>Alpha preview
Next thing you know we are going to be publishing text documents on ideas that we have for previews for previews.
The game seems like it might be neat, and I guess good on the developer for getting it out there early, but why bother making a placeholder right now anyway?
(This has been my whinning, do with it what you will)
At least some of these devs (not this one, judging from the screenshot) seem to hire the artist first and produce kind of a "proof-of-concept-with-drawn-titties" just to show that they do have a basic grasp of what video games are and how to make them. Given that these are porn games we're talking about, it's a tossup whether the average consumer (of porn games) is interested in unique and fun gameplay with some breasts and semen thrown on top, or are looking for porn that they just have to work to get.
I think this approach has sort of tailored itself to the whole patronage model we're seeing these days. Sturgeon's long shadow is harder to get out from under when self-publishing is the rule, since anyone who can find a few other people who think like them and are at least moderately talented can start up a team for a game like these. Long term plans in those cases are much like assholes: everyone has one, most of them stink, and what they produce is generally unpleasant. Market forces don't seem to be sifting out the chaff, either; I bet that most everyone who's likely to buy a game under this model is probably already paying at least part of their fee before the game's even in beta. What's to pressure people to keep working when they're being given wads of money for producing just enough to keep people happy? I wonder: do these folks even consider how they're going to distribute the game to new customers after the patronage period ends?
Anyhow, those who can, do; those who can't, write armchair-expert posts like the one I'm writing now. And I guess I should mention that I don't know if anything I said even applies to the game under discussion, but I'm old (relatively speaking) and I'm allowed to ramble.
