- Sep 5, 2018
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Are you quoting our message from May of this year? And similar messages that have been shared throughout this thread? Because we have addressed people feeling they are separate. that is why we're currently pouring resources into converting our SU:Android to PC, for 8 months now.At the end of the day it’s simple. If the core build isn’t being updated and content is released as separate apps, people will see them as separate projects. That’s just cause and effect. And no, I’m not being fooled into thinking you don’t listen. I’m saying you’re not actually addressing this point.
Honestly, if every bit of criticism turns into a fight like this, you might want someone else handling player relations, because this approach just escalates things and pushes people away. Attacking motives doesn’t make the issue go away.
Not every criticism turns into a fight if you accept the answer you're given instead of searching for the one you want. Narravtive matters and so does timeline. May we issue a statement on our direction of the "main game" praises from this thread. September we announce project evolution and now they want an abandoned tag. December we release an update and now it's you only update "spin offs", and an abandoned tag. This isn't a dodge this is reality.
We're hoping it's right around the corner. We have meetings this week to set the direction and hopefully give a good idea of time line. Unity will be updated with all this content as well in the coming weeks.I for one am really excited about the Ren'py build, especially because the Mercy scenes tend to crash when you run them on linux, but it has to be said that the community has been burned so many times by reworks, rebuilds, tech updates, and ports that the very concept is tainted. Summertime Saga and the like soured the concept so much that the community is unfairly treating Devs, but from a historical stand point changes like this are the signs of the beginning of the end. I hope Gunsmoke Games delivers and is shining example of a dev doing it right and not fucking over the community. Keep up the good work Gunsmoke Games we believe in you!
I want to say I appreciate you're comments QuestionableNinja. We needed to pivot, you can see we have a huge issue with SU, and that is size. Only a small portion of people get what they want, and eventually those people pile up and create a bunch of noise, and we shift, and the other pools fill up. We needed to pivot, plain and simple. If that pivot kicked you in the nuts I'm sorry, but the road we're on with SU is unsustainable at best. Moving to smaller projects, which SU argueably should have been (like imagine how much better if it was a bunch of smaller experiences that had way more polish). We're going to be moving more in that direction in the future.Part of what's tickling people the wrong way is the timespan to achieve anything that we can see. Most people already don't understand game dev already, even when you factor in an engine as plug-n-play as Ren'Py, a lot of time gets sunk into making these games. We also can't ignore the trend of an easily-imagined line graph where income line goes up while the productivity line steadily goes down. Almost all of the biggest games on F95 (that I have experience with, at least), have progressed from an update every few months, to every 6 months, and then every year.
To GSG's credit, they have actually been releasing stuff. They aren't just sitting quiet. However, what they've been releasing ventures further down the spin-off route which alienates those who're waiting for it to be added to the main game to experience it. For the biggest update of the year to be a completely unrelated game, one with a concept that already has 2 projects, is just a kick in the nuts.
Thanks for trying to quiet those who think something is easy, but it's a losing cause. We have spent a lot of money rebuilding SU, and tracking it slowly through multiple people. I have watched it be attempted 3+ times by the community (and now a 4th with you) and all end, not even near the finish line. That is why I fight so hard to keep the narrative clean Henshin alt+tab'ed for 4 years now, as there is no clean way to get text out of Unity.On the subject of fans thinking they can do a better job, I've tried making a Ren'Py version too. I'm not a game dev by any stretch of the imagination but I was able to get my head around Ren'Py enough to start making a port. I don't think I can make a better game than GSG and I know I'd only be able to go as far as porting what exists since I have a -2 in my art stat. I do, however have extremely basic image editing skills enough to use the asset library to recreate art assets into Ren'Py-friendly versions and where I shine is my writing. I'm no acclaimed author but my writing is decent and I make a really good spell-check replacement. My one objective and pretty much the only thing I could bring to this project was my burning desire to see all the incredibly annoying and long-ignored typos and bad English corrected. Sadly, unlike GSG, I don't have the script assets lying around to copy and paste in and correct them as I went along so my energy ran out thanks to my ADHD dropping anchor with the insane amount of alt-tabbing I was having to do when transcribing the script from SU to my Ren'Py build and not being able to scroll back to anything you may or may not have missed or accidentally clicked past. If the game was already ported, I could quite easily fix the writing (spelling-and-wording-wise, not as plot critique) but with it being stuck on Unity, it's just a pain in the ass to do.
And I think that's pretty much where everyone else is at, just fatigue at not seeing progress on the original/core game for one reason or another. There's a lot of negative circle-jerking going on in this thread, but even as someone who's previously played Devil's Advocate, I can see where the negativity is coming from and how people are stewing in it.
As for "everyone else", yes there is a large contingent that want more progress on the original/core game, but even there it's all over the place. Bordello, cell content, etc are major askes, but in 2023-2024 the loud voices were cryng for plot, which we're working on now. The shifts in wants are very difficult to manage.
SU is the way it is, and it's not without problems. Complaining constantly and continuing to shift the narrative to try and get us to focus on what individuals would like is burning us out. We rather move on to small fun projects that get people excited. SU will live on, but it is what it is. It's a hot mess, but there is no other hot mess like it.