So just quoting both of these comments as I simply cannot agree with these statements
- 10k per month is what the dev is earning now (gross before the cut of Patreon and taxes presuming he declares this extra income) it wasn't always 10k per month so 1 million is too high it was less than that over that time frame
- In the amount of time since this game was first released as a v0.01, the dev has completely started from scratch on it (engine swap I think it was to a newer version of RPGM) and also got inspired to make another project at the same time, Overgrown which could have easily ended up being abandoned or gotten slow updates. But while it did delay the development on Claire's Quest - Overgrown has been finished and completed. Which is great and it is a great game with a substantial amount of content
- The dev likely has IRL stuff as well, a family, a job --- who knows? The difference with a professional company and hobbyists like those that make a lot of the games that are on F95 including Claire's quest is that hobbyists aren't going to be able to work on it 5 days a week 9am to 5pm. No they likely have 9-to-5 job taking up the bulk of their time and are only working on their game in their limited free time
- Even as a full-time endeavour, solo development is long and hard
- I don't think many people really understand how hard game development is even for an adult game. Just making the art in itself takes a long time and for that this dev had to hire someone else to do it. But also the writing of the dialogue takes a long time, the coding of the events, map building in RPGM etc.... this is all very longwinded and very time consuming to do
As for whether or not the development is being intentionally dragged out, without personally knowing the dev no one can say that for sure. He may have other stuff going on in his life and adult game development even at 10k per month might still be a hobby for him
One thing about Patreon income is that it is not guaranteed income so even at 10k unless you first build up a massive savings is not a safe bet to then quit your job and rely on that income. The income can fluctuate or just completely stop one day like we saw with the invasion of Ukraine, Patreon stopped all payments from both Ukraine and Russia so many devs saw their income go to near 0 for quite an extended amount of time. So while it is a lot of money, it isn't reliable money
If I started getting 10k per month as an adult game dev I would be tempted to quit my day job but I would have to weigh up the pros and cons. One benefit of keeping my day job is then I have my 4k per month (before tax) income. Which is guaranteed and safe (I am very good at my job and the company I work for is massive with little to no risk of vanishing and my job is essential to the company so even with downsizing my role would always need to be there no matter how many jobs they need to get rid of) and then I'd suddenly be earning 10k on top which would just be pure extra money that I can save, invest, use etc....
If I were to quit my job then that 10k extra (or whatever it is after Patreon cut) is suddenly a lot less. And I would still need to declare that income anyway and pay taxes on it so you can see why many devs even with high earnings on Patreon still keep their day jobs
What some devs have done is use the income to build up savings and then start their on adult game development company and that has been a massive payoff but others simply stay as a hobbyist dev and thus their games don't get the update progress we'd hope for but it doesn't always automatically mean they are scamming their Patreon supporters or being scummy
Anyway sorry for long text, that's my 2-cents on it. I am a bit of a fan girl of Dystopian Project, I love Claire's Quest and I love Overgrown Genesis
And I also am developing my own Renpy game now for the past 2 years and I still don't have a v0.01 ready so I know how hard it is to find time and develop a game not to mention how personal circumstances can change and delay development. In my case being kicked out of flat I was renting as landlord decided to sell
The devs are actually earning closer to 12k USD per month, but I rounded down. And you're misinterpreting my math. I never said the devs have earned $1,000,000, but rather that at current rates of patreon support matched with the 8 year development cycle announced, they would earn nearly $1,000,000 USD for a total of 16 updates. I specifically said that estimate does not include the previous 6 years of development. (They have, without a doubt, received hundreds of thousands, though; as they've been at around $10k support for years).
So if you're going to write an essay to respond to my criticisms of the devs shady business practices, actually reading what I said is important in providing a valid rebuttal.
Changing the engine, redoing the entire prologue, redesigning characters, scrapping questlines or massively altering/expanding them in favour of actually finishing the multitude of current, unfinished quests already in the game, and not updating the main story for years are not things which the developer should receive praise or patience for. They're a sign of badly mismanaged development, with no direction, little respect for patron's time and money who have invested in order to see a finished product in a timely fashion, and a clear decision to cater to unique fetishes when those are what's generating revenue at the moment. (And then subsequently dropping said quests when the benefactor is no longer funding them, leaving yet more unfinished content like the entire breeding ranch quest).
They literally lied about increasing the number of updates Claire's Quest would get once Overgrown: Genesis wrapped.
All of that is in stark difference to how Dystopian Project started out when creating Claire's Quest and Overgrown: Genesis years ago.
Monthly releases, focus on finishing questlines and expanding main story content, adhering to promised schedules, niche fetishes remained secondary to primary development of gameplay, locations, and mainstream content, and there was consistent direction in terms of scope, tone, and story that was being told in both games. They found the time and the resources to create far more content, far more regularly, and with a lot less money rolling in, but now after years of success they've suddenly forgotten all those lessons and struggle to release two full updates a year?
My criticism comes primarily from the fact that the Dystopian Project of today is a far-cry from what it was back then. And I do not understand how anyone can look at their current production cycle and their planned one, see how much money they're making with how little, unfocused content they're putting out, and factor in the broken promises over the years, and still actively defend them.
They're not a brand new developer struggling to get by or balance the commitments to life, work, and development. They've been doing this for over half a decade and have started to provide notably worse service for a whole lot more money.
