Sadly when a "Contributor" is merciful to the poor and decides to share it here since the developer explained that for his part (and it is understandable) he prefers to sell it on his patreon
There may be a misunderstanding with this, but it's understandable that you may think so.
The truth is that I have never thought of it as a "pay game", to be a patron is to contribute to the project, without that we wouldn't be able to go ahead because of the expenses involved. What happens is that those patrons who support the project must have a reward for doing it too, so some tiers are given access to the "Early Access" version 15 days before the "normal" release, and other tiers are given access to the latest version of the game... BUT, there's always a free version for all! It has been like that since the beginning, what has happened is that there has been a time without a free version, because in the v0.3 that we published there were many changes in the programming, and the save files of previous versions were not compatible, so it didn't make sense to have in Patreon a free version, the v0.2.x, knowing that those who played with it, couldn't use their save files to continue with newer versions. Now that v0.5.x has been released, the penultimate version, v0.4.x, has been made freely available to everyone, so there is a free version of the game.
The other problem is that currently it took a long time to release a new version, so between the latest version and the penultimate version there can be a lot of time and content difference. That is what we're going to try to improve now with more frequent updates, so, in some time, the difference between the reward version for the patrons (paid version if you want to call it that way) and the free version for everyone, will be very little.
Currently we still can't release v0.5.x free for everyone because there are patrons who have waited a long time to enjoy it, and it's the reward they deserve, but like others, it will be free in the near future.
No one is forcing you to become a patron to play the game, there's a free version. Being a patron doesn't only help the project in an essential way, but it also provides you with certain rewards, such as voting in polls, access to special renders and, also, access to the latest version of the game.
Understandably, there are also contributors who their money, prefer to spend on full games.
Stop calling yourselves poor people!
And stop believing the "false prophets."
You are not forced to take up a collection to buy them an rtx4090.
No, please make you patons that I have to pay for my second Ferrari and my second residence in Malibu, lmao
Seriously speaking, for the creators these are tools!
3D rendering programs are high in power demands on computers, and if we want to be able to work smoothly, with acceptable rendering times, and with scenes with large scenarios or many characters, we need high power, and, obviously, the contributions on Patreon help to do so, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to upgrade my computer. And it's a normal thing to do, isn't it? Contributions to the project are used to buy things that help to improve it
I will be transparent about this because there is nothing to hide....
I started with the equipment I had at the time, an i5-5400, 8GB of RAM, and a GTX 1060 6GB. I was able to create the images needed for, if I remember correctly, the first 2 versions. They were renders containing 2 or maximum 3 characters, with normal scenarios, and no animations. And although I could do it, the render times in some scenes in particular (depending on light, textures, etc) were huge, taking in some images between 7-11 hours, for ONE image!
After a while, not with Patreon's money because I was in my beginnings and it wasn't enough, but with my own money, I decided to upgrade my computer, I added +8GB of RAM (16GB in total) because in some scenes Daz crashed giving an error (the minimum recommended to work with Daz is 16GB, IMO), and I also bought a GTX 1080Ti with 11GB (also having the 1060 as secondary), which was a huge change because with 11GB I could work in bigger scenes and/or with more characters, and it was much faster than the 1060. .. so after a short time, I added a second 1080Ti (replacing the secondary 1060); and at that moment, with 2x1080Ti, I could start creating animations because the render times were more acceptable (still, with that power, some animations could take 1 or 2 days to complete... and we are talking about short animations, between 30-60 frames, lol).
Subsequently I made some "minor" improvements, like switching to an i5-8400 and having 32GB of RAM... I thought Daz would be happy with those 32GB of RAM, but it eats everything in its path, so in some really big scenes, it even had problems, d'oh!
I spent quite a bit of time with that setup and the 2x1080Ti, I was comfortable and could work well. Patreon was growing and I was getting more money for the project. I could have stayed like that and kept the money for myself, but I'm always looking to improve and provide better content, so I decided to make a big investment and build myself a "monster".
So, I changed the equipment completely, buying a Ryzen 9 5950x, with 64GB of RAM (expandable to 128GB, which I will probably end up doing), with more storage capacity, with 1200w PSU, and with 2x3090Ti with its 24GB!
I'm really happy with the current setup! And it has allowed me to create scenes with big scenarios (huge), or with many characters (I think the maximum I've used are 8-9, but according to calculations I could with up to 14-16 characters), and it has also allowed me to render images at the speed of light, sometimes it takes me less than 1 minute to render an image (depends on light, number of characters, and other things, but in no case exceeds 1h.), and finally it has also allowed me to create long animations, several hundreds of frames
So... Do you really think I spent >$5,000 on the last equipment upgrade for my own benefit?
..... NO ! It was for the game!
... How can it benefit me to have such a beast for a normal use of a PC, if not for the creation of the game?.... With my initial setup I could already play the strategy games I like, or use my Oculus (BTW, both things I don't do since more than 3 years because the free time I dedicate to the game creation).
This is only in terms of hardware requirements on my part to be able to create the images/animations contained in the game.
Now add as many other things as... The electricity consumed by the GPUs (yep, it's not cheap!), the asets and extra programs needed for the game, the payment of online services like GDrive, MEGA (to upload the game and its extras), the online professional translator (I need it, lol), pages to have access to songs/sounds/images that I can use in the game without infringing copyrights, payment to the collaborators (my friends!) without whom the game wouldn't be possible, and also, of course, the taxes to pay derived from any economic activity.
All this without counting my hours invested in the game, because if I have to count what I have left after the costs and investments, the price/hour is ridiculous, so "getting rich" is not the reason for making the game...
It's because I like it! It's because I love it!
If at some point we can make more money, obviously, it will be welcome, because both my collaborators and I think we deserve it because there's a lot of work behind this game, as in many others.
Please, keep this in mind before you start talking nonsense
Patreon and supporters are necessary, without them there's no game.
That said, of course, we are not forcing anyone to become a patron, there are plenty of games of this type so (friendly) competition is served, whether we succeed or not will depend on how well we do our job.
We, for our part, will keep trying to improve now and in the future!