Hi,
Shark has offered something in his Priv-Box that I think is a great idea that could be developed even more to help you guys encourage people to donate some money to you for access to more from your sites. I call out the game/story authors that I think could benefit most from this, but others could as well, like Craban, though his body of work is not big enough yet, I think.

In his Priv-Box, Shark offers addtional scenes to some games (maye just one, I can't remember right now) not included in the final version of a game available for free. Furthermore, he created an addtional scene to "Horny Afternoon 3" due to popular request that is available outside of the priv-box. And ILS writer has added scenes to her stories specifically in response to my request before, which is awesome. So, this is not a new idea at all, it is being done, but what I'm suggesting is to do exactly this, but more aggressively. That is, with a large body of work, create extended versions of all your games that can only be accessed by subscription/priv-box/donation etc... That is, rather than creating single stand-alone scenes, put the additional scenes back into the original game, creating a bigger game. For example, Leonizer's Passion One has already had an enormous amount of feedback on his site wishing for a threesome scene with both girls. So, add it in, and offer access to it only with subscription. The great thing is that the free games themselves operate as advertising for the pay-to-play games. I would jump at the chance to revisit High School Romance and be able to get a threesome scene in the bathroom when the one girl catches the couple doing the blowjob in the bathroom stall, or even just to have the blowjob continue to orgasm, and so on. All these games have had feedback suggesting a scene fans wanted but didnt' get, so it seems there would be good demand to be able to get those scenes in extended versions.

Imagine offering access to extened versions of a list of games, and describing for each the extent to which it is has been added to (e.g. " 2 new sex scenes added, 1 new endings, 12 new images, 3 new animations..." and so on). People play your games and or read your stories more than once already, imagine now if they got the opportunity to play them to find addtional sex scenes.

You could even have a voting application with each game (on the free game) where fans could vote for scenes they'd like to see added, which encourages them even more to then pay to play the game they voted to create (much like Pusooy has fans vote on what game they'd like to see next).

I decided to post this so we could see what other lagooners think of the idea and I want to acknowledge again that this isn't my idea, that Shark has already been doing it to a lesser degree (I hope you don't mind me encouraging others to use your idea, Shark).

One other point I want to make, to fans of free games: I'm a fan of free games, and I'm not suggesting these authors stop doing the free stuff, I'm just pointing out how additional game development after a free game is already completed could pay off for them. And secondly, I'd like to see these guys make money, because the more money they make, them more games there will be, and the better the games will be.

Kind of like DLC for video games. Makes sense, and it certainly works there. Our games here are still simplistic enough, though, that it wouldn't necessarily be clear what to do to get the new content. I wonder which is better, to do a separate standalone game that's just the deleted scene or to do an addon to the existing game that requires you play the existing game to get to the addon.

Although we didn't charge for Daydreaming about Keeley, we chose the latter path with that one. It was a "deleted scene" that we did as a standalone game. That's my current prefrence, but I'm interested in the discussion on the pros and cons of the other path. I believe Chaotic has done the other way (adding Lei to Rachel 1), but I never bothered to go back and play again to pick up the additional scene. Had it been standalone, I would have.

That said, I ravenously buy every Bioware DLC as soon as they come out. Clearly the model can work...

Tlaero

I'm all for bonus content, after all, who doesn't want "More MORE MOAR!?" However, keep in mind that such content takes away time from starting new projects. Aside from Leonizer, I think that most of these people are 1 to 2 (wo)man teams. Should there be exclusives to paying customers when you offer a free product, sure, why not? But if you're going to hide content behind a cash-gate, I think that most people would expect the content they have to pay for to have a higher value than the free content anyone can access. There is an obvious exception to this, and that would be fans of a product who buy collector's editions (e.g. DVD's with new footage or games with art-books/sculptures packaged in) because they want to support the authors' works as best they can.

Unlike, Tlaero I'm not a fan of DLC, but I do enjoy expansion packs. That is to say, I'm not going to pay $2 for some horse armor, but I will pay good money for something that is at least 50% of the time and content of an experience I thoroughly enjoyed, so that I can further be entertained and enriched from that experience.

Will such models work with the games we play here in the Lagoon? I don't know. But, I suspect that the creators of those games will and have found their own ways to earn what they feel is appropriate compensation for their work.

G

To be clear, by "DLC" I mean new quests and content. I don't pay for outfits or armor either.

Tlaero

Oh yeah, Tlaero, I should have remembered that you did an add-on too (and it was awesome). I seriously love your work and feel bad that I overlooked acknowledging you and Freaky among the other major authors I had mentioned previously. Not to assume you would be bothered at all by it, but sorry. The reason is, I was thinking mostly about the authors who have their own sites and are trying to make some money from them - to the best of my knowledge you and Freaky haven't been trying to earn money with your games. Though, ILSWriter hasn't tried to make any money yet, but she does have her own site and I'm sure she's intending to find a way to make some money at it. On the same note, I should have called out Chaotic too because he does have his own site he's trying to earn from, and yeah, I forgot he does implement this idea to a certain extent.

I'm realizing how unoriginal this idea really is (even though I knew it was a borrowed idea to begin with), but I still think there is a way to do it that can pay off pretty well. For instance by having the expanded scenes come directly from fan requests/voting, and by revisiting what have already been particularly popular games/characters with additional options/scenes. And Graen, I see your point, but even though it's time not spent on new games, I think it's comparably less work to expand a game than make a whole new one, and so my hope is that a little extra work can lead to the same amount of new games, with some new expanded games as well that pay-off well for the authors.

Getting paid is an interesting concept. I like my anonymity, and it's hard to stay anonymous when being paid. I don't know how Phreaky feels about it. Aside from time, which we both spend in spades on these games, he's got the bigger expense with the artistic software, models, clothes, etc.

Tlaero

Interesting concept there

In my opinion, there's a difference between doing something as a hobby and doing it professionally to earn money.

Doing keeley and christine games are really fun, I did enjoy my collaboration with tlaero. We can express our creativity along the way.

But I think the one that makes it more enjoyable is that we have almost no pressure at all, no deadline, no target, and we just do the tasks everytime we feel we want to do it.

If we add money to the equation, I think many things will change, such as the expectation, which in turn will also add some more pressure I think.

I guessit really depends on what are the motives of the game creators in the first place.

And also money means commitment and time.

That said, this concept needs to be considered by free-games creators