If a Western indie developer released a visual novel on the scale of games like Steins;Gate and Fate/Stay Night...

If a Western indie developer released a visual novel on the scale of games like Steins;Gate and Fate/Stay Night, would you be interested in playing it and how much would you be willing to pay for it?

What I have in mind so far:

>An unassuming high school senior gains superpowers and has to struggle between balancing his new life with his old one.
>It soon turns out that things are a lot more complicated than it seems from the shiny outside. Because of differing political interests, philosophies, etc. superheroes are constantly being broken into factions and clashing. Many of the most infamous supervillains, upon closer inspection, may have been the ones who were right.
>Meanwhile all the bizarre powers heroes have had throughout history have left permanent, labyrinthine marks on the nature of the world which continue to have complex, chaotic repercussions on everything. Imagine entering a warzone after Legion-like superheroes have been fighting each other for decades and trying to orient yourself.

>At some point in the story it splits into 3 major routes where you side with very different characters. Each route has a romantic interest and is also associated with a broad ethical position: Consequentialism, Deontology, Virtue ethics/Pragmatism.
>All routes are consistent which each other in terms of character motivation, etc., but are written completely from scratch, mirroring the enormous consequences of your ethical sympathies.
>The game is filled with choices. Some might have huge repercussions later, no matter which route you choose, while others will only reveal world-building details you otherwise won't know.
>Information from routes and loose threads you've played through earlier might give extra depth to other scenes and aid you in choices.
>Presentation will be designed around completionism. The game will encourage you and award you for seeing everything there is to see while at the same time carefully charting all types of progress.

>Character designs inspired by Western comics.
>Accessible, fast-paced prose with lots of action and colorful characterizations, though with a complex plot and serious themes.
>No holding back in terms of violence, sex, etc.

If I wanted to read a book, guess what I'd do

No way fag

I read VNs just for a particular VA

Nice weebfiction, my idea man.

>>Character designs inspired by Western comics.
Hell no

I'd play your game. I'd also pay exactly 0 dollars.

>what is VA-11 HALL-A
>what is Come Out on the Top
>what is katawa shoujo general #4365


Yes but this is not really a market and doing this for money is unlikely to pay out. I cannot imagine paying more than ~25$ for what is effectively a book.

It's also a difficult kind of a game to tackle >because it has no gameplay

>high schooler gains super powers

No because for starter, the artsyle would be a complete piece of shit like most western games.

>how much would you be willing to pay for it?
As much as I did for them. Zero

I feel like VNs keep being underestimated on the Western market. From what I understand Steins;Gate has done pretty well and the Phoenix Wright games were a huge success. As a writer tired of not seeing much money, it looks like it might be worth a shot. I mean, even if it sells only like 100k copies at a budget price, I would be fucking set for the rest of my life.

I'm registering people don't like the idea of Westernized character designs. The idea behind that was to give a Western VN a distinctual style (also focusing a lot more on choices than Japanese ones typically do), and everyone is used to seeing superheroes drawn in a Western style in the first place. On the other hand I might as well signal really clearly what kind of "game" this is and give my expected audience exactly what they want.

I also agree about not trying to be "too deep" with the philosophy or the bizarre powers. I do want to do that whole NGE/Steins;Gate/MGS pop-cultural "deepness" thing though.

I think you're going to run into the issue that people already accept Japanese VNs are being a thing and a thing that costs a certain amount of money and the like. Your thing would probably be seen as a dodgy imitation at best or just a confusing creation at worst.
S;G did well enough on Vita and PS3 to justify the work of a second Steam release and a much more timely translation of Zero, and Danganronpa (while more of a game) has a pretty solid following as well. The western market is warming a little to them, but it's still early days.

>high school student
>suddenly gets superpowers

What's the point of making a Western VN if you're just going to use the same generic formula that Japan keeps shitting out?

Danganronpa is fucking huge
It nearly reached KH sales in the first week

Most Japanese VN companies start out very small though. Tsukihime was made by like what, 2 or 3 people? It's not that difficult to program or anything. The bulk of the work drawing and writing. I'm pretty sure I can make it look fairly presentable.

And isn't the early days exactly when it's best to strike? Think of computers.

They did, it's called Katawa Shoujo. It's free.

Life is strange is basicly a western VN, complete with a dogshit ending.

Dude, Katawa Shoujo is cute and all, but it's like a tenth of Fate/Stay Night's size and the writing is incredibly uneven.

You'll notice that most stories that have some kind of genius, experimental concept are not very long. For the kind of accessible story you can escape into, like most VNs and Harry Potter, I think it's best to have a loose, simple structure and then focus on all the filling.

>Western indie developer
Stopped reading here

I am also visual novel development and the only advice i can give you: you're story is too ambitious. A single person or an inexperienced them will never put out something as deep and refinished as Steins;Gate or the likes.

Also either go full weeb or steer away from japanese tropes, it seems you're in a grey area and I don't think it's a good idea.

Personally, i am working on niche projects for niche markets.

also sorry for ridiculous grammar but i am not a native english speaker.

Will there be gameplay? If not no interest $0. If there is actually gameplay then about $30 but no more.

For what it's worth, I'm very experienced with writing and I like to challenge myself.

I think you guys are most likely right about going full weeb ...

*tips hakama*

>Personally, i am working on niche projects for niche markets.
Is it Sakura series

>tfw want to get into Steins;Gate but haven't played the first one and the only way to get the HD remake was by preordering Zero.

I don't have a PC at the moment either so looks like I'll have to postpone that shit for later, good thing I have loads of stuff to play in the meantime.
Should I just watch the anime before playing the VN's?

no, VNs are shit no matter where they come from

The Anime is a pretty good adaption but you should play the game.
Just pirate it my man.

no

That was my intention, but as I stated above, I don't have a PC at the moment, so it will have to wait. Is Zero still worth a purchase for PS4 or should I pirate that too once I get a PC?

I wish, they are selling a lot. Eroge is not a niche market

>would you be interested in playing it and how much would you be willing to pay for it?

I'd pay money not to play it tbqh.

Nah, OELVNs are pretty much always shit. The fact that you're already mentioning Steins;Gate and F/SN shows you wouldn't create anything original. And your pitch is generic as shit, with small alterations it could be used to describe dozens of existing chuuniges.

Besides, I don't like the idea of reading eroge in English. Reading Japanese is enjoyable by itself.

Well, some like Zero some don't.
I say go for it if you enjoyed S;G and want more.

Do it, but all you'll discover is the reason why weebs and japs love Visual Novels is because there's a whole load of fucking passion behind developing it which amounts to almost no reward financially due to such a small fan base.

Honestly if you love writing, and can do art, make your attempt, and if your lucky people will dig it. Otherwise don't be surprised if anything unoriginal gets ripped to shreds, or delivery falls flat.

If anyone has talent, I say go for it, and I'm sure people will enjoy it. Just a reminder though that the best visual novels are fucking painful, since you've got branching story lines you got to do, and each one needs a satisfying ending.

It's the truth, from a marketing standpoint, who is going to buy your game? It's best to dive into something that is pre-established.

You're also competing with fan translations, sure your game might sell 'a little' due to the convenience of things like steam.

But unless the internet starts sucking your dick like you won the lottery, your game more than having something special, needs to be well constructed as the basics.

Many developers keep their dream game in the cupboards till they are confident they can pull it off. The inexperienced ones flounder around during the development because they can't compromise, or adapt to make something fit.

Nothing is "original" dumbass.

> If a Western indie developer

No

I dont trust the western developer to be able to tell a compelling story, I want something that is explicitly Japanese and that's not something I want to see people like me try to recreate, it doesn't feel authentic no matter how close the artstyle is like that persona rip off game, a modern rpg or something I think it's called. I really don't like that.

I honestly think there's an untapped market for VNs in the west. Looking at all of these narrative driven games, I can't help but wonder why no one, on a large scale, hasn't tried to delve into straight up cutting the middle-man out.

I gotta say though, if you're gonna do something on the scale of FSN, make sure the protagonist is interesting. The grail war concept was the thing to hook people, but Shirou was what made them stay. The VN started with giving you the base premise, but from UBW and beyond it's firmly his story.

Undertale is basically a visual novel pretending not to be and it was pretty successful.

Especially not you.

*tips gender-neutral pronouns* m' good xir