Let's push forward, your opinion matters.

[Emoon]

Hey fellow F95ers,

Edit: Small note upfront. I'm not trying to create the next big hit or some form of game changer here! I also want you to not care about the question if something would be way to hard to pull off for one or a small team of developers. We all know pulling off a lewd game in the scope of a AAA game would be way to heavy. The questions that i asked at the end of the post are solely there to get a feel for your preferences in games and not something i have planed.

i'd like to start a little conversation about the "direction" of the adult-gaming genre.
Don't worry i'm not here to judge your kink or something like that. No i want to talk with you as player and also with developers around here about the "direction" of the adult-gaming genre. A round-table between players and developers if you will.

Let me explain a bit what i actually mean with all that gibberish up there.
I've joined this community almost exactly two years ago and i like it here, however over the two years i noticed a few things that made me sad think:

• (Directed at Game-Devs) The very first thing is the lack of advancement. 8 out of 10 games are either RenPy VN's or GameMaker RPG's.
  Now don't get me wrong, i got nothing but love for everyone who creates games with those solutions and no doubt every once in a while we get extremely solid projects who were made with RenPy or RPGM. But unfortunately it doesn't change the fact that we stagnate, both in terms of general game-design and in terms of technical progression.
  
  I know game development mostly consists of copying "Project X" and then slightly change it to "Project Y" (sry for the lack of a better explanation) but too many games here follow a certain paradigm that seems to be set in stone, be it from a story perspective or from a design perspective.
  Sure it's easy to create a story around a young boy in a city or household full of submissive women but it get's dull pretty fast especially if your "competition" does the same (just as an example, it's not directed towards anyone or anything). Creating rich and interesting stories doesn't mean that we have to double down on the sexual content, nor is it a thing exclusive to all the non-sexual themed games out there. I'm sure we have more than enough outstanding story writers around here.
  
  From a technical/design standpoint we're stuck as well. We have a wide array of outstanding game engines at our hands who offer almost endless possibilities but we prefer to waste hours with waiting for our single-shot frames to finish rendering (Arr shit i forgot to hide that clothing part, well here we go again).
  I've seen only a handful of games who actually made full or at least good use of an offline-renderer in the past two years.
  I'm sure most of you follow the major game-engine developers out there, so i don't need to explain that the difference between an offline-renderer and realtime is minimal these days (for the majority of our needs at least).
  We are able to do amazing
  You must be registered to see the links
  (Project for free available in the sidebar) or
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  that stands its ground against offline-renders. Sure it's not a "drop in and be done with it" solution like in DAZ but getting your character from DAZ to Unity or UE4
  You must be registered to see the links
  and h
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  countless times before. If we support each other with the migration process from DAZ to EngineXYZ we are able to establish a proper and easy to use/follow workflow, even for someone who is totally new to it.
  
  I don't know why we restrain ourself, maybe some of you can enlighten me.
  
  
  
• (Directed at Players & Game-Devs) Another thing i noticed is that players and developers sometimes seem disconnected from another. Often times when i read a thread about a game i stumble upon players who provide their honest feedback (good feedback without flame) or request certain features but way to often this feedback is either rejected with the words "If you don't like it, don't play it" or it goes completely ignored because the developer itself is either not active on F95 or simply just don't care.
  I know that some developers are not particular happy about F95 but ignoring it will lead to nothing, if you engage in the community you can show your passion about your project and who knows it might resonate with someone who then decides to support you directly.
  
  BUT i don't want to blame just the developers here, also players need to understand a few things. It's not uncommon that i see players who ask for a certain feature that would totally change the direction of the game or questions about certain design decisions. The always famous question about NTR comes to mind. You have to understand that every game, be it a lewd game or regular game, has predefined boundaries. Boundaries like the general theme, story, mechanics, world-design etc. and changing one of those boundaries almost always leads to a fail. Try to suggest additions and not radical changes.
  
  
  
• (Directed at Players but Devs should read) That's the part that interest me the most.
  What would you like to see in upcoming games? Please feel free to ignore any worries about scope or possible technical limitations. But also keep in mind that this is not about a certain kink that you feel is underrepresented, let's talk purely game and tech here.
  If you can't think about something straight out of your head let me give you some questions that you can answer or take as an entry point.
  
  
  • Would you like to have deeper stories with sex-scenes who rather act as a side-activity instead of being the main focus?
  • Would you like to see more common gameplay approaches like having First Person or Third Person games, something in the line of Mass Effect or The Witcher?
  • Do you prefer a god or a bad protagonist as the main character?
  • How about Character Customization? Going a bit further how about NPC Customization, settings presets (small boobs, big boobs, thick, thin etc.) for the characters you will meet throughout the game (in a non-spoiler way ofc).
  • Since most developers use DAZ for their characters, how important are custom DAZ characters for you? Do you dislike seeing the same character in multiple games or do you don't mind?
  • Would you like to see larger game areas and have the possibility of exploring these areas to your hearts content?
  • How important is a good looking environment for you?
  • What's your favorite game of all time? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)
  • Which game had the best gameplay in your opinion? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)
  • Which game was the most impressive from a purely visual standpoint? (Let's stick to regular games here please)
  • What is the answer to the question of life, the universe, and everything?

That shall be it for now, i'm eager to hear your feedback and to see if that thread will lead us somewhere.
All the best.

 

[Avaron1974]

• (Directed at Players & Game-Devs) Another thing i noticed is that players and developers sometimes seem disconnected from another. Often times when i read a thread about a game i stumble upon players who provide their honest feedback (good feedback without flame) or request certain features but way to often this feedback is either rejected with the words "If you don't like it, don't play it" or it goes completely ignored because the developer itself is either not active on F95 or simply just don't care.
  I know that some developers are not particular happy about F95 but ignoring it will lead to nothing, if you engage in the community you can show your passion about your project and who knows it might resonate with someone who then decides to support you directly.

A number of reasons behind this. More often than not it's because people request something that takes the game in a direction the dev doesn't want to go. If something will make a dev stop caring about their own work they aren't exactly going to add it to their game.

I've seen people ask to have incest added to games where the dev doesn't like incest. He said no repeatedly and said if he did add it then the scenes would be shit because he doesn't like the subject and he'd probably end up abandoning it because that's not what he wanted to make.

As a player i'm here to play games the developers produce not a collection of terrible ideas by random forum dwellers. The big problem is everyone thinks their idea is great but very, very few of them actually are.

There are also a lot of devs that are making the game they want to make, telling the story they want to tell. Those are the games I want to play.

 

[Carpe Stultus]

I think a lot of the Ren'Py games are made with it because a lot of people refuse to play anything else than Ren'Py games. There are very often complains if developers use something like Unity.

- I don't mind deeper stories with less sex, but the story has to be good otherwhise i get bored pretty fast...ok even with a ton of sex i get bored if the game overall is garbage.

- Nah i don't need common gameplay in these games here. If i want gameplay like Mass Effect i'll just go and play that instead, i honestly enjoy it to just have to read and click and nothing more.

- Good or bad main character? Doesn't matter it has to work with the story and honestly most MC's of the games i've played would be considered bad guys if they would do the stuff they do in the game in real life.

- I don't think its necessary that porn games get a full on character customizing option. It would be so much more work for the dev's and the complains about slow updates with little content would grow extremly.

- I don't mind if a dev takes standard DAZ models and the top games have customized models anyway.

- Nope i don't need lager game areas and i don't want to stroll around in them because there will be a lack of content, which shows already in most standard sandbox games.

- A good looking environment makes the whole game better, but it is not the most important part of a game for me.

- I don't have a favourite game of all times, i have too many favourite games to name them here.

- Also no answer because there are a lot of games that have a very good gameplay.

- It might have not the most impressive visuals by todays standards but when Far Cry came out it was amazing.

Spoiler: Meaning of Life

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Ok its not the meaning of life for Avaron1974 but you'll understand what i mean. ^^

 

[OpenNSFW]

The main reason why people use rpgmaker / ren'py money and ease of use. You have keep in mind that you are starting with nothing and you most likely won't be the next Icstor or whomever. People want to build on actual content as fast as possible rather then focus on learning an engine. Most developers would even rather use Ren'py then rpgmaker but rpgmaker has a much lower bar. Even now there are like 3 BIG NAMES in porn games remastering the game they spent years later because they never wanted to stop producing content in order to do so.
Also, people like ren'py because of android is a surprisingly big thing still.

I do agree with your sentiments though.

My personal problem is that developers are not willing to even look around for models. They will just grab what they can get there hands on easily. So we see hundreds of games with the exact same dead eyed model. Meanwhile communities such as rule 34 animator/model creators who have 1000s of models where the artists are begging to be used. Drives me nuts.

 

[vir_cotto]

First of all - don't like Unity or UE4 adult games because they're almost always terribly optimized.

• Would you like to have deeper stories with sex-scenes who rather act as a side-activity instead of being the main focus?

Yes. That's the only thing I play, tbh.

• Would you like to see more common gameplay approaches like having First Person or Third Person games, something in the line of Mass Effect or The Witcher?

Sure. But how can (mostly) solo dev pull that kind of game? Not even established teams with a few devs like LewdLab would be able to do that.

• Do you prefer a god or a bad protagonist as the main character?

I can't play bad guys and I don't even try that anymore.

• How about Character Customization? Going a bit further how about NPC Customization, settings presets (small boobs, big boobs, thick, thin etc.) for the characters you will meet throughout the game (in a non-spoiler way ofc).

Yes, would be nice, but not really important. I doubt will see that - same as with question 2. Only one game that I know with simple customization is My Strange Sis.

• Since most developers use DAZ for their characters, how important are custom DAZ characters for you? Do you dislike seeing the same character in multiple games or do you don't mind?

As long as the story is good, I don't mind.

• Would you like to see larger game areas and have the possibility of exploring these areas to your hearts content?
Same as previous.

• How important is a good looking environment for you?

It is important. I don't mind recycled interiors and exteriors, but a nice background is always appealing to me. I wasn't sure what was in HS assets that bothers me so much and then I finally got it: that sickly yellow-ish backgrounds. So, now I only play HS games that put some work in their scenery.

• What's your favorite game of all time?

Planescape: Torment, everything by Black Isle/Obsidian, everything by Bioware till ME1 and DAO (both included) - basically all good RPGs. Adult game: Divi Dead.

• Which game had the best gameplay in your opinion?

Elder Scroll series and Fallout series because you really feel like part of that world. But, basically, the title of the best is changing with every new game.

• Which game was the most impressive from a purely visual standpoint?
Every new game looks better than the old one. But let's talk about our adult games here. Wicked Choices, BaDIK, DeLuca Family, City of Broken Dreamers... They look amazing!

• What is the answer to the question of life, the universe, and everything?

42

 

[anne O'nymous]

I don't know why we restrain ourself, maybe some of you can enlighten me.

It's simple, around 75% of the authors never wrote a single line of code before starting their game. And for the other 25%, the majority did it for their pleasure. If most of them use RPG Maker or Ren'py, it's because they can use it, contrarily to the other engines. That's why "we" restrain ourselves...
Without those two, easy to use, engines 90% of the games we actually have wouldn't have existed, including the bests of them. Simply because their authors wouldn't have been able to make them.

[...] request certain features but way to often this feedback is either rejected with the words "If you don't like it, don't play it" [...]

Honestly, would have I been a game author, that I would have answered exactly the same thing. It's to you to adapt to the game the author want to make, not to the author to adapt to your desires.

• Would you like to have deeper stories with sex-scenes who rather act as a side-activity instead of being the main focus?

Half of the games already are this. Few are effectively well wrote, but still, the age of pure grind corruption games start to fade. More and more games now focus on the story, we just need better writers for them.

• Would you like to see more common gameplay approaches like having First Person or Third Person games, something in the line of Mass Effect or The Witcher?

I tend to dislike this kind of approach for adult games. I can pass hours playing a Fallout or The Elder Scrolls title with adult mods, but it's because the mods add something to what is already an interesting environment. But what this kind of game can give if they are initially wrote as adult games ? Nothing really interesting, they are just a sex simulator and, whatever how deep the story can be, in the end it's rarely more than a background, when not just a pretext.

• Do you prefer a god or a bad protagonist as the main character?

I don't care as long as the MC is interesting and isn't bad just for the pleasure to be bad or for the pleasure to be a jerk. If you give me a MC who go full rampage to avenge the death of his loved ones, I'll not care this much. But if you give me a MC who's just a bad guy because he wanted to be it, they I'll not play it ; among other reasons, because the story is generally stupid in the few games who choose this approach.

• How about Character Customization? Going a bit further how about NPC Customization, settings presets (small boobs, big boobs, thick, thin etc.) for the characters you will meet throughout the game (in a non-spoiler way ofc).

I don't really care... No, in fact I prefer not. In the end the girls would all look alike. I prefer the real life approach, being surprised by the author choice and learning to like a girl for this or that particularity, than trying to define the girl as I would like her.

• Since most developers use DAZ for their characters, how important are custom DAZ characters for you? Do you dislike seeing the same character in multiple games or do you don't mind?

I dislike only one Daz Character, the MC of Big Brother ; it's stronger than me, I can't see it without wanting to punch his face with a brick. But I don't really bother me for the others. Sometimes it's even what save a game for me, the fact that one of the character remind me of a game I like.
I doesn't mean that I don't like custom character, just that I don't care this much.

• Would you like to see larger game areas and have the possibility of exploring these areas to your hearts content?

I would like, but there should have something interesting coming from this exploration. And by "something interesting" I mean something else than random encounter with random girls, that will lead to random sex scenes, or find a needed item/solving a mandatory quest.
Said otherwise, unless you've a team of 200 persons helping you to design, write and populate a game area that look in the side of The Elder Scroll or Fallout, forget about this.

• How important is a good looking environment for you?

It's pleasant, but I don't care this much.

• What's your favorite game of all time? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)

Difficult to answer, there's too many of them and all for different reason. Plus the answer wouldn't help you. I mean, I could name Day of the Tentacle among them by example, or the first Half Life, or even the first Baldur Gate, they are both parts of my favorites and I replay them time to time. But it's a question of feeling and memories, more than anything else ; it's what make something your "favorite", not the effective interest you can initially have for it.

• Which game had the best gameplay in your opinion? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)

Still waiting to find it, and I play games since a little less than 40 years. I can names some that have the worse one that I ever seen, but there isn't one that have the best one. They all have default, to which you can adapt, but to which you have to adapt.

• Which game was the most impressive from a purely visual standpoint? (Let's stick to regular games here please)

Wolfenstein 3D, then Doom (the original, not the remake), then Half Life. After this, not a single game amazed me visually speaking. Some are really great, but they are just what we can expect for a nowadays game. Nothing that can impress, contrarily to the three I named, that were totally unexpected and effectively impressive.

• What is the answer to the question of life, the universe, and everything?

Still waiting to be sure that it's was the question.

First of all - don't like Unity or UE4 adult games because they're almost always terribly optimized.

Agree. When you see that a game like The Twist, have some freeze while still being basic with 3D models that are far to be really detailed, there's a problem.
And this when they aren't also shitty done. I obviously forgot the names since, but there's two/three Unity games I tried to play when I still had a 4/3 monitor... And the games didn't cares of my screen ratio, trying to fit their 16/9 screen on my 4/3 monitor, without success obviously.

• Would you like to see more common gameplay approaches like having First Person or Third Person games, something in the line of Mass Effect or The Witcher?

Sure. But how can (mostly) solo dev pull that kind of game? Not even established teams with a few devs like LewdLab would be able to do that.

There's few attempt, but as far as my memory don't betray me, only one (abandoned - a tale of forgotten lives) have been finished, while 90% haven't been updated since 6 months or more. Like you said, it need a team for this kind of games, and it's also a full time job, you can't do it in your free time.
Well, to be fair you can, M Velesk, who make Total Seduction among other games, achieve to do it. But the cost is a bugged game and a really low quality for the 3D ; but well, at least the game is entertaining.

 

[DawnCry]

• Would you like to have deeper stories with sex-scenes who rather act as a side-activity instead of being the main focus?

Both can work, it just depends on the game focus.

• Would you like to see more common gameplay approaches like having First Person or Third Person games, something in the line of Mass Effect or The Witcher?

It doesn't truly matter to me, I like both.

• Do you prefer a good or a bad protagonist as the main character?

I usually play in games as the bad one, but in games with sex I prefer to be the good one or neutral.

• How about Character Customization? Going a bit further how about NPC Customization, settings presets (small boobs, big boobs, thick, thin etc.) for the characters you will meet throughout the game (in a non-spoiler way ofc).

Too much work to tell you the truth, I prefer that characters are what they are, focus that effort in more content.

• Since most developers use DAZ for their characters, how important are custom DAZ characters for you? Do you dislike seeing the same character in multiple games or do you don't mind?

It gets boring seeing the same character over and over.

• Would you like to see larger game areas and have the possibility of exploring these areas to your hearts content?

Not a fan of exploring just for the sake of it.

• How important is a good looking environment for you?

Well... I won't die if I don't have it.

• What's your favorite game of all time? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)

This is a hard one... in the lewd side I would guess it's kichikuou rance, on the regular game side there is a lot more of competition, my top 3 would be dragon age origins, the witcher and baldur's gate.

• Which game had the best gameplay in your opinion? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)

Kamidori alchemy meister for lewd and the witcher for regular.

• Which game was the most impressive from a purely visual standpoint? (Let's stick to regular games here please)

The witcher 3 is quite a visual feast, especially in some locations.

• What is the answer to the question of life, the universe, and everything?

Life is meant so that it tries to achieve inmortality, the current concept of inmortality lacks a will and that's why life exists. That's why we fear death, because it's the ultimate failure in what we were meant to achieve.

 

[Emoon]

First off all thank you all for your feedback so far! But i feel like i need to clarify two things.

I'm not trying to create the next big hit or some form of game changer here! I also want you to not care about the question if something would be way to hard to pull off for one or a small team of developers. We all know pulling off a lewd game in the scope of a AAA game would be way to heavy. The questions that i asked at the end of the post are solely there to get a feel for your preferences in games and not something i have planed.

I've seen people ask to have incest added to games where the dev doesn't like incest. He said no repeatedly and said if he did add it then the scenes would be shit because he doesn't like the subject and he'd probably end up abandoning it because that's not what he wanted to make.

Honestly, would have I been a game author, that I would have answered exactly the same thing. It's to you to adapt to the game the author want to make, not to the author to adapt to your desires.

I probably should've been a bit more precise on this one. I'm fully with the both of you, asking to add or change the genre of a game is a no go and if a dev then says "Don't play it if you don't like it" i more than cool with it. But i've seen this response to a lot of minor feature requests too, something like "can we get an inventory screen" or "can you enable the auto/skip function) and so on.

I think a lot of the Ren'Py games are made with it because a lot of people refuse to play anything else than Ren'Py games. There are very often complains if developers use something like Unity.

And i'd REALLY like to know why?! Is it because of reputation, hardware requirements or something else.
Thanks for your feedback and i don't mind you last answer in fact it gave me a good chuckle. So thanks for that!

The main reason why people use rpgmaker / ren'py money and ease of use. You have keep in mind that you are starting with nothing and you most likely won't be the next Icstor or whomever. People want to build on actual content as fast as possible rather then focus on learning an engine. Most developers would even rather use Ren'py then rpgmaker but rpgmaker has a much lower bar. Even now there are like 3 BIG NAMES in porn games remastering the game they spent years later because they never wanted to stop producing content in order to do so.
Also, people like ren'py because of android is a surprisingly big thing still.

I do agree with your sentiments though.

My personal problem is that developers are not willing to even look around for models. They will just grab what they can get there hands on easily. So we see hundreds of games with the exact same dead eyed model. Meanwhile communities such as rule 34 animator/model creators who have 1000s of models where the artists are begging to be used. Drives me nuts.

First of all - don't like Unity or UE4 adult games because they're almost always terribly optimized.

It's simple, around 75% of the authors never wrote a single line of code before starting their game. And for the other 25%, the majority did it for their pleasure. If most of them use RPG Maker or Ren'py, it's because they can use it, contrarily to the other engines. That's why "we" restrain ourselves...
Without those two, easy to use, engines 90% of the games we actually have wouldn't have existed, including the bests of them. Simply because their authors wouldn't have been able to make them.

And here is the gist of why i started this thread. I'd like to avoid dropping names or bad examples so let's just say every single game on here is shit (even tho it's clearly not the case).

I feel like "we're" all lazy bastards who stick with what's been there for ages just to avoid any form of effort and while we make no effort to change anything we miss a shit ton of opportunities that could save US time and produce better results. For example, there is a game (quite a popular one with really good rendered images) that uses Unity, but instead of using Unity's full potential it still rolls with images rendered in an offline-renderer. That's like living in huge ass mansion but only staying in the basement.

The reason why i ask about Character Customization or if you mind seeing the same Characters over and over is because of the easy way to alter Characters with a realtime engine. DAZ Morphs can be imported into Unity or Unreal and then be used to modify certain body parts for instance, facial morphs are a bit more complex and i wouldn't go that far since you can end up quickly with results like in ME:Andromeda pre 1.05 patch. But nonetheless it would add a layer of artistic freedom and help to stand out under all those Big Brother MC's (btw. i fully agree with you here anne O'nymous ).

I don't know, it might be because of the niche this genre serves or myself who comes from a larger background where efficient solutions are a requirement. But when i see people complaining about long ass render times in DAZ while they could have almost instant results who look pretty much the same if not better in a realtime renderer (see examples in my main post above), it drives me nuts. And all it would require is a little effort to get a proper workflow up and running.
If i think about the cinematic tools inside the UE4 who are a bloody godsend for anyone who wants to make a VN. One could create 100+ scenes in a couple of hours instead of waiting a couple of months for 100+ renders to finish. And it's not like that these features aren't well documented, on the contrary.

Ok to be fair i do understand that coding is a huge roadblock for many developers, setting up a base VN framework is certainly not the most basic task to accomplish especially not for beginners. And i honestly have no clue how i could convince someone that it would be worth the time spent, other than saying you do it once and everything else after it will be much quicker to iterate upon. :/ Would it make a difference for anyone of you if you had a ready-to-use template for let's say the UE4?

Last but not least the optimization part vir_cotto mentioned.
Yes! Unfortunately optimization is a part of game development a lot of devs seem to not care about at least in the hobbyist area. And i honestly gave up a long time ago to argue with a lot of them, if i hear one more time someone saying "It runs on my i7 with a 1080" i quit the interwebz forever.
But for those who are interested in optimizing their game, i'm willing to lend a hand at least for the UE4 (since it's my general weapon of choice) but also if need help with optimizing your meshes(models) or textures. Feel free to PM me.

EDIT:

Meanwhile communities such as rule 34 animator/model creators who have 1000s of models where the artists are begging to be used. Drives me nuts.

Totally forgot to weigh in on it. That's what i saw as well, there are a shit load of really good animators out there who do amazing short sequences but it's as rare as a Rockstar game to see them team up with game developers. A while ago i saw a video of someone doing a scene with Quiet and a horse and even tho i'm not really into such things i have to admit that the animation work was a piece of art. But not just outstanding animators do exist but also character artists and concept artist aren't exactly a rare sight. I do know a few concepters and character artists who would work on a lewd game (not full time tho) but they have been never approached by someone. I wonder why that is? Embarrassment to ask? Or are "we" to focused on one field?

Ok that should be it for now, i'm already writing too much again.
Thank you all for your feedback and interest in this topic, looking forward to see and hear more from you.

 

[anne O'nymous]

I probably should've been a bit more precise on this one. I'm fully with the both of you, asking to add or change the genre of a game is a no go and if a dev then says "Don't play it if you don't like it" i more than cool with it. But i've seen this response to a lot of minor feature requests too, something like "can we get an inventory screen" or "can you enable the auto/skip function) and so on.

Ok, from this point of view I agree with you. In fact I even relate since one dev told me (more gently) to go fuck myself when I tried to help him with his code.
For me there's two reasons behind this. Obviously there's a part played by the author's ego, like in my example, but there's also the way to ask for it. I gave some advice or provided some help to many dev here, and each time I'm confronted to the same problem : How to express this without making the dev think that I'm saying that his code is shit ?
The same apply when you ask for this or that. If there's no inventory (to keep one of your examples), it's either because the dev thought that is wasn't necessary, or because he don't know how to do it. In both case, if you're too straight in your way to ask for it, you'll hurt dev's pride and have to deal with it.

And i'd REALLY like to know why?! Is it because of reputation, hardware requirements or something else.

The answer is simple, a lot of people tend to prefer Ren'py because of its extra features.

• There's the auto-advance, that let you pass quickly the boring part ;
• There's the skip feature, that let you pass what you've already seen when it's, yet a game that need to be restarted every two updates ;
• The same skip feature also help you catch the difference between two routes :
• There's the rollback, that let you play the game by using a trial and error approach ;
• There's the watch feature that let you survey the main variables, a great complement of the rollback ;
• They are easily modable, and many are modded, making them better than they actually are ;
• And obviously there's the console that let you cheat like a pig, make enjoyable some game that would have been plainly boring otherwise.

In addition to this, it's an engine with 15 years of experience behind it and still in development. It don't prevent bugs and glitch, but there's less than if the dev would have had to both write the core of his game and the game itself, like it's often the case with Unity or Unreal. Take what I talked about regarding the Unity games that didn't cared that my monitor ratio was 4:3. It can't happen with Ren'py, because it's something that was wrote by an experienced dev and tested again and again each time someone played a Ren'py's game. So, it's something that will works fine or that will be quickly fixed if suddenly it don't works with new hardware.

I feel like "we're" all lazy bastards who stick with what's been there for ages just to avoid any form of effort and while we make no effort to change anything we miss a shit ton of opportunities that could save US time and produce better results.

I totally disagree. It's an observation made on a too short period of time, and that isn't even effectively true.
When I started to play adult games, they were either games made by XXX porn studio, or Japaneses RPG with porn inside. In both case, they were made by professional studio able to make either porn and none porn games. Then, XXX porn studio where strike by internet and didn't had the money to continue make games, while the Japanese production mostly stopped being exported outside of Japan. Therefore, came the time of shitty flash games that where all the same.
And now (since few years) it start to rise again, with games that are effectively games, like Sakura Dungeon, Long Live the Princess or Damsels and Dragons, by example, or stories that are effectively stories. All aren't good games, but they are clearly different from the rest of the production.

For example, there is a game (quite a popular one with really good rendered images) that uses Unity, but instead of using Unity's full potential it still rolls with images rendered in an offline-renderer.

Er... which one ? The only game that I know that is both popular, use Unity and use pre-rendered image is Big Brother. But the quality of the rendering is far to be good, so it should be another one.
But, once again we fall on what I said from the start. The adult scene isn't anymore ran by professional developers, they are the playground of indies studios that most of the time have one member only. The game is like this because it's as far as it author knowledge go. Take The Twist by example. The game started with static real time rendered image, then slowly introduced the possibility to change the position of the camera. Now there's also real time rendered animations. We see the dev's knowledge improving with the time. But this isn't something that anyone can do. Coding isn't just a question of knowledge, it's also a state of mind, and like it's not everybody that can become a great writer or a great painter, it's not everybody that can become able to code a game.

Ok to be fair i do understand that coding is a huge roadblock for many developers, setting up a base VN framework is certainly not the most basic task to accomplish especially not for beginners. And i honestly have no clue how i could convince someone that it would be worth the time spent, other than saying you do it once and everything else after it will be much quicker to iterate upon. :/ Would it make a difference for anyone of you if you had a ready-to-use template for let's say the UE4?

You can't convice someone that it would be worth the time, because it's not the problem. I talked with enough devs to know that it fall more on the confidence side, when it's not just a question of time. I've seen devs call me genius for things I see as pure basis, while other said things like, "Oh, it's as simple as this ?".
For some reason, they have a latent fear when it come to write code. They see it as some kind of magic that only initiate know about. And all this with Ren'py, so while I'm not against the idea of a ready-to-use template, coming with it wouldn't save the problem, just move it. They'll be as stuck with the said template that they are with Ren'py, which is finally just an advanced template over PyGame.
It's not that it's strictly impossible, but you need to pass month talking individually with each dev to achieve it. This knowing that half of the time you'll fail. Not because the said dev isn't smart enough, but because he isn't made to code.

 

[Hadley]

In a perfect World I obviously would want Witcher 3 as a Lewdgame, but thats not going to happen unless a Billionaire hires a 500 people Devteam to make a Game like that.

Since pretty much all Games have barely any budget I always like when Devs focus on Story and Writing. I see no point in adding much "Gameplay" into a Game because that mostly ends up being some very simple Mini-Games or RPG Mechanics that don't add much to the Game. I also don't need absolute perfect 4K Renders, they are nice but I prefer good Writing and a Story that makes sense over it.

I see lots of these Sandbox Games lately, but the Sandbox part really does not add anything to the Game. Its pretty much always just clicking through different Backgrounds until you find the next Event.

I play these Games for choice-based Romance-Stories I can't get anywhere else. If I want Gameplay I play my modded Skyrim or Sims.

 

[Carpe Stultus]

...And i'd REALLY like to know why?! Is it because of reputation, hardware requirements or something else.
Thanks for your feedback and i don't mind you last answer in fact it gave me a good chuckle. So thanks for that! ...

Well first of all its probably because of the hardware requirements but its also that you have a lot of games with other engines that are lagging like crazy even on PC's that are not out of the 19th century. Then you have this beautiful rollback function and the easy console usage to cheat. I for my part don't mind Unity and some of the others but i have to admit that Ren'Py has its pro's compared to other engines...besides RPGM.

Thats what i was aiming for with the last answer so you are welcome.

 

[Domiek]

Only want to answer regarding devs using Ren'Py or RPGM. We're devs in name only. Most of us don't have the background education or work experience to be considered game developers. Most of us can't 3D model or can only model rudimentary things, definitely not figures.

Because of these limitations, the scope of games are also limited. You have similar slice of life games because the asset marketplace caters to this. It's no coincidence that 2D art games cover a larger variety of stories and settings, despite also using rpgm or renpy.

Now I for one would love to put in a year and learn blender to an ok level. Or even to move on to pro development tools. However, we are not game developers.

We have full time jobs and family commitments. These games are our expensive and time consuming hobbies. If you're already making a game, you're also limited by how much time you can take to learn new software or techniques because the community is sending you DMs saying "update when?".

 

[Captain Kitty]

As a gamer before creating games, unity was slow and easily crashed with an old PC. That's why I chose renpy.
I checked about blending Daz into Unity. I'm not good even at Daz. And I saw some people said it's hard for clothes, etc...
If people who are good at codes, technique... write posts about those stuff, I will be very appreciated. At the moment, I can't even make an android version from renpy. LOL

 

[Zippity]

Hey fellow F95ers,



i'd like to start a little conversation about the "direction" of the adult-gaming genre.
Don't worry i'm not here to judge your kink or something like that. No i want to talk with you as player and also with developers around here about the "direction" of the adult-gaming genre. A round-table between players and developers if you will.

Let me explain a bit what i actually mean with all that gibberish up there.
I've joined this community almost exactly two years ago and i like it here, however over the two years i noticed a few things that made me sad think:

• (Directed at Game-Devs) The very first thing is the lack of advancement. 8 out of 10 games are either RenPy VN's or GameMaker RPG's.
  Now don't get me wrong, i got nothing but love for everyone who creates games with those solutions and no doubt every once in a while we get extremely solid projects who were made with RenPy or RPGM. But unfortunately it doesn't change the fact that we stagnate, both in terms of general game-design and in terms of technical progression.
  
  I know game development mostly consists of copying "Project X" and then slightly change it to "Project Y" (sry for the lack of a better explanation) but too many games here follow a certain paradigm that seems to be set in stone, be it from a story perspective or from a design perspective.
  Sure it's easy to create a story around a young boy in a city or household full of submissive women but it get's dull pretty fast especially if your "competition" does the same (just as an example, it's not directed towards anyone or anything). Creating rich and interesting stories doesn't mean that we have to double down on the sexual content, nor is it a thing exclusive to all the non-sexual themed games out there. I'm sure we have more than enough outstanding story writers around here.
  
  From a technical/design standpoint we're stuck as well. We have a wide array of outstanding game engines at our hands who offer almost endless possibilities but we prefer to waste hours with waiting for our single-shot frames to finish rendering (Arr shit i forgot to hide that clothing part, well here we go again).
  I've seen only a handful of games who actually made full or at least good use of an offline-renderer in the past two years.
  I'm sure most of you follow the major game-engine developers out there, so i don't need to explain that the difference between an offline-renderer and realtime is minimal these days (for the majority of our needs at least).
  We are able to do amazing
  You must be registered to see the links
  (Project for free available in the sidebar) or
  You must be registered to see the links
  that stands its ground against offline-renders. Sure it's not a "drop in and be done with it" solution like in DAZ but getting your character from DAZ to Unity or UE4
  You must be registered to see the links
  and h
  You must be registered to see the links
  countless times before. If we support each other with the migration process from DAZ to EngineXYZ we are able to establish a proper and easy to use/follow workflow, even for someone who is totally new to it.
  
  I don't know why we restrain ourself, maybe some of you can enlighten me.
  
  
  
• (Directed at Players & Game-Devs) Another thing i noticed is that players and developers sometimes seem disconnected from another. Often times when i read a thread about a game i stumble upon players who provide their honest feedback (good feedback without flame) or request certain features but way to often this feedback is either rejected with the words "If you don't like it, don't play it" or it goes completely ignored because the developer itself is either not active on F95 or simply just don't care.
  I know that some developers are not particular happy about F95 but ignoring it will lead to nothing, if you engage in the community you can show your passion about your project and who knows it might resonate with someone who then decides to support you directly.
  
  BUT i don't want to blame just the developers here, also players need to understand a few things. It's not uncommon that i see players who ask for a certain feature that would totally change the direction of the game or questions about certain design decisions. The always famous question about NTR comes to mind. You have to understand that every game, be it a lewd game or regular game, has predefined boundaries. Boundaries like the general theme, story, mechanics, world-design etc. and changing one of those boundaries almost always leads to a fail. Try to suggest additions and not radical changes.
  
  
  
• (Directed at Players but Devs should read) That's the part that interest me the most.
  What would you like to see in upcoming games? Please feel free to ignore any worries about scope or possible technical limitations. But also keep in mind that this is not about a certain kink that you feel is underrepresented, let's talk purely game and tech here.
  If you can't think about something straight out of your head let me give you some questions that you can answer or take as an entry point.
  
  
  • Would you like to have deeper stories with sex-scenes who rather act as a side-activity instead of being the main focus?
  • Would you like to see more common gameplay approaches like having First Person or Third Person games, something in the line of Mass Effect or The Witcher?
  • Do you prefer a god or a bad protagonist as the main character?
  • How about Character Customization? Going a bit further how about NPC Customization, settings presets (small boobs, big boobs, thick, thin etc.) for the characters you will meet throughout the game (in a non-spoiler way ofc).
  • Since most developers use DAZ for their characters, how important are custom DAZ characters for you? Do you dislike seeing the same character in multiple games or do you don't mind?
  • Would you like to see larger game areas and have the possibility of exploring these areas to your hearts content?
  • How important is a good looking environment for you?
  • What's your favorite game of all time? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)
  • Which game had the best gameplay in your opinion? (You can name a lewd game or a regular game)
  • Which game was the most impressive from a purely visual standpoint? (Let's stick to regular games here please)
  • What is the answer to the question of life, the universe, and everything?

That shall be it for now, i'm eager to hear your feedback and to see if that thread will lead us somewhere.
All the best.

First off, great conversation starter... It hits on several key points, that for us who've been reading/playing these things for a long while, there are moments and trends that seem to percolate throughout this niche genre's spectrum...

With regards to Players and Readers, one of the issue with regards to feedback and other forms of input, regardless if it's on this website, or the literal dozens of other similar sites, boils down to the numbers... The sheer numbers of people playing and/or reading the visual novels and games, found in this niche of the overall porn market, is staggeringly high... Yet, the percentage of those folks who speak up, write reviews, give feedback, speak up on fan sites, payout donations, is extremely low... Most folks are very private about playing and/or reading these things, and you'll never hear from them, ever... A small percentage actually join as members on the available websites that contain these projects for download... A tiny number of folks speak up now and then, but not on a regular basis... A miniscule number of folks are highly opinionated, and usually are only looking out for their own needs, and to hell with anyone else's ideas and opinions... And a super tiny miniscule amount of the overall readers/players regularly write reviews, give opinions, join in on conversations, and so on...

That last group is actually split into several camps, which is innately a biproduct of the social media age, sadly (one of the reasons I'm not a fan of social media in general)… Some camps are fanatical in their protection of a given product and not very open minded about criticism... Some camps just want to masturbate and really are just interested in increasing the quality and quantity of the porn aspect... Some camps want to be entertained with a good mix of high quality story and erotic sexual content... Some camps want well told story, and some could care less about a well told story... The list goes on and on... And the types of input they give, also varies from person to person... What is sad though, is that the camps who are more selfish about their own personal needs and desires, have a tendency to be more boisterous in places like this one... Artificially creating a sense that they are in the majority... Which then sometimes negatively effects some projects, where the developers actually are listening in, and may be easily influenced by their input, especially when they are new at it... As this is primarily an Amateur Developer driven market...

Because the numbers of folks giving any form of input, are so super small, when compared to the number of readers and players out there as a whole, you will never really get a complete picture, of how well some products are truly doing... Especially in the current sea of western developed visual novels and/or games... A sea that is in constant fluctuation, not only in quantity, but also in quality...

As to the topic of developers... The problem with this being a primarily amateur developer driven market, is that it's systemic of it's culture... There are so many folks out there that have all these ideas in their heads... And typically those ideas are inspired by the VN/Games they've liked and/or tried... You then add in the ease of how Ren'py (and others like RPGM) is designed, along with free utilities liked Daz3D, and then throw in the hacked utilities like Honey Select and others... Yes, some of those utilities require a little bit of skill to use, but there are many free tutorials and videos, along with other folks who are willing to pass on their knowledge, on how to use these utilities... Also, add in sites like Patreon and others, who offer up a platform that easily handles the money side of donations...

All these things added together, culminate in an epic ton of folks trying to put their ideas (good and bad) into this market... And here we are... A niche market full of varying qualities... A niche market full of constant new products... A niche market of a few big hitters, a marginal number of ok products, a bunch of mediocre products, and a plethora of poor products... Many of which will never reach completion, and/or end up getting hastily (and poorly) finished in order to go onto another idea... Some developers have so many ideas in their heads, they just can't wait to get them out there, and end up working on more then one project at a time, or sadly rush through production on one or all their projects... Even the motivations can have a real effect on quality... Some are just in it for the money, some are in it for the art, some are in it for an ego boost, some are in it to full fill a dream, some are in it to experiment, some are in it because they were inspired, some are in it to be unique, and the list goes on... Even developers attitudes vary, where some are open minded, some are close minded, some are overly defensive, some are ambivalent, some love all input, some are easily influenced, some stick to their guns, and again, the list goes on...

Sadly for the readers/players, it's a highly complex mess... Yes, players and readers have had some influence now and then... But this market is primarily driven by the Amateur Developers themselves, and not the masses of folks who play/read their products and give input... Why else do we have so many copy cats, developers riding on the coat tails of other projects, and a general lack of originality... Sure, now and then some of those rip offs do better then their predecessors... But it's usually the opposite... And yes, some donating fans can have some, or perhaps even too much influence, sometimes, on a given project... But for folks who are fairly new and haven't been around as long, playing and reading these things, they may not see, yet, how many unoriginal ideas, concepts, and themes are actually out there... But for us folks who've tried hundreds of these things, and been around for some of the key moments in this market's evolution, we see and experiences most of these trends... With some trends that fluctuate now and then, but usually not by much...

As to your questions:

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Zip

 

[Zippity]

Since pretty much all Games have barely any budget I always like when Devs focus on Story and Writing. I see no point in adding much "Gameplay" into a Game because that mostly ends up being some very simple Mini-Games or RPG Mechanics that don't add much to the Game. I also don't need absolute perfect 4K Renders, they are nice but I prefer good Writing and a Story that makes sense over it.


I play these Games for choice-based Romance-Stories I can't get anywhere else. If I want Gameplay I play my modded Skyrim or Sims.

I'm definitely not a fan of Mini-Games either... I think that they are probably added by some developers because they like Smartphone Games... I actually hate most games on mobile devices... And not just because they are over simplified, but because most are designed around micro-transactions (a blight on the gaming industry)… And most mini-games I run across feel out of place, dumb, and pointless...

Same thing when Final Fantasy style combat is in an Erotic/Adult VN/Game... It feels mostly like a waste of my time, that pointlessly and unnecessarily prolongs the time investment into a VN/Game... Usually detracting from the product more then boosting it... This trend started with some Japanese Visual Novels/Games and has somehow weaseled it's way into the western market... Same thing with X-Ray visuals, which for me just takes away from the sexiness of a scene/event... Sometimes it even looks so gross, as to be a complete turn-off... I typically quit a VN/Game when I run into the X-Ray non-sense...

As to choice-based Romance Stories, I'm a sucker for well told romance stories, even if story isn't the main focus of the VN/Game...

Zip

 

[CarbonBlue]

I get the desire for games to innovate, but you have to remember, even the AAA-gaming scene doesn't innovate. FIFA, Madden, Call of Duty, Battlefield, etc, etc. Innovating and pushing forward usually requires money, which a lot of us creators don't have. What's more, it's quite a risk, as people often say they want innovation, but then they do things like give the new Aladdin movie almost $90 million in the opening weekend.

 

[whiskeyrose]

I feel like "we're" all lazy bastards who stick with what's been there for ages just to avoid any form of effort and while we make no effort to change anything we miss a shit ton of opportunities that could save US time and produce better results.

This is where the earlier comment really hits home.

It's simple, around 75% of the authors never wrote a single line of code before starting their game. And for the other 25%, the majority did it for their pleasure. If most of them use RPG Maker or Ren'py, it's because they can use it, contrarily to the other engines. That's why "we" restrain ourselves...

Most of us lewd game developers got started because we had a fetish or game content we wanted to see, that didn't exist. Using myself as an example, I had a fantasy of wanting to have impregnation sex with all the pornstars I thought were hot. That game didn't exist so I took a stab at it with my own projects (from my signature).

But I'm not a programmer, aside from some very basic training I learned everything from google and help docs. Anyone who looks at the spaghetti code behind my projects will see I'm just flying by the seat of my pants. I'm sure 90% of the devs programming education came from the renpy tutorial more than anything else. The idea of coding something in unity, or god forbid unreal is just a downright impossibility. So yes, renpy, RPGMaker, and in my case, Twine is easy to use and comfortable, which is why its used.

Another thing to consider is the development time and effort it takes to make a lewd game. Motivation just drains so fast on projects. You spend hours upon hours coding scenes, and at the end of the day you can't even fap to it because you made the goddamn thing. Very often you learn back in your chair and look at whatever kind of smut you're working on and ask yourself "What the fuck am I doing?".

 

[Emoon]

I'm currently clocked-up with that shitty RL stuff we all have to endure so i can't get back to you guys, but i will for sure! Nonetheless i want you to know that i'm really grateful for all your responses so far, it helped a lot to put things into perspective for me.

Also, i want you to know that i blame no one of you for doing this as a hobby or for not having the time to dive deeper into it. The real world and especially family should always come first!

 

[Joshua Tree]

I get the desire for games to innovate, but you have to remember, even the AAA-gaming scene doesn't innovate. FIFA, Madden, Call of Duty, Battlefield, etc, etc. Innovating and pushing forward usually requires money, which a lot of us creators don't have. What's more, it's quite a risk, as people often say they want innovation, but then they do things like give the new Aladdin movie almost $90 million in the opening weekend.

That's all about money though. You find a recipe for success and you keep repeat it and give the masses what they want until they don't... Can't say latest Battlefield ended up a smash success at the stock market. But you can't really fault the industry to much in this regard, because the money required to create new games ip these days is staggering and very few like the idea of a fluke. The gaming industry is in process of devour itself with games as live service etc. Still there is rays of hope with the likes of CDPRRED and their upcoming Cyberpunk etc.

 

[Ataios]

When it comes to elements of regular games in porn games, I think, demanding that, would be unrealistic, comparing the resources available to porn game developers and those available to regular game developers. A sandbox or open world porn game with free exploration would be fine, but so would be traveling with the speed of light. It just wont happen.

Even if it were possible, though, I still think, porn games function different from regular games. While it would be nice, if they had epic storylines like regular games, difficulty and time requirements are different matter. Regular games in most cases should provide a certain level of challenge, while porn games shouldn't. You play a porn game to fap after all, not to brag about beating the secret boss. For similar reasons, turning your mom and aunt into submissive sex dolls in a porn game should not take as much time as crafting a legendary great sword in an MMORPG.

As far as protagonists go, I usually favor evil protagonists. Romance among kind-hearted people is for real life and regular games. Porn games carter to darker fetishes and therefore to more evil characters. My absolute favorite are dominant evil female characters, but only, if they can be played 100% lesbian.

Character customization should be nice, but again, let's be realistic. A character creation system like in Aion or Black Desert Online will not be available in any porn game at any time, the exception being mods for games like Sims that already have character customization. However, what I think, would be possible, is a sort of dress-up system, where you can choose character outfits, like in Lust and Power, where you can dress the mom as sexy maid. Many games would be much better with such a system, so this is really something developers should work an. In most cases, dressing up NPCs would be at least as or more interesting than dressing up the MC.

Another sort of limited character customization that greatly improves porn games, is the option to choose between two or more characters, often between a male and a female one. The best examples for this are After Invasion and Illuminati.