From Alorth on Discord replying to why it's taking long.
"You have all the right to voice your opinion, we won't kick you as long as you're not being disrespectful or your actions are viewed as such. It's true that we all agree that the update is taking way too long, not just the players but even us developers. The reasons for that is a big mixture... we are not only developers but also normal people, we also have family and like to play games sometimes... that means that as humans we can sometimes also get a bit lazy. On the other hand though, the update is bigger than the other ones and the branching also is a pain in the ass as it goes for the coding which would have initially taken longer one way or another, but of course not this much. Now it's true that the last month, we had planned to get the update out, but we had some inconveniences. Sorry that the waiting time is dissapointing, there isn't something we can do to turn back time... but we are already grinding the update out as fast as we can now. It looks to me like, people believe we developers are some special living creature that has no needs but just work. All the developers that are out there and have short update times, they are giving all of their free time into development, putting it on first place and everything else second. It's costing them everything, like it cost to me in the past. I used to have updates every 2 months, but I almost broke up with my gf because I had 0 time for her or other stuff. I worked, ate and sleept, nothing else, 0 playing games or so. Not to mention I even have a dog that I have to walk and give some attention. There are developers that even pass away, because they are all the time only working and being stressed about it. One of the reasons things slowed down on first place was due to health issues coming from overworking myself in the past. So to put it short, I'm taking it slower for my own good at moment and I even hired a artist to help me. You might think that it should be faster if I hire someone, but that's wrong thinking... the few artists that can do close to my quality work that I can hire, take way more time than I do with artwork, so it's not making up for me doing less work. I could hire more artists, but imagine, just for example, if i would hire any other developer out there... how drastically the quality of the game visuals would change... The visual quality is not a fixed thing of this engine, so not anyone can do it, even if they have 5 years experience with it, it might not be enough if they lack the understanding of the engine. If some genie would grant me a wish, and say... You can pick one developer, to work for you for free for the visuals so pick one... I would say, fuck it, no thanks... There wouldn't be a single one around I could pick for my own games unless I teach them for at least half a year and there are no exceptions. I don't want to seem like a high nose or something, but I'm being realistic. I was like everyone else at start, but I started to work in a different way, which made such a huge difference in quality and any other way won't be the same. Not everyone can overcome a huge wall alone... Don't get me wrong, there are good developers out there which have nice quality visuals and use the same engine, but this is also about consistency of the games and the more someone is used to work one way, the harder it is for that person to change his ways."
