Dorian Review

What Is Dorian?

Dorian is a platform where independent creators build branching romance games and readers play them in an app. The App Store title is "Dorian: Romantasy Games Hub", and the creators page describes what authors build as branching romances. The home page claims 11,000+ games and 1M+ players; those are vendor figures and we have not audited the catalogue. The genre chips on the creators page run from romantasy and dark romance to dating sim, horror-romance, supernatural, sci-fi romance, comedy and fantasy. The platform also has live streams and chat channels, and the App Store lists messaging and chat among what the app contains.

The operator named on the App Store is Dorian Inc., and the Google Play developer is "Dorian.live". The site is dorian.live. Our genre pages cover where it sits: it is listed on dark romance, paranormal and fantasy pages from its own genre chips.

Dorian review: who it suits

From the evidence, Dorian suits a reader who wants creator-made dark romance, horror romance and paranormal choice games, and who is happy to find the price of a choice game by game. It documents its two currencies in a public help centre, which several larger apps here do not. It is a poorer fit for someone who wants a browser version, a published explicit-content policy beyond one sentence, or a single predictable price per chapter.

How much the choices change

The App Store copy says Make meaningful choices that change the story, and the creators page describes branching romances. Because each game is made by a different creator, the number of endings is a property of the game, not the platform, and Dorian publishes none. Each project declares its own content rating and content warnings, per the guidelines. That is useful in practice: it means the rating is read per game. It also means that no platform-wide statement can be made about how much a choice changes.

Our page on interactive stories shows how Dorian sits against the other services.

Hearts and sapphires: how the currency works

Dorian's help centre explains the two currencies clearly. In its words, Hearts are available for purchase, and support independent creators. Sapphires can be earned for free, but do not support the creators. It adds Hearts and sapphires both can be used to unlock choices. Choice prices are set by the independent creators. Sapphires come from logging in daily, winning events and giveaways; hearts are only available for purchase. So a free reader can unlock choices but the creator is not paid when a sapphire is spent.

The App Store lists these purchases:

Checked October 27, 2026. Source: apps.apple.com. Prices change with region, promotions and the store you buy through.

Nine packs print a heart count, which allows the arithmetic:

Hearts cost more than the diamonds and gems of the other apps in this section: between 11.6 and 14.2 cents each in the standard packs, against 6.7 to 9.95 cents for the standard diamond packs published by Scripts and Chapters. They are a different unit, so the comparison tells you the price of the unit, not the price of a story. One pack stands out: 100 hearts for $6.99 is about half the standard rate, and the listing does not say why. We report it as listed.

The price of a premium choice cannot be given, and not only because we do not install apps. Each creator sets their own, so a single choice may cost any number of hearts or sapphires; the platform publishes no figure. There is also a web Heart Store at webstore.dorian.live, which is script-rendered, so its prices could not be read. Hearts and sapphires spent on a choice cannot be refunded; the help centre says we are unable to refund hearts or sapphires. See the Dorian cost page and our guide to story app credits for the wider pattern.

What you can get for free

Dorian is free to download and play. Sapphires are the free currency, earned by logging in daily, winning events or finding giveaways. We did not record how many a daily login pays. The App Store does not label advertising under what the app contains, and Google Play shows in-app purchases without an ads label, so we make no claim about ads.

Where Dorian runs

The App Store listing was updated on September 29, 2026 (version 3.79) and Google Play on October 23. The help centre is explicit about the website: We do not support play on the website at this time. On the website, you can only be an audience member for streams. Windows viewing needs the Google Play Games beta, per the same article.

Explicit content: the guidelines and the ratings

This is the clearest case in the section where the service's own rules and the store ratings sit apart, and we give both sides.

• The community guidelines, under "Content & Safety", say: Every project declares a content rating and content warnings. Respect them. Suggestive and mature themes are welcome where rated; explicit sexual content and illegal content are not.
• The App Store listing shows 18+. Every descriptor Apple lists is marked infrequent, including sexual content or nudity and mature or suggestive themes.
• The Google Play listing shows Mature 17+.
• A help-centre article is titled What kind of content is allowed on Dorian? (PG-13 limit, mature content policy). Its body reads only Please see our community guidelines.

We have not reconciled these, and the pages do not. Another service in our data, StoryLoom, sets the same two facts side by side: its Acceptable Use Policy says pornographic content is not permitted and its App Store rating is 18+. It launched on October 20, 2026 and has no page here yet.

The age figures

Dorian's terms set no numeric age. The terms say Be at least the minimum age required where you live to hold an account. The App Store figure is 18+ and the Google Play figure is Mature 17+. Those are the three facts; we add nothing.

No age check is described in the pages we read. The help centre has an article titled I'm concerned about underage users on the platform. How is this handled?, and its body says Please share this report with our support team. We will review the information and take action as soon as possible. We looked for a sentence saying that all characters are adults on the store listings, the guidelines and the terms and did not find one. That describes the pages we read. The catalogue is user-made, each game declares its own rating, and we have not audited it. The store copy shows no school framing.

For creators

Dorian's pitch to creators is 50/50 revenue share: Keep half of everything your fans spend. The home page adds Keep your IP and set your own prices and zero coding. The page also quotes $10M+ spent by fans on creators and $3M+ earned in a year by one creator, SlashFic. Those are vendor claims and the pages say results vary. Payout detail beyond the headline split is not published, including whether the half is calculated before or after store fees. For how other platforms pay, see how erotica platforms pay writers.

Privacy and billing

The terms and community guidelines are the policy documents we recorded. A privacy policy address, a card descriptor and a cancellation route were not recorded, so we state none. The refund rule for spent hearts is above. Our page on what erotica apps look like on a bank statement covers what to check after a first purchase.

Best Dorian alternatives

Three comparisons stand out. Lore is the opposite model: flat subscription pricing, no gems and no paid choices in its own words, and no creator programme found. Choices is the one with the other well-documented currency. Romance Club shares the choice format and publishes far less. For community-written fiction in a browser, Chyoa is free, though it has no creator payments. The wider field is on the interactive erotica hub, and the apps section lists every review.

Final verdict