Tags have become essential for discovering games on F95zone

[riadhloch]

FYI, this is not a complaint, merely an observation.

I can't speak for everyone, but it seems as though we are eating very well when it comes to the sheer quantity of erotic games shared on F95zone these days. It's genuinely amazing, despite the efforts of the CC companies and crazies trying to censor everything they can.

However, this also feels like a bit of a double-edged sword because there're so many games curated now that finding the right games that align with your interests is necessary. It's not economical to look through every new game once a week to see which ones might be worth checking out. For that reason, I don't know about anyone else but I've found I have to use Tags a lot, both for excluding and for including.

But therein lies the problem. I've become so reliant on tags that I'm sure I'm missing some gems that aren't tagged properly. Does anyone else have a similar experience and similar concern? How do you mitigate that risk?

 

[hoochimama]

Games can be missing tags they should have, or have tags they shouldn't. If there's a given game I liked I search the recommendation & identification subforum to see posts where it's mentioned as they are bound to be mentioned alongside similar games.

Ideally the forum would let users give a game a like/dislike so it could automatically recommend games liked by those who shared your likes & dislikes.

 

[Insomnimaniac Games]

How do you mitigate that risk?

I tend not to filter with tags that can be "avoidable". Example, futa/trans. That tag is avoidable a lot of the time, so even if one doesn't like it, it's best not to blacklist it if you want the maximum visibility.

 

[morphnet]

But therein lies the problem. I've become so reliant on tags that I'm sure I'm missing some gems that aren't tagged properly. Does anyone else have a similar experience and similar concern?

Most games are tagged correctly, most uploader don't / can't play every game they upload and rely on the information available at the time. It comes down to the community to help by reporting missing tags or tags that should be removed.

For this it's helpful for the members to read and know the sites tags and definitions and not use their own when requesting a tag be added or removed.

https://f95zone.to/threads/tags-rules-and-list-updated-2024-11-14.10394/

How do you mitigate that risk?

Encourage the community to play a greater role in making sure that games are correctly tagged according to the sites tags and definitions.

 

[allanl9020142]

FYI, this is not a complaint, merely an observation.

I can't speak for everyone, but it seems as though we are eating very well when it comes to the sheer quantity of erotic games shared on F95zone these days. It's genuinely amazing, despite the efforts of the CC companies and crazies trying to censor everything they can.

However, this also feels like a bit of a double-edged sword because there're so many games curated now that finding the right games that align with your interests is necessary. It's not economical to look through every new game once a week to see which ones might be worth checking out. For that reason, I don't know about anyone else but I've found I have to use Tags a lot, both for excluding and for including.

But therein lies the problem. I've become so reliant on tags that I'm sure I'm missing some gems that aren't tagged properly. Does anyone else have a similar experience and similar concern? How do you mitigate that risk?

I don't know about that. Seems like there's "quantity" but no "quality". Most things worth playing update maybe once a year now. Some update more often than that but the norm over the past few years has become really long dev cycles for no reason other than probably the devs are just burnt out.

As for what I usually see:
I'm not into NTR and I don't want to play as a female protagonist. Then what's left is like early dev games that will be abandoned at some point and every other game just being about feet or some niche fetish. What's left after THAT is just stuff with terrible ratings (usually but not always the same few devs who just pump out half-finished shit and then tie a bow on it a few months down the line to deem it "Complete")

I check maybe once a week or so and I'm caught up in like 2 pages. Even then, the ones I bookmark are like a soft "Maybe I'll try it if I have time" (I usually don't).

I'm honestly half way out the door and thinking about building a rig to just do RP with character bots. It's at least more interesting or I can at least control things to my taste. Only a few games have me sticking around or sometimes I'm just too lazy or just want to see pictures.

 

[olaf_yaddax]

The only way to reduce this risk is to ask people. Especially by clicking on the link below.

https://f95zone.to/forums/recommendations-identification.104/

It's true that some games don't have all the tags, but some have an excessive number of unnecessary tags. Let's say I like anal and I searched for the anal tag. I found a game, but it only has one anal scene. It's definitely not the game I'm looking for, but it still has an anal tag because it has an anal scene. However, if I use the link above to say I'm looking for a game with lots of anal scenes, my chances are higher.

 

[Lerd0]

Encourage the community to play a greater role in making sure that games are correctly tagged according to the sites tags and definitions.

...will never happen...
...most zonies still think the report button is only for when someone was mean to them......

 

[Goeffel]

The only way to reduce this risk is to ask people. Especially by clicking on the link below.

https://f95zone.to/forums/recommendations-identification.104/

This.

And not just for asking, but also for profiting from lists that some dedicated users made. (the yellow "recommending" prefix)
Or even going to help with identify/ seeking topics, from some of those I found me niiiiice games for myself.

given, I am a slow player, so I feel there'll always be more games for me than I can play - and that is with excluding a LOT (like all "realistic" 3dcg, ntr, evil rape [I know, I know], prostitution, mindbreak, superhuge breasts, etc. etc. etc. etc.)

Nevertheless, so far have not excluded any tags - things like scat or so are rare enough that it isn't worth the bother, and others are you never know if eg. it is a fully gay game (not for me) or just some gay stuff you do not need to play, but can (ok for me if other parts are interesting).

 

[orellion]

There are "best of" dedicated threads to most genres or kinks on the forum. They are pretty good for finding missed gems.

 

[Count Morado]

the report button is only for when someone was mean to them

Got it. Will use it this way from now on....

 

[seifukulover]

My view is that games should be more focused/niche, rather than trying to fit as many tags into it as possible. When you have too many tags, people who block certain tags when they're searching have less chance of ever seeing your game.

I was thinking recently about one of my favorite games Living With Sister: Monochrome Fantasy. One of the things you can do in that game is go watch your sister pee, which is why it has the urination tag. I don't like urination in my eroge, so I would be inclined to block this tag when searching. But then I might never have discovered this excellent game with all its other 5-star content. The urination stuff is also completely optional and you'll never stumble upon it accidentally. But there's no way to know it's optional just by looking at the tags. A new player might see the tag and think "this is a game about peeing" and skip over it.

So devs should try to make their games more focused. But we players also need to decide which tags are tolerable and which are dealbreakers, instead of just blocking every tag we dislike and risk missing out on otherwise great games.

 

[Naraden]

Yeah, I also feel like tags should be able to come in levels like minor/major. It's not the same one game featuring 1 random scene in some obscure path related to the tag, than one featuring it as a core mechanic, but right now both have the same tag.

This is for example very prominent on the gay/lesbian tags, a lot of games tagged as such have just a route/scene but consist of mostly-straight content which is the main focus and typically unavoidable. To the point they tend to overshadow actual gay/lesbian-focused games when browsing.

 

[Zoe Archangel]

How do you mitigate that risk?

I search for the only tag that matters: "Completed."

 

[baneini]

Tags dont do a good job. Theres no way to differentiate 1 off scenes from game focus.
You can do stuff like limit yourself to a wider net with blacklisting some key tags, using tags that imply games focus, the engine used and trying to figure out if the game OP with its presentation excudes quality or if its by AI factories from india.

The recommended section can be useless when it's a list of literally every game with certain tag with no differentiation. Ultimately at some point you do need to get recommendations to find new games that are buried under the current tag system.

Another issue is games not differentiating themselves from the pack. The devs dont market their games features, theres no dev authored text that conveys the key content/target audience with the tags they think are relevant even.

 

[Waterthose]

...will never happen...
...most zonies still think the report button is only for when someone was mean to them......

How dare you call me out! Reported! (I'm joking.)

 

[A_Tome_Of_Forgotten_Lore]

I've definitely missed a few awesome corruption games that weren't labeled correctly, a good example in my book is Parasitic Evil, it has all the trappings of the female lead going through the phases of corruption but it doesn't have the tag corruption. Granted I would have played this game regardless because it's that good, but if I was only lazer focused in searching for games with only the corruption tag, then I would have absolutely missed this one.

 

[Silentce]

I consider my opinion to be in the minority and equally as unimportant in the great scheme of things, however in the almost 7 years ive been on this site I've never really cared about tags outside of tagging games correctly for the community. Me personally? I couldn't give less of a shit about tags. When I first started participating in the community more I was sort of shocked how adamant some folks were about tags. They treat tags like fucking holy scripture and if a tag is accidentally added or omitted and they play a game with shit they don't like or lacking content they love they will light on fire and die. If I see a game I find interesting and gets my attention, ill try it. if i end up hating it ive lost an hour of my day at most. again this is just my meaningless opinion.

This isn't meant as a complaint or stab at anyone I just find it interesting the level of "passion" people put into the things they enjoy and also hate lol.