VN Ren'Py Abandoned Casual Desires [v0.19b] [ionDivvy]

[ename144]

But maybe if all those who complain about slow update will have try to make a game themself, they could understand how indie dev have to struggle.
Why any little thing can totally jeopardize the development of a game.
Why hearing people just whining while they don't even pay for their handwork can be completely demotivating.
And that sometime, you make decisions you think will be good, but turn out bad.
Like we said in French "la critique est aisée, mais l'art est difficile" (it is easy to criticize but hard to act).

I'm skeptical. At best I think developing their own game might make internet critics a bit less vicious when they critique. Even if the experience somehow managed to grow their heart three sizes, they would still have bones to pick. As other have noted, one of the big issues here is that ionDivvy is spending a lot of time on Rebel Duet. To people who like this game and dislike that one, well, the delay is always going to frustrate them.

Does that make it fair to take their disappointment out on Divvy by insulting him left, right and center? No, obviously not. Plenty of comments here go too far. But that's the nature of fans: it's short for 'fanatics,' not 'even-keeled-dispassionate-advocates.' Complaining about the complaints just ratchets up the heat. And sometimes passionate critiques can sting even if they are as polite as possible simply because the points strike home. IMHO, it's best just to have a thick skin, glean whatever valid criticism you can from a post, and move on. I've never seen any reason to gate criticism by whether the critic is an artist themselves.

Personally, I don't think Divvy has done himself any favors promising to support both games. That's not to say he's lying; I believe he genuinely wants to do right by both games (though he does have a habit of consistently underestimating development times). But it seems clear to me that he's been struggling with Casual Desires for a while now. Maybe that's because he hit a conceptual wall with this story, or because he'd much rather tell an epic fantasy yarn than a slice of life soap opera, or maybe it was problems adapting CD for steam. Whatever the case, something was causing problems and Divvy tried to power through it, which led to lots of missed deadlines and much ill will.

I think it would have been better to suspend CD officially until whatever issues were resolved. There'd still have been plenty of ill will, but there would have been less uncertainty. Still, what's done is done. To be fair to ionDivvy, I think he did eventually get better at deliberately deprioritizing CD and focusing on RD. While I *dearly* wish it were the other way around, I still appreciate knowing where things stand. I'm willing to wait and see how things go now that CD is, hopefully, being prioritized again. Fingers crossed!

 

[damnedfrog]

I'm skeptical. At best I think developing their own game might make internet critics a bit less vicious when they critique. Even if the experience somehow managed to grow their heart three sizes, they would still have bones to pick. As other have noted, one of the big issues here is that ionDivvy is spending a lot of time on Rebel Duet. To people who like this game and dislike that one, well, the delay is always going to frustrate them.

Does that make it fair to take their disappointment out on Divvy by insulting him left, right and center? No, obviously not. Plenty of comments here go too far. But that's the nature of fans: it's short for 'fanatics,' not 'even-keeled-dispassionate-advocates.' Complaining about the complaints just ratchets up the heat. And sometimes passionate critiques can sting even if they are as polite as possible simply because the points strike home. IMHO, it's best just to have a thick skin, glean whatever valid criticism you can from a post, and move on. I've never seen any reason to gate criticism by whether the critic is an artist themselves.

Personally, I don't think Divvy has done himself any favors promising to support both games. That's not to say he's lying; I believe he genuinely wants to do right by both games (though he does have a habit of consistently underestimating development times). But it seems clear to me that he's been struggling with Casual Desires for a while now. Maybe that's because he hit a conceptual wall with this story, or because he'd much rather tell an epic fantasy yarn than a slice of life soap opera, or maybe it was problems adapting CD for steam. Whatever the case, something was causing problems and Divvy tried to power through it, which led to lots of missed deadlines and much ill will.

I think it would have been better to suspend CD officially until whatever issues were resolved. There'd still have been plenty of ill will, but there would have been less uncertainty. Still, what's done is done. To be fair to ionDivvy, I think he did eventually get better at deliberately deprioritizing CD and focusing on RD. While I *dearly* wish it were the other way around, I still appreciate knowing where things stand. I'm willing to wait and see how things go now that CD is, hopefully, being prioritized again. Fingers crossed!

You expressed what I think.
I don't think IonDivvy lie. I think they made a mistake when trying to develop two games at the same time, but I think they believed the could do it.
I'm not a game developer, but I'm a programmer and I know that anything can cause delays to explode.

 

[Anteron]

Be better to do the opposite. There are FAR too many in the fantasy genre here already.

 

[Turret]

I'm skeptical. At best I think developing their own game might make internet critics a bit less vicious when they critique. Even if the experience somehow managed to grow their heart three sizes, they would still have bones to pick. As other have noted, one of the big issues here is that ionDivvy is spending a lot of time on Rebel Duet. To people who like this game and dislike that one, well, the delay is always going to frustrate them.

Does that make it fair to take their disappointment out on Divvy by insulting him left, right and center? No, obviously not. Plenty of comments here go too far. But that's the nature of fans: it's short for 'fanatics,' not 'even-keeled-dispassionate-advocates.' Complaining about the complaints just ratchets up the heat. And sometimes passionate critiques can sting even if they are as polite as possible simply because the points strike home. IMHO, it's best just to have a thick skin, glean whatever valid criticism you can from a post, and move on. I've never seen any reason to gate criticism by whether the critic is an artist themselves.

Personally, I don't think Divvy has done himself any favors promising to support both games. That's not to say he's lying; I believe he genuinely wants to do right by both games (though he does have a habit of consistently underestimating development times). But it seems clear to me that he's been struggling with Casual Desires for a while now. Maybe that's because he hit a conceptual wall with this story, or because he'd much rather tell an epic fantasy yarn than a slice of life soap opera, or maybe it was problems adapting CD for steam. Whatever the case, something was causing problems and Divvy tried to power through it, which led to lots of missed deadlines and much ill will.

I think it would have been better to suspend CD officially until whatever issues were resolved. There'd still have been plenty of ill will, but there would have been less uncertainty. Still, what's done is done. To be fair to ionDivvy, I think he did eventually get better at deliberately deprioritizing CD and focusing on RD. While I *dearly* wish it were the other way around, I still appreciate knowing where things stand. I'm willing to wait and see how things go now that CD is, hopefully, being prioritized again. Fingers crossed!

Hi ename144!
I think you know me well enough to know that I criticise very few developers at all and even fewer I give no mercy to. That has to be "earned". In the last 1 1/2 years Iondivvy did more than his fair share to earn a place among such "distinguished developers" as gumdrop, Aorrta and several others.
I am sorry to have to disagree with you on one thing here. Iondivvy might be a politician in real life, going by how he phrased many of his posts and backtracked on them. Iondivvy only admits to something if he cannot bluff it out anymore. He is a consumate liar, I know this type from our city council. Several of his posts were in bad faith from the get go.

He should have remembered that building trusts takes quite a time, destroying trust takes sometimes just a few seconds. Rebuilding broken trust takes a lifetime.
I mentioned it in one of posts sometime ago, had Iondivvy been open about the development of CD and RD from the start, that would have been sad, but most fans would have understood. Instead we were fed lies like "development of Rebel Diarrhoea, äh, Rebel Duet (my mistake) will have no impact on the development of Casual Desires", a string of blown deadlines and promises, posts of problems he had, but "curiously" never impacted development of RD...

And it did not stop at all. He promised that by mid-March the long overdue CD update would be out, no matter what! Did not happen. Then he said that end of March, latest first week of April the CD update would be out, definitely. Also did not happen.

 

[cxx]

Be better to do the opposite. There are FAR too many in the fantasy genre here already.

all games are fantasy.

 

[Anteron]

all games are fantasy.

Not the genre/tag. That means the stuff involving magic, elves, orcs, etc. The one nearly everyone knows what someone means.

 

[ename144]

Hi ename144!
I think you know me well enough to know that I criticise very few developers at all and even fewer I give no mercy to. That has to be "earned". In the last 1 1/2 years Iondivvy did more than his fair share to earn a place among such "distinguished developers" as gumdrop, Aorrta and several others.
I am sorry to have to disagree with you on one thing here. Iondivvy might be a politician in real life, going by how he phrased many of his posts and backtracked on them. Iondivvy only admits to something if he cannot bluff it out anymore. He is a consumate liar, I know this type from our city council. Several of his posts were in bad faith from the get go.

He should have remembered that building trusts takes quite a time, destroying trust takes sometimes just a few seconds. Rebuilding broken trust takes a lifetime.
I mentioned it in one of posts sometime ago, had Iondivvy been open about the development of CD and RD from the start, that would have been sad, but most fans would have understood. Instead we were fed lies like "development of Rebel Diarrhoea, äh, Rebel Duet (my mistake) will have no impact on the development of Casual Desires", a string of blown deadlines and promises, posts of problems he had, but "curiously" never impacted development of RD...

And it did not stop at all. He promised that by mid-March the long overdue CD update would be out, no matter what! Did not happen. Then he said that end of March, latest first week of April the CD update would be out, definitely. Also did not happen.

I haven't been following ionDivvy as long as you, but I have been following him for a while and I prefer to give him the benefit of the doubt. Yes, Casual Desires has missed many deadlines, but Divvy's estimates always wind up being grossly optimistic; personally, I think that stems more from poor time management than from malice. And yes, it was foolish to say developing a second game would have no impact on CD, but lots of people do foolish things even when they ought to know better. I can believe he *thought* Rebel Duet would be a fun side project that would help him recharge his batteries when he was struggling with CD. That obviously has not been the case in practice, but I can see why he might genuinely have thought it would work out.

Am I being naive to trust ionDivvy? Maybe. But when I look at his output over the last couple of years, what I see is a person trying to deliver the best output he can. He's responded to critiques (of both games) by explaining his intentions and reworking things when his intentions weren't conveyed well. Now one can certainly argue the reworks just make his lengthy development cycles worse, but I also think it argues against Divvy being a shameless huckster who's only stringing us along to make an easy buck. For better or worse, he does seem to take pride in his work and that goes a long way with me.

At the very least I'm willing to see what Chapter 20 of CD looks like before I consider writing Divvy off for good - though I certainly didn't expect it to meet the announced schedule. Mid-April is earliest I'd have expected it, with May a more likely target. We'll see what happens.

 

[Turret]

I haven't been following ionDivvy as long as you, but I have been following him for a while and I prefer to give him the benefit of the doubt. Yes, Casual Desires has missed many deadlines, but Divvy's estimates always wind up being grossly optimistic; personally, I think that stems more from poor time management than from malice. And yes, it was foolish to say developing a second game would have no impact on CD, but lots of people do foolish things even when they ought to know better. I can believe he *thought* Rebel Duet would be a fun side project that would help him recharge his batteries when he was struggling with CD. That obviously has not been the case in practice, but I can see why he might genuinely have thought it would work out.

Am I being naive to trust ionDivvy? Maybe. But when I look at his output over the last couple of years, what I see is a person trying to deliver the best output he can. He's responded to critiques (of both games) by explaining his intentions and reworking things when his intentions weren't conveyed well. Now one can certainly argue the reworks just make his lengthy development cycles worse, but I also think it argues against Divvy being a shameless huckster who's only stringing us along to make an easy buck. For better or worse, he does seem to take pride in his work and that goes a long way with me.

At the very least I'm willing to see what Chapter 20 of CD looks like before I consider writing Divvy off for good - though I certainly didn't expect it to meet the announced schedule. Mid-April is earliest I'd have expected it, with May a more likely target. We'll see what happens.

Hi again!
Iondivvy outran my benefit of doubt a while ago. If you read his posts on CD and RD, coupled with his actions, you recognise a consumate liar and complete untrustworthy person. Ironically like you I think he takes pride in his work and wants to deliver good games, but his biggest flaw is his penchance for deliberate lying. Several posts of his reek of the motto: Why tell the truth, if a boldfaced lie will do too?

Tell me your opinion: What was Iondivvy thinking when he made his mid-march release post? At this point in time he had destroyed nearly all trust the CD fans had in him. He makes his promise that in mid-march he will release the long overdue CD update whatever it takes. Releasing on time would regain him at least some trust. Instead he blew it and another promise too.
Is he stupid? If you make a promise like that, especially if your trustworthiness is already heavily compromised, you should move heaven and hell to meet this date.
So Iondivvy is either a compulsive liar, since he never intended to keep his promise from the start and simply win some time or a Vollidiot, since he is so braindead to not see that blowing a set date he promised to meet no matter what destroys the last bits of trust in him. He is, like many other Patreon developers, lucky to have a business model perfected for abusem since a normal firm breaking promises and deadlines like Iondivvy does would be toast within a short time.
Whatever is the correct answer I am happy I do not have to be in contact with a person like that.

 

[ionDivvy]

Be better to do the opposite. There are FAR too many in the fantasy genre here already.

I disagree. If anything, the modern day setting is overdone in western adult games while true fantasy remains relatively niche. If you're expecting me to stick to a modern setting, you'll probably be disappointed since any future projects will likely be some variation of fantasy or sci-fi. I enjoy CD, but it's not really something I wish to make a second time.

 

[GreenDark]

Be better to do the opposite. There are FAR too many in the fantasy genre here already.

Rebel Duet being fantasy is not the problem at all. The problems are Casual Desires being abandoned, the unending delays, the broken deadlines, the dishonesty and the inescapable fact that Rebel Duet is aggravatingly bad regardless of its genre.

I think CD being abandoned could have gone over significantly less badly if RD was at least somewhat decent and the dev hadn't handled CD as terribly as they did. But no. I still wince remembering the painful dialogue, lack of urgency, nonexistent world building, limp action scene and, likely most relevant for people who only play for porn, excruciatingly boring and awkward sex scenes. I have no idea if or how RD has changed since the last time I bothered to give it a chance, but considering how deeply the issues ran I highly doubt it's improved much.

 

[Anteron]

I disagree. If anything, the modern day setting is overdone in western adult games while true fantasy remains relatively niche. If you're expecting me to stick to a modern setting, you'll probably be disappointed since any future projects will likely be some variation of fantasy or sci-fi. I enjoy CD, but it's not really something I wish to make a second time.

Well, that sucks. I HATE fantasy in adult games. There are far too few in modern day that don't have "weird shit" like superpowers, monster girls, etc.

Rebel Duet being fantasy is not the problem at all. The problems are Casual Desires being abandoned, the unending delays, the broken deadlines, the dishonesty and the inescapable fact that Rebel Duet is aggravatingly bad regardless of its genre.

I think CD being abandoned could have gone over significantly less badly if RD was at least somewhat decent and the dev hadn't handled CD as terribly as they did. But no. I still wince remembering the painful dialogue, lack of urgency, nonexistent world building, limp action scene and, likely most relevant for people who only play for porn, excruciatingly boring and awkward sex scenes. I have no idea if or how RD has changed since the last time I bothered to give it a chance, but considering how deeply the issues ran I highly doubt it's improved much.

It's been like 900 million years since it was last updated...

 

[TLouis2]

in a (few) days.

 

[johnie82]

Just took a look at patreon again, this Q/A was posted under the most recent RD update 4 days ago



Well lets wait "a few days" more

 

[ionDivvy]

image

Then you can stop asking if you don't like estimates.

Estimates are not release dates.

 

[Anteron]

As has often been said, being an AVN dev must be the most dangerous job in the world.

 

[SonsOfLiberty]

As has often been said, being an AVN dev must be the most dangerous job in the world.

No more dangerous than working in hospital, being a doctor, working as construction worker, being an electrician, working at a dam, being in the army, working at a meat processing plant, being on a submarine, being in a gang, being a carpenter, or even driving your car to your local grocery store.

 

[Anteron]

No more dangerous than working in hospital, being a doctor, working as construction worker, being an electrician, working at a dam, being in the army, working at a meat processing plant, being on a submarine, being in a gang, being a carpenter, or even driving your car to your local grocery store.

Except look how many have delays or whatever because of injury, etc...

 

[cxx]

devs are too sick, need more sunlight and fresh air.

 

[Anteron]

devs are too sick, need more sunlight and fresh air.

And backups of everything on their computers - as they are so prone to crashing. And have normal family trees - not 3 or 4 different grandmothers dying in the process of making the game. And check for resurrection ability - at least one case where a dev "died" and "miraculously" came back to start another game. Then IIRC died again...