For whatever it's worth, I have seen what a lot of devs make on steam vs patreon/substar. Let's just say I've yet to see any dev, regardless of size, say that they made more from subscriptions over Steam sales.
I want to make a game, but struggling with a couple of mental hurdles...
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Thanks, and that's the site I started at. But they don't track/estimate data on sales, revenue, etc. It's mostly # of players currently playing and player peaks. That's why they link to other sites, like the one I ended up on to gather the revenue data I did get at Gamalytic.
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Just like I mentioned to PeterPPP - unless you have seen the actual data of a representative sample of the thousands of adult games on Steam (or saw the data on all of them) - we cannot make an educated assumption, guess, or prediction, not without a deeper dive.
And I am not disputing that - and I haven't at all. At the start of this I said that one cannot make a proper prediction without knowing the data. And after doing a quick look at one site gathering the data - In fact, I stated:
However, at the same time:
And the screenshots of the data showing the median adult game developer revenue estimates bares both of those statements I made.
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Not saying you did. Just making a general statement as someone who has seen devs talking about it.
- Jun 10, 2017
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Nor did I said that you did.
As I already said, you don't need to focus particularly on a game, nor on the top earning. It suffice that you don't acknowledge the others. And it's precisely what you are doing. The fact that it's unvolontary doesn't mean that it's not happening.
I attribute it to you because you are the one claiming that "devs generally make more on steam than on patreon", while this mostly apply to the top earning games. Especially since you clearly don't acknowledge that, while it's true that Steam sales accumulate with the time, Patreon pledges do too.
Yeah, you've "seen numbers from a lot of f95 devs who are both on patreon and steam"... But it doesn't mean much.
With 9,117 devs on Patreon, most of them having their game featured here, I wonder which ones you searched on gamalytic. You surely haven't searched them all, especially since the search is based on the game name. You searched for the games you thought about, and those that you've seen during your search period. What mean that, probably without actual intent, what you got is the numbers for the successful games, those that are known enough for their game to attract the attention and be bought on Steam.
But once again, what matters is the result over the time. So, let's take The DeLuca Family...
I chosen it because I like HopesGaming and his game, and I know that he's on Patreon, that his game is available on Steam, and he's an averagely successful creator. He don't stand out in terms of support, but stand above the US$ 1000/month.
He hide his earning on Patreon, but it's possible to extrapolate through
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. Last time that the earnings were available, the average pledge was at US$ 5.63/patron. His number of patron evolved through the time, especially since he finished the Season 1 and many thought that it meant that the game is completed. Yet, when you look at the graph, an all time average at 500 is a reasonable guess. This mean US$ 2,815/month, US$ 33,780/year and US$ 236,400/overall, with a 6% to 12% fees for Patreon. What leave with an US$ 208,092 gain (with the 12% fees).Against US$ 232,8xx
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, with a 30% fees. What leave with an US$ 162,960 gain; yet it's probably less, since it's Steam and sometimes games will be sold for less (actually it's at US$ 7.99 in place of the usual US$ 15,99).There's at least a US$ 46,000 rounded gap in favor of Patreon.
He sold 12 copies during the 7 last days. Keeping this constant, it's 48 copies/month, at US$ 11.2 (once the fees applied), therefore US$ 537.6/month.
He still have 264 patrons on Patreon, what mean US$ 1,308/month (once fees applied).
Even expecting that the last 7 days were a low time for his game, he need to sell 117 copies/month for Steam sales to overcome his Patreon pledges. And for Steam to be just equal his overall Patreon earnings, he need to sell 117 copie/month + 4,107 more copies; this still assuming that all the sales will be at the top price.
It's obviously not impossible, but his game don't really stand out on Steam. With a 73.54% rating, it's the 1511th games with sexual content.
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, far from the top games.Looks like my example that, I swear on my wife memory, I took randomly and expected to be more in your favor, do not back up your claim.
Obviously, US$ 162K is good to take, but the question here isn't "does one can make money on Steam", but "does Steam earning are actually higher than Patreon pledges". And for him, as well as for many others, the answer is "no".
It's true for top creators. Perhaps is it true for some bottom creators, since 10 sales/month at US$ 10 (fees applied) worth a bit more than 20 patrons at US$ 4.4 (fees applied), while being a not to exagerate expectation even for a bad game. But for the majority that stand in between, it's not as true as you think, nor as true as your numbers shown you.
Raynare Studios
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says who? not me. that's your words, not mine. i dont think so. the devs i've seen and are talking about are from all ranges of earnings. you're wrongly attributing it to me.
yeah, i did too. look where it got me
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GoblinSpokesman
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wicked-green-eyes
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This is pretty interesting to see, thanks for taking the time to run this all.
I think the Gamalytics data is underestimating sales figures for NSFW games, though, possibly vastly.
From the Gamalytic's estimation methodology page (
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), it seems they use a weighted combination of four estimation methods, but I think 2 or 3 of them are skewing the estimate way lower for NSFW games.The first estimation they use is review scores, where they say the median sales-to-reviews ratio is 35 sales per review.
This ratio should be higher for NSFW games, since people are incentivized to not review 18+ games. Due to general shame, but probably mostly because you can buy games privately on Steam, but you can't review them anonymously - the review is always publicly associated with your account and displayed in your activity feed. So if you wish to keep your ownership of the game secret, you can't review it on Steam.
I've bought a lot of Mango Party's recent releases, and they're been making celebratory news posts when they hit a sales milestone (e.g. 30k sales). When I check the number of reviews after seeing these, I get much higher numbers.
| Gamalytics Median | 35 sales per review | Listed on their methodology page. I assume this is what they use as a base. |
| Half-Demon Shinobi | 147 sales per review | 2025-01-19: 619 reviews on store page. On the next day, a post was made celebrating 90k sales. |
| Isekai Sex Boutique | 219 sales per review | 2025-07-03: A post was made celebrating 50k+ copies. SteamDB listed 228 cumulative reviews on that day. |
| Mirai's Midnight Stream | 190 sales per review | 2025-07-07 (today): A post was made celebrating 60k+ copies. Right now, the Steam store page says it has 315 reviews. |
...Actually, somehow SteamDB lists the cumulative review count for Mirai's Midnight Stream on July 7 as 351, so SteamDB might not be totally accurate? I'm assuming the actual Steam page is perfectly accurate. Maybe there's some deleted reviews?
Anyway, a ratio for adult games could be estimated by checking all Mango Party games with such a post, and running the number against reviews at the time of the post. Though that number may be biased, since it's all from one publisher and it's all only sampling games that manage to reach a sales figure worth celebrating.
But the point is: The typical ratio is way higher for adult games. Gamealytics mentions that they adjust their ratio using various metrics ("release dates, price, review scores, etc") but neither their methodology page nor their reference pages mention taking into account whether or not the game is erotic.
In addition to review ratios, Gamealytic also checks public Steam profiles to estimate game ownership/sales. But naturally, people buying 18+ games are most likely going to be buying them privately or even turning their entire profile private, so this method is likely significantly underestimating adult game sales.
And they also use the number of concurrent players and average playtime to estimate the playerbase/game sales.
For average playtime, they rely on things like public profiles and public reviews. In this case that shouldn't result in a sales underestimate for NSFW games; it would be accurate but imprecise, due to fewer data points.
However for the number of concurrent players on Steam: I don't know whether Steam counts players for this number even if said player has their profile or game privated, but if not, then this estimation method would also be underestimating sales for adult games.
So, 2 or maybe 3 of their 4 estimation techniques are likely skewed for adult games, yielding lower sales figures than the reality.
Also, the leaked dataset that they use to test their aggregated estimation method is from summer 2018, and Steam only began allowing porn games in fall 2018 from a quick check, so their test set for their estimation method doesn't have any adult games in it. (well, maybe it has unofficially adult games, e.g. offsite-patch-needed games).
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- Jan 21, 2022
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Read their about... In it they admit that on individual games they may under/over estimate, they offer the percentages, too. But in the aggregate, they have found 99% accuracy.
If you cross reference individual games to Steam DB and look at the other sites that estimate revenue, you'll see that each has their own methodology and no single site appears to consistently over estimate or under estimate in relation to the others. Sometimes one site is at one end, other times, other sites are at that end.
As of right now, these sites are the best available to make comparisons and predictions - you already note a bias if you simply look at one developer. Also, it sounds like you are making an assumption that they don't already do that kind of spot-checking --- and yet based upon their sharing of methodology and accuracy percentages, we already know that they do.
A lot of your post is using a lot of assumptions and personal biases, as well. And you're taking the word of the developer on their sales figures without seeing the data for yourself. That's not a criticism , but an observation.
I mean, while I doubt there are many who would inflate their numbers to look more impressive for marketing purposes to get bandwagon effect ("wow, that many bought it?! It must be great! I gotta buy it now!") I wouldn't put it past all of them. And again individually, some games Gamalytic has stated they will be quite a bit off, but on the aggregate, 99%.
While I appreciate your take, as I have said previously, without a deeper look this is the data available.
It would take sitting down and doing a massive undertaking of creating a whole new dataset using the various metrics available from Steam -- something I doubt many of us have the time or motivation to do. Now, one could go sign up for accounts on the other sites and look for median sales.
To me it doesn't matter who is top, who is bottom or who is median -- just looking at for that median amount. So individual game metrics doesn't interest me, but the aggregate does.
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