I suspect that FA's Internet discussion presence is the most crucial amount of what keeps FA interest afloat, self-reinforcing and becoming part of the product, potentially even the vast majority of the product. Most likely FA could go at least 6 months without any update at all and not lose more money than could be explained through random fluctuations--and the discussions would keep going the same as usual.
HTML Female Agent [v1.20.1p] [Crushstation]
- May 25, 2017
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But you would accept that there is a significant difference between the budget of a AAA game and a game with 0.3% of its budget? So the resources available must factor into any criticism.
As my previous essay, I don't think cowering from release dates is ultimately positive for developers or customers.
Believing that so long as nothing is promised work is progressing well is a fantasy of inexperience.
Not naming it to avoid any unwelcome attention, but it is a popular and fairly high-profile game, which does meaningful, but fairly infrequent updates.
Not sure how he expects to provide enough content to make a sandbox section worth the effort of producing given the pace he writes at
- Jan 25, 2020
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Welp, anyone want to try to develop a game where the writer doesn't take forever to write five paragraphs? I'm at least equal and at times better writer than C-dawg. I'm down to write, just -- that's my only talent.
Me neither. And actually, re-reading the update and checking the Patreon page, it looks like he may have finally figured that out, too.
That actually sounds like he may have finally commited to episodic VN style. Maybe more importantly, he has finally! taken the time to update his Patreon's intro,removing the word sandbox there.
It also sounds like he has enough quests planned that most of them won't be implemented until after the heat death of the universe unless he finally fucking learns to force himself to a actually write to a deadline, but baby steps.
- Jul 25, 2017
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He may just hire a writer if he is struggling that much. Can't be that hard to find someone help with this, I mean this is not The Lord of the Rings or something. Almost all choices until this point are fake choices anyway, so if he tell his ideas to a good writer and polish after he is done it wouldn't take this long.
- Jan 25, 2020
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I've said it before. The two actual scenarios are this:
Not actually unhappy: don't change anything.
Unhappy: change something (that is, get a coach).
Not actually unhappy: don't change anything.
Unhappy: change something (that is, get a coach).
I'm new here, and really like this game. Can I understand something from more experienced members on the date tags though? Looking at the release date it shows 2022, however the first comments start in 2017. How long has this game been in development and are there any finished routes?
I tried going to website and found a completely different 1.6.3 version, however that never reached Bangkok. Any chance this will get a completed tag in the next year or so? Too many abandoned and unfinished games here, and I'd support if I had some idea it would not be a cash grab.
Any Patreons got any idea? Thanks in advance!
I tried going to website and found a completely different 1.6.3 version, however that never reached Bangkok. Any chance this will get a completed tag in the next year or so? Too many abandoned and unfinished games here, and I'd support if I had some idea it would not be a cash grab.
Any Patreons got any idea? Thanks in advance!
A snowflake's in hell.
I'd suggest you get as much as you can out of both the 1.6.3 and the current version, then check back up on this around 2025ish.
2022 you saw is the release of latest version of the game. CrushStation has rewriten the game after the old 1.6.3 version. The old one has background story of the protagonist while the new one actually reaches Bangkok. And no, I don't think the game would be finished in 2023 with current speed of writing.
Thanks for the speedy replies. I've played them, then saw some projection that there would be a new version out in September which apparently hasn't happened. Maybe I'm oversimplifying but why does a HTML game that's well funded take till 2025?
My kinks are female protag corruption so I've played a few. Hand drawn games are being completed (e.g. Our Red String) and 3D animated ones like Anna's Exciting Affection are quite far along too. Is it because HMTL is more difficult to code? I'm running out of games in this genre.
Really keen on finding out what happens to our female agent! Maybe Crushstation can write CYOA first then let someone else turn it into game code, please?
- Jun 6, 2019
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It's not that html games takes longer, it's the dev themselves. Crush has restarted and redone the prologue several times, before cutting it out (temporarily) and finally focusing on the agent actually in bangkok. The above posters were joking about the estimated finish date because Crush has painted himself as being unreliable when it comes to deadlines and development time management.
Oh, you misunderstood me. 2025 is my guesstimate for when Crush will have added enough new scenes to make coming back for it worthwhile (barely more than half a dozen if he keeps up his established tectonic pace of writing).
Actually completing the game by 2025 (without being a huge letdown for only having 6-8 more scenes) would require him to start settting meaningful deadlines and forcing himself to stick by them, something he has proven utterly and completely unwilling to do over the past 5 years.
Chances are the game will remain in development well into the 2030s; there's still a lot of stuff Crush has teased having visions for, and there's no reason to think patrons that still support FA after the last 5 years' worth of going nowhere will ever actually start demanding he pick up the pace or be defunded.
I'll try to give as much of an objective vision as possible.
The project began in 2017. It had a glacial development cycle witwh some rewrites scattered inbetween. The main rewrite happened (or at least, was announced) around September 2020.
Since then (14 months) we've had, on average, one "episode" every two months. In the beginning (of the rewrite) it was roughyl 1.5 months, now we're approaching 3 months between episodes, so I'm going to be generous and say every two months.
Answering "how many episodes are left" is pretty hard, especially since we don't actually know anything the developer has planned, however, I would argue that the current state of the game is (being generous), 30% complete.
So essentially, it took 14 months to get to a 30% completion of the project. It's not at all unreasonable to think it would take at least another 28 months to have it somewhat close to completion.
Personally, I'm not that optimistic and I think it will take longer than that (keep in mind that right now, the updates are basically "Just write stuff without offering many choices that would affect later down the line", it's basically "the easy part"), but still.
There are definitely some nice games of that type around here, and welcome to the thread! You probably have seen that some games here get quickly completed, while others go into a long and open-ended development cycle where the developer often spends a lot of time apologizing for lateness. Female Agent is of the latter type, with the explanation that Crush has tremendous difficulty writing the events themselves. It's not difficulty in coding: the chosen format is relatively easy.
Wow... Thanks everyone for your very candid and fast replies. My main takeaways:
1) Check back here end 2025-2026 (optimistically)
2) Crushstation is very lucky to have such an awesome community of positive people, because I know my boss wouldn't be paying compensation without fixed outcomes.
3) For that reason, I'm happy to come back when the game is finished and pay for it then.
See you in 2 years!
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