- Jul 14, 2020
- 1,203
- 1,773
I agree completely.I can see this. Which is why so many of these projects need a *team* to be successful.
Not everyone is Notch, Scott Cawthon, or Toby Fox. And even *they* have teams to help them out.
I call it the "creativity leash." It's what helps us get things like the star wars original trilogy and prevents things like the 16 year gap before and quality of the prequel trilogy. It gives us Star Trek TOS and prevents situations like TNG seasons 1 and 2.
If you have someone on staff who can and will tell you your idea is complete shit or to stop getting distracted by other things, you're more likely to finish a product. This is why South Park has lasted almost 30 years.
I've even experienced it myself. When I was collaborating with someone else on my fictional universe, we created a TON of content and I was writing a lot. But once we "broke up" progress slowed to a crawl.
With Patreon projects, this can be exacerbated by your audience asking for weirdly specific and weird things that can inevitably distract from and cause burnout. Like, the guy above me who asked about toenails. Hypothetically, what if the author/artist didn't like toenails? But your audience wants toenails, so you feel compelled to do it. And with no one else on your end to say "Ew, toenails?" and build you up to be able to say no...you can end up taking on more weight.
This is what I call a "latex skunk": Something people paying you want in your game, but implementing it would distract from the story you're trying to tell. I named it after the frankly bizarre prevalence in indie fetish game projects that inexplicably have a latex skunk either as a character or a player transformation. Seriously there's like 6 games with latex skunks in them that otherwise don't focus on latex skunks.
I think a dev listening is good but it's still gotta do this on their terms.
Listening too much can be bad too.
I see it a bit like working out.. I hate working out, it's so damn boring. I tried it and did it 3-4 times a week for half a year and then I quit. I wanted the killer dream body, 6 pack and the whole shebang but if I don't find it fun to do I will eventually quit.
Better to find something I would find fun instead. Martial combat? soccer? May not get the killer body I wanted but I'd be doing something I'm enjoying and can keep doing.
I guess if I enjoyed combat I could enjoy moderately training with weights too, to further that end.. Yet better to just do what I find fun.
Also games that are dictated on polls and money tend to become quite boring. fast.
Disclaimer edit for you guys: I'm not flaming Zenkuro or hating, I'm just speculating and I'm glad he/she still makes games. I enjoyed ANLIS and had hoped to see it finished but even if not.. I'm still enjoying what this dev is creating, thank you and keep on doing stuff. Create how many new projects you like for that matter. It's better than nothing. Even if I want to see games finished.
Last edited: