- Aug 21, 2018
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Long post incoming, trying to address some points I saw...
There was never a plan with the sister being sexually involved, that was always explained since the first very release of the game, she was always gonna be solely a narrative plot device. We removed her now because time have changed, moderation is now automated, done without care or due process, and even having a non sexually involved character like this in a NSFW game can pose issues. This is not a risk I'm willing to take anymore.
I'm depressed, I'm personally going through my worst year, Patreon is all I have left, I had personal issues this year that are kind of serious. On top of that, when it was already going bad, Itch.io removed support for paid content nsfw game, and it represented at least 50% of the revenue of the game, I had to do an emergency landing on Steam and I had to make sure it would happen, this also meant going slightly beyond what was required at the time.
The problem is when people see a sister in a porn game they always assume it's gonna include incest or something, this also affects moderators that have to review your game in 5 min and don't have much time to dedicate to it.
There is not that many NSFW games where there is a big emphasis on the plot like this, where you have characters that are solely for plot purpose and others solely for sexual gratification. Because of this, some users/moderators assume it's gonna feature incest and you start getting conversation around the game that resolves about incest.
It's a compliance nightmare, you can see it clearly on this thread alone. Many people still thinking we were gonna lewd her, even though we made it clear from the start and repeated every times it was brought up, that it was not gonna be the case.
Frankly, it's a design mistake I made when I was younger, starting on this project. From the start, I should have not included a character that creates wrong expectations. The decision to replace her is something I was hesitating on for years already, the current climate just made it that much clear.
I just want to focus on what matters and not stress making this game, when I'm already overwhelmed IRL with problems, it also doesn't represent much value lost and I'll try to explain below why.
Regarding the change, here my personal take on it:
This is not gonna ruin the game, personally I found the new character of Beatrice to fit better the story, because previously, working on past scripts I always felt that the part where the MC was going out and in of town to search for her missing sister was weak. She was family, and she was very fragile. So to me it always was in the back of my mind that it's simply unbelievable he would not at least camp outside for the thing he want to protect the most in the world, the very thing he left India with to protect, and that he would believe she might be alright for that amount of time left in the woods alone, surrounded by horrific monsters that are not slow (the MC have to run to town to escape from them plenty of times). That part always seemed insane to me.
I also find that the Beatrice character fixes certain issues because she is much more capable, physically stronger, and also the relation with the MC is balanced enough that yes the MC would look for her but not to the point where he would take too dangerous risks like camping outside or just leaving town, not to return. She is supposed to represent pure love, in the sense that the MC would have ended up with her in India, that's almost certain. She won't be involved in sexual content too, we are not bringing this character to introduce a new possible LI.
In that sense, I feel like the plot works better now, I understand it lessens the drama a bit but believe me this isn't as important as you may think, because this character (Alice/Beatrice) is not actually the point of the story, you will understand everything at the end, there are different layers to the story, but since I feel like I have to say more because I'm under attack, this is just a bait since the beginning.
Yes, the bait might be a bit less dramatic but overall it doesn't matter all that much. It was never about her, the core/twist of the story is a second layer that is revealed at the end, she is just a plot device to make you go out of town and unravel the first layer. The real thing is at the end and the change doesn't impact it in any ways.
For me, games are not the place where politics should be pushed. Specially in porn games. We've experienced a significant pushback on freedom in recent years. I encourage everyone to reach out to elected officials for better regulations on payment processors and engage in political activism in relevant places. All the platforms that legally support us are also not operating on their free will, and getting less free just like us because they have to abed by the rules of the government and payment processors.
It's obviously difficult, but as game developers, our main goal is to entertain, and we must operate within the current constraints or make changes/adapt on the go to fit the new constraints in case of long winded publicly available game being developed like here. This game was started in an era where things were simpler, and now it's not. We also don't have the capacity to fight back, we are worms to them, specially in the NSFW field, we don't have any lobbies fighting for us, almost nobody want to work with us or defend us.
I regret that, but believe me there's nothing we can do about it and some of us are in contact with each others (the devs), and it's hopeless. You need political power to have an influence on those issues and we don't have any, there is no big corporation doing NSFW with lot of moneys to fight back or represent us.
Right now the NSFW field is saturated with AI driven releases that add very little creatively, made sometimes entirely by a sole individual, with no team and no responsability, don't know how to code, don't know how to draw, selling the output of a prompt of an AI model. Going ham on the few projects that aim for quality and employ real artists and writers does not help the scene. All the external legal communities understand this because they see what we are dealing with on a daily basis.
On a pirate site that context is sadly missing, it's easy to miss how much has changed in recent months and years because it is operating outside of the laws and outside of the current societal norm. Hosted on servers from some strange exotic locations, outside of the reach of any government.
I hope you can forget but please trust me when I say the game is not ruined, this was like 1% of the value of the game lost, changed to something that in my opinion is not really worst for the reasons I tried to explain, and if you disagree I get it, I just hope the perceived lost value will weaken as the game moves to the end and you see what is the actual revelation at the end and that this character being his sister or not, it doesn't really matter. It's always been a secondary character.
@Nullx54 Please accept my friend invitation on discord, I would like to discuss with you, I know you supported me in the past and I always felt like you had some good takes, but I don't understand the "villain arc" and I would like to hear your concerns and explain to you what is happening, maybe in more details.
There was never a plan with the sister being sexually involved, that was always explained since the first very release of the game, she was always gonna be solely a narrative plot device. We removed her now because time have changed, moderation is now automated, done without care or due process, and even having a non sexually involved character like this in a NSFW game can pose issues. This is not a risk I'm willing to take anymore.
I'm depressed, I'm personally going through my worst year, Patreon is all I have left, I had personal issues this year that are kind of serious. On top of that, when it was already going bad, Itch.io removed support for paid content nsfw game, and it represented at least 50% of the revenue of the game, I had to do an emergency landing on Steam and I had to make sure it would happen, this also meant going slightly beyond what was required at the time.
The problem is when people see a sister in a porn game they always assume it's gonna include incest or something, this also affects moderators that have to review your game in 5 min and don't have much time to dedicate to it.
There is not that many NSFW games where there is a big emphasis on the plot like this, where you have characters that are solely for plot purpose and others solely for sexual gratification. Because of this, some users/moderators assume it's gonna feature incest and you start getting conversation around the game that resolves about incest.
It's a compliance nightmare, you can see it clearly on this thread alone. Many people still thinking we were gonna lewd her, even though we made it clear from the start and repeated every times it was brought up, that it was not gonna be the case.
Frankly, it's a design mistake I made when I was younger, starting on this project. From the start, I should have not included a character that creates wrong expectations. The decision to replace her is something I was hesitating on for years already, the current climate just made it that much clear.
I just want to focus on what matters and not stress making this game, when I'm already overwhelmed IRL with problems, it also doesn't represent much value lost and I'll try to explain below why.
Regarding the change, here my personal take on it:
This is not gonna ruin the game, personally I found the new character of Beatrice to fit better the story, because previously, working on past scripts I always felt that the part where the MC was going out and in of town to search for her missing sister was weak. She was family, and she was very fragile. So to me it always was in the back of my mind that it's simply unbelievable he would not at least camp outside for the thing he want to protect the most in the world, the very thing he left India with to protect, and that he would believe she might be alright for that amount of time left in the woods alone, surrounded by horrific monsters that are not slow (the MC have to run to town to escape from them plenty of times). That part always seemed insane to me.
I also find that the Beatrice character fixes certain issues because she is much more capable, physically stronger, and also the relation with the MC is balanced enough that yes the MC would look for her but not to the point where he would take too dangerous risks like camping outside or just leaving town, not to return. She is supposed to represent pure love, in the sense that the MC would have ended up with her in India, that's almost certain. She won't be involved in sexual content too, we are not bringing this character to introduce a new possible LI.
In that sense, I feel like the plot works better now, I understand it lessens the drama a bit but believe me this isn't as important as you may think, because this character (Alice/Beatrice) is not actually the point of the story, you will understand everything at the end, there are different layers to the story, but since I feel like I have to say more because I'm under attack, this is just a bait since the beginning.
Yes, the bait might be a bit less dramatic but overall it doesn't matter all that much. It was never about her, the core/twist of the story is a second layer that is revealed at the end, she is just a plot device to make you go out of town and unravel the first layer. The real thing is at the end and the change doesn't impact it in any ways.
For me, games are not the place where politics should be pushed. Specially in porn games. We've experienced a significant pushback on freedom in recent years. I encourage everyone to reach out to elected officials for better regulations on payment processors and engage in political activism in relevant places. All the platforms that legally support us are also not operating on their free will, and getting less free just like us because they have to abed by the rules of the government and payment processors.
It's obviously difficult, but as game developers, our main goal is to entertain, and we must operate within the current constraints or make changes/adapt on the go to fit the new constraints in case of long winded publicly available game being developed like here. This game was started in an era where things were simpler, and now it's not. We also don't have the capacity to fight back, we are worms to them, specially in the NSFW field, we don't have any lobbies fighting for us, almost nobody want to work with us or defend us.
I regret that, but believe me there's nothing we can do about it and some of us are in contact with each others (the devs), and it's hopeless. You need political power to have an influence on those issues and we don't have any, there is no big corporation doing NSFW with lot of moneys to fight back or represent us.
Right now the NSFW field is saturated with AI driven releases that add very little creatively, made sometimes entirely by a sole individual, with no team and no responsability, don't know how to code, don't know how to draw, selling the output of a prompt of an AI model. Going ham on the few projects that aim for quality and employ real artists and writers does not help the scene. All the external legal communities understand this because they see what we are dealing with on a daily basis.
On a pirate site that context is sadly missing, it's easy to miss how much has changed in recent months and years because it is operating outside of the laws and outside of the current societal norm. Hosted on servers from some strange exotic locations, outside of the reach of any government.
I hope you can forget but please trust me when I say the game is not ruined, this was like 1% of the value of the game lost, changed to something that in my opinion is not really worst for the reasons I tried to explain, and if you disagree I get it, I just hope the perceived lost value will weaken as the game moves to the end and you see what is the actual revelation at the end and that this character being his sister or not, it doesn't really matter. It's always been a secondary character.
@Nullx54 Please accept my friend invitation on discord, I would like to discuss with you, I know you supported me in the past and I always felt like you had some good takes, but I don't understand the "villain arc" and I would like to hear your concerns and explain to you what is happening, maybe in more details.
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