How much money needed to make H games

[anjaymobal]

Hello, fellow game developers!

I’m planning to develop my own game and publish it here on this platform. I already have an old laptop and some drawing skills, so I’ll be creating my own assets.

Could you share your insights about the costs involved? How much did you spend developing your own game? Are there any additional expenses I should prepare for that might not be immediately obvious?

Thanks in advance for your advice!

 

[Waterthose]

As a solo dev there really isn't any hard costs. The main cost is mostly "opportunity cost". The time it takes to makes your game a reality and the subsequent updates.

There's no real "development" cost if you do everything yourself, unless you are hiring artists/writers/proofreaders/composers etc. Or you are buying assets instead of making them yourself. It can quickly add up if you go that route but isn't really ideal for new devs.

 

[anjaymobal]

As a solo dev there really isn't any hard costs. The main cost is mostly "opportunity cost". The time it takes to makes your game a reality and the subsequent updates.

There's no real "development" cost if you do everything yourself, unless you are hiring artists/writers/proofreaders/composers etc. Or you are buying assets instead of making them yourself. It can quickly add up if you go that route but isn't really ideal for new devs.

do you need to pay to upload your game here?,and i heard that file host also need subcription

 

[Waterthose]

do you need to pay to upload your game here?,and i heard that file host also need subcription

This is a pirate site... you don't need to pay anything. The uploaders of this site will also make links for your game once you provide them with one. I personally use MEGA as I do not want to sign up to a bunch of other sites (it's free).

 

[skyblueaster]

Depends… realistically in terms of time and labor I’ve spent several thousand dollars at three chapters in.
Turns out coding, custom art, and voice acting are very expensive.

I’m not mad at pirates, though it is a little upsetting seeing the download/support ratio being skewed at 1000:1 sometimes
If even 10% of downloaders dropped a few dollars, we'd have enough to make the game and several sequels. :3

 

[anon43221]

You could probably hire various freelancers with some AVN-type development / work experience who live in developing countries to make a somewhat decent game for about $10,000 with minimal animation and mid-range renders assuming you're not trying to do anything incredibly rare or unique like for example voice-overs, etc.

 

[tanstaafl]

If even 10% of downloaders dropped a few dollars, we'd have enough to make the game and several sequels. :3

Most of the people here are too scared to ask their parents for their credit cards to support the NTR, Scat, incest games they're into.

 

[Insomnimaniac Games]

As a solo dev there really isn't any hard costs. The main cost is mostly "opportunity cost". The time it takes to makes your game a reality and the subsequent updates.

Gonna second this. Be prepared to spend thousands of hours (and I mean that literally), and be prepared for people to call all that work dogshit. Never focus on negative opinions though, focus on what you want to do, what you can do, and focus on your actual audience.

With cost, I'd say I spent around 200-300$ on various things.

 

[tanstaafl]

With cost, I'd say I spent around 200-300$ on various things.

Assuming you started with a gaming rig capable of decent render times? Ever upgraded with the sole intentions of rendering?

 

[Insomnimaniac Games]

Assuming you started with a gaming rig capable of decent render times? Ever upgraded with the sole intentions of rendering?

I was already pretty set thankfully. A 3080, and a 5800X3D. I just bought some additional ram and storage. But, if someone is planning on using DAZ, they'll most likely want an Nvidia card so if they don't already have that it could factor into cost.

However, as I use Koikatsu the render time itself isn't an actual factor. You're already working in a rendered environment, so rendering is practically instant, but there's more "upfront" performance cost.

( Not directed at you, but before anyone says anything, I would have went the 2D route if I didn't have nerve and muscle damage in my hand. And KK is NOT easier than DAZ.)

 

[tanstaafl]

I was already pretty set thankfully. A 3080, and a 5800X3D. I just bought some additional ram and storage. But, if someone is planning on using DAZ, they'll most likely want an Nvidia card so if they don't already have that it could factor into cost.

However, as I use Koikatsu the render time itself isn't an actual factor. You're already working in a rendered environment, so rendering is practically instant, but there's more "upfront" performance cost.

( Not directed at you, but before anyone says anything, I would have went the 2D route if I didn't have nerve and muscle damage in my hand. And KK is NOT easier than DAZ.)

Yeah, wouldn't have taken any offense even if it was directed at me. I thought about getting into game dev, but with my job already being dev I decided I'd much rather relax on other people's dimes, lol.

 

[anne O'nymous]

Most of the people here are too scared to ask their parents for their credit cards to support the NTR, Scat, incest games they're into.

They should try... Who know, perhaps it's what mom secretly dreamed about since he hit puberty

 

[DumpTruckLover]

I'm not a game developer, and I don't know much about this subject, but I can say that the amount of money you need to spend is directly related to what you want to create. If you want to use a program like Daz or something similar to make a very visually impressive game, you might need a powerful computer, which means money. Or you could use something like Koikatsu/Honey Select, which involves lower visual quality, and you wouldn’t need to spend much money. It’s entirely up to you. I'm assuming you'll handle everything yourself, such as the script, renders, coding, and music. If you plan to outsource these tasks to others, the cost will, of course, increase accordingly.

 

[Volta]

Not a dev, yet, but i can say it really depends on what you're looking to make. For a high quality daz game a top end Nvidia GPU is needed for realistic render times, i've got a 4070 and it's great but i'd need better if i wanted to go and compete with Dr.PinkCake or Phillygames.

Coding is required in most cases as is art, which may involve hiring on another person or commissioning ect., neither is cheap but the alternative is learning time consuming new skills. Music can be open source/commons free type of stuff and so long as it's not awful you should be ok, no one plays porn games for the sound track.

That said if you were interested in writing an old school AIF game you could probably do that on your own fairly quickly. Which brings us to the most important part; time. It takes a long time to build up the skill base to be a solo dev, add that to the time you need to make a game and you can see that mostly it's not about the money but effort. Don't get into solo deving if you want to make money out of it, sure the money is there, lots of it in fact but when you're solo it's not going to be easy.

In short the barrier to entry is low for everything that isn't a CG heavy VN or requires similar levels of hardware, think 3d modelling and such. The barrier is a time investment that is required IMO.

 

[TheMagicalGurl]

Not a dev, yet, but i can say it really depends on what you're looking to make. For a high quality daz game a top end Nvidia GPU is needed for realistic render times, i've got a 4070 and it's great but i'd need better if i wanted to go and compete with Dr.PinkCake or Phillygames.

Coding is required in most cases as is art, which may involve hiring on another person or commissioning ect., neither is cheap but the alternative is learning time consuming new skills. Music can be open source/commons free type of stuff and so long as it's not awful you should be ok, no one plays porn games for the sound track.

That said if you were interested in writing an old school AIF game you could probably do that on your own fairly quickly. Which brings us to the most important part; time. It takes a long time to build up the skill base to be a solo dev, add that to the time you need to make a game and you can see that mostly it's not about the money but effort. Don't get into solo deving if you want to make money out of it, sure the money is there, lots of it in fact but when you're solo it's not going to be easy.

In short the barrier to entry is low for everything that isn't a CG heavy VN or requires similar levels of hardware, think 3d modelling and such. The barrier is a time investment that is required IMO.

Logical post here.

What he doesn't mention is the need to post ads and get people aware of your work. You have to MAKE A NAME somehow... If you don't, your hard work falls into obscurity and you wouldn't believe how many it happens to... How you do that is up to you...

 

[Volta]

Logical post here.

What he doesn't mention is the need to post ads and get people aware of your work. You have to MAKE A NAME somehow... If you don't, your hard work falls into obscurity and you wouldn't believe how many it happens to... How you do that is up to you...

This is a good point, i've seen a lot of people use F95, reddit and other forum/social media options for advertising/awareness. Another option is old school networking, some devs like AceX have partnered up with other devs like Llamaman and cross post on each other's patreon/do a deal to advertise each other, which is pretty smart IMO.
Some devs also use next to no advertising at all, i've never seen Baal of superpowered have anything like that and he's been going for an extreme amount of time by adult game dev standards.

To be frank having a product to advertise is probably more important for a while, then it's about getting seen once you have something to show, otherwise you'll have a cyberpunk situation of selling sizzle not steak, great for a while but those chickens come home to roost pretty quickly.

 

[SloppyTurdSlapper]

Depends on what you anticipate to earn. After reading what you have in Store, you should have no problem in making a Visual Noval, as that is the my suggestion for your set of Equipment. It's also depends on if you want to make an erotic Game and how taboo'd it is. If you do not plan to make an erotic Game then you should consider, what I am about to tell You, even though this is non of my buissness. This Comment is my own without reading other User's opinion, with all due respect.

It looks like, you are in a tricky spot. This Site does have a lot of traffic, that would get your content exposed to wide range of people. Theres an opportunity to Test the product in a enviorment of a game Dev. without getting "Mainstream" attention. Bond with you're potential Investor. However, if you are considering to upload here, know that you are exposing your self to "cheaters" and you're game will get exposed, regardless of the outcome that it might bring. Be very clear about that.

Now; I am not a Game Dev. but if the situation had happen, where the necessary steps would have occured, i would be. This is the last move that i would take. To be honest it wouldn't be in my range of throught to release a Game on this website. You should try other "clean" plattforms, like Patreon, BlueSky, Reddit, Twitter/X, Kickstart, Indiegogo or some other Stage. Heck, even a Videogame reviewer on a public Stage like Youtube would be a better choise then here.

 

[Count Morado]