Missing link in adult games

[ItsEricBoi]

Most adult games don't contain any conflict; whether its with other characters or plot-wise. There is never anything to lose or a chance that your efforts can go to nothing. You'll always be able to get the girls and you can even skip all the dialogue up until the sex scenes to prove it.

I am not a fan of NTR, nor will I bitch about it, but it can be used to create conflict very easily as long as the foundation of character development is already there. This will automatically make you think about your decisions more and treat a relationship more realistically thus makes you more invested in the game. There are of course many ways to create conflict, but NTR is the most obvious way.

For example, Lancaster Boarding House, didn't have any conflict- you could pretty much screw who you wanted and the teacher wasn't there to stop you, nor was Jason. Since there was nothing to stop you from getting what you wanted, my immersion broke because real-life isn't like that.

Every story from every medium has some form of conflict and I am sure that if adult games had more cost involved for the player they would be more enjoyable.


I would like to hear your thoughts

 

[Winterfire]

It depends, not all games are meant to have conflict or should.

If you were playing a romance game and you were dating someone and then you could just do a full 180° and take another route like nothing happened, that would make you raise an eyebrow (reminds me of persona game).

If a game has harem or just occasional quick sex, having any conflict would be an annoyance... It could happen once or twice to spice things up, at most.

As for being able to skip dialogue, this is because visual novels are telling a story, perhaps a non kinetic one but a story regardless... It would be like reading a book but with more pictures and bobs.

 

[Avaron1974]

Not everyone is interested in conflict.

We have enough of that in real life, I play games to relax and enjoy a bit of romance and sex. I mainly play RPG's so it's not an issue but in the romance games I play I have been known to delete them when they throw in bullshit conflicts.

Example, a relationship is going great, both parties are happy and suddenly a random Joe appears and for some reason manages to shake up a solid relationship.

That sure sounds fun ..... no, wait, it's doesn't ... recycle bin for you.

 

[Winterfire]

Conflicts can be good tho, it happens all the time in tv shows and movies... It is one of the many ways to shake the story up a bit to avoid it being bland and boring.

I agree that, unless you love NTR, having a random Joe appearing is kind of no sense but conflicts can be many other things... Like forgetting her birthday, anniversary, doing a mistake, ignoring her (...)
In a visual novel where choices are given and matter, there could be obviously good choices and obviously bad choices and somewhere inbetween.

You could even have a game where all choices are "gray" but yeah, not all games need conflicts perhaps just story depth and realism that does not make the game less funny or frustrating to play.

 

[Xalenda]

It really depends on the conflict, personally. The games and stories I like to play do have conflicts within them, but they're never as obvious as a big flashing sign that says "DADDY ISSUES". It intrigues me more when there's the oft-interrupted side glance, or the nervous mumbling, or biting of the lower lip as they try to come up with a proper response to a question.

And conflict can be a bunch of things, not just another person added to a relationship to mix things up. It can be a person's inability to fall in love, having been heartbroken so many times before, until the PC starts to help and sex is just a natural reward for this kind of thing. It can also be a person's failing marriage, broken family, hatred for all things MAN or WOMAN related, racism, politics...

Just throwing a third person into the story to mess things up doesn't make a good conflict; you can have a better story with one character overcoming a singular internal conflict, than you could with eight characters defeating the Evil King.

 

[saintvermillion]

Both points of view are valid, people often do play games for that escape and aren't searching for conflict but a world where everything is a guaranteed win and for once to see everything go your way is satisfying. Should that be all there is though? I would hope not for the same reason people tend to enjoy playing poker more when some money is involved, there are real stakes at play and that makes things more interesting, more immersive and involves more emotional investment. Enjoyment from sex or fappage/fippage and the degree you're invested emotionally are heavily related.

That's why DMD and some of the better VNs storywise are so wildly popular, They spend enormous amounts of time building that emotional investment which makes the experiences 50x more satisfying.

 

[Xalenda]

Escapism aside - because games, books, music, art in pretty much every form are just various forms of ignoring the real world to focus on something imaginary - the guaranteed winning does have one significant drawback.

"Well... what now?"

Think of it in terms of those cheat mods for the various Renpy games on here. You suddenly have a million bucks, all stats maxed, everybody loves you, and it's day 2. Now you think, oh great, no more of the 'tedious' stuff and I can just go fuck all day, woo.

Day 3, more of the same; and by day 4, you've seen all the content and are left bored and unfulfilled.

The best part of conflict in all of its various forms - from the over-arching nemesis to the petty insults hurled your way - is that sense of accomplishment that finally, you beat it and came out on top. Likewise, there's also that idea of growth, knowing that while you may have fucked 8 women in three days, they aren't miraculously cured of all their faults or foibles, making them more "human".

 

[Finsit]

Welp I will answer "no". But I won't answer the poll.

Not because I disagree with your statement but with the premises of your question.

From my experience the conflict/no-conflict scale is pretty balance. Of course one can only play a sample of the total corpus but at least for the genre I play no overwhelming imbalance seem to be felt here.

 

[saintvermillion]

lol if you're feel like playing a game with extreme conflict try

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It's like the dark souls of adult games, though far more dark souls and horror based than adult.

Sure there other forms of conflict that work but I agree with the OP that considering the strong feelings people have in the community about NTR that there would be no stronger way to increase the stakes for making bad choices or fucking up in game and considering that it is underutilized. I at least haven't seen it in that format outside corruption jrpgs where a number of people try hard to play pure routes. 30 hours towards keeping the heroine a virgin then they lose to a boss and she gets banged like a drum. I don't think I've seen it in a western VN or sandbox style game and I've played alot of them.

As to the general state of the conflict/non-conflict spectrum I think it depends alot on the genre of the games you're playing and the engines.

 

[Finsit]

Sure there other forms of conflict that work but I agree with the OP that considering the strong feelings people have in the community about NTR that there would be no stronger way to increase the stakes for making bad choices or fucking up in game and considering that it is underutilized.

Well, I'm quite sure that one more game will include pretty much exactly what you are talking about.

As to the general state of the conflict/non-conflict spectrum I think it depends alot on the genre of the games you're playing and the engines.

Yup, in the mind control genre, it's not rare to see an antagonist mind controller leading to that kind of "turf" war.

 

[saintvermillion]

Well, I'm quite sure that one more game will include pretty much exactly what you are talking about.

There are probably a couple in the thousands of games on this site but considering the potential there it's still underutilized.

Yup, in the mind control genre, it's not rare to see an antagonist mind controller leading to that kind of "turf" war.

Lust Epidemic comes to mind with your dweeb rival but I'm curious about other examples of this.

 

[Xalenda]

I've always preferred the MC games where the person doing it is later revealed to be under its effects themselves, leading to either good or bad consequences (Snow Daze immediately comes to mind). The best twist is where they come out and see everything they've done, and completely snap from having turned their family, friends, loved ones and potential romantic partners into somebody else's playthings.

 

[recreation]

I'm not a fan of conflicts or big drama in adult games, even though my game "features" both of it in a specific way

 

[saintvermillion]

I've always preferred the MC games where the person doing it is later revealed to be under its effects themselves, leading to either good or bad consequences (Snow Daze immediately comes to mind). The best twist is where they come out and see everything they've done, and completely snap from having turned their family, friends, loved ones and potential romantic partners into somebody else's playthings.

The even bigger gutpunch metatwist of snowdaze is it making you wonder if by playing these types of mindcontrol or trainer games you're not in exactly the same position as the MC? If you go too far down the rabbithole don't you become one of your victims?

 

[Finsit]

There are probably a couple in the thousands of games on this site but considering the potential there it's still underutilized.

Yeah, I know.

That is why I thought about it for the game I'm working on. Since we try to have a serious go at the character development it seem pretty obvious a uninhibited girl would try to find her fun with somebody else if not cared after. But I get why it's not more often used : it's not easy to get the concept of the system behind it and more often than not games are not made by programmer than can make those kind of thing happen.

Lust Epidemic comes to mind with your dweeb rival but I'm curious about other examples of this.

Well, may I suggest A Spell For All then ?

But if you are interested into comics too, then I will say "By the Book" and "Persuader".

The even bigger gutpunch metatwist of snowdaze is it making you wonder if by playing these types of mindcontrol or trainer games you're not in exactly the same position as the MC? If you go too far down the rabbithole don't you become one of your victims?

Well considered the power of the control methods used in the genre, I think just playing some games is pretty safe.

 

[ItsEricBoi]

Not everyone is interested in conflict.

Since most RPGM games have fighting I'd say most people are interested in it

 

[Akamari]

I think the topic is too general. Essentially, every story should have some kind of conflict. If everybody's content and nothing ever happens, that's not a lot of fun, is it? Conflicts are the driving force of the narrative.

It all depends on what the conflicts are and how are they implemented. I'd agree that most of the games do so poorly.

 

[polywog]

Some side scrollers run into all sorts of conflicts. I wouldn't call tentacles NTR though.
Some games don't even have a player character, the MC is autonomous.

 

[saintvermillion]

Yeah, I know.

That is why I thought about it for the game I'm working on. Since we try to have a serious go at the character development it seem pretty obvious a uninhibited girl would try to find her fun with somebody else if not cared after. But I get why it's not more often used : it's not easy to get the concept of the system behind it and more often than not games are not made by programmer than can make those kind of thing happen.

There can be big player pushback if the win scenario is difficult to obtain. The amount of balancing acts a developer or team of developers has to understand let alone pull off to create a successful game is intense which makes it all the more impressive achievement when someone really does it well.

Well, may I suggest A Spell For All then ?

But if you are interested into comics too, then I will say "By the Book" and "Persuader".

Thanks.

Well considered the power of the control methods used in the genre, I think just playing some games is pretty safe.

lol well okay, not exactly the same as the mc and if playing the bad guy in a game makes you a bad guy then i don't want to be good but you've got to admit playing the sadist over and over that you find in many genres of adult games can't have zero impact on you. Reminds me of that old quote 'stare into the abyss long enough and the abyss stares back'.

 

[redknight00]

Not at all, the slice-of-life genres are known to have little to no conflict and instead focus on wholesome fun situations and characters.

On the other hand, when the story actually calls for it, conflicts can and should be an important part of the game. That, of course, needs creativity and imagination to pull off an original twist of through sheer skill implement an old cliche in a satisfying manner.

In these regards, NTR is IMO one of the worst conflicts one can add in a game, it's cheap and cliche as far the usual formula goes, and most of all often an external factor of a dude that comes from the outside to steal your girls or the failures of the player in picking the right choices. Instead, better relationships conflicts should focus on both parts, mayhaps the NTR happens because of the players threated their loved ones like fuckbags leading them to become sluts, or their possessiveness and jealousy drove the girls away, etc.

And more, the conflict doesn't even need to be internal, job problems, Demon Kings, invading aliens, zombie attacks are always an option and exploring how a relationship can develop under the circumstances is simple yet effective.