Why charge for Eroge?

Visual Novel Community Archive, 2000-2009
#1

How about: in order to at least compensate the costs for developing and testing them in the first place?

EDIT1:
Professional work resulting in professional quality products deserves professional payment - what is so strange about that?

EDIT2:
And it’s not like providing these games by hosting them and buying the bandwidth for distributing them via download would mean no cost either. Thus I am very surprised to learn here that any professional software company would give away their products free of charge.

EDIT3:
What kind of “market” is it in which one side gives away something - and the other side just takes it without giving something back?

#2

Short answer: That’s the way it has been and continues to be now.
Long answer: First off, as I’m sure you know, this form of “game” was born in Japan. Since the concept of “online” as we know it was only in it’s zygotic form at the time of birth for eroge, that means that the games were only available as hard copies. If the Wikipedia article on eroge is correct, the first eroge were made by NEC, which I’m sure you’re aware of, like most companies, is in business to make a profit. Thus eroge from the beginning was sold, not given away. (It was even sold at around the same price as now acording to the wiki.) Now we come back to my first point. As Peter Payne has talked about many times (if you read the J-List newsletter), many kinds of change are slow to come in Japan. You are much more likely to hear someone say ??? (shikata ga nai) or ??? (shou ga nai), which both roughly mean “It can’t be helped”, than to find someone who is willing to change things.
Input on what I have said from more knowledgeable regulars than myself would be appreciated.

#3

Sorry for the double post, but I thought I’d give an example of what Peter has said in the newsletter for those who don’t read it.

#4

Because people have already demonstrated a large willingness to shell out for it? (Seriously, porn was the first profitable net business.) Because making people use a credit card is considered in most legal jurisdictions to be sufficient proof-of-age?

Because the only real popular free-to-play yet also for-profit games that have really succeeded are MMORPGs?

Because an online game of the sort you seem to be proposing involves a LOT more money than typical eroge makers have available to spend? In up-front costs that you have to pay just to try your idea out?

It’s an interesting idea, but I doubt it would work.

#5

… really? Which ones are these?

Do you mean the little free flash games, which have to be developed on a timescale of about a month in order to make ends meet on advertising revenue? Flash game sites often offer to pay about $500-$1000 to buy the full rights to a game. Now consider the salary of a programmer, a musician, and an artist. You end up with games either made by kids and hobbyists who are grateful to get any money at all, or you get super-short games pumped out quickly. GOOD LUCK finding someone who can program and draw an entire hentai game of quality in the timescale necessary to survive on that budget.

Do you mean the Asian-style free-to-play MMORPGs, which make ends meet by selling add-ons? That makes no sense at all for an eroge. What do you want, a free game with no pictures where you pay per-CG to have the graphics added back into it? :slight_smile:

There are free games being made, check out a hobbyist community or a flash games site. But you generally won’t find quality+quantity there, because it’s not economically feasible. You may have a great idea for a game and be willing to work on it for free, but are you a fabulous artist? And if you ARE a fabulous artist, don’t you probably need to be busy making a living with your fabulous art?

People have to eat.

#6

Narg has a solution for everyone! Rather than money, get eroge by trading it for sex! :wink: :stuck_out_tongue:

#7

… Wow, what a ball-stabbingly stupid article.

It starts out talking about one thing (people intentionally trade sex in order to get Things) then suddenly switches to another (people WANT to have sex with you because you are a provider) and then completely out of nowhere slams non-breadwinner men (How dare you not be a main provider? No one will want to have sex with you then! Unmasculine!)

Let me happily proclaim, then, that I want to have sex with my non-breadwinner partner all the time. So there. :slight_smile:

(COmpletely random thought - Have you noticed that all three of our join times are listed as 6:01 am, although on different days?)

#8

I believe that the forum change to phpBB did that. A lot of people have that time listed.

#9

Ah… Katawa Shoujo. I was watching that some time ago, but completely lost track of it. Thanks for the link. When I first learned of it, I was slightly worried the “similar setting” would be a problem with a pet project of my own. However after some quiet observation and post readings, it became apparent the thematic elements were completely different. Thus I could continue to green light progress. Glad to see Katawa Shoujo is still ongoing and nearing completion. Fits my secret agenda. 8)

Their timetable and shown work quality is impressive. Most impressive.

#10

Yea, I think you hit the nail on the head. Let’s face it, eroge games are from Japan, and Japanese marketing policies are clearly different from ours in America. Before asking whether an American eroge company would sell eroge for free, ask yourself, “Would the Japanese do it? Could I convince the Japanese to do it?” Short answer: No.

Also keep in mind, even if American publishers wanted to sell eroge for free, the companies they license games from wouldn’t allow them. In MangaGamer’s example, they’re forced to use anti-piracy protection because their licensed companies wanted them too. For this similar reason, I highly doubt many licensing companies would consent to free games. The companies in Japan are the top dogs about what happens to their marketing products, so before convincing America, you’d have to convince the Japanese first.

The only exception to all this is if you make your own eroge, then you’re welcome to do whatever you see fit, but good luck with that 8).

#11

Yes, that’s sort of what I was saying in my posts. I don’t think it’s that nobody has thought of it; it’s more like no one is willing to step forward and try something that is different from what everyone else is doing.

#12

Not so much as no one has thought of it, but rather because the risk for NOT earning profit is too great. Look at the regular porn industry, which has a FAR larger number of customers. Look how the “free porn” venture from over a decade ago failed so miserably to win profit from ad sales. You’re not looking at this from the prospective of a business investor; you’re looking at it from the prospective of an ero gamer…

Let’s pretend for a second, that I believe in your idea. That I’m willing to finance your venture. How will you payback the loan I give you, with significant interest (i.e. my profit), in a specified period of time? As an investor, what incentive do I have to take this risk? That just a start… I’ll have dozens more. If you can seriously answer them, then maybe you can convince someone to fund your idea. Not everyone is in it for the fun or love. Many are in it for the money. Those “free” MMO exist to line someone’s pocket. They’re fun because they have to be amusing to convince (some say scam) people into buying useless add-ons. It’s not about quality or redefining the gaming industry… its about maximizing profits.

Here’s something else you need to consider as well: piracy. How will you compete against free eroge, created by companies that might use more money to create their titles, which is stolen and provided for free? If your free stuff is crappier than the free stuff they can already get from other avenues, why bother? Please don’t tell me it’s to support the game makers. That’s what happened to the “free porn” market.

#13

Hmmm, I wonder… if you used a combination of a game like from the Raidy series or Downhill Night Blaze and a business approach like Nexon, do you think a “free” eroge could work Narg?

#14

See the problem is that free isn’t free at all. Somewhere profit is being made. There are literally dozens of methods. For example:

  • Paid through the purchase of in-game items with real money: like outfitting your avatar with hats and clothing.

  • Paid through the exchange of real money for in-game currency (Nexon is something like this).

  • Paid through the use of real money to acquire additional or more powerful playing pieces than the “free account” provides.

  • Paid through third-party companies (like Coca-Cola or McDonalds), being allowed to throw their ads within the game or in a banner that shows on the game screen.

So forth and so on. It’s not really free. There’s hardcore profit… or else it will die off.

The problem with porn is that most commercial ventures don’t want to put their ads in them, to keep a positive image. For example Coca-Cola likes to portray itself as a family business, so they wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole. So there goes that idea. Basically that gives us the exchange of money for something. That leaves a scenario sorta like this (unless someone here is REALLY creative):

You find investors to finance the creation of this really cool game engine to run eroge. Now what? You provide one free eroge game to run on this? Maybe one free chapter? Okay, done. So where’s the profit? Where’s the money to pay back the investors? Okay… you’re not using investors. You’re using a free game engine for your venture (Ren’py or something). How do you pay for the hosting and bandwidth? Using a torrent? Okay… fine. What about the paychecks of your artists, musicians, programmers, and writers? See where this is leading? It just gets more and more convoluted, when you try to squeeze out the equation of money. That’s a charity, not a business. And that’s why you haven’t seen a business do it. What you do get, is things like DLSite - not free, but low priced. Still results in a profit though (DLSite gets their cut from each sale; I believe professional companies also have to pay a membership fee). If we’re following the free MMO idea, you’re gonna hit the kind of “profit solution” that papillon brought up:

Pay for CG’s? More characters? Additional chapters? Endings? I mean seriously… for an eroge? That sounds kinda dumb. I know as an erogamer, I wouldn’t do it. Sounds too much like a “scam” to me (even if its not).

Somewhere. Somehow. You gotta be making money. :expressionless:

#15

Hence the quotation marks around free in my last post. I don’t think anyone is trying to say that there isn’t an aim to make a profit.

That’s partially what I’m saying, as dumb as it may sound to you. While nowhere near as severe as papillon puts it (there would be the basic core of the game that is free, with scenes for the few characters), if I were in charge of such a venture I would certainly have characters and such that you have to pay to have access to, but there is more to it then that. Let’s look at the conversion of a game like Raidy to this business model. Nexon has proved that people will shell out for all sorts of stuff that doesn’t matter in terms of gameplay or story. Want to change the way Raidy’s armor looks? It’ll cost you a little. Want to customize the look of a weapon? It’ll cost you. Want to change the size of Raidy’s breasts? Yep, you guessed it: it’ll cost you. Now I’m no expert, but I think these changes could be easily reflected in scenes by constructing the scenes in layers, with variations in positioning of arms, legs, head, etc. so that while the base layer of the picture is the same, the end picture for the scene looks like something different enough to fool the player. It’s even simpler than that if the scenes are done in a 3D engine similar to Time Leap. In any case, Nexon seems to have perfected the art of nickel and diming people out of huge sums of money. Just look at the success of MapleStory. I personally don’t understand why people can’t see this for what it is, but as the saying goes, “There’s a sucker born every minute”. Getting back to unlockable characters and such, it would be more like an in-game key that unlocks a door to another area of a dungeon, or a magic item that lets you breath underwater. The new characters would be in these areas, along with new gameplay.

#16

A “free” eroge/galge followed by upgrades that you have to pay for sounds nearly like trial versions of games that are available now… You can play the first arc of Higurashi for free, but if you want to read more, you’ll have to buy the game, etc.

#17

Ah but don’t you see, that’s already being done with games where the core content is being paid for: download content like XBOX LIVE. See the iDOLM@ASTER as the perfect example. The SIMS is an even bigger and more profiting making one (which EA has been trying to spread across all their ventures). The “suckers” are already hooked. Why provide something for free, that the market proves people will pay for already? As an investor, you’ll be VERY hard pressed to sell the idea of financing a core engine that will be given away for free, if people - by the millions - are already paying for them. I wanna mimick the success of iDOLMASTER and The SIMS ¬ñ massive cash flow titles.

Also take note that if a game is catchy and well built, in most cases people will pay for it, even if it was free. Example? Bejeweled used to be free waaaay back ago. Now you pay for it. People bitched and moaned when it happened, but that didn’t stop it from making millions. Furthermore, the profit made from the paid downloadable content in the iDOLM@STER, was not as much as profit made from the sales of the game itself ¬ñ despite how incredibly popular that title and its downloadable content was. In fact more people bought the core game, because they learned there would downloadable content to make things fresh. Namco also cheated in the network backbone costs, because they didn’t have to build their own download and credit paying system from scratch (they just use the one Microsoft built).

I’m not saying your idea is stupid - no serious idea is stupid - but the investor in me isn’t sold by the proposal: I can make even MORE money by selling the core engine, not giving it away for free. Also if the venture fails, at least I got some return from the core engine sale. These money loaded investors I keep referring to? They’re greedy scheming bastards: that’s why they’re so loaded. :stuck_out_tongue:

#18

Great points.

After all, if we want a new car, we can’t force the seller to give us one for free. Could be a great deal for us, but not for him… he would be bankrupt in no time. Still, he can offer us a free ride just to feel the car and check if the one we chose is the best option, instead.

In the same way, if we want to buy a (H)game software, but we don’t know if we will like it, would be better to give a try in the TRIAL VERSION first! That’s for free. :wink:

#19

When a man(or woman the same,i won’t repeat this)works,he does’t work for nothing ,but in his work he seeks to satisfy his needs,which could be material or spiritual or both.When one need is satisfied,another arises,the man will continue to work as long as his needs are not completely satisfied.Material needs are more important. But when material needs are satisfied (to a certain degree),the man has the possibility to look after his spiritual needs.For ex:one could go fishing ,not for the fish but for the “pleasuse” of catching fishes,sitting idly…because he has no immediate need for the fish,in another word hes not hungry.
Now ,lets us look into this ‘freegame’ matter.Please note that i’m using 'freegame ’ here only as a concept,im not going to prove or disprove of its existence or interested in debating it,so you don’t need to go ahead and tell me:“There s no such thing as freegame”.Lets just suppose that there is a certain thing called “freegame” here okay?.Like i said above,when human are satisfied materially,they will seek to be satisfied metally.If someone has the time\manpower to create\work on something that wouldn’t satisfied him materially,it indicates that he seek to satisfied his spirit.So it’s mean that freegame(and many thing alike) are the work of\by someone who are freed\temporarily freed from his days-to-days struggle for living,given him the suitalbe amount of time to create it.This game,which is a mean to to satisfy his metal need,of course its a product entirely based on his will\ego and must firstly and most importantly meets his own taste\personnality\viewpoint\politics BEFORE that of those who are going to play it.To create this game,however he will need more then just time.It will require a certain amount of ability\technologies\artworks…In the case of visual novel,he will need a script ,game engine,some CGs at the very least.Lets suppose that the creator of this game,as he has planned beforehand,has the suitable ablity\manpower to control the outcome of this game as his wishes,then the game willl come out as entirely ‘individual work’.But if he doesn’t then the will be two possibility:first,the outcome of this game will be not as he planned,with would make this a “bad” game because it has violated its own meaning of existence.Second,he must get assistance from another individuals\groups but if he does that ,he will ‘own’ others or more exactly,he will became merely a ‘subject’ not the ‘almighty’ of this game ,make him not much diff from worker of a game com.Note that in this case,he here could be understand as a group,but of people who are:freed\temporarily freed,has the same(or at least common)will/interest and has the same expect for the game.Because they all seeking to satisfy their spiritual needs and willing to work with each other make them as close as ‘individual’.You may doubt this but its not really something strange in the field of creation.So,continue what i said before,if the game is completed and come out as the creator wants it,he giving it for free and then we play it,but because the content(as i said before)is entirely based on the creator’s self,that mean the player coukd LIKE :smiley: it or HATE :evil: it.
What does it affect?What really is the diff between freegame and market game?Lets…leave it for next time ,now im sleepy :oops: …

#20

You know… I tried to read your post and I ended up giving up because of a headache. If you’re not going to try to spell things correctly and construct proper sentences, at least give the reader the courtesy of line breaks.