So, I'm probably gonna peace out this game as well. First, it's very grindy. Second, because of the microtransactions. I'm definitely not one against devs making profit from what they do. I just think you have to build that following first and even then, it's gotta be stuff that doesn't limit folks from making decent progress in the game (e.g., financial stuff), but gives those that support extra features. That's a difficult balance to achieve and maybe this dev is still figuring that out. But still, it seems a little early to introduce stuff like that.
Either way, I don't know the dev's situation, but I just don't think this was a wise move. Also, I do try to support many folks on patreon, but I also don't have unlimited funds. In return, I at least try to provide valuable feedback to help them make their games better. I'm not always successful with that, but whatever.
Dev said saves from last release are not backwards compatible.