- Mar 23, 2019
- 1,224
- 4,875
You are very right. 2021 seems to be the year of abandoning great VNs. One after another of my favorites just went kaput. Hillside is one of the surprise hits in the last few years. The characters are great, and this VN justifiably has many fans. I hope that Darkblue can just take some deep breaths, and just work on it when he can, and forget about release dates. As long as he is making progress, we can all wait a few more weeks or months or whatever.
I think the main issue is that the money is almost never that great, compared to the hours put into it, unless you are DPC or Mr. Dots or maybe 5 or 10 very successful devs. Everyone else is working for barely minimum wage (in most countries), once you factor in hardware and electricity.
So really, a dev and his team have to enjoy what they are doing, without a lot of family, health issues, or other distractions, and keep the pressure off themselves. It has to be a labor of love, something they enjoy doing in their free time for some spending money, and the extra Patron income is just a nice bonus to help offset the cost for hardware, electricity, and assets, plus a little extra.
That is why a dev should never, ever, give a release date. It is bound to be held up by life, or technical problems, or creative problems, or any number of things. Then, if they ever don't meet it, all the complainers (who are not supporters, naturally), come out of the woodwork like vermin. It is best for a dev to just say, "I am working hard on it, and it will hopefully be done in the few months or so." or be even more vague, and say "It is about 80% percent complete, still have a few more scenes to finish".
Too much pressure put on yourself is a recipe for losing your heart in a project.
