What's the best Patreon-alternative website if my game contains some characters who are under-18?

[PandaPercolate]

Hello, I've been working on a game recently which has a huge variety of characters ranging from ages 13-39, of which nearly all of them have some kind of erotic element. It has a similar style to TiTS, a sort of open-world text game with RPG combat, only obviously with way less resources put into it, and less focus on character customization.

Disclaimers:
I believe that my game would still be acceptable on F95, if perhaps in a grey area, because:
1) It is primarily text based, there is artwork but nothing erotic, just character portraits
2) The youngest characters are still in their teens and none are prepubescent
3) It's obviously fantasy, highly absurd, and could in no way be mistaken for any sort of realistic depiction

And before you start coming at me with legal nonsense, everything in my game is 100% legal under US law, where I live. There's not even any grey area. It's all in the white. When I was in middle school, I randomly stumbled upon an extremely graphic sex scene involving a minor in a random novel from a fairly popular author that I bought at Barnes and Noble. In fact, that character was even younger than any character in my game, and it was a far more realistic depiction. And you can find erotic audio content all over the internet of adult women portraying underage characters. So if you're going to tell me not to bother because of the legality of it, you don't really know what you're talking about. But just because something follows the laws, does not mean it follows the rules or terms of service, so that's the focus of my question.

And, not that it needs to be stated, but just to be 100% clear because I know certain people will want to bring it up: I am completely opposed to any kind of exploitation of real children. Minors cannot consent to sex, a fact that is stated clearly even within the game itself. I've spent years working at summer camps and never had any thoughts about the kids besides that I'm there to keep them safe and make sure they have fun. My only interest in this theme is purely the taboo element of it, in a fictional, fantasy scenario, in the exact same way that people like incest porn but would never consider banging their sister. Myself and everyone involved in the development of the game is an adult, and my game is intended for adults only. I also believe that any kind of realistic erotic depiction of children, even if purely text-based, can be harmful, because it contributes to normalization (imagine, for example, a story with a contemporary setting about a man who slowly grooms his niece over a long period of time). For this reason, I've specifically made sure that the scenarios in my game are absurd enough that there is no possible way they could be taken for being anything other than pure fantasy.

With all that out of the way:

What's a good website where I can host my game and make some money from it? I know that Patreon is a no-go of course, and neither is Sponsus. It seems like itch.io is perfectly fine for this sort of content, and Subscribestar might be okay. My plan is to make the game free, but perhaps give early builds for people who donate, or something like that. I was also thinking about maybe having a Patreon, but setting it up in such a way that there's no trace of my game on there. I know of some other developers that do that, and Patreon doesn't seem to take issue with that type of setup.

Also, do you think there's much of an audience for a game like that? You look at places like Sankaku Channel or nHentai and it's just overflowing with loli at the top of the popular filters, but then you look at NSFW games and it's all very careful to make sure the characters are at least ambiguosly adults. So it seems to me like there's maybe a bit of an untapped niche out there.

Or, if you think such a game would never be successful, either because of terms-of-service violations or a small audience, what kind of changes do you think would be necessary so the game could have a chance of being successful? I've only implemented about 1/6 of the main storyline so far, most of my time has been spent implementing the core game mechanics and combat system, so I don't think it's not too late to make significant changes.

Thanks for any advice you can give me.

 

[Asia Argento]

Itch.io and SS are your best bets... Newgrounds would likely host it too?

 

[kytee]

If it's only text, just change some words around or omit them entirely to produce a "clean" version that you can put on Patreon. I think the ability to put it on Patreon with it's potential earnings more than justifies the extra work you have to put into making it work.

 

[PandaPercolate]

If it's only text, just change some words around or omit them entirely to produce a "clean" version that you can put on Patreon. I think the ability to put it on Patreon with it's potential earnings more than justifies the extra work you have to put into making it work.

That's a great idea actually, thanks! I wish I'd that of that a few weeks ago, lol. However, maybe this is a dumb question, but do you think it would matter if the original text exists in the source code? Every sex scene is optional, so it would be a pretty easy change to simply hide every scene that contains contentious content for a certain version of the game, but the text would still exist in the code that you would have to download in order to play it.

 

[PandaPercolate]

Yes, I think that's the case with Patreon. This is why all games with IC or other 'questionable' content go the LewdPatcher route. It'd be best to strip the game of those elements completely and turn it into a DL for LewdPatcher. Look at Come Inside's case where the MC becomes a shota during flashbacks with the patch applied. However, only do this if you want to use Patreon.

Oh, interesting, I didn't know there were games that did that. Okay, it will be a little extra work but that sounds like a good idea. Maybe I'll just have an adult-only game on Patreon and the full game on itch.io. Do you think even just having any underage characters at all could be grounds for remove from Patreon? For example, I have a 16 year old vendor NPC who sells an important quest item so I can't remove her entirely, do you think just removing her sex scene would be enough, or should I make her 18 as well just to be on the safe side?

 

[PandaPercolate]

They do not tolerate 'FULL' versions on other platforms, aside from the LewdPatcher stuff since consumers need to perform that change themselves. If they so much as get a whiff of you selling an, according to their standards, immoral version on itch or SS you'll have a high chance of your Patreon getting pulled.

Hmm. Okay, good to know. Seems like rather strange logic to me, but if that's the way it is, then so be it. Don't have much experience with making mods/patches for my games but I'm sure it should be easy to figure out.

 

[M$hot]

Well I mean, Patreon makes their money based on the total amount of money flowing through. The risk/reward is just not there for a fairly niche customerbase. They may lose some money a month if they kick an "offensive" game (or dev), but the potential loss if they don't remove an "offensive" game and they get boycotted? Twitter and other social media has really gotten into the spirit of witch hunts and Patreon wants no part in any of those.

Over here kids often get jobs at age 15 or 16 because they don't need to get paid much, so that totally makes sense to me. I've been 15 and obviously fucking goes down. (I didn't do much of it but in general, hormones make people do crazy stuff). However, I think any sexual content relating to a minor may be an issue even here on F95, rule 7 is pretty black and white, don't know if you can dance in a grey area. Leaving my personal opinion out of it, I wonder if the taboo is worth the risk you're courting in terms of potentially getting de-platformed. If Patreon finds out you're selling a 'non offensive' version of a game that would normally transgress their rules, they can still kick you off for 'off-platform misconduct'. So even a mod may not guarantee anything. And normally, it would need to be reported to them, which is why I think most incest patches are fine, because nobody is reporting that these exist for games. a patch to add in sensual/sexual content featuring a minor might get reported however because it's something a lot of people feel strongly about. Maybe the risk is worth it if you have a chance of making a lot more money on the game but it's hard to know.

 

[gunderson]

First and foremost, make your game be whatever you want it to be. Based on what the content of your game is, that might tell you what site you can use to support it and how that content gets delivered to your players, but never let Patreon or any company like it tell you that you can't have imaginary underage ladies doing imaginary fucking (for example) in your porn game because banking execs are prudes. That's complete horseshit.

That being said, the easiest way to put content in your game is to make a Patreon-safe version with the caveat that your game is also sufficiently patchable that *somebody* can provide a patch to your game at the time of its release that includes whatever content Patreon doesn't like. This can mean making age or relationships a variable that patches can change, or changing dialogue, or (if your game has visuals in it) changing images. Some patches even add whole scenes and story arcs to games! Most of the time, it's also viable to just leave the content Patreon doesn't like in the game's data and have the patch file be a code to trigger its availability. It's not quiiiiite as safe, but as long as extracting the images doesn't immediately give the game away, it's rare that people dive into a game's source code to see if it follows the rules or not.

Reminder: the reason patches are generally safe is because they can't easily be tied to the dev. So what if a quirk of your development process is that ages or relationships might be a variable rather than plain text in dialogue? It's not your fault if some unscrupulous fan changes your game to make roommates into siblings or an 18 year old into a 17 year old, and Patreon can't justifiably (or at least, I've never seen them do this for patches of that sort) blame you or punish you for modifications fans make to your game.

 

[baneini]

Most games with 12y old characters say they're 18 and patreon is fine with it.
Since theres no real point having 12-17 characters, from legal pov theres no difference between a 1 week old toddler and 17y and 364 day old, it leads to a funny distribution of almost all games having either purely preteen characters or only 18+ characters.

 

[PandaPercolate]

First and foremost, make your game be whatever you want it to be. Based on what the content of your game is, that might tell you what site you can use to support it and how that content gets delivered to your players, but never let Patreon or any company like it tell you that you can't have imaginary underage ladies doing imaginary fucking (for example) in your porn game because banking execs are prudes. That's complete horseshit.

Thanks for the encouragement. Maybe I should just make it whatever, money be damned. I kind of had my sights set on the possibility of paying for a cheap apartment, but maybe that's a bit of a lofty goal anyway. It's kind of ridiculous anyway how it's fine to have a game where you murder, torture, do whatever horrible, disgusting, but non-sexual things to a minor you could imagine, rendering in hyper-realistic 3D, but as soon as you take their pants off that's where the line is drawn.

Reminder: the reason patches are generally safe is because they can't easily be tied to the dev. So what if a quirk of your development process is that ages or relationships might be a variable rather than plain text in dialogue? It's not your fault if some unscrupulous fan changes your game to make roommates into siblings or an 18 year old into a 17 year old, and Patreon can't justifiably (or at least, I've never seen them do this for patches of that sort) blame you or punish you for modifications fans make to your game.

Most games with 12y old characters say they're 18 and patreon is fine with it.
Since theres no real point having 12-17 characters, from legal pov theres no difference between a 1 week old toddler and 17y and 364 day old, it leads to a funny distribution of almost all games having either purely preteen characters or only 18+ characters.

Unfortunately it would be a bit of work because... the game first of all has the classic "you can defeat this enemy by shooting them... or by spanking them" style of gameplay, so I would have to either change the age of the characters or make it so you cannot use such attacks on those characters in the first place (second one wouldn't be too hard since there's already enemy traits which make them immune but it would introduce balancing issues since it's an RPG so it would be unfair to players who invested more in those skills). Second, all of the scenes that have underage characters are heavy on explicitly age-related dialogue and descriptions, so I would have to either entirely rewrite them or entirely remove them. And third, the game being a game with combat and sex naturally has a fair bit of non-consent in it as well (probably more than half the scenes to be honest), and currently 1 bestiality scene, so even if I made all the necessary age related changes it would still be violating some other guidelines.

However, I do notice that games like Ravager or TiTS have huge amounts of blatant rape/bestiality scenes in them while also maintaining extremely successful Patreons (also both of those games have at least one character who is implied to be a minor although their age is not explicitly stated iirc). Are both those games just 1 report away from losing thousands of $$$ per month? Is the only reason they get away with it just because people will report a game for minors but not for non-consent so they fly under the radar? I also know of some adult women who make NSFW audios with underage content that have thriving Patreons.

Everyone in this thread has been really helpful so far, though. My current thinking is I'm just going to keep working on the game normally, but just make underage content in such a way that it would be easy to remove if I have to, and also probably make less of it in general.

 

[baneini]

However, I do notice that games like Ravager or TiTS have huge amounts of blatant rape/bestiality scenes in them while also maintaining extremely successful Patreons (also both of those games have at least one character who is implied to be a minor although their age is not explicitly stated iirc). Are both those games just 1 report away from losing thousands of $$$ per month? Is the only reason they get away with it just because people will report a game for minors but not for non-consent so they fly under the radar?

Theres probably some threshold of reports needed before someone takes a look, then if the game has the outward appearance of themes acceptable to leftish cali sjws they'll just stamp it as low offending item, unlikely to cause issues with pr or cc side of things.

 

[gunderson]

I kind of had my sights set on the possibility of paying for a cheap apartment, but maybe that's a bit of a lofty goal anyway. It's kind of ridiculous anyway how it's fine to have a game where you murder, torture, do whatever horrible, disgusting, but non-sexual things to a minor you could imagine, rendering in hyper-realistic 3D, but as soon as you take their pants off that's where the line is drawn.

In brief? Yeah. The expectation that a Patreon porn game project is going to pay rent in anywhere like the near future is a gross misunderstanding of the market. Essentially, even the safest and most compelling porn game idea is still a crapshoot as far as how likely it is to become a viable primary source of income on Patreon. It's even less likely that your project will do so within the first couple months that it exists.

What makes it extra difficult is that you're working primarily in text and are, at least as far as I'm aware, a relative unknown. Star power or exceptional renders can make up a lot of ground in the early part of a project in terms of attracting supporters. Otherwise, you've got to have a lot of time, a lot of talent (or at least enough enthusiasm that it manifests in the quality/scope/ambition of your game), and another source of income while your project gets off the ground. Hopefully you also have enough experience that you're not learning everything on the job, or that's going to make your project take even longer.

I'm not writing all this to discourage you, btw. I think a lot of people get into this business expecting to immediately be successful but then quit after a month or two when their drive to create peters out and it starts to become...y'know...work! I think that if you know what you're up against, you can make a better calculation of what a worthwhile level of investment is for a project like this. Right now, it sounds like this should be a side project, if you're expecting Patreon to pay your rent. If it wins big later on, great! Make it your main gig and be a happy porn game dev. But if it takes a while to get momentum going, having another source of income for that time means you can still indulge in your passion in your free time and also put food on the table.

 

[PandaPercolate]

> The expectation that a Patreon porn game project is going to pay rent in anywhere like the near future is a gross misunderstanding of the market. Essentially, even the safest and most compelling porn game idea is still a crapshoot as far as how likely it is to become a viable primary source of income on Patreon. It's even less likely that your project will do so within the first couple months that it exists.

All great points. I need to be realistic. It's too easy to look at a Patreon raking in 6 figures yearly and think "I can do better than that" when you don't even have a game published yet.

> What makes it extra difficult is that you're working primarily in text

At the end of the day, I'm not making the game that I think would be the most commercially successful. I'm making the game that I wish existed, but doesn't. And hopefully other people might feel the same way. Aside from all the huge advantages of text with regards to iteration and anti-burnout, I think most people agree that bad art can ruin an otherwise decent game, and good art bogs production pace down to the point where people get frustrated about being drip-fed content. The NSFW graveyard is filled with games that had amazing art that just unsustainable for the developer. My game is designed around being able to compete with content creation rate of much bigger games while being a solo developer on a $0 budget. I will have portraits because I can paint them quickly and I think they add a lot of value given the time investment. But that's it. I am a game developer at every level, I can program games in Unity and Unreal, I can do 2D art, 3D art, visual effects, etc. I even have my name in the credits of a well reviewed game on Steam. But just because I CAN do something doesn't mean it makes sense for every project.

> a relative unknown

True, especially in the NSFW space, outside of a few NSFW audios I posted on reddit last year that actually did reasonably well. However, I have experience building a following from scratch. I just a couple months I was able to get over 2,000 YouTube subscribers, back in 2013. I had several videos with over 100,000 views. I also built up a following from scratch for a fan MOBA game in 2015, getting a facebook page with over 5,000 followers over the course of a year. So this ain't my first rodeo.

> exceptional renders can make up a lot of ground in the early part of a project in terms of attracting supporters.

I'm with you 100% on that, which is why I plan on spending a lot of time working on promotional art for the game before I even think about releasing it.

> Otherwise, you've got to have a lot of time, a lot of talent (or at least enough enthusiasm that it manifests in the quality/scope/ambition of your game), and another source of income while your project gets off the ground.

I have all 3 of those things. I moved in with my parents recently and I'm "unemployed." So I have all the time in the world and virtually no expenses. But I occasionally work at my parents engineering company and they pay me, quite frankly, pretty insanely high hourly wages. And, I have worked at a professional game studio in the past. I can't imagine any better position I could possibly be in if I was to have any chance of success, tbh

> expecting to immediately be successful but then quit after a month or two when their drive to create peters out and it starts to become...y'know...work!

I have plenty of experience with burnout. I have dozens, I mean literally dozens of pretty interesting Unity prototype games on my hard drive that I just never felt like finishing. That's half the reason I'm making this game in renpy. One of my biggest design considerations when working on the initial google doc for this game was how to make a game that would allow me to create lots of content in a short amount of time. There's no branching storylines, options in dialogue are fairly minimal.

I've played so many NSFW games where the developer poured hours into dialogue options and branching stories and at the end of the day I never feel like this has contributed to the experience. I do have some little tricks I use to improve a sense of player agency. I also think the general open-world nature of the game has more player agency than a visual novel with a few dialogue options. But my core design philosophy is: Have interesting turn based combat that's not too hard, but actually makes you think, and reward every win with at least one fun sex scene, and in between the combat and sex, there is a bit of dialogue explaining a story that's just barely compelling enough to drive the player along. This is what I want an NSFW game to be and this is what mine is.

Probably the one thing I've spent the most time on so far is creating the combat system backend, but once that was finished I'm now able to add new, varied combat scenarios to the game insanely fast. So far, I'm really happy with all of my backend design of the game. It's a game that's mean to be iterated on quickly and set up so I can easily add on anything as soon as it pops into my head. Of course, I'm saying this, but the game isn't done yet. And maybe it never will be, who knows. But I'm at least doing everything I can do prevent burnout.

> Right now, it sounds like this should be a side project, if you're expecting Patreon to pay your rent. If it wins big later on, great! Make it your main gig and be a happy porn game dev. But if it takes a while to get momentum going, having another source of income for that time means you can still indulge in your passion in your free time and also put food on the table.

I consider myself incredibly lucky to be in the position where I could sleep all day and still pay for basic food expenses with the small amount of money I make off the stock market. But living with my parents kinda sucks. I'm 25, lol. Granted, there's a ton of lame jobs I could very easily get and then afford move out- hell, I have enough savings right now that I could probably live a year on my own with zero income- but I find it really hard to work a job if I don't enjoy it. I enjoy being a game developer. So I hope that I can find some way to make money in a way that I enjoy, even if it's less. And hopefully when the virus dies down I can go back to working at a real studio and just make indie games as a hobby.

Wow, that turned into a huge wall of text, geez.

 

[Alcahest]

If you have a lot of underage content, just go with SubscribeStar and save yourself the hassle. If your game is good and appealing enough to certain crowds (like people into underage/CP), there is the potential to do very well there too money-wise.

The game being primarily text-based is not necessarily a con. Granted, I don't have much insight into that particular genre, but it also has very successful games, and my feeling is that the text-based genre isn't as saturated as the Ren'py/Unity/Daz/HS one.

 

[Machinist]

Patreon said they would be ok with contents like "lolita", so I'm not really sure what they allow or not regarding that. Since it's text, maybe they would allow it? try contacting them.