How to make an adult game: engines, stores, payments and the law

Making an adult game uses the same skills as making any other game: an engine, writing, art, testing and a release plan. What is different is the set of rules around it. Stores and payment companies decide what can be sold, laws draw firm lines around minors and real people, and age verification rules apply to anyone who shows explicit content online. Planning for those rules from the first day saves a game from being blocked at the last.

This guide covers the decisions in the order most developers meet them. It is practical information with sources, not legal advice.

Key points

• Engine: Ren’Py for visual novels, RPG Maker for role-playing games, Godot or Unity for anything else.
• Content: every character must be an adult, clearly and consistently. Some themes cannot be sold anywhere that takes card payments.
• Selling: Steam, itch.io, specialist stores and subscription platforms each have their own rules. Read them before you write.
• Payments: Stripe will not process adult content. Specialist processors will, at higher cost.
• Your website: keep it safe for work, and put explicit material behind a separate, age-checked address.

Step 1: choose an engine

Most first adult games are visual novels, and most Western ones use Ren’Py. Its script language is simple enough for a writer to learn, and Python is available when a game needs systems such as stats, inventory or time management.

Pick the engine that fits the game you can finish. A short, complete visual novel teaches more than a large project that never ships.

Step 2: know the legal lines before you write

Three kinds of law matter. They vary by country, so treat this as a map of where to look, not a set of answers.

Characters must be adults

This is the most important rule in the medium. Many countries outlaw sexual depictions of minors even when they are drawn or computer-generated.

• In the United States, 18 U.S.C. § 1466A covers obscene visual depictions of minors, including drawings and cartoons.
• In England and Wales, section 62 of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 makes it an offence to possess prohibited non-photographic images of children.

Stating that “all characters are 18 or over” is necessary and not sufficient. Stores and platforms look at how a character is presented: appearance, setting, behaviour and context. Patreon’s rules, for example, say illustrated subjects must be unmistakably adults. Design characters who are adults in every respect, not characters who are adults only on paper.

Real people need documentation

Content showing real people, including photographs, video and anything traced or generated to resemble a real person, brings its own rules. In the United States, 18 U.S.C. § 2257 requires producers of sexually explicit material with real performers to keep records proving every performer’s age and identity. Steam’s rules prohibit sexually explicit images of real people outright, and itch.io bans AI imagery made to look like real people.

Most adult games avoid this entirely by using drawn or rendered characters.

Obscenity and local rules

Some countries restrict explicit material more broadly. Japan, for example, requires explicit images to be obscured with mosaics under Article 175 of its Penal Code. Developers commonly block sales to countries where their game would break local law, and stores let them do that.

Step 3: decide where you will sell, before you write

Store and payment rules now shape content as much as law does. Read them at the start, because a scene written in month one can make a game unsellable in month twelve.

• Steam allows adult content that is labelled and age-gated, charges a 100 US dollar fee per game, and since July 2025 excludes content that may break its payment processors’ rules without saying exactly what that covers.
• itch.io allows fictional adult content that is legal and publishes a list of banned themes: non-consensual content, underage or “barely legal” themes, incest, bestiality, coercion, trafficking and voyeurism.
• Specialist stores and subscription platforms each have their own lists, and several tightened them in 2026.

Across every route that takes card payments, the same core themes are excluded, because Mastercard’s rule 5.12.7 names them as brand-damaging. A game built around them has no mainstream sales channel.

Where adult games can be sold compares every option, and how payment processors decide explains why the lines fall where they do.

Step 4: plan how the game is paid for

Adult games are usually funded in one of three ways.

1. Self-funded and released complete. You make the game, then sell it. This is the simplest legally and the hardest financially.
2. Monthly subscriptions during development. Supporters pay monthly and receive new versions as you release them. Many Western adult games are funded this way. It brings steady income and the pressure of regular releases.
3. A publisher. Some publishers take on adult games, mostly visual novels, and handle release in exchange for a share.

If you sell from your own site, you become the merchant. Stripe will not process adult content, and PayPal may not. Specialist processors for adult businesses will review your site first and expect terms, a privacy policy, a refund policy, an age gate and a complaints contact.

Step 5: build compliance into the game

• Age gate. Ask for confirmation of age at launch. It is expected by stores and processors, even where it is not a legal requirement for the game itself.
• Content warnings. Say plainly what the game contains, at the start and on the store page. Players want it, and it protects you when a store reviews the game.
• An all-ages option. Consider building a toggle that removes explicit content. It lets you sell an all-ages version on stores that require it and helps streamers and reviewers cover the game.
• AI disclosure. If you use AI for art, text or voice, check each store’s rules and disclose it. Steam asks about AI use in its content survey.

Step 6: keep your own audience

Stores and payment companies change their rules without notice, as 2025 showed. Developers with a direct line to their players were the least exposed.

• A website you control, kept safe for work. A site that shows explicit content takes on age verification duties: in the United Kingdom, the Online Safety Act requires highly effective age checks, with fines up to £18 million or 10 percent of worldwide revenue. Several US states require checks where more than a third of a site is explicit. Keep the main site clean and put explicit material behind a separate, age-checked address or on the stores themselves.
• A mailing list. It is the one channel no store or bank can switch off.
• More than one store. If one channel closes, the game is still for sale elsewhere.

Step 7: mobile, if you want it

Google Play and the App Store do not allow explicit games. If you want a phone version, the options are a browser build, an Android app file installed from your own site, or an all-ages version on the stores. Android is introducing developer verification for apps installed outside Google Play, starting in four countries in September 2026, so register as a verified developer even if you never publish on Google Play. Details are in adult games on Android and iPhone.

A checklist before release

1. Every character is an adult in appearance, context and text.
2. No content falls into the themes your stores and processors exclude.
3. No real person is depicted without documented consent and age, and nothing resembles a real person.
4. The game has an age gate and clear content warnings.
5. The store page labels the content correctly and describes it honestly.
6. AI use is disclosed where it applies.
7. Sales are blocked in countries where the game would break local law.
8. You have a safe-for-work website and a mailing list.

How this page was put together

Engine details come from each engine’s official site. Legal points quote the statutes directly, and store and payment rules come from the companies’ own published policies, all listed under Sources. This page is general information and not legal advice; for a specific project, consult a lawyer in your country.

It was written on 3 October 2026. To report an error, see the corrections standard.