You've nailed it. If I were to summarize this announcement in GIF form it would be:
View attachment 1550569
There is nothing of substance that is positive in this announcement. It is my belief that he didn't say anything because he doesn't have anything to say. The only thing of substance that he had to say was that there would be a delay on the next update, and then he masked it with vague bullshit.
Fine, few of us here support him on Patreon any longer, so maybe we don't deserve an answer. But why on Earth wouldn't you throw your Patrons a bone and give them something specific? If it's animations, great, tell them. It isn't like he'd be the first to do animations, so I don't see why you'd keep it a secret. If you're partnering with someone; great, tell them. Most of his patrons would be pleased to hear he was building a team. If this second computer will (somehow) make development easier and faster; great, tell them.
But he said nothing.
He's letting everyone twist in the wind and fill in the gaps for him. He keeps everything vague so that he can't be held accountable. This behavior is unethical and shady. I'm not upset about the delay. Who cares? I don't think any of us held out any real hope that the next update would arrive quickly. What I'm upset about is the utter arrogance and unethical behavior to not tell your patrons
why you're delaying the next release. These are people who support you through thick and thin, and you couldn't be bothered to give them any specifics?
The
ONLY conclusion I can take away from this is that he has nothing. For one reason or another development of the next update is going slow and he's throwing out another excuse. Maybe there is a second computer, and maybe he's trying to build it with nano machines and alien tech, but he had an obligation to his patrons to tell them his plan; and he couldn't do it. He danced around the topic, said nothing, couched it all as a positive, and then slunk back into the darkness.
I don't believe he has a viable reason for needing this second computer. I don't believe there was any reason to divert resources away from the game at this time. I don't believe that this is the type of announcement that should be cloaked in secrecy in order to maintain a surprise. In short, I don't believe he's acting in good faith.
Best case scenario, he's working on something big, know what he should have done? He should have said nothing for now. He should have waited until he had all the details lined up and then come out and made an announcement. Instead, he made an announcement today for nothing. In the short term it only sews confusion and raises questions, and in the long-term if it doesn't work out it will expose him to criticisms that he wasted time on a failed effort.
But I don't believe in that best case scenario. Instead, I believe he's pursuing another vanity project that will make him happy and do nothing to improvement development time or the quality of the game. I'll even put some skin in the game. I'll bet a profile pic declaring my eternal undying love for L&P if he announces something worth a damn by January 2nd. I'll eat my words and even join his Patreon at the base level for one month. But that announcement has to come with some sort of tangible result- some sort of deliverable product that proves his efforts are working. I can be patient, but it can't be something like "Hey everyone, it's January 2nd, my new computer is going to use advanced AI to create art. It should be ready to run by the end of the year! I guess GingerSweetGirl has to change her profile pic!"
I'm sorry for my rant, I'm just super frustrated with what I see as poor behavior from a developer towards his patrons. I only ran a small patreon page for a short while, and I would never have dreamed of jerking my patrons around like this.
