After 9 Years of Game Development Was Cracked, a Japanese Adult Game Developer Says He'll Exit China

Original title: After 9 Years of Game Development Was Cracked, a Japanese Adult Game Developer Says He'll Exit China

Source: Game Main Line

Cover image source | pexels

On October 17, Japanese doujin game developer Hide posted a long post on social media. His game "Deserter's"—an adult-oriented fantasy strategy simulation game he had spent nine years making—had been cracked. Not only was the pirated version translated into Chinese, but the game content had also been modified, and even the bugs in the original version had been "conveniently" fixed by someone. Hide said he was at the time discussing a Steam version with a partner company, and the plan originally included Chinese language support.

He wrote in the post, "As a business, I guess this can no longer continue," and said he was considering completely exiting business targeting the Chinese market.

Three days later, the wind shifted. Around October 20, Hide deleted the post mentioning "Chinese people cracking the game," and his new post explained, "I felt it had reached a level that endangered personal safety, so I deleted the original post."

A crack that even "fixed the bugs along the way"

"Deserter's" was produced by doujin development team WhiteCute&AlphaNuts. The series originally began in the feature-phone era, and this generation is a from-scratch rebuild that took about nine years, released on Japan's doujin digital platform DLsite on March 14, 2026. The game revolves around lords, generals, and faction management, featuring domestic affairs, strategy, and military gameplay, using an original engine with hand-drawn art, Live2D animation, and a large amount of text content, while also containing adult content.

On October 17, Hide revealed on social media that the game had been cracked. What upset him had a progressive escalation: first the pirated version spread, then it was translated into Chinese and distributed for free, then the game content was modified without authorization, and finally even the program bugs were "kindly" fixed.

He later added a reflection. He said he was not particularly angry, but felt more of an indescribable sense of powerlessness. "A Chinese person I've never met took the game I spent 9 years making, translated it, and spread it for free, saying 'please enjoy,' as if it were a work they had created themselves. At that moment, I felt like I was watching something happening in another world."

The blow was bigger than expected. He said his creative career, which had spanned a quarter of a century, might come to an end, and he once considered temporarily withdrawing from development. Additional follow-up content would still be made, but the part originally planned to support Chinese could only be shelved, and in the future perhaps only a Japanese version would be released.

The dark humor of "exiting the Chinese market"

Many Chinese reports framed the headline as "Japanese developer announces exit from the Chinese market." "Deserter's" is an 18+ work that unlocks adult CG after reaching a certain progress point. Such content cannot be sold through legitimate channels in mainland China anyway—it has no game license (ISBN) and no legitimate distribution channel. In other words, this game never had a legitimate "market to exit" in mainland China in the first place.

The Steam channel was indeed an exception. At the time, he was negotiating a Steam version with a partner company, and the Steam version was the first chance for this game to reach Chinese users in a compliant way. But after this incident, Hide decided to no longer target users in the China region.

Some onlookers felt this carried dark humor, after all "exiting" a market that was never accessible in the first place sounds a bit odd. Some also felt it had a bit of "killing 800 enemies at the cost of 1,000 of your own" flavor, and suggested he might as well take the opportunity to sell some nostalgia to Chinese users, keeping the Steam China channel open, and earn whatever he could.

Some players said Chinese players are accustomed to cracking first and paying later, and if a game's quality is solid, many players will pay for it on Steam later, so there is no need to worry too much about piracy.

Around October 20, Hide deleted the original post mentioning "Chinese people cracking the game," and the new post explained, "I felt it had reached a level that endangered personal safety, so I deleted the original post."

Viewed against the larger background, the problem is actually a structural mismatch. China has a huge community of single-player and doujin game consumers, and the demand for Japanese small and medium developers' works is real; but adult content cannot obtain a game license in mainland China, legitimate channels cannot enter, so demand sinks into the gray zone. Cracking, translation, and free distribution filled this gap—but also took away the creators' revenue.

Steam has changed this situation to some extent. As more and more Chinese users begin using Steam, foreign small and medium team developers should perhaps seriously consider the possibility of targeting the Chinese market.