Why do you gotta go dragging me into these things! I'm trying to work over here!You are arguing based on a faulty premise. That being Mr. Dots or some random guy makes images as nice as ICSTOR. Don't get me wrong, I love DMD, but no way Mr. Dots' images have the quality that ICSTOR's have. Look closely at some of Mr. Dots' images, and you'll see things like clothing clipping, feet hovering, etc.
I'm not an image expert, but I know quality when I see it. Quality takes time. And if you don't believe me, I bet artists like stoper , RomanHume and Philly_Games would agree. Suggesting that he change his workflow to go faster (and lose the quality that he needs* to make) is way out in left field.
* My opinion, based on my interpretation of his work and writing.
Artists named above picked because they focus on image quality and are active on these forums. And I know I've read rants** by each of them on quality!
** "rants" is a joke! Chill out guys!
In all seriousness though, being used as an exemplar of visual quality is a bit of an honor and I thank you for that.
I love DMD and I love the work that Dots has put into Melody, but his art is what I like to refer to as "out of the box". Very few (if any) custom poses, materials or lights. And there appears to be zero effort in trying to correct the rampant clipping, hovering and sometimes cringe worthy facial expressions.
Icstor's work is exceptionally detailed and his lighting is fantastic! His animations have no equal that I've seen yet. In fact I've cut animations from my game altogether until I can achieve a similar quality.
To that end, animating in Daz is complete and utter ass. I can't even begin to estimate how much time it requires for him to do a single animation, but knowing how long it takes to do a single frame, it's gotta be substantial.
The only developer I've been a patron of longer than Icstor is in fact Mr. Dots. But that's only because DMD was one of the first games I had ever played that I was like, "WOW, That's great shit!". I've been supporting both of those developers for over a year and have never once felt cheated, lied to or disappointed. In fact even though I harp on Mr. Dot's art, I'm infinitely grateful he found a way to continue his game after the "Great Patreon Shit Storm of '08". He could have shit canned it and moved on to a new project like a lot of devs did and he didn't, and for that I'll always have mad respect.
However, having become a developer myself, I'm ultra appreciative of the efforts of other developers and these days I'm doubly understanding of their delays.
It'll get here when it gets here, and I have every reason to believe that when it does, it'll be fucking great!