There's a lot of weird negativity here, but I just wanted to say that, as someone who's been around since the old fire level demo, up and through the point where patreon demos cut off to prevent spoilers? I'm still fully invested, and I don't see any issue with however long it takes. The electric demo, on its own, was already infinitely more playable progress than one could reasonably expect from most finished games, so I've seen the waiting as equivalent to the wait for a sequel. Because, honestly? That's the equivalency, if we're talking sheer scale of time and effort.
In a genre filled with low-effort games and overly ambitious projects that never even reach the earliest of demo stages, Future Fragments has put consistent effort into not just constantly building upon what they've already made, but also holding themselves accountable and communicating with their audience. No one does that! You get updates for a few months that amount to a few screenshots for a title that only ever really exists as text, and then they disappear and you wonder what happened! Which is totally fine, for the record. But then we've got the FF team, here, trying to keep people posted, even when it's really only to their detriment to have people privy to every possible setback, complication, and delay in estimated deadlines.
That's game development. You either have some executive-level idiots forcing out a Sonic '06, or you have a team that keeps working even when "the game should have already been done," because, ultimately, it's done when it's done. Waiting an extra year or two or twelve, even, honestly bothers me way less than seeing a game release with so much wasted potential.
I'm not saying it isn't valid to be frustrated-- it's totally reasonable. But it's not really fair to blame the dev team for it when they've been doing their absolute best for quite a while now, ya know? They want the game finished more than anyone, so we're all on the same side, here! This stuff is difficult and complicated, and it's not like they're some triple A studio with a thousand employees who've done this a hundred times. There's a learning curve even when a game isn't this detailed and ambitious!
So... I feel like we can cut them some slack. It's a small team, who are taking a loss to begin with, and yet there's always been that clear communication and years of detailed progress reports. Waiting for something cool is always going to suck, but they've put in the time and effort to show that they're serious about making the best game they can.
I've pledged plenty of times on patreon, across a handful of different accounts, because the team has given me plenty of reason to believe in this game, and I was happy to help. If the finished game isn't what you wanted it to be, then that's a totally fair time to pick things apart. But if the game is worth every one of those little setbacks, is it really worth being negative about it right now? I get it, people are normally lying about progress on games and stuff, but... they've literally posted constantly for years to try and show their work, and they're always communicating directly with their audience.
Fair's fair, ya know? They put enough trust in their audience to keep in constant contact like this, so I think they've earned some benefit of the doubt, is all. As for me? I'm just wishing them the best, and I just continue to feel hyped about the game. Gives me something to talk about, and to look forward to, and even a nice bit to play in the meanwhile? More than enough for me. Only reason delays might bother me is because I'd be worried, rather than annoyed.
...I'd meant this to just be a "yo, keep up the good work, I love everything I've seen so far over the years!", but some of the recent replies really had me feeling down about sharing some shallow sentiment so simply if people were feeling that down about things. And idk what was with all that alliteration, but anyways. Point is! Plenty of us are just kinda humming to ourselves in the corner as we quietly wait, too! But, like, it's easier to speak up when you're frustrated than it is to encourage someone, is all! And I get it! But still-- the electric demo alone was more than worth my attention, so everything else has been gravy! Keep at it! Encouraging platitude number 12! Et cetera!
tl;dr: Keep at it-- I believe in y'all, and I'm not alone, so don't mind the bits of negative stuff! I definitely lost focus completely in this post, though, lol. ^^;