Interview with Mr.Moonmi an adult gaming developer of Adult game How to Fix The Future

SPICY DEVELOPER INTERVIEW: Mr.Moonmi

Being one of the prettiest adult games out there How to FIx the Future sets new standards when it comes to renders and animations. We picked it as our Game of the month for October. Now let's have a chat with the man behind the game and see how he pulls it off.

1. Can you tell us more about the story of How to Fix the Future? How did you come up with it?

I've always been a fan of post-apocalyptic and science-fiction stories. And especially time-traveled stories. I’m a movie and series man. I love beautiful cinematography and good stories. I’m also a very creative person and during my entire life, I occasionally had glimpses of ideas which I always tried to write down. I guess a lot of creative people know what I’m talking about. Though I didn’t know what to do with all of this stuff, I just knew I should note everything that comes to my mind. And leave it until better times. Any good idea takes time to grow into something really big. I also always dreamed of writing a novel or even making a movie on the subject. But I knew that these were more like childish dreams, with nothing to do with reality. At least the movie option. But eventually, I started writing a novel. The first version of How to Fix the Future was written as a novel and even included two finished chapters. It wasn’t finished, though. This was something I’d been working on in my spare time, and I wasn’t quite happy with how it looked. Now it’s obvious that it was meant to be a game. Besides, I always had doubts that I would make a good writer or even filmmaker. That’s why there are so many details in the world I created that aren’t really important for adult visual novels. Certainly, I changed a lot and completely reworked the plot. But the basis remained the same.

Story-wise, How to Fix the Future is pretty simple and someone can even say that there is a whole set of clichés. An evil man who destroyed the planet and a group of simple weirdos who were chosen, and now they have to save the world. But the truth is that such stories always work. Most people can relate to the main characters, and aren't we doing nothing but trying to save/fix the future every day in our real lives? Just read the news, and you’ll see that my story might not be a fantasy after all. I’d even say that my personal life experience is reflected in the game.

2. There are not many games that deal with the future. Why choose this theme, what are the challenges and are you especially attracted to sci-fi genre?

I've already answered part of that earlier. I can only add that I want to create not only an entertaining story, but also an instructive one. Of course, when you’re dealing with the future and sci-fi, you’re limited only by your imagination. And when in conjunction with real-time, it can be a good way to show the cost of decisions and their consequences. The future is unknown, and that’s why it’s so attractive. And sci-fi elements just make it more believable. If you can’t explain something logically, just say it’s something super techie, and it was invented later in the future. Pretty simple, huh? :D But jokes aside, I want to bring up some important topics in the game that people don’t usually see in this type of games. And this setting helps me with that. Thus, you may notice reflections on war and its price, forms of government, power, betrayal and loss... Complex social problems that are relevant to our time as well as to the future. As well as problems with alcohol and drugs, loneliness, anxiety, family problems, phobias and many, many more. Most of it is spiced with humor and nudity. Sometimes, even fetishes. But I’ve been honest from the beginning. This game is not only about sex. It’s a serious novel with adult themes in it. At least this is the one I want it to be. Hope I’ll succeed.

3. How long has the game been in development? How did it all start?

More than two years already. I started working on this game in the spring of 2020. It was very hard at the beginning. I didn’t know what I was doing or where to start. I rushed from one task to another. Constantly freaking out when something wasn’t working or didn’t look as I wanted. I'm a perfectionist and it worked against me. As a person who never dealt with 3d or programming a game before, I faced a serious challenge. It was exhausting. Learning something new is always hard. I even thought about giving it all up. But luckily I didn’t and after a year of work and constant learning, I released the first version of How to Fix the Future in April 2021. The problem was that I wanted to create something unique. Something outstanding. And it’s impossible to do so without any experience. So I kept working and working until I reached a result that I was happy with. Spoiler: I wasn’t quite happy with it, but I realized that if I won’t continue with the quality I managed to achieve, I may never release it at all. I also realized that I had kind of reached the limit of my hardware. To create something better, I needed a new GPU. I needed more memory.

Spoiler 2: I’m still working on the same 8Gb GPU and my renders improved significantly. So it’s not about the hardware. It’s about the skill. But of course, it limits my options. I just learned how to deal with it. Fun fact. In the middle of the development of the first version of the game, I was so unhappy with the result that I just deleted every scene file, every render I made, and even some of the characters and started completely from scratch.

4. Are you a solo dev, or do you have help creating the game?

I’m a solo dev. And I guess I always will be. I can’t imagine how someone can create something that is in my head. It's a work of art. A work of art made by my head and my hands. I have a picture in my head, and I’m creating it. It’s not some kind of business where I can delegate work to others. It’ll ruin everything. It may sound a bit snooty, but there is my author's style in renders I create. As well as in dialogues I write. No one can replace me. Unfortunately, it’s hard to save this author's style with translation, but I changed several translators and proofreaders in these two years. Good English is really important to me. But I guess it’s nearly impossible to make it as good as if I were native and had been writing the game in English in the first place. The only part where I can use some help is coding. But so far I managed to deal with it myself. And I don’t plan to add any complex mechanics to the game anyway. Maybe I’ll use some help on this later, but for now, I’m fine.

5. What Did you do before creating adult games

Before working on this game, I worked in many areas. When I was a teenager, I was into photography and videography. I worked in this field for a while when I was a student. Even shot a few small short films. But it was more like a hobby of mine. I finished photo school and even did a writing course. So I do have a background in this. And this experience helps me a lot right now. Then I worked in IT. Front-end development mostly. After some time, I even had some experience as a project manager. That's where I got some experience in graphic design and marketing. But eventually, I ended up working in a lead generation. And I’m still working in this field, apart from game development. I’d like to do the game development full-time, but it makes too little profit at this moment. Maybe someday.

6. What led you onto the path of creating adult games?

Circumstances, I’d say. During the epidemic, the amount of work has decreased. I lost a big part of my job. I had also been dealing with a painful breakup at that time, and my life became a total mess. I was feeling the urge to express myself through art as never before, and I didn’t know how to do it. I knew that I had to change something in my life. Game development was always a dream of mine. And when I discovered such a genre and did some research, I realized that this is it. This is where I can merge together all my passions, use my experience, realize my ideas and express myself. And if I do a good job, I might even make some money. But primarily this became my creative outlet. Only then a source of income. I knew that I’ll develop the game even if it won’t earn me anything. Maybe not as fast, but It will. It actually still doesn’t bring me much of an income. I spend most of my income to cover expenses. On assets, subscriptions, music, bills. That’s just a note for those, who think that developing an AVN can earn you a fortune. It’s not.

You can support Mr.Moonmi and other developers directly on Spicygaming by sending them some tokens

7. Would you like to tell us about the influences various books/games have had on the development?

I’m not really a bookworm, to be honest. Of course, I read them, but I’m more into movies and series. There are certainly some popular books that influenced me. Most of them were also adapted for television. Like 1984, Dune, Outlander, The 100, The Maze Runner, Divergent, The Hunger Games etc. As for games, I don’t play much as well. Mostly, because I don’t have much time for that. And when I do have time, I can’t do it because I have only one PC, and it always renders. I usually play single-player top-tier games like any other gamer. But of course, my favorites are interactive and narrative adventure video games. Each game by Quantic Dream studio. Huge fan. Played many times. Each game is truly a masterpiece. I can say that they influenced me and the way I develop my game a lot. Life is Strange, obviously. Also a big fan. But what really influenced the game the most are series and movies. Simply because I really love to see someone's vision and their work. Like the directing, the cameraman's work etc. It helps me to awaken my imagination even more than just books. You can even find a lot of references to some series and movies in my game. Some ideas for my story were also picked from different pieces. I often just take some idea and rethink, rework and slightly change it. However, there are a few things that were too good to change. The way the main character has been chosen by the game and how the agents show up, for example. It's basically a copy of a scene from the TV series “The Future Man”. I have a lot of references to this series. Highly recommend it if you haven’t seen it. A hilarious sci-fi show about a time travelling. The best sci-fi series of all time: “The Expanse”. One of my favorite series: “The 100”. And even “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”. The list is really long. Basically, every book I read, every game I played, and every series and movie I watched influenced me. It’s hard to pick something particular. But you can find something in common between my game and those I named.

8. What does the process of creating new characters look like? Can you show us an example of how you do your art? Do you maybe have any early takes?

The process is pretty simple and hard at the same time. I have a picture of this character in my head. I know who I want to create, I’m picking several references and start working. Trying different options and looks. Since I work in Daz, mostly it’s just a combination of different morphs. Sometimes I also use Zbrush, but I’m not very good at it. In general, my process is pretty creative. I just open a blank page and start experimenting until I’m happy with the result. Cathy was the first character I created. In the first image, you can see her first, second and final versions. The left render was created in April 2020, the second in August 2020, and the right is the final result which you see in the game. I spent the most time on her since she was the first character I created. I was learning during the entire process. If I were to create a new character right now, I think it would take me from a day to three days. Of course, you can create a character in 5 minutes. But I’m talking about testing different body types, textures, hair etc. I create several different options and then choose the one I like the most. As a bonus, I want to show you what all characters looked like in the first version of the game, the one I deleted and then started from scratch. The biggest changes were made to the main character, Octavia and Riley. Others were also changed a bit, but not as much. I already know and see the mistakes I made while developing characters. When I work on my next game, I’ll do a much better job on characters, that’s for sure.

9. Is crypto still going strong in the future?

If we’re talking about the game world, then no. It’s dead. It may be stored on some hard drives etc. But no one is using it anymore. The world is nearly dead, c'mon. But if you ask me about the real world, if we don't end up in a situation close to what How to Fix the Future shows, then it’ll be part of our everyday life, that’s for sure.

10. As this is an adult game, what, in your opinion, is the hottest scene in the game? (you can send a picture of it, we won't mind 😉).

The scene with Octavia and Liu on a sub path in the last update. As well as the dom one. Damn, they’re so hot. I was literally drooling when I was writing and posing these scenes. But that’s just me. I'm a switch myself, so that’s why players who are also into domination point out how well they made. Especially how well and deep Octavia's character is developed. I know there are few people who hate her and even think she’s the worst and least developed character. That’s funny how people have two totally different opinions. But usually this is just people who can’t bare strong female personalities or hate any form of domination. I created a separate path for them, actually. And they seem to like it so far. Though, I find it too misogynous and aggressive, so I might make it a bit softer in the future. Anyway, I’m pretty sure everyone can find something for their taste, as I try to create each scene as hot as possible. And not only show it with renders, but also describe it with words. I also really love the scene with Riley with the red light and Liu at her place. Each of them is hot and feels different. And just to clarify, my preferences are not limited to BDSM only. I also enjoy vanilla sex and relationships as any other person. I’m just trying to add variety to my game. So each player could find something to their taste. And yes, BDSM is a big part of the game, but not the main part.

11. Are there any particular fetishes that you're excited to introduce in the game?

Yes. A lot, to be honest. I’m looking forward to working on scenes with Daisy. Since she’s trans, there are a lot of interesting and hot possibilities in their lewd scenes. I also can’t wait for more hot and even humiliating interactions with Octavia and Liu on both sub and dom paths. Since it’s BDSM, it has the majority of possibilities and fetishes. For example, it’s paddling, pegging, rimming, watersports, spitplay, tease&denial etc. I want to add as many kinks and fetishes as possible. Not only BDSM kinks. I believe that every kink has its place, even in the most vanilla relationships. People should be more open-minded, you know? Certainly, each fetish and kink is optional. If it’s not your cup of tea, just refuse it and continue playing. I won’t force anyone to do something they don’t want to do. If you get used to more traditional adult visual novel content, you’ll be fine. You’ll just get shorter updates and will miss a lot of hot content.  All I’m saying, just don’t refuse something that you don’t understand. Give it a chance. Even the dirtiest and most perverted kink can be sensitive, passionate and even beautiful. And obviously, there are characters like Cathy, Chloe and Ellie who will get more traditional lewd scenes. However, they might also have some light fetishes. And also after some time, there might be a few… surprising fetishes that some players will enjoy;)

12. How to fix the future has animations, how long does it take to make an animated scene? Any tips you would share on how to approach creating animations?

Omg, animations… My weakest part. I am really struggling with them. With current equipment, rendering animations is a nightmare. After some time I learned a few techniques, but it’s still pretty annoying. I’d say it takes about 3-6 hours to pose an average animation and about 12-24 hours to render it. Depending on the lighting in a scene and amount of characters in it. I can’t give any tips because I, myself, need them:D But I have one tip. Save every minute in a separate file. Since if you make any change somewhere in the middle of your animation, it can break the whole sequence and if you don’t have a backup it may turn up that you've spent 5 hours for nothing. I ruined about 10 animations because of one small mistake that ruin the whole animation and I didn’t have a backup. Hours of work for nothing. That’s why I hate doing animations. But I know players love them, so I have to deal with it. But I’d rather not. I don’t know how other devs doing them, honestly. And some even enjoy this process. For me, it’s a pure nightmare. I don’t understand how you can make dozens of them, enjoy the process, and then even have time left to pose static renders. For me, it’s a week of struggling with a few animations which don’t really look well in the end. But I keep learning and I won’t stop. My animations improved significantly since the intro, and I hope they’ll get even better.

13. Do you identify with any of the characters portrayed in the game?

Not really. The main character has some base qualities, but the player fills in the blanks themselves. Some people scold me for making MC with no personality, but they're wrong. He has a personality and a backstory. But the player has to fill in all the blanks and define his character better with the choices he makes. But I’d say that each character in my game has some part of me.

14. Who is your favorite girl in How to Fix the Future?

It’s a hard one. As I said, each character in this game has some part of me. And since I created each of them, I treat each of them as if they were my own child or something. I love every character, I don’t have favourites. But if I put them in descending order, I guess I would say this: Daisy, Riley, Octavia, Chloe, Cathy, Ellie, Liu, Olga. But again, I love each of them :)

15. We talked about the influences of books and games, but what about the adult sector? Any influences? Any favorite porn stars?

I prefer amateur porn, to be honest. And since my tastes are pretty specific, most of you don’t know their names. The majority of them are content creators on OnlyFans, and had never filmed in professional adult movies. Though I have one name. It’s Riley Reid. Loved watching her when I was younger, and my Riley took her name and a bit of personality as well. My girls are a collective image of different women. They are based on many different persons. Girls and women from my life, content creators that I follow, characters from series etc.

16 How long does it take for you to produce an update? Do you follow any steps, or do you have more of a go-with-the-flow kind of approach?

It’s go-with-the-flow for me. I tried to put myself into some kind of framework, set tasks and deadlines. Tried to create some kind of template for my workflow. It doesn’t work. If I feel like writing dialogues, I’m writing dialogues. If I feel like posing, I do posing. Obviously, I have some important steps like creating an outline before starting to work on a new update. But when it’s done, and I know where I should be heading, it’s a creative process. Sometimes I even do posing and create scenes without having a screenplay for this scene written. I'm just making up it on the fly. It doesn't happen very often, but it does happen. It usually takes about 3 months to finish a new update.

17. Can you talk more about the upcoming content? What can we expect in the future?

You can expect more lewd scenes with girls, that’s for sure. I know how a lot of players can’t wait for lewd scenes with Daisy, Cathy, and Chloe. Some can’t wait to see Ellie again. But with some girls, it can take a while. Especially with Daisy and Ellie. I can also promise more scenes in the future setting. The city, the world above the wall. I'm planning a lot of time travelling. And not only into the time from where the MC was taken. There will be several different time travels to different time periods. You may even meet some real historical figures. In short, I plan a lot of interesting stuff. And I’m sure I’ll surprise a lot of the players. And who knows, you might even go to space…

18. Which aspect of the game improved the most since when you started the development? If you were to go back in time, would you do anything differently?

It’s renders, for sure. Just compare my first renders from the intro and from the last update. The quality of girls models, framing, lighting, post-work. I believe I did a good job on renders. If I were to go back in time, I’d say “BUY FUCKING BITCOIN!” :D. But seriously, no. I fixed almost all the mistakes that were made when I only started working on this game. I might have given myself some tips that might have sped up the development, but I wouldn't change anything in the game. Maybe a few tips on how to make girls models look better, but people seem to like them, so I’m not really worried about that anymore.

19. How much do you pay attention to the feedback from the fans? Do player expectations play a huge role in your planning for the next update?

A lot. I’m reading almost every feedback and keep it in mind when working on new updates. If it’s constructive criticism, I always pay attention to it. If it’s just some hater complaining about powerful women or trans women, I ignore it. But still, players don’t have much impact on the game since I know what story I’m telling, and I don’t refuse some parts even if some players might not like them. I have many choices in the game, and all of them matter. Players form their preferences themselves. I was able to achieve this because of the feedback from the players. I added few new paths and scenes thanks to the feedback. And what also really helps is statistics I receive on choices players make. I can analyze their preferences and see where I should concentrate more in the next updates. But am I trying to please some players' expectations? No. I’m telling my story.

20. What are some of the struggles you have been facing while developing the game?

I mentioned this earlier. Animations. My stumbling block. Coding is also not my strongest skill. I often struggle with it too. Especially when I have to create something new. I wanted to add to the game some sort of notebook or bios. But after several days of trying, just refused this idea. Working on heavy scenes is also pretty annoying. It’s hard to work with more than 3 characters in a scene. I'm hitting the memory limit. So I often have to render the same scene twice and then combine them in post-work. It takes a lot of time and effort, but there’s nothing I can do about it.

21. How has your experience been in the adult gaming industry so far? What are the top advantages and disadvantages you’ve come across so far?

Can’t say much about it. Pretty good, so far. Nice community, helpful devs. It would be great to have more ways for marketing adult games. But your platform already working in this direction, so I hope it’ll be sorted soon. The only disadvantage I can mention is the large number of pure garbage on the market. It's pretty hard to get noticed among all of this. And people tend to not trust new devs coz lots of this garbage becomes abandoned after two-three releases. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that I’m a genius or that I’m making a masterpiece or something. There are a lot of talented devs who are doing a much better job that me. I still have a lot to learn and a lot of space to improve. I’m saying that there are a huge amount of mediocre games that were created only to repeat someone's success and to make some easy money. But it doesn’t work this way.

22. Do you play adult games often? If so, which ones are your favorites currently? Any recommendations?

Very rarely. I played only a few adult games since I first discovered this genre about two and a half - three years ago. The most popular ones. By Philly, PinkCake, Ocean. These are the devs that inspire me. Very talented guys. But I don’t play other, less-known games. Again, only because it’s hard to find something good among all of this garbage. Maybe there are awesome new devs that I’m not aware of. I heard about a few new promising games, but don’t even have time to play them. So there’s also a time-lack factor.

23. What is/are your advice(s) for the new developers? Any tips on what should be the first thing when starting?

Ask yourself a question. Are you ready to dedicate all of yourself and all of your free time to your game? Are you ready to forget about movie nights, beer with friends, tinder-dates? If the answer is no, then don’t start working on a game. I swear to God, sometimes I even forget to eat while I’m working. There are days when I don’t even go outside in fresh air. But seriously, it may sound and look tempting. Becoming a game developer, growing numbers on patreon and on discord server. But there’s a huge amount of work behind that. If your only intention is to make some money, forget about it. If it’s your passion, if that’s your creative outlet, then go ahead. But be ready for constant learning. 3d, coding, photoshop. And SAVE! Always save while working.

24. What game would you like to see as our game of the month?

The one as good as mine :D Since I don’t play any, I’ll leave it up to you.

25. Have anything to say to the members of Spicygaming? Now is your chance 😊

Well, if you’ve read that far, then you’re really a fan of mine. Thank you, Spicygaming for such an opportunity and honor. And thank you to everyone who plays and enjoys my game. I’d like to ask you to write a review on my game when you have time and tell your friends about it. Spreading a word about my game really helps me to gain more attention. But apart from that, enjoy the games, stay safe and stand with Ukraine.

How to Fix the Future HAS A FREE TO PLAY VERSION!

Try it and if you like it, support the developer by sending him some tokens!

LEARN MORE ABOUT THE ADULT DEVELOPERS IN OTHER INTERVIEWS WE DID