Itch.io Changes Policy for Adult Games

[jamdan]

You must be registered to see the links

You must be registered to see the links

Payment processors strike again.

 

[arynknight]

Wonder if they even tried to reason with the payment processors, or if they simply elected to take the L. Adult/VN content is pretty huge on itch, have to imagine this will hit the pocketbook hard.

If they didn't fight it, stupid decision. Even if you want to take some baseless 'all porn is bad' angle, you have to realize that forcing it off high-vis platforms isn't going to stop it from being made.

 

[Meaning Less]

That's a big one, it really seems like payment processors are at it again, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Patreon is on the horizon.

 

[redknight00]

Doesn't look like it's payment processors, just itch stopped fronting the money transfer. It's not unreasonable to imagine someone flexed on them and caused this change, but there's no direct involvement here.

 

[Hagatagar]

Wonder if they even tried to reason with the payment processors, or if they simply elected to take the L. Adult/VN content is pretty huge on itch, have to imagine this will hit the pocketbook hard.

If they didn't fight it, stupid decision. Even if you want to take some baseless 'all porn is bad' angle, you have to realize that forcing it off high-vis platforms isn't going to stop it from being made.

Dunno, what could they have done?
They don't have any leverage at all to negotiate, so if the payment processors say no, they lose all their revenue.
Their choice was probably either less revenue through NSFW or no revenue at all.

 

[Rafster]

FUCK, I can't believe this. My game is free already, but I guess I should stop taking donations from there. This will hit hard the adult game scene there, really hard.

Let's hope Patreon does not do the same, they are very restrictive as it is now. If Patreon does this, it's bye-bye for me, it's my only payment option.

 

[Count Morado]

You must be registered to see the links

You must be registered to see the links

Payment processors strike again.

They didn't strike again. It's the same way they've done business for years. Just because creators were getting away with doing something in violation of the processors' terms for this long doesn't mean they've struck anything. again. Itch.io simply said all along "you shouldn't try to sell things that violate processor policies" and never/rarely checked on the creators. Someone reminded Itch.io that's not the way it works and so Itch.io had to do the job they should have been doing from the start by reviewing creators' pages and giving the creators a warning before having to do something to make sure the accounts were in alignment with policies.

FUCK, I can't believe this. My game is free already, but I guess I should stop taking donations from there. This will hit hard the adult game scene there, really hard.

Let's hope Patreon does not do the same, they are very restrictive as it is now. If Patreon does this, it's bye-bye for me, it's my only payment option.

You should probably expect Patreon to eventually follow suit -- it appears Subscribestar may become adult game developers' only viable 'simple' solution because they use Dropp.

 

[Rafster]

You should probably expect Patreon to eventually follow suit -- it appears Subscribestar may become adult game developers' only viable 'simple' solution because they use Dropp.

If Only... SS was my very first option, even before I decided to create my patreon account, but no luck. I was in touch with their support team, and even though they would love to have my game there (he told me that I would get approved quickly), there are no payment options for my country (Venezuela), so I'm stuck with Patreon

By the way, I just checked: I didn't get the infamous email from itch about changing payment methods yet, and my payment method is still set to "Collected by itch". But I think that could change anytime soon.

 

[VegitoHlove]

Oh for fuck sake. Why do all these retards have such a fucking complex about adult games? Soon they'll be preaching that sex even for the sake of having kids is bad and you should only have test tube babies.

Just once I would like to hear. "We're not a bunch of fucking manchilds. Here's some sex games and books and your mom"

 

[jamdan]

If Only... SS was my very first option, even before I decided to create my patreon account, but no luck. I was in touch with their support team, and even though they would love to have my game there (he told me that I would get approved quickly), there are no payment options for my country (Venezuela), so I'm stuck with Patreon

By the way, I just checked: I didn't get the infamous email from itch about changing payment methods yet, and my payment method is still set to "Collected by itch". But I think that could change anytime soon.

I've mentioned it before, but devs should move to Onlyfans and Fansly. They don't allow the same content Patreon doesn't allow, so you still have to use patches and stuff. But their entire business is built around adult content so at least you won't get demonetized/banned out of no where.

 

[anne O'nymous]

You should probably expect Patreon to eventually follow suit [...]

Unlikely to happen, at least at short/middle term.
Patreon have negotiated for

You must be registered to see the links

, and payment processors know that they host it, since they are the one who forced for the ban... of only a parts of this content. Plus they now have a stricter policy for their age verification.

The current strike over adult content is more the consequence of EU attempts to enforce the protection of minors against pornography. As too often when it come to their rules regarding new technologies, politicians believe that saying is enough and everything they want is possible. But it isn't, and some platforms decides to simply remove the content before the EU decide to ban them ; what also wouldn't be as possible as the politicians think.

 

[Count Morado]

Unlikely to happen, at least at short/middle term.

Sorry, I should have been clear - I'm not thinking this year or even next... but considering with next five years. I understand the environment in which Patreon negotiated their current situation, but since that time things have become more tenuous and the global climate has become less... tolerant(?)... not more in the past 5-10 years. I don't see that trend changing direction anytime soon and may place Patreon in a new position to need to cut ties with certain creators in order to save itself before 2030.

 

[anne O'nymous]

[...] but since that time things have become more tenuous and the global climate has become less... tolerant(?)... not more in the past 5-10 years.

But it's mostly protection of minors that lead to this, so nothing that can't be worked around... As long as at the host they are is ready to work it around.

Imgur don't want to spend money on this, and decided to ban adult content, what is understandable since they have really limited income sources. Itch.io can't really spend money on this since, as you said, they are not supposed to host adult content. But look at onlyfan, that came back on their idea to ban adult content, and decided to enforce their controls instead.
In the end, it's probable that it will just clean the place, leaving only platforms that are financially stable. And Patreon is one of them. They only get 20%-30% of their income from adult content, but with a yearly income expected between US$ 50 and US$ 75 millions last years, it's still something you don't want to get rid off. Plus they've now outsourced their security and safety team, what mean that legal issues isn't their concerns. It's the society they pay for this that have to be up to date with regulations all around the world, and find solutions to deal with them. What they'll do quickly and efficiently, since it's how they have clients.

 

[fidgetspinner]

It has nothing to do with tolerance. It's a question of bigger fish to fry.

Patreon was once small, they didn't really curated stuff until it start hurting their business.
Itch was once small, now they are a target of payment processor
SubscribeStar is still very small and niche and not yet under the payment processor's target. It will happen one day and a new patreon-like website will emerge to take over the niche TOS stuff.

This is a cyclical process. just get used to this.

 

[EssenceOfChieftain]

Reddit will be next.
I'm convinced they'll drop the hammer on hardcore pornographic/fetish material when they go public in the second half of this year.

 

[DuniX]

Nothing will change until payment processors get a class actions lawsuit.
The porn clause has to go, it's not their business what you do with your money.

 

[Gwedelino]

What the drawback of itch. Io direct payment option ? Seems like adult content can still use that option if they still want their content to be monetarized.

 

[Rafster]

What the drawback of itch. Io direct payment option ? Seems like adult content can still use that option if they still want their content to be monetarized.

If you use the direct payment option, paypal/stripe/payoneer will know you develop adult games, and proceed to ban your account (violation of their TOS). Patreon for example, handle all that for us, just like itch when you select the payment handled by them.

By the way, people on the dev forum are commenting that the issue seems more exclusive for itch. It seems some games revenue share is not high enough to be profitable for itch to do the payment for the dev, so they are cutting this option, and even some SFW devs also got hit by this. So this doesn't seem a widespread movement against NSFW devs or something.

If you ask me, this is a shitty movement, if they review case by case, why not tell the devs they want a higher rev share? (maybe they look at steam, which takes the 30%, want it or not). I would prefer to accept a higher rev share, than having my game banned or offered for free on itch.

And that also explains why I wasn't affected, my game hardly gets any donation there

 

[RedPillBlues]

Thats a shame, even though I don't use ITCH I know a lot of devs relied on it as an alternative to Steam. I guess even more games will be moving away from HS and college theme if they want to actually properly sell a finished game.

 

[anne O'nymous]

By the way, people on the dev forum are commenting that the issue seems more exclusive for itch. It seems some games revenue share is not high enough to be profitable for itch to do the payment for the dev, so they are cutting this option, and even some SFW devs also got hit by this. So this doesn't seem a widespread movement against NSFW devs or something.

Accordingly to

You must be registered to see the links

, it effectively seem to be this.
The issue being that running the service, and processing the payments, have a cost, and when the price is too low, itch.io spend money and earn nothing.

(maybe they look at steam, which takes the 30%, want it or not). I would prefer to accept a higher rev share, than having my game banned or offered for free on itch.

It wouldn't change much. The problem being all the creators who let their game being downloaded freely by those who want, whatever itch.io share, it will still be a percent of 0.