This kinda feels like the
Fek/R2CK situation all over again. Put out an interesting project, rake in obscene amounts of money, and then just kinda stop updating it. I think the main reason Fek's Patreon has been steadily dipping (right now he's "only" making $13k per month, down from $18k/mo last year…SERIOUSLY, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK, PEOPLE, STOP GIVING HIM MONEY) is because he basically just gave up any pretense of caring and basically stopped posting. Inno at least makes an attempt to communicate with her fanbase, even if most of the posts are just delay announcements.
I wish I could say that this is limited to the Patreon/SubStar scene, but at my last job one of the developers was making close to what Inno is currently making and was far worse at coding.
As I've discovered from the never-ending
Blackgate dumpster fire, Patreon users 1) don't seem to research the project they're backing
at all and 2) really love to invoke the "butt programing iz hrd" defense (as if that excuses a complete and utter lack of progress on what amounts to a
paid project). It's as if the backers of these projects don't look at these sort of gigs as jobs or something.
It doesn't help that LT genuinely offers a bunch of features that most other adult games don't have, so between that and the fact that Inno is communicative people are far more likely to get roped into it. I think eventually the curve is going to reach its peak and start to fall if things don't change—I've seen it happen enough times before with equally vehement fanbases—but for now its novelty is enough to continue to drive its growth.