn't "good enough", no no no, you as a creator need to NTR an NTRing NTR NTR NTR that is NTR NTR NTRNTRNTRNTRNTR CRAM IN MOAR NTR, [insert a jpeg of a soyjack twitching on the floor, foaming at the mouth while muttering "ntrntrntrntrntr"... What does that even mean, you might ask? Well, for these cretins, it MUST rigidly follow the same, fatalistic, paint by numbers formula. The happy, wholesome & over the top sappily in love couple in the beginning, bad guy antagonist comes in, starts seducing & manipulating the wife, she get's rapidly corrupted over a series of encounters, she becomes a heartless, mindless sex addict & either husband remains inexplicably oblivious or they reveal the affair to him & he's sad, cut the ending off without any actual real ending & all choices & branches in the game must all be different variations of that same, static trajetory with only the most trivial & meaningless of variation. Now, even if that's the shit that get's these guys dicks rock hard, for most people, it gets rather... well.... BORING. It's literally the 4u0340302403423434th rerun of the exact same story.
So one would think, to keep things interesting, maybe have some choices where the MC is able to turn the tables & win, or maybe after the "reveal", he snaps & goes on a revenge arc for some measure of pyrric victory, or maybe where the NTR ends could be the midpoint & the back half of the game is him rebuilding his life & moving on with someone better. Most rational people would look at that & say "Hey, that's pretty cool. There's something for everyone there. This is pure heresy for those specific NTR fans. Just like the nutjobs on the anti-NTR side that shreik that the mere presence of ANY NTR, even if it's completely avoidable, is intolerable, as though even a drop of it somehow taints & ruins it's pure aryan heritag.... er... I mean... Ruins the purity of their harem game... The NTR "purist" types are equally as psychotic with their insistance that a single drop of anything that's not purely in strict service of NTR in the game "ruins" it & therefore makes it no longer count as "legitimate" NTR. Not only that, but merely even saying "wait... That doesn't even make sense. What are you, insane?" To them, that's not legitimate criticism, additionally, they will take the actual content of your critique, throw all of it out the window, & then screech that you are an existential threat to lord god NTR, because you're "an NTR hater that is just hating on NTR & trying to take their precious NTR away from them". Even if you're actually a fan of the genre & your "transgression" was as innocuous as saying "wait, I don't get it, what's the big deal if there's ADDITIONAL content that appeals to others, as long as all the NTR content that otherwise would have been there anyway is still in?" Doesn't matter. You've committed a treasonous transgression against lord god NTR & must be shunned as the "anti-NTR apostate" that they believe that you are.
As should be crystal clear by this point, The vocal participants in the Pro vs anti NTR squabble are the lowest IQ, Lowest EQ, most unhinged & defective of the community. It should come as no surprise that the overlap in the ven diagram of those people & the incels & derranged psycho parts of the community is basically a perfect circle. As such, these are the people that are most demanding, but least deserving of anyone pandering to them. They are the Karens of the community & should be treated as such.
PREAMBLE OVER
So, I know that was a long bit of preamble, but stick with me. With all that preliminary context taken under consideration, the next thing that you need to ask yourself is "WHY am I making this game & WHOM am I pandering to?" If your goal is to make something creative that you can take pride in & really want it to be something GOOD, my advice is to not worry so much about pandering to specific kinks, but rather focus on crafting a really good, unique story with good, engaging characters. THAT should be your cornerstone. You can find ways to weave different kinks into it, especially if you're not afraid of making a story that REALLY branches in different directions. It may require more writing & such, sure. But quality takes time & effort. You could have a game that, depending on choices made, could go down a harem path on 1 route, a vanilla pure love on another, a swinging path on yet another & an NTR path on yet another. On the swinging & harem paths, you could even include option triggers that could expand the love interest options to include family, roping in the incest crowd too. The key is, story boarding out how those different routes might look, structuring the characters in a way that could lead them in those directions & then paving the way in a way that's logical, natural & makes sense. MOST of the people that actually appreciate quality will be more apt to appreciate this & will be more likely to support it. Even if it's not anchored to any specific kink, if the quality of the story, characters & craftsmanship is there, then it will be appreciated.
Now if your position is, "I don't really care all that much about the product itself, (as in you're not really personally invested into what it is), I just want to make whatever will maximize monetary profits & / or clout". Well this branches again. is the goal just clout & bragging rights? If so, is it clout for high quality? If so, refer to prior paragraph. If it's more number of fans, then just pick a kink, pander as much as possible to that crowd, & whle you may alienate some portions of the community, you will be damn near worshipped by the fans of that kink. Now, personally that's about as worthless, (IMHO), as bragging about your Reddit Karma score, but hey, that kind of shit is important to some people for some reason.
Now, if your goal is to make money, Here again, you have to kind of think ahead. I mean, a purely harem or purely NTR smut packed romp will certainly get you a LOT of built in, really excited fans, HOWEVER, these are the 2 kinks with the largest concentration of those defective type fans. (again, to be clear, I'm not saying ALL harem & NTR fans are defective, I'm talking about the specific types of fans that I referenced earlier that are the main contributers to the brain dead back & forth bickering). With that in mind, knowing that these people, as individuals, are so defective & socially incompetent that THIS is their substitution for their lack of any actual success with women, What do you suppose their success with upward mobility & ability to attain & maintain employment / income that allows them to have the disposable income to contribute via Patreon or what not, to supporting you? If we're being realistic here, the bulk of them likely don't have a lot of professional success or substantial income either. Also keeping in mind, these are the same folks that have the highest level of narcissism & entitlement & the lowest level of self awareness, these details combined means that the bulk of them will be the most opinionated & demanding that you pander to what they want, while putting absolutely ZERO coin in your pocket. Now, that said, let's say you pick the NTR genre, you'll get a decent sized chunk of fans that will be willing to consistently support you. I mean for example, HangoverCat is making a couple thousand bucks a month. However, using Mr Dots as an example again, who's making somewhere between $5,000 to $20,000 a month on Patreon alone, plus a few thousand a month more on Subscribestar. When reviewing the discussion on his games, Even the non incest fans have high praise, as he clearly puts a lot of effort into the story & overall quality of his projects. As such, he not only has a larger fanbase, but also a larger perentage of fans that have the disposable income to consistently throw at his games in higher level tiers. The thing is, aside from the incest kink in 2 of his 3 games, (which is basically nothing at this point), his games are fairly vanila kink wise
End of the day, No matter what kinks you pander to, (within reason, obviously), ultimately, if you write a good story with good, compelling characters & really put quality & genuine care & effort into it, that will pay off the most. Just keep in mind, it will take time, dedication & real genuine passion for what you're crafting. If you're going for a cash grab, just make sure that you focus on a specific demographic, just understand that with less effort comes less rewards.
Bit late to the conversation on this one, though I just now came upon this thread. I'm not gonna lie, that's a bit of a tough needle to thread. The reason being is because the first cornerstone principal that you have to account for is this. On here, just like in everyday real life, you have a mix of smart, mentally & emotionally stable & well balanced people that actually appreciate works of quality mixed with people that are exceedingly dumb, mentally & emotionally unstable & unfortunately are exceedingly entitled, narcissistic & clueless about anyone but themselves. Now, while this point won't have much direct bearing on the work itself, it is important to keep in mind regarding the reception of your game. Now, while in reality, the smarter, more stable people are to some extent the majority, with the less desirable folks being in the minority, (more or less), they are certainly more vocal as they typically lack the general intelligence, Emotional balance & social aptitude to, well... know better.
For example, just take a stroll through the confidently incorrect or not how girls work subreddits. Some classics that have been memed to death are the, (comically more than 1), guys that post "women don't actually enjoy sex, I know because I've been with plenty of women & none of them enjoyed it", lacking the basic common sense & self awareness to realize they just publicly said for all to see, "I can't get a woman off". Another great classic being, (again more than 1), guys posting that women can't piss because urine is stored in the balls, which they don't have". You get the point.
I should also clarify that when I say things like being smart, mentally & emotionally balanced & socially competen
t, at least in relevance to this area, What I mean are possessing the character traits of being sociable, self awareness, not being narcissistic / self absorbed, Being able to perceive & interact with others, (especially women), in a normal & healthy way.
Now the reason why this is important is because it's key in understanding the main draw of these types of media & the concentration of these 2 overarching groups of people in this community. See, we all know that the main purpose & appeal of adult VNs & porn in general is stuff to jack off to.
Most smart, well balanced & competent guys are typically better at obtaining & maintaining real relationships, as such, they are less interested in general in adult content, as they typically are for the most part getting their sexual & emotional needs fulfilled with their actual relationships, plus those relationships are where they invest most of their free time. Now, having said that, do some of them also enjoy adult entertainment like this? Sure. I'm one of them. I'm all for some good spicy content in a good story. Some have kinks that are great in theory, but not not so much in reality. However, we are in the minority.
So from there, let's look at the rest of the community. Now, I imagine that a large contingent of that remainder also consists of guys that are also smart & well adjusted, but due to things like social anxiety, low self image & lack of confidence, struggle significantly to get relationships & use media like this as a substitute for sexual stimuli. However, in that larger group, you also have tons of incels, Red / black pill / MGTOW idiots & others that fall solidly in the dumb, unstable & socially inept category. These last types are the ones that you typically see being most vocal & narrow about what they will & won't accept in games they they are getting for free & not really contributing in any substantial way to, (did I mention they were dumb)? Anyways, these people make up the majority of this community because, for obvious reasons, they have significantly less, (often zero), success in any kind of sexual relationships with real women, so this kind of media is what they utilize for their sexual gratification. Not pointing this out to make any judgement calls on anyone, just pointing out what we already know.
Now the reason for all this seemingly unrelated preamble is this. When it comes to the NTR fans vs NTR haters back & forth,
most people TRULY don't care. There's tons of people of the mind of "NTR isn't really my thing, but I mean if the rest of the game is good, I'll give it a shot. Especially if it's avoidable, or if the game has more to offer than just that." Likewise, there's tons of NTR fans that say "I like NTR, but if the game has other routes that are different, That's cool too". These are the usually silent, sane, rational bulk of those sub-communities. They are not the people you see in the back & forth comments. No, those are the unhinged, unstable & stupid ones that make up the bulk of the visible noise. The ones that you see going out of their way to either shit talk, or say they are passing on a game, just because it features some NTR comment, especially in cases where it's avoidable, you have to wonder, "Dude, you're THAT fragile that the avoidable risk that bad choices in the game might lead to a bit of NTR? IN A FUCKING GAME? REALLY?"
As for their pro-NTR counterparts, The are just as, if not more unhinged, almost cult-like. See, for them, Writing an interesting NTR themed story isn't "good enough", no no no, you as a creator need to NTR an NTRing NTR NTR NTR that is NTR NTR NTRNTRNTRNTRNTR CRAM IN MOAR NTR, [insert a jpeg of a soyjack twitching on the floor, foaming at the mouth while muttering "ntrntrntrntrntr"... What does that even mean, you might ask? Well, for these cretins, it MUST rigidly follow the same, fatalistic, paint by numbers formula. The happy, wholesome & over the top sappily in love couple in the beginning, bad guy antagonist comes in, starts seducing & manipulating the wife, she get's rapidly corrupted over a series of encounters, she becomes a heartless, mindless sex addict & either husband remains inexplicably oblivious or they reveal the affair to him & he's sad, cut the ending off without any actual real ending & all choices & branches in the game must all be different variations of that same, static trajetory with only the most trivial & meaningless of variation. Now, even if that's the shit that get's these guys dicks rock hard, for most people, it gets rather... well.... BORING. It's literally the 4u0340302403423434th rerun of the exact same story.
So one would think, to keep things interesting, maybe have some choices where the MC is able to turn the tables & win, or maybe after the "reveal", he snaps & goes on a revenge arc for some measure of pyrric victory, or maybe where the NTR ends could be the midpoint & the back half of the game is him rebuilding his life & moving on with someone better. Most rational people would look at that & say "Hey, that's pretty cool. There's something for everyone there. This is pure heresy for those specific NTR fans. Just like the nutjobs on the anti-NTR side that shreik that the mere presence of ANY NTR, even if it's completely avoidable, is intolerable, as though even a drop of it somehow taints & ruins it's pure aryan heritag.... er... I mean... Ruins the purity of their harem game... The NTR "purist" types are equally as psychotic with their insistance that a single drop of anything that's not purely in strict service of NTR in the game "ruins" it & therefore makes it no longer count as "legitimate" NTR. Not only that, but merely even saying "wait... That doesn't even make sense. What are you, insane?" To them, that's not legitimate criticism, additionally, they will take the actual content of your critique, throw all of it out the window, & then screech that you are an existential threat to lord god NTR, because you're "an NTR hater that is just hating on NTR & trying to take their precious NTR away from them". Even if you're actually a fan of the genre & your "transgression" was as innocuous as saying "wait, I don't get it, what's the big deal if there's ADDITIONAL content that appeals to others, as long as all the NTR content that otherwise would have been there anyway is still in?" Doesn't matter. You've committed a treasonous transgression against lord god NTR & must be shunned as the "anti-NTR apostate" that they believe that you are.
As should be crystal clear by this point, The vocal participants in the Pro vs anti NTR squabble are the lowest IQ, Lowest EQ, most unhinged & defective of the community. It should come as no surprise that the overlap in the ven diagram of those people & the incels & derranged psycho parts of the community is basically a perfect circle. As such, these are the people that are most demanding, but least deserving of anyone pandering to them. They are the Karens of the community & should be treated as such.
PREAMBLE OVER
So, I know that was a long bit of preamble, but stick with me. With all that preliminary context taken under consideration, the next thing that you need to ask yourself is "WHY am I making this game & WHOM am I pandering to?" If your goal is to make something creative that you can take pride in & really want it to be something GOOD, my advice is to not worry so much about pandering to specific kinks, but rather focus on crafting a really good, unique story with good, engaging characters. THAT should be your cornerstone. You can find ways to weave different kinks into it, especially if you're not afraid of making a story that REALLY branches in different directions. It may require more writing & such, sure. But quality takes time & effort. You could have a game that, depending on choices made, could go down a harem path on 1 route, a vanilla pure love on another, a swinging path on yet another & an NTR path on yet another. On the swinging & harem paths, you could even include option triggers that could expand the love interest options to include family, roping in the incest crowd too. The key is, story boarding out how those different routes might look, structuring the characters in a way that could lead them in those directions & then paving the way in a way that's logical, natural & makes sense. MOST of the people that actually appreciate quality will be more apt to appreciate this & will be more likely to support it. Even if it's not anchored to any specific kink, if the quality of the story, characters & craftsmanship is there, then it will be appreciated.
Now if your position is, "I don't really care all that much about the product itself, (as in you're not really personally invested into what it is), I just want to make whatever will maximize monetary profits & / or clout". Well this branches again. is the goal just clout & bragging rights? If so, is it clout for high quality? If so, refer to prior paragraph. If it's more number of fans, then just pick a kink, pander as much as possible to that crowd, & whle you may alienate some portions of the community, you will be damn near worshipped by the fans of that kink. Now, personally that's about as worthless, (IMHO), as bragging about your Reddit Karma score, but hey, that kind of shit is important to some people for some reason.
Now, if your goal is to make money, Here again, you have to kind of think ahead. I mean, a purely harem or purely NTR smut packed romp will certainly get you a LOT of built in, really excited fans, HOWEVER, these are the 2 kinks with the largest concentration of those defective type fans. (again, to be clear, I'm not saying ALL harem & NTR fans are defective, I'm talking about the specific types of fans that I referenced earlier that are the main contributers to the brain dead back & forth bickering). With that in mind, knowing that these people, as individuals, are so defective & socially incompetent that THIS is their substitution for their lack of any actual success with women, What do you suppose their success with upward mobility & ability to attain & maintain employment / income that allows them to have the disposable income to contribute via Patreon or what not, to supporting you? If we're being realistic here, the bulk of them likely don't have a lot of professional success or substantial income either. Also keeping in mind, these are the same folks that have the highest level of narcissism & entitlement & the lowest level of self awareness, these details combined means that the bulk of them will be the most opinionated & demanding that you pander to what they want, while putting absolutely ZERO coin in your pocket. Now, that said, let's say you pick the NTR genre, you'll get a decent sized chunk of fans that will be willing to consistently support you. I mean for example, HangoverCat is making a couple thousand bucks a month. However, using Mr Dots as an example again, who's making somewhere between $5,000 to $20,000 a month on Patreon alone, plus a few thousand a month more on Subscribestar. When reviewing the discussion on his games, Even the non incest fans have high praise, as he clearly puts a lot of effort into the story & overall quality of his projects. As such, he not only has a larger fanbase, but also a larger perentage of fans that have the disposable income to consistently throw at his games in higher level tiers. The thing is, aside from the incest kink in 2 of his 3 games, (which is basically nothing at this point), his games are fairly vanila kink wise
End of the day, No matter what kinks you pander to, (within reason, obviously), ultimately, if you write a good story with good, compelling characters & really put quality & genuine care & effort into it, that will pay off the most. Just keep in mind, it will take time, dedication & real genuine passion for what you're crafting. If you're going for a cash grab, just make sure that you focus on a specific demographic, just understand that with less effort comes less rewards.
