Think about it guys.
You have to be really gullible to support any project on Patreon. It goes double for something like supporting Gumdrop, but really, as a way to fund the development of games, the model is totally untenable.
You can buy a finished commercial quality VN for $10-$20.
If somebody was paying $20 monthly for three years (and stop pledging now), it adds up to $360 for beta versions of a game that's not even complete, and
WON'T be complete with part X, since it's only the first act and there are two more to complete the story.
Seriously, no game is worth $360.
If you support a creator on Patreon, you don't do it for the game, you do it for the sake of a creator.
Here's a theory: Gumdrop is stalling Dual Family as long as possible while he's also making other games under a different name. He's now finishing them and has time to get back to DF. It's as good as any other theory so far and explains everything, lots of effort in the beginning, minimum effort later (even though we saw that he's perfectly able to make the game).
Gumdrop won't ever start working on this game again until enough of his supporters stop supporting him and he needs to start putting out content to make money again, but given how delusional his supporters are that won't be for a long, long time. After all, it's been well over 2 years with nothing and he's still making so much. And even then, who knows if he'll actually start working on the game again if his support ever does fall low enough because there's probably a good chance that he'll just let his patreon fall and start a new scam under a new name.
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He didn't have to do anything to regain patrons last year and he didn't have to release anything to regain them this year. It was some time ago, but I went back to his posting history last year, and he didn't start panic posting to regain trust.
My impression is that his patron count doesn't influence his decisions. In fact, I don't think his patrons mind supporting him. There was a post I made here back in December or January where I listed his recent posts and comments/likes count for them. It was extremely low, like a complete lack
My bet is he keeps collecting his money without putting in any work, maybe he puts out a couple more updates one day to keep stringing his supporters along when his parteon falls low enough. Then when it's hard for him to keep getting his patrons back because even they started to realize he's a scammer, he'll just start a new game under a new name and do it all over again.
Unless he's already doing that, it wouldn't work out well now. Three years ago, Dual Family fit a very precise empty niche which has since become crowded, but is still unique enough that people believe in the idea of Dual Family.
I don't think a niche like this exists now.
Because he doesn't want to work, he just wants to make money. Completing this game and working on another one would actually require him to have to work for his money. He could probably make more money by actually putting in work, but when you have so much money you eventually reach a point where making more doesn't make you as happy. He's probably happier not working even if it means less money.
I don't know what sort of team he put together, but with his earnings, if he's comfortable having a team, he could have hired a developer, a CG artist and a copywriter and the game would write itself.
With a constant stream of updates, he would have probably keep gaining patrons and he could have been up there with the best of them (
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), making tens of thousands per month.
Why on earth would you even remotely assume "one update per month" out of a scammer who didn't deliver for 2 fucking whole years is beyond me.
Because he released seven parts on a monthly schedule. If he had not a lot of money from patrons, he'd either keep up because he believed in the project, or he'd have abandoned it* a long time ago.
*) I don't mean a situation like we have now. I mean one where he literally stops posting anything about the game.
Why are you still trying to find reasons to justify this liar, to take the blame off his shoulder and put it on someone else (his brainwashed supporters on discord)?
Because none of us here know if he's lying to scam people, or if he's lying because he's in way too deep and has no idea how to get out.
That doesn't make any sense at all. And even assuming he didn't start out as a scammer and only became one later with the unconditional support of his fans: so what? That doesn't make him less of a scammer today, and it's not an excuse for his actions!! Well I suppose Hitler as a kid was not a genocidal piece of shit, right?
Godwin's Law!
So basically what you're saying is that all the shit he did later was not his fault entirely, but all the people who gave him credit were also responsible exactly as he was? Dude your way of thinking makes my blood boil.
By your logic, a kid saying (lying) that a dog ate his homework is a scammer that is no better than Hitler.
Giving him far too much credit....... didnt start out a scammer as he didnt know if it would take off but once the money started rolling in every action from that point was to secure as much money for as little work as possible. His months developing his website to take payments (should have taken days, actually hours to be honest), his long drawn out messages saying the release was soon, all done to keep people on the hook for as long as possible.
oh and for the "he cant be a milker crowd" on discord who we know read here....... milking your patreons for over 2 years and then saying at the end of the two yours "cancel your subscription" doesnt absolve him from the milking tag.....
Watch out with calling him a milker. Some people here have a very narrow definition of milking in that you have to have something that you're withholding by stringing people along. If you don't have anything, you're a scammer, and not a milker. Flame wars started over the definitions of some words...
he's had a boat load of money already and is just trying to sucker the last few into staying with his "honesty and transparency" while also trying to secure a little pity as he lost 2 members of his imaginary team because of financial constraints. Pausing until the release would have been far better on the optics of the situation, however as there is likely to never be a release he couldn't do that, after all Gumdropz gotz to get paid!
You know... for as much shit people give ICSTOR over at the Milfy City thread; at least he had the decency to suspend his funding when he decided to stop development.
What does Cumdrop do? He leaves it up to his cult to cancel instead. He takes all the blame, but isn't man enough to cut the cord himself. He knows his sick fans won't stop supporting! He's strung them along this far, why would they cancel now?
That makes a lot of sense. It didn't occur to me until you pointed it out. Yeah, he should stop taking money and resume payments only
when if the game is released.
There's just one thing that might excuse him.
I know it's a very unpopular opinion around here, but you have to realize that Gumdrop did release nine parts and an extra side game which are his intellectual property. Complaining about him here, on a pirated games forum, where almost nobody posting in this thread has ever supported him (but did download the game for free) isn't very sincere.
You can obtain the game legally by subscribing to his Patreon (or through Steam, or through his own site). I don't know how much flexibility you have on Patreon with regards to suspending pledges while allowing new ones to still subscribe.
It seems that a lot of people think Kyle made minimum effort in releasing these previous parts and only did it in order to scam people. I tried out RenPy to see how much effort is needed and it's colossal. There are a lot of other ways to scam people out of money instead of making an incest porn game.
Not that it excuses his lack of work (damn, if I was making 10 thousand bucks a month by making games, I'd have done anything to keep it going and keep on releasing stuff).
