Is the golden age over?

[mgtoons]

Last year when I found this site, I was blown away at all the great games that were interesting to me. Occasionally, there were some outliers with futa/trans, beast/monster/furry, female protag, and gay. I figured someone had to cater to those tastes, so whatever. But as the year has passed and months have gone by, it feels like the outliers are now becoming the mainstream of content. Every day when I go to look at updates, most of them fit into one or more of these categories.

Now, I'm not trying to disparage anyone for what they like and I'm perfectly fine with those games being made. I just feel like the content that originally was being produced has started to become the outlier and fewer in number. Has the general populace's tastes really changed that much so quickly? At this rate, I feel like there won't be much reason to look for those types of games I loved so much. I'll just move on, and things will go back to what they were before I found this site. Am I the only one that has seen the latest trend? Or am I way off base?

 

[HopesGaming]

The golden age was basically incest.

Mediocre games (no shots at any games or dev) could get a huge amount of patrons and income by simple copy paste a popular incest template. Which meant a shitton of games got made in that template. People want a piece of the pie.

Then it kind of died down. Too much copy paste. But in my opinion, it is on the rise again. So many great games are coming forth that is doing something different. Daring to explore and gamble beyond the simple incest game.

Can't really remember futa, gay, bestiality or any of those dominating the golden age tho.

Dating my daughter, Summertime saga, Man of the house, Something Unlimited, and a couple of more.
Not all of them are incest but the majority of them are.

 

[kshyk]

I think most of us expecting more than "Hey guys. I'm making a game. You are a male teenager, living with your mother and two sisters, and your father just died.."
(seriously, I'll drink full bottle of vodka every time I see new game with this plot)
And there's not so many 'futa, gay or bestiality' games... It's really hard to find good game with these tags.
I'll give away two incest games for one with bisexual female MC (or bisex male)

Recently theres a lot of new games with NTR tag. (Unfortunately for me) It seems like it's very popular genre now..

 

[Erectangles]

Last year when I found this site, I was blown away at all the great games that were interesting to me. Occasionally, there were some outliers with futa/trans, beast/monster/furry, female protag, and gay. I figured someone had to cater to those tastes, so whatever. But as the year has passed and months have gone by, it feels like the outliers are now becoming the mainstream of content. Every day when I go to look at updates, most of them fit into one or more of these categories.

Now, I'm not trying to disparage anyone for what they like and I'm perfectly fine with those games being made. I just feel like the content that originally was being produced has started to become the outlier and fewer in number. Has the general populace's tastes really changed that much so quickly? At this rate, I feel like there won't be much reason to look for those types of games I loved so much. I'll just move on, and things will go back to what they were before I found this site. Am I the only one that has seen the latest trend? Or am I way off base?

I understand where you're coming from even though I don't necessarily feel the same way. There is, however, an exorbitant amount of titles coming out that are "version 0.0.0.0.0.1" popping up with Patreon accounts that promise all this desirable content IF THEY GET ENOUGH FUNDING. I don't know if the Golden Age is over, but I feel like it's slowed down a bit. It's kinda like how these huge studios release blockbusters once a year and then the rest of the year they just kinda fart out rom-com's.

 

[mgtoons]

Maybe 'golden age' wasn't to proper title for this post. That is very subjective to what someone likes. I guess it should have been more about the current trend.

 

[anne O'nymous]

I think most of us expecting more than "Hey guys. I'm making a game. You are a male teenager, living with your mother and two sisters, and your father just died.."

Gave me a great idea for a game. You're a teenage female living with her father and two brothers, and your mother just died...


Don't search me, I'm already outside.

 

[acidnightmare]

I think the community has evolved and is interested in new experiences. It just depends on the type of person you are, some people only want to read one genre of book (trashy romance novels) or play one type of game (Call of Duty) whereas others are always looking for new things to experience, things they may not have considered in the past.

 

[OhJo]

In uncertain times, the familiar becomes a refuge. When your world is calm, one tends to be more adventurous.

Right, well .. I mean.. okay, that was my application to the vacancy of F95-ortune Cookie.


To be fair, I had the exact same experience earlier this year.. so maybe this, like all things, depends on perspective and context.

Last year when I found this site, I was blown away at all the great games that were interesting to me.

 

[Walg]

Maybe 'golden age' wasn't to proper title for this post. That is very subjective to what someone likes. I guess it should have been more about the current trend.

Probably. To me, it's mainly about expectations. From a story standpoint there's definitely more directions to push but to get that cash it's easier to follow a standard template and also you'd have to abide by Patreon's rules (Unless you go with SubscribeStar) which might stifle creativity. So expecting a knock-out story that's able to abide by some rules is pretty difficult and why people just turn to a template instead.

A little bit of those expectations have also been pushed due to dev's pushing the boundaries from a production standpoint so patrons expect more because devs can push more. So those devs that can't keep up are seen as "lower quality" despite putting in the hours. I've definitely been guilty of putting unrealistic expectations on some dev's.

I understand where you're coming from even though I don't necessarily feel the same way. There is, however, an exorbitant amount of titles coming out that are "version 0.0.0.0.0.1" popping up with Patreon accounts that promise all this desirable content IF THEY GET ENOUGH FUNDING. I don't know if the Golden Age is over, but I feel like it's slowed down a bit. It's kinda like how these huge studios release blockbusters once a year and then the rest of the year they just kinda fart out rom-com's.

Ha you're also finding your feet too You're right too many are after funding but I do think it's based on your own expectations on dev's as I said above.

In uncertain times, the familiar becomes a refuge. When your world is calm, one tends to be more adventurous.

Right, well .. I mean.. okay, that was my application to the vacancy of F95-ortune Cookie.

Did someone say cookies?

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But also, in uncertain times one might make that great leap into the unknown because they're wired that way. Not all sayings hold true especially in this day and age

 

[ppoooors]

I think we can all agree that the incest trend has slowed down a little bit during the past couple of months,
in the 'golden age' we had 3 big games, Dreams of desire, Big Brother, and pretty much always an ICSTOR game.

All 3 were incest, but now we have Milfy City, Being a DICK, The DeLuca Family, City of broken dreamers, being some of the trending games, with only one of them being incest.

I honestly don't think incest will ever go away for good! It'll for sure remain as one of the most popular genres, but it's also good to see new games/ideas.

 

[OhJo]

What did you expect, I'm method-acting a fortune cookie here. Of course I'm going to be wrong to the wrong people!

Not all sayings hold true especially in this day and age

I love the amount of advice you can get on this forum, it's absolutely brilliant.
Expectation management is hard for anyone though, be they producer or consumer.

 

[RanliLabz]

Last year when I found this site, I was blown away at all the great games that were interesting to me. Occasionally, there were some outliers with futa/trans, beast/monster/furry, female protag, and gay. I figured someone had to cater to those tastes, so whatever. But as the year has passed and months have gone by, it feels like the outliers are now becoming the mainstream of content. Every day when I go to look at updates, most of them fit into one or more of these categories.

lol - speaking as someone who makes a game including futa/trans, monster/furry and gay content (and incest!) I'm not sure that I agree there are less of the 'trad' games - just more games in general, catering to more tastes. The Trending Games tab of this site is still massively dominated by suburban American incest.

That said, at one point the massive commercial success of Summertime Saga and Milfy City led to a rash of poor imitations full of grind, appalling dialogue and almost no sexual content - generally quickly abandoned the moment their authors realised they weren't going to be making 50k a month on Patreon for their unsatisfactory efforts. Players reacted predictably - often declining to even play a game under v0.3 unless it had something that really sparked their imagination or lust. Patreon reacted equally predictably - (unfairly) banning incest to avoid becoming an incest site itself (PatrOedipon? ). The old 'golden age' hands expanded, taking on new team members and upgrading their equipment so that they could release multiple animations with each release, something new devs (often with jobs or studies and limited resources) couldn't compete with.

Basically - market forces.

But that opened a gap for other creators - with quirkier, nichier concepts as original as Dark Cookie or ICSTOR were when they first arrived on the scene - and the explosion of new content has been a massive boon as far as I'm concerned. Players can dip into Long Live the Princess, Straight?!, Battle of the Bulges or (ahem) SpaceCorps for whatever suits their tastes, bringing more people onto the site - and opening up more possibilities for story-telling, passion projects and stuff you just wouldn't see elsewhere.

Maybe the 'Golden Age' is dead - but the Age of Discovery is just beginning!

 

[Walg]

I think we can all agree that the incest trend has slowed down a little bit during the past couple of months,
in the 'golden age' we had 3 big games, Dreams of desire, Big Brother, and pretty much always an ICSTOR game.

All 3 were incest, but now we have Milfy City, Being a DICK, The DeLuca Family, City of broken dreamers, being some of the trending games, with only one of them being incest.

I honestly don't think incest will ever go away for good! It'll for sure remain as one of the most popular genres, but it's also good to see new games/ideas.

If they're forced to host their VN on Patreon, then if they want an incest story-line they'd have to patch the VN up but asides from that, it also forces devs to think outside the box. It can be a good thing as @RanliLabz said above. We all have to be patient.

What did you expect, I'm method-acting a fortune cookie here. Of course I'm going to be wrong to the wrong people!

That's not the way a fortune cookie should act I thought you were supposed to sell your confidence to others?

I love the amount of advice you can get on this forum, it's absolutely brilliant.
Expectation management is hard for anyone though, be they producer or consumer.

Haha! If you believe the musings of an idiot, sure! Expectation management is pain for everyone. From a dev's point of view, you can't please everyone (Nor should you) and from a patron's standpoint they want what they like and if a dev can't produce what they like, they walk away. Don't forget the expectations from outside forces too

 

[ppoooors]

If they're forced to host their VN on Patreon, then if they want an incest story-line they'd have to patch the VN up but asides from that, it also forces devs to think outside the box. It can be a good thing as @RanliLabz said above. We all have to be patient.

Yep, that why I'm saying it's good to see new ideas popping up.
I only wish that the people who 'copied' the incest games to make an easy fortune had at least put some effort into it and copied something with a story, like DoD, not Milfy City that's basically just Dialogue->Fucking. At least, then someone could have come up with something worth checking out.

 

[Walg]

Yep, that why I'm saying it's good to see new ideas popping up.
I only wish that the people who 'copied' the incest games to make an easy fortune had at least put some effort into it and copied something with a story, like DoD, not Milfy City that's basically just Dialogue->Fucking. At least, then someone could have come up with something worth checking out.

It might be too much effort for them or they might have a different creative vision. Don't forget that there's always budding devs popping up so you have to hope and/or guide them to story focused VN's and hope they bite

EDIT: Or that budding devs have the foresight to know that story based VN's can knock the socks off people. But that's also preference based.

 

[RedPillBlues]

I'm still mad Big Brother popularized NTR in western games. So many games have it all of a sudden.

 

[redknight00]

I would say the opposite, that games today are better than they ever were, both in term of pure quality, but also size, scope, production value. Opinions are biased, and if you like incest, for example, I can see how you would think the games fell in quality, but there was aways niche game, and there will always be, it's probably that previously you didn't need to dig to get the goodies and didn't notice how much there was.

Trends come and go, with the end of the big incest boom, lately most games that manage to rise above and generate some buzz are the ones with better writing and stories, and that's a good thing I believe. I always hated how little creative there was in the industry, and now at least we can see at least some degree of originality in the works. I'm still waiting for that trend to bleed into the sex scenes and they become more creative and kinky, but I'm a patient man and can wait.

 

[jamdan]

Is this a roundabout way of saying games need more peeing content?

but on a serious note (if i wasn't being serious already ). I think the quality of games has gotten better and they have better diversity. Still have some default things that seem to be in almost every game like going to a clothing store or whatever but its still improving. I also think people evolve their tastes, just speaking for myself I started to play these games for *fap fap* reasons but now almost all the games I play are VN games based on the storytelling. If the game doesn't have a good story, i cant get into it. Speaking of the earlier incest talk, i used to always use the incest patch if the game had one but now I only do if it actually impacts the story (like in No More Secrets) or it makes the dialog/scenario make sense, lets be honest nobody loves their landlady. I evolved into a sophisticated perv . The "Golden Age" of anything is largely in the eye of the beholder.

 

[GaboCAP]

Well, I felt the same last days, mostly when lot of games that I enjoyed went on-hold or abandoned. But then I questioned my feelings. When I discovered F(urry)95, around last mid-year, I found a HUGE amount of content, and I mean completed games, advanced ones and lots of proyects. Globally, that was A LOT to play. But eventually the well went dry, and must feed this new addiction with the regular dripping of updates and new games with very few content. This can be the key to the current
dissatisfaction I'm experimenting. Can't say about a "golden age", because I've no idea how things were before I found the site, but the feeling is like last year discovering a whole candy shop all to myself, eat all the chocolates, and now having to settle with one, sometimes two, candy bars at day.

As for the incest trend, when started to play Big Brother and similars, I recall a book I read long ago, a french novel from Guillaume Apollinaire about a young brat in the beginning of WWI, who arrives to his family's country manor, just for being mistreated and becomed the house's underdog, untill all male in the surroindings goes to war, and then the boy proceed to, one by one, fuck all women at her hand, including aunt, two sisters and mom. Sounds familiar? I'm not saying that Dark Silver readed the book (but maybe saw the movie made in the 80's), but anyway, the base idea is not original. It's one of these narrative backbones used and re used in storytelling since forever (as Romeo and Juliet basic story, let's say), with almost infinite reutilization posibilities... if something new or surprising is aded to the mix. We can have infinite future variations of "horny horsedicked brat living with mom and 2 sis", and hopefully some of them will be enjoyables and innovatives.

 

[Valaska]

I'd have to say, I'm honestly proud of most our EroDev/EDGN cohorts in this genre. There are a lot of amazing quality projects with a ton of effort and work, absolute passion projects that people want to be good... they want these games to be marketable and enjoyable.

I think the golden age is now, it's starting. Shovelware did... slow down, but again, who wants Daz3D again, and again, without original content? I think we're getting to a good place and I am seriously impressed with a ton of the projects out there.

Also, many of the projects are beginning to mature! Back in the day, it was literally a joke to say "release date?" As you knew the game was never coming out.