Hi everyone,
I've made a very short survey about my patreon and possibly a discord channel. I would grateful if you guys could try it here(I've posted much more about this below): https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfsCkqw7dzAtrKkE6FIWa3BwOd6znJQ0woCVug8OcielIEyjQ/viewform?usp=sf_link
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I thought I would talk about a few concerns and such below, but I will try to avoid making this too long.
Right now I am not able to develop games as anything more than a hobby(my free-time is usually limited), however something I've always longed to do for years now is to be able to develop hentai games full-time and I've been hoping that that might be possible through crowd-support with sites like patreon.
Something I've been wondering for awhile now though is how many people are interested in my games and if it would be possible for me to develop games full-time in the future. In order for this to be possible though, I would need to be able to get enough to make a living with patreon, subscribestar or similar.
My patreon was original started in 2015 and was most active during the
development of Girls x Lust and now with the development of Immoral
Sorceress. It has never been at a level that could be called successful
during all that time(which does concern me), but still I am extremely grateful to anyone who
has ever supported me there as this is a significant part of my motivation to keep making hentai games, along with my persistence and love for making them(but I am certainly grateful to fans who could not support me there as well).
Looking at things more recently on patreon, during the first demo release of Immoral Sorceress my
patrons count stayed about the same, during the demo 2 release my patreon
went up notably for about a month before balancing out(this is likely
thanks to new fans from the new places the game was posted), and now between demo 2
and demo 3.1 releases my patreon has gone down (new patrons are very rare
and I'm also losing patrons, also a few people pledge briefly to view
patreon-only content before unpledging a short while later).
To summarize concerns related to patreon, despite everything I've done up to now, I haven't made
much progress toward my goal of being able to make hentai games
full-time with patreon and this can be disheartening at times.
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Regardless of how successful my patreon has been though, I have always continued for my fans and because I love making hentai games. I am not really concerned about becoming popular and I do not expect to become wealthy with patreon, However, I am concerted about the future, if my support never really grows, are people interested in playing my games(and will I ever be able to do this full-time)? or maybe my rewards are too unreasonable on patreon.
My subscribestar page has now been approved but before I set up things there, I would greatly like to know what you guys think about my patreon and if my rewards are too much. My subscribestar page will likely have the same rewards.
I am also wondering if you guys might like me to start a discord channel. I have been considering it, however I may not be able to be active on it much, and more so, in real life I am a very shy and quiet person, so I do not know if you all would get bored of me. However, I am willing to try discord if you guys would like for me to make one.
So for feedback for stuff relating to this, I've made a very short survey about my patreon and possibly a discord channel(at the link near the top), and I would be grateful if you guys can take a look at it.
Anyways, I do not mean to make anyone worry with this post, and game development will continue like always.
Um, that's all for now,
see you all later.
I am very sorry pizzacat. I am not currently in a situation where I can donate to patreons. I know that isn't any comfort for you, but all I can do is apologize. Maybe releasing on steam maybe a possibility for you, now that they allow adult games. As far as discord goes, I would like you to make one. But discord is strict with their rules about hentai, so you should look into that a bit. I am glad you're sticking with Immoral Sorceress, please keep going if you can.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the suggestion, and please don't worry too much. Your words of support means a great deal to me. Thank you. ^^
DeleteI believe you have the talent to develop hentai games full time through crowd funding sites like patreon and subscribestar, however there are several reasons I feel that it isn't happening for you right now. This is going to be a long comment, but I'm going to break down what I believe the problems are and what you can do to fix them.
ReplyDeleteThe first thing you need to keep in mind is that hentai game making is a market. You supply your hentai game and the consumer/fans play your game and then decide whether they want to monetarily support you or not. Now the main problem you have is that you are marketing this game to such as small amount of people. Your are doing this by adding so many extreme fetishes to the game that are going to turn people away. When this game was originally released I thought it was going to be a futanari game where the main character grows a penis and has sex (probably noncon) with a bunch of girls. I quickly realized that there are several extreme fetishes in this game (from abortion to poop). So now, the subset of people playing your game went from futanari fans, to futanari fans that aren't going to run away from the abortion and poop scenes. Your target audience keeps getting smaller and smaller as more extreme fetishes that are going to be deal breakers for most people drives them away. And as more people are driven away, obviously less people are going to donate. You can keep making the game this way, and add in as many extreme and disturbing scenes as you want, but you have to understand that the majority of players aren't into this kind of content and they are going to leave. There isn't a large consumer base for poop and abortion content in hentai games. So you can either dial the content back a little to reach out to a wider audience, or you can keep tailoring your game to this small amount of people and understand that there won't be as many people following and donating. Being a niche game creator can be a good thing for you, provided that there are enough people who enjoy that niche to provide you the following you want.
Another problem that's stifling support is, I think, the lack of cgs. The majority of the sex scenes in the game don't have any cg images yet. I am aware that you plan to add more in later, but a lot of people are either going to check back on your game in a long time when they feel the cgs are added, or just stop following altogether. You may want to make it a priority to add in cgs rather than advancing the story further at the moment.
The next is advertising. When you get some cgs for the game, post some of them places. You want to entice people with your beautiful cgs and get them to come check out the game. Post more previews for the sex scenes and game updates on r/lewdgame, r/Futanari_games, and f95zone. I realize you post a few previews here, but that is only helpful to the people following this blog currently. You want new fans to see your work and come follow you. Advertise your game as much as you can wherever you can. Keep people engaged.
Also, discord is probably a good idea. Anyway you can engage fans and the community helps.
The game is really well done, and you are a great hentai game maker, and I am perfectly fine with you continuing as you're doing now. I just think it's going to be hard to find support as it stands without switching things up a bit.
Thank you very much for your detailed advice. I appreciate it. I wouldn't be able to put my heart into it whole-heartily if I had to tone things down, so that will never be an option for me. I do believe there are audience for the extreme stuff but you may have to somehow build it. Taimanin Asagi is a good example of a popular hentai game series with lots of extreme content, there are also many artist that have huge followings that do a lot of extreme content(USA and other western country's developer tend to make tamer content than japan though), so this could be an issue of finding/building an audience. So instead of changing content, I would rather focus on what I can do with my game content left as-is.
DeleteYes, my game does really need more CGs, I am planning to try to add them within the next few months. Hopefully I will have it by then. Thanks for the suggestion.
As for the discord, on the survey currently about 60% of the people said they would join it even if I can't be active, so I may try to make one.
If there is one thing that I have, it is persistence, but being a hentai game developer can be quite difficult in general. Thanks again for all your advice, I appreciate it.