Written by OtakuApologist
Asmongold, perhaps the most popular streamer covering Blizzard Entertainment’s games, made a reaction video months ago, that should’ve set the world on fire. The topic is about nothing less than the future of gaming.
Without realizing it, what Asmongold said of this video is scratching at the heart of the hentai games industry.
If you haven’t noticed, mainstream live-service games are stupidly popular. The situation is even more extreme in the field of western adult games. The dominance of free-to-play live-service games is getting extreme, so much so that some companies are opting to discard download titles almost completely.
Quick reality check before we go further. For every League of Legends, Fortnite, Dota, CS:GO, or Smite, there are innumerable failed live-service titles. The free-to-play market is feast or famine. Successful tiles may still be cancelled years down the line as unprofitable, as has happened with numerous F2P hentai games that I personally reviewed. Because despite the most extreme monetization tactics, only a tiny portion of the playerbase ever buys anything.
The situation is worst for downloadable adult games. Far, far worse.
Live-service games are becoming the new normal. As Asmongold points out, when you look at the most viewed titles on TwitchTV these days, it’s almost all live-service. Even AAA titles that you buy for $60 have live-service elements these days. Because the revenue generated from the sales of cosmetics, battle passes and loot boxes is ridiculous.
I literally had this conversation with a company. They’re changing their entire focus to be on live-service, because the difference in revenue generated makes download porn titles a joke from an investor’s perspective. Granted, mainstream games have it easier, with numerous gamers buying their entertainment from Steam and similar services. But I am talking about eroge now, and many eroge that are not permitted on Steam are completely fucked by piracy.
It’s a crisis you haven’t even thought of. Many sexy games with a unique niche focus are never getting made, not with a good budget anyway. Because how do you argue to a businessman that they should invest in a kinky product that cannot be sold on the biggest platforms, such as Steam? There is not enough profit to warrant the risk.
Also read about the actual problems with F2P business models.
We are very lucky to have tenacious studios and publishers who relentlessly push the medium forward, despite countless obstacles. Even the works of Studio Empress are starting to have official English translations.
Steam is a goldmine for eroge devs who somehow bypassed the censorship and dodged the post-publication de-platforming, which sometimes occurs. But that leaves innumerable developers with nothing more than a dream.
Must I state the obvious? When you pirate niche games, because they’re not covered by Steam’s DRM, you are sending a market signal to the big wigs. This shows in various metrics that companies gather and discuss. And from that pool of data, company executives and investors derive their decisions. They do what pays and don’t do what doesn’t.
Here you may argue, but what about those runaway hentai download game hits? They are difficult to predict. No company can pump millions into a fluke. There must be data to base such decisions upon. Either that, or you need a shotgun approach. Make tons of titles that appeal to different niches and hope at least one of them makes back what you spent. This means a strained budget for individual games. It’s not uncommon that you spend on ten different projects, all with great prospect for sales, and still end up at net-loss. I’ve done the shotgun approach with my own comics and games.
What went wrong with gaming? Nothing. You, the customers, are getting exactly what you are paying for. More live-service games. Meanwhile, serious investment on download games for underserved niches remains abysmally low.
Think about it. What’s the highest quality footjob focused game you’ve played? Can you think of any? Feet are one of the biggest fetishes in existence and almost nobody is making content for people who love feet. Think of your kinks, what’s the best shit you’ve played that matched those kinks? Some DLSite indie title, a pervy little Patreon thing with a few hours of content? That’s the best you’re ever getting, unless things change.
Think of the vistas of adult gaming that we haven’t even begun to explore yet. The western adult games industry remains a cesspit of low-quality media, far from its true potential.
