(emphasis mine) The staff is very helpful and attentive, so if you have any problems with or questions about the submission process, you can always contact them. Desura has some great development tools and whatnot and the site is very user-friendly. One thing in particular that I like about Desura is the auto-patching system they've got in place. (for games that are available through the client) As the staffer put it:Desura Game Manager wrote:If you know of other high quality VNs or other games we would love to know about them and possibly put them on the system depending on quality. The games don't have to be games for sale, but clearly we would like to have more of those than free ones. The biggest issue is quality if I allow it to be on the system or not. I am trying to expand the user base of Desura so it isn't just those interested in hardcore FPS and RTS games. I will need other types of games to attract an audience of that type. [...]
We own the sites ModDB.com and IndieDB.com so we have been working with the indie community for 10 years and we bring that focus to Desura. We are quickly becoming the largest indie platform on the web. So stuff doesn't have to be mainstream to fit in here. [...]
Yes we don't mind hosting free games even if they are short as long as the quality is good. So if the quality is the same feel free to submit it. [...] Basically my only requirement is that it has to be quality work. It doesn't need to be the most amazing thing you have ever seen but at least it shouldn't make your eyes hurt to look at it. [...] I will take anything but eroge. I don't have a way to restrict or at least mark adult content right now. That will change in the future as we add more features to the system though. Oh and you can imply all you want in your stories we just can't have have any nudity in them or more of the adult themes like BSDM etc. The simplest rule I guess for themes is if you have to be 21 in the US to buy it then we can't put it on the system right now.
It's even possible to do invite-only private betas and whatnot using this system, so I've been thinking about using it to beta test BCM. (which I have been encouraged to do and been told is entirely possible)Desura Game Manager wrote:Doing updates using the client side of things is so easy. You do a clean install of the game, select "create MCF" then it looks at what is on the server that matches files in that directory and then only uploads new files or changed files. It does the same exact thing for users. It only downloads the changed and new files. Updates should be very quick to do for MCFs unless you made major changes that effects lots of files. [...]
For users it will always be better to use the client rather than standalones because the client will let you know when there is an update to any game you own. Standalones you have to remember to go check version numbers and see if there is a new version. That is the same for every game store online that does standalone downloads.
So anyway, it appears that they're specifically looking to expand and bring in more VNs/story-driven games so those of you with finished or in-progress high-quality VNs should try and submit them. If your game isn't finished, it needs to at least have a short playable demo and lots of screenshots (and possibly gameplay videos). They are pretty adamant about not accepting "game concepts" or "ideas", only seriously in-progress games. About the videos:
You should probably also make sure your game is free of major bugs and whatnot and that you're not using any copyrighted material. It's not a free-for-all, so not all games will be accepted. They do have a screening process that can take several days to go through... But other than time, you don't really have anything to lose and personally I think it's great that a major distributor is reaching out to the VN community. The staffer I've been talking to even said that he thinks VNs have a lot of potential in the west, so. .....Yeah. /not sure how to end this postDesura Game Manager wrote:It doesn't have to be a long trailer. I have had several people say you know it's basically a novel so a video would not be normal. I am aware of that but just something to get an idea of the story kind of like what you might read on the back of a book along with some shots of the game showing off the artwork.
Let me know if you have questions? I can relay them to the staffer if you're err too shy to ask or something. ^^; Most of the information you'd need is on the Desura website, though. Err thanks for reading!
The only thing you have to be 21 to buy in the U.S. is booze. So no drinking or alcohol in the games, huh? 
