Overall though, in my experience with Games, Communication in addition to a Regular Schedule be it long or short, is an unbeatable combo. It's SO nice to hear from a Dev, their Ups, their Downs, their Progress, their Walls, and most of all, their Plans going forward after the Post. And if you know that Dev to be Consistent with that Schedule, it can put you at ease. It just engages you? I guess would be the correct term, keeps you from forgetting the Game altogether as opposed to a Dev that just SAYS it'll take 3 years (exaggeration but does happen) but then goes MIA the entire time.
Let me jump in on that lol.
From my personal experience, I totally agree that communication with a respected schedule is key in this domain.
And what I think is the most optimal way, is having small to mid length (mostly depends on the devs capabilities, if he invested in good equipment, and the hours he put in) updates every 2 months for patrons then release the final product as public. That way, not only the patrons will get exclusive content, it'll also satiate their hunger.
Bc I mean sure some are willing to support for a 6 months to a year without an update (ofc they pin ups, esxclusive imgs...) but that's not what most of them are there for.
As the client if the dev doesn't update and end up betraying my trust (as I'm sure plenty of donors experimented) by not delivering a said product on time as agreed, I'd be disappointed and most probably wouldn't renew my subscription. Wheras, if it's just for 2 months, sure it's stil frustrating but a lot les than if it was for nearly 1 year.
If the dev didn't betray my trust willingly but maybe bc he had a prblm while developing the game, I could just wait for the next 2 months to confirm if that's the case and see if the game is updated. A decrease in donors for 2 months is a lot better than on in 6 months-1 year (even if they are few, every penny counts lol).
Another good thing abt this way of doing things is that you can use your patrons as beta testers, get feedback, change things depending on it... You can then also release the public update without delaying for the non subscirbers as the patrons alrdy got that prvilege several time for the 2-3 updates that make up the public one.
Doing that, you can easily win over the non subs. As not only they make a large part of your audience but every sub was non sub at some point lol. Plus, they participate to your reputation and your game's too.
In summary you'd have these advantages :
-recurrent updates throughout the year which'll reassure the patrons as well as the undecided ones. Bc trusting you don't necesarrily for 2 months is a lot easier than nearly a year
-Having regular feedback and adapting to it, free beta testers lol. SO that when the new potential client is there there is a higher chance of him being satisfied with the final product
-Having the final update released at the same time for everyone will make f2p feel more appreciated and will participate to a good reputation.
the risks :
-Burnout
-Difficulty keeping the rythm
-Ridicilous amount of content
-Some may not like it if your fanbase was too used to a certain way of things being done
-Pretty obvious but dev miht just be good at doing small to mid length updates, everyne has their own way of doing things. Certain ppl can adapt well but some others have a hard time doing things another way
lol I had fun writing that, tell me what y'all think
THX
