so a system where i could pledge a reasonable amount as a one off and get updates for a period of time would work better than committing to a monthly debit.
Absolutely not.
I think that there's a misunderstanding here. Doing a translation and making a game are too different works implying really different process and you don't pledge one for the same reason you pledge the other.
Doing a translation is difficult, but mostly you just need to do that. Plus, if for a reason or another you miss the dead line, almost no one will care. So, not only translator just need some free time, but also you give them some money as a thanks for what they do/have done.
But creating a game mean spending hours thinking about the story and write, then rewrite and rewriting again, every single line of dialog. It also mean that you need to do all the visual, and redo them because there's something which don't feel right. To this you need to add all the coding, all the testing and debugging, and some assistance to the guys who give you some money. And obviously, if you miss the dead line for an update, people will start to complain, same if the update isn't consequent enough.
Because of this, most game creators working alone do this as a full time job ; because
it is a full time job ! And those who don't works alone need to pay the guys/girls who works for them. Hey, nobody wake up a morning saying, "I can earn a lot with my drawing, but I'll do it for free because fuck money !".
Of course, whatever they works alone or not, they don't create AAA games, it's just some indie games with or without some qualities. But don't forget that an AAA games not only need years of works, but also need around a thousand people, when not more. So, here we talk about people who do what ? A game with 50 time less quality, and do it with 500 time less people...
When you give them money, it's not to thanks them, but to pay them, because they've earned it.
And it's because of this that there's an big difference between one-off pledges and monthly pledges. With the monthly pledges, you know by advance how much you'll earn each month, so you can plan your update, command X pictures and know that you'll be able to pay them, and so on.
At the opposite, with one-off pledges, you know nothing and so can plan nothing. Plus you always have a terrible fate above your head. If one month you don't earn a single dollar, you'll have to do a "real" job to pay your bills (if your works alone) or you'll not be able to pay the people working for you. This mean no update for this month, and like there's no update, why someone should give you some money ? It's just the end of the game, because everyone had a low month at the same time.
