Persona 5 Royal is my favorite Persona! Have fun!

Congrats!

I think this shows how important localizations are. I actually translated the Steam store page itself as well in 10 languages using AI (Opus 4.6/4.7).

This is my first game so I'm having fun learning all of this!

If you are making your own game, let's chat here on Bluesky and learn together! :)

But to me, direct navigation coming third for visits, means external marketing on other sites like subreddits, social media places like Bluesky, etc are important.

Let's also talk about the traffic itself. 66% of the traffic was from *outside* the US. That's huge!

#solodev #indiedev #gamedev

Most of the visits came from the Adult Only Hub on Steam. Surprise, sex sells lol. Discovery Queue is 2nd, which also re-affirms that the store page art is doing it's job. Direct navigation is 3rd; but I wish it told me from which sites people were coming from! lol

#solodev #indiedev #gamedev

200k impressions in a month and 16.5k visits. A click-thru rate of about 6.8%. AI tells me this is a pretty good rate, so that tells me that my capsule art, store page descriptions, etc are doing their job and getting people to go to the store page.

#solodev #indiedev #gamedev

Inspired by @dyrkabes.bsky.social sharing their Steam stats, I also want to share my own and compare notes! These metrics are for Ririka von Lustveil, from March 8 to April 8, 2026. The game released on March 15, so you can see a very large spike due to the release.

#solodev #indiedev #gamedev

Thank you for sharing real data! I hope those numbers continue to climb for you and your game! :)

This is why I use AI as a massive time-saving tool lol. Combine Claude Code with local MCPs, and you can turn a two week long feature implementation into 2 hours with one conversation.

I use AI in my day job (software engineer) to the same effect.

I never clear my wishlist on Steam lol. I only add to it! That being said, we'll never know why someone removed a game from their wishlist. It also doesn't matter and has no bearing on how well your game will sell on Steam.

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Please give it a listen and then perhaps try the demo on Steam or Itchio! :)

Steam: store.steampowered.com/app/4262750/...

Itchio: hexecho.itch.io/ririka

I found myself listening to the new theme song for my game, Ririka von Lustveil, over and over again lol. So I wanted to share it with everyone via Soundcloud!

soundcloud.com/hex-echo/lus...

#eroge #AIart #loli #VisualNovel #RenPy #mesugaki #hentai #NSFW #hentai #hentaiartist #AIイラスト #waifu #ロリ

When it came to determine which languages I were going to localize to, I used my Steam traffic data to determine that. For week 1, it was US, Russia, Japan, Korea as my top 4. So I went with those as my immediate roadmap items. I eventually translated to 10 total languages. Follow the data! lol :)

I used Opus 4.6 for my translations on my project. It's hard to determine the quality of these translations, but I did managed to get a positive review from a Russian speaker and they claim the Russian translation is very good. They also said that a quality translation in Russian is very rare lol.

But I had a hunch that a good quality translation of the entire game, from UI and Settings to dialogue and story, would make a big difference. And it certainly did. In week 1, 90% of my sales were US based. The following week, I added Russian and then nearly half my sales were Russia based lol.

Nice! I wish you the best of luck with your release!

Oh! Another important factor that massively impacted my sales, is localizations! Don't neglect translating your game to multiple languages. This might be specific to genres though. As my game is a visual novel and very text heavy.

Yes! I also agree. I think an important factor is how "shareable" is the game. Like, if there is some element of your game that makes someone who is playing it, want to share a clip or screenshot or something, that's your golden ticket.

External marketing is important! That is, posting on relevant subreddits, websites, reaching out to curators and YouTubers. I also use Keymailer (with ok results; mainly because of my game's genre I think). I also think the game's genre has a big impact on where you need to market your game.

Don't get discouraged! Every game we make is experience and makes the next one even better. Keep learning, keep improving!

Next Fest definitely helped with my wishlist numbers, but it also depends how many wishlists you were getting before. For example, I was averaging about 5-10 wishlists a day until Next Fest spiked to 86 in a day. Not thousands, but it still helped.

For some reference, my wishlist conversion percentage hovers around 7-8%. So if you have 1000 wishlists, about 70-80 of them will convert into sales. I have no idea if that percentage varies from genre to genre though.

Anyway, us indie devs gotta learn together! :)

Something I learned while making my first game (Ririka von Lustveil), was that getting it on Steam as early as possible to gather wishlists is massively important. I only had it up for about 2 months before release, but I think the ideal window is like 6 months.

Bonus drop: v1.9.0 also ships a new J-pop opening theme — "Lust Magic Academy ♡"

🎵 Plays on the main menu when you boot the game
🎤 Catchy, on-character (very mesugaki, very Ririka)
📦 Available in EVERY build — Steam, demo, adult, all of them

Let it play before clicking Start~♡

Download the latest indie games itch.io is a simple way to find, download and distribute indie games online. Whether you're a developer looking to upload your game or just someone looking for something new to play itch.io has you co...

The Sprite Gallery is exclusive to the full Original (uncensored) edition. To access it:

🔓 Apply the adult patch to your full Steam install (patch is free from itch.io)
📦 Or grab the full adult build directly

itch.io: hexecho.itch.io/ririka

Built to be enjoyed comfortably:

🎮 Full controller + Steam Deck support (D-pad navigates, Y hides HUD, B exits)
✋ One-handed friendly — WASD or arrows both work
👁️ Toggle HUD with F or H for unobstructed viewing

Localized in all 10 supported languages.

What's in the Gallery:

🎨 60 unique character sprites (every Ririka pose + Lilith, Kai, Aldric, Elias, Beast King, werewolves)
🌅 28 backgrounds — every location in the game
🎵 16 BGM tracks
🔊 6 SFX groups with random variety

Everything unlocked from the start. No grinding required~

Download the latest indie games itch.io is a simple way to find, download and distribute indie games online. Whether you're a developer looking to upload your game or just someone looking for something new to play itch.io has you co...

Ririka von Lustveil v1.9.0 is out!

🎨 New Sprite Gallery (full Original edition) — sandbox viewer for sprites/BGs/BGM/SFX
🎵 New J-pop opening theme "Lust Magic Academy ♡" on the main menu (all builds)

itch.io: hexecho.itch.io/ririka

#VisualNovel #VN #indiegame #gamedev #RenPy #AIart #eroge #loli

Here is a scene from my eroge visual novel, Ririka von Lustveil!

Check out the full game either on Steam: store.steampowered.com/app/4262750

or Itchio:
hexecho.itch.io/ririka

#eroge #AIart #loli #VisualNovel #RenPy #mesugaki #hentai #NSFW #hentai #hentaiartist #AIイラスト #waifu #ロリ