Your thoughts on game development

[givemethattrt]

Hello,

I have been a lurker since a while here and I have grown an increasing interest towards H-games in general.
Now, I am thinking on developing a game on my spare time and I would like to share with you my plan on that and maybe get your suggestions.

First, you should know that I am mainly a software developer. When it comes to design, I think I am not bad, but I am willing to learn. I used to draw lots of anime / manga back in the days. I also have some experience with c4d. As for other tools, I use photoshop very often and I have a good experience with it.

Anyways, let's get to my plan for the game:

• Story: this is a crucial point. I like stories that involve self-questioning and philosophical questions (religions, mythologies, existence, etc.) coupled with actual scientific theories (dimensions, time, etc). One example of a visual novel I really liked (storywise) is stains' gate.
• Game type: I am really undecided for this. I don't know if I should go with rpg or visual novel. But I think I will go with a mix (an rpg with long / visual novel-like scenes).
• Game engine: I checked RPGMaker MV, ren'py, etc. However, I think I am going with a custom-made one. I don't plan on using anything too fancy (unity for instance). Using JS / PixiJS doesn't look too bad (given that the code base is well written). It would allow to easily make the game portable too.
• Gameplay: I really need suggestions here. I am aiming for these functionalities:
  • Character customization: this will really depend on the type of art (see below), but it would be nice to have the possibility to customize some parts of the appearance (hair color, eyes, body parts, etc). This could be done more easily if using 2d art.
  • Full character stats / h stats: few games already do this. I think oneone1 games are among the games that provide the most complete stats.
  • Death alternatives: losing should mostly trigger scenes instead of game over.
  • In-game walkthrough (player chooses to activate this). Ideally, we should have a full tree of choices / consequences for those players that do not want to spend too much time exploring.
  • Multiple endings.
  • Should I go with male or female protagonist ?
  • Which tags should I aim for ?
• Art: 2d or 3d. I have bought plenty of 2d art tools (for ex: clip studio and assets) and 3d (daz, poser, c4d, etc and assets) and have good hardware to render in 3d. But I really don't know which way I should go. Which do you think is mostly appreciated: 2d or 3d? (I mean: excellently drawn 2d vs photo-realistic 3d).
• Audio: good bg music and voice acting. For voice acting I could use existing speech synthesis solutions. There are good ones out there that generate nearly human voices (amazon polly or
  You must be registered to see the links
  ).

Also, do you think such games are easily monetizable? This is not really my objective as I plan on doing this for fun.
But, I am curious to know if I could expect any monetary income from this.

Please, feel free to suggest ideas, cheers

 

[ZZ23]

I'm also software developer but with zero talent in design.

Anyway I think two most important thing when making VN is story and visuals(well duh). But it is amazing how many VNs
we see which have insane visuals but no story and vice versa or even worse when some one tries to make an rpg but
all it comes down is grind loop to make player invested by wasting time.

My advice would be to just drop all this RPG nonsense and focus on just story and visuals. Write it down and try to bring it
to life. If you can't make interesting and hot kinetic novel how can you hope to make good choice VN ? My favourite VNs
are pretty much kinetic novels that gives you false sense of choice because people that made them gave it all on story and visuals.


RPG and roaming can be used with world building but don't force it to be a gameplay, just use it to drive story forward.

Question on 2d or 3d comes down to you and story you want to tell. Also your ability to bring it to life with either of those.
I think 3d is just way easier to get hot scenes especially if you are not designer type of person. You can place objects
in world way easier then in 2d where you need whole new scene drawn for different angle.

Don't bother with audio unless you have REAL voice actors, you are just going to waste time on something that nobody wants.


It is not easy to monetise since you need to make something promising first and then earn trust of people. Also you want people to support you as creator and not single work you are doing at the moment. So as long you keep on going down that road more and more people will want to support you. It is hard road but one that pays of so much in the end.

 

[DawnCry]

Seeing that you like religion, mythology and time travel then I totally recommend that the mc is a scientist that manages to go back into the past to the ancient Greece (that or he was summoned by the gods), overall Greece mythology is really rich, the gods fked everything on that time and had many weird children, albeit mythological stories are not exactly about chastity and loyalty to one partner *cough* Zeus *cough* Poseidon...

About the sex of the MC... I would recommend first that you focus on male character just because it's the most popular, however it could be interesting to have a female MC in reserve too, such as "the main character travels back in time with his girlfriend/coworker or whatever you call it".

Overall I wouldn't recommend focusing on character customization from the start, it can be quite time consuming or costly to take into account the customization in multiple scenes, unless you have an easy way to do it of course.

As an alternative to "death" you can have being captured as a slave, or perhaps raped by some mythological creature.

About stats... perhaps it could be interesting to add a character fetishes and that depending on the situation he will act based on them, perhaps giving him levels on different actions that follow how much he pleases his partner when doing certain sex acts?.

Related to tags... it's better to focus on things you are comfortable with. While mythology is kind of NTRish there are exceptions such as Hestia, the chaste goddess, albeit to be fair I think everyone would love to beat Zeus when he transforms into something and tries to fuck your girl, at the very least I would find it comical. But well, just focus on what you wish to do, if there is something that mythology is good for is how rich it is in content, you want femdom? you have the amazon stories, you want maledom? you can visit Athenas and other city states, war? it's so easy in ancient greece, you want more equal standing relationships? visit Sparta, from what I know it's the city state in which women had the highest freedom in ancient Greece.

The only mandatory tag that I would say you should have is harem, people expect to fuck many different things, after that it's your option if you are more inclined towards Zeus being Zeus and other gods being like they are or if he got bored and is now a total voyeur lul, just dont make bad things as something forced, it's okay to have a time requirement, it's okay that it happens as a consequence of losing a fight, it's okay too that it happens as a consequence of a bad stat check.

 

[moskyx]

If you really want to do this for fun, don't ask people what fetishes/tags would like to be implemented, or at least don't put the focus on what they say. Just go with what you like/feel comfortable doing. Players suggestions could be a burden for your motivation. You can add some of them as side quests or something like that, but your vision should come first, both in game's story and sex scenes

 

[SubSupreme]

I'd suggest re-thinking your desire to create a game if you don't have any ideas about gameplay... because that is the core of it. There's nothing wrong with sticking to VNs with a basic branching path, especially if you are starting out. Also, unless you really know what you are doing, I would avoid mixing VN and RPG together because in a lot of way they oppose each other on a fundamental level. Too much time on VN scenes and people who were expecting an RPG will get bored and skip through your game, while spending too much time with RPG mechanics will cause confusion and apathy with players who are only interested in the VN parts of the game. (That being said, the Persona series is my favorite of all time and they tend to mix both pretty well, see P3P)

moskyx has the best advice. Don't overthink it, just pick an idea and see where it takes you. If you hate it, pick another idea and see where it takes you and repeat this loop until you stumble upon something that you feel you have to complete for you own sake! Best of luck!

 

[NylonBandit]

I agree with Moskyx, but the problem I see is you don't have much of a vision right now. Just the idea about making a game. I mean, no offence, but it kind of feels like you're asking us to do the create part for you like a free focus group.

Slow it down a little and think about what your game would be like and then what you could realistically achieve. Most of the questions you asked will be answered as your idea or vision starts to form.

Start with your design doc. Try and describe the game you would like to make in under two or three sentences and try to think of something that will make the game unique. Something like,

'MyGameName is a story driven game where the player must stalk his dates to learn about them without being spotted. The main story will consist of 8 dates, each with increasingly crazy stories. In addition, there's a simple crafting system where the player has to combine clue items to form evidence items'.

Once you've got your blurb, you can start piecing things together. Is it story driven or gameplay driven? Will this work as a VN? Would it be more fun to have an environment the player character can explore? Is a more RPG style required? Can I just do it in RPGM? Do I need more flexibility? Should I use Godot or Unity?

Keep in mind, the bigger the project, the more assets you'll need and the longer it will take to complete.

Come back to us when you reach a point where you're like 'Guys, I have this idea but I'm not sure how to implement it'.

 

[khumak]

If you really want to do this for fun, don't ask people what fetishes/tags would like to be implemented, or at least don't put the focus on what they say. Just go with what you like/feel comfortable doing. Players suggestions could be a burden for your motivation. You can add some of them as side quests or something like that, but your vision should come first, both in game's story and sex scenes

I agree. Figure out what sort of game you personally would want to play and make that. If you want to expand your audience a bit you could look at adding some fetish content that is related to what you originally planned and that you find at least somewhat enjoyable to develop for. Don't fall into the trap of adding whatever fetishes are most requested unless you personally enjoy those fetishes as well.

 

[megaplayboy10k]

I agree with Moskyx, but the problem I see is you don't have much of a vision right now. Just the idea about making a game. I mean, no offence, but it kind of feels like you're asking us to do the create part for you like a free focus group.

Slow it down a little and think about what your game would be like and then what you could realistically achieve. Most of the questions you asked will be answered as your idea or vision starts to form.

Start with your design doc. Try and describe the game you would like to make in under two or three sentences and try to think of something that will make the game unique. Something like,

'MyGameName is a story driven game where the player must stalk his dates to learn about them without being spotted. The main story will consist of 8 dates, each with increasingly crazy stories. In addition, there's a simple crafting system where the player has to combine clue items to form evidence items'.

Once you've got your blurb, you can start piecing things together. Is it story driven or gameplay driven? Will this work as a VN? Would it be more fun to have an environment the player character can explore? Is a more RPG style required? Can I just do it in RPGM? Do I need more flexibility? Should I use Godot or Unity?

Keep in mind, the bigger the project, the more assets you'll need and the longer it will take to complete.

Come back to us when you reach a point where you're like 'Guys, I have this idea but I'm not sure how to implement it'.

This is good. Very similar to the tips screenwriters give or to the "elevator pitch" concept.

 

[megaplayboy10k]

Generally, if you are the primary developer and you aren't already friends with a 2d or 3d artist, you're going to be the "default" artist for your game, comic or project. Ditto for coding, writing/story/dialogue, and miscellaneous stuff like audio, marketing and so forth. It's a lot of hats to wear. So my only advice, as someone considering jumping in somewhere down the road, is develop your basic ability in one area, then another, then another, until you feel comfortable with the basic elements--art, coding, writing. People will forgive shortcomings in one area if the other two are good or strong. And if your art is good but the coding is glitchy and the writing bad, then you won't be as successful as you might want to be.