VN Ren'Py Stray Incubus [S2 Ch.3b] [IP Studios]

[DarkBlade12345]

Future of the project... (I urgently need support on Patreon…)
Hi, everyone. I have already started working on chapter 1 of season 2 and I was planning on posting a progress update, but first, some bad news...
I have honestly debated whether or not I should write this post, and I ultimately decided to write it after all… So, as many of you might’ve noticed, my latest update was leaked very very early into release on F95zone. Furthermore, you might’ve also noticed that even though lots of work was put in to make nice looking renders, the plot was kind of rushed, wasn’t it? So why?
Well, you see I’m living in Germany now, and as you might know, you’d usually need around 750 euros a month to stay afloat around here. However, if anyone saw my patron count, they’d probably be able to guess that I was quite short on that amount for the last couple of months. That’s why I saved up some money (thanks to my loyal patrons) before I moved to Germany to account for the insufficient Patreon income once I’m here. And I ate a hole in those saving as I was sadly averaging between 500-600 euros a month on Patreon ever since I came here. But I had a plan, which seemed pretty solid. Release chapter 12, get a few new patrons and get to the 750+ euros per month goal and stop eating up your small savings, problem solved, right? Well…
Sadly chapter 12 proved to be quite the handful. It was planned to be way bigger than what it ended up being, but I had to rush its release because my savings were running out and I needed more support, and I hoped with its release I would get that and start being able to chill out while making my updates and not have to rush them. However, thanks to the leak, my Patreon income is still not nearly enough as it barely increased because I was only granted very few days (3 or 4 if I’m not mistaken) of early access and no one had to subscribe. I still don’t understand why someone would pay 35 euros just to potentially destroy the project…
Regardless… Point is, if I don’t get many more patrons in the next few weeks, I will run out of savings in a month or two and will have to take a part time job next to being a student, which trust me is already taxing enough. If I end up doing that, we can all kiss the project goodbye as I well most certainly have no time to work on it anymore.
If you guys care about the project and want it to stay alive, please consider supporting me on Patreon, because I need it now more than ever…
As always, thank you!
-Flynn.

TL;DR: Thanks to someone leaking the project, I will probably have to abandon it in a few weeks if don’t get support on Patreon, if you care about the project and want it to stay alive, please support me now…

Have you considered opening a SubscribeStar page? I've seen a lot of people prefer Subsribestar over Patreon, so that could lead to an increase of support/subscribers. If you are able to obtain enough support to continue, I would consider reworking chapter 12 before you continue to the new season. If you admittedly feel like you rushed the release and that you wanted to do more, I think now would be a good time to spend some more time on that, since it would have a quicker turn around than a brand new chapter.

 

[Mr_Sel]

I like Flynn's work and I know, I might sound like an a-hole but I have to appreciate the irony of people using pirated Honey Select content, complaining about piracy

 

[Dark Silence]

I think there's a balance to it. A lot of devs have noted that their subs either taper off or actually drop after a leak, so some people definitely need a personal motivation to support. On the other hand you're right that people supporting to support are a lot more stable.
I really hope it works out by I worry Flynn put too many of his eggs in one basket. You need to develop a strong enough support base before you make game developing your sole job. Especially with the massive over saturation of adult games in the post covid world. Then compounding that most of SI's development has been on an entirely free model. Pretty sure there's only been like 3 updates since Flynn opened his Patreon. The amount of support he's gotten in that short time is actually really impressive but it's almost impossible to make a living wage off of this that fast in the current market.

This 100%. Thing is some devs, not sayin any names here, will make threatenin posts about abandonin their games if they don't make a certain amount of money. Then they make the amount they demanded and say the game will release and they never release them. Months later, they come back with a new game and the same shit occurs. Rinse and repeat.

 

[Zareem]

Yep I think only releasing for patrons first is good cos it makes it easier for ppl to realise they can support the creator even if they hadn't thought about supporting him, and they may eventually subscribe. Cos ppl think they want to play the new version all the time, but it less so just occurs to them that they want to support the creator.

 

[Pitrik]

Always said that the ones you call " Heroes" for leaking the builds early ruin the games I know is a pirate site but have some respect for the devs sometimes

 

[jurgendreh]

Found this game last week, i really like it. Misty best girl

 

[jurgendreh]

Always said that the ones you call " Heroes" for leaking the builds early ruin the games I know is a pirate site but have some respect for the devs sometimes

Well if it happens to smaller devs, it can end the game.

 

[Mr_Sel]

Always said that the ones you call " Heroes" for leaking the builds early ruin the games I know is a pirate site but have some respect for the devs sometimes

It's funny how you make the same assumption as big corpo, that if people didn't have access to the build earlier they would immediately jump onboard and become higher tier patrons. It does not work like that. If someone isn't already a patron, it is highly unlikely that he will become one, just to skip few weeks of waiting.

Early access is a nice bonus but that's all it is - a bonus, not the main reason people support a creator.

Also, it might sound brutal but I can easily name as least 15 or 20 projects on this site worth supporting. The competition is severe and the economy sucks even is first world countries. Expecting you will make a living in western Europe from indie, adult game development, when you can't even legally sell it on Steam or gog because of using copyrighted assets, is simply being not realistic.

My only advice to Flynn is: go back to thinking about Stray Incubus as a nice, creative hobby. If that means 1-2 updates a year - so be it. Don't make it about paying the rent because you will burn out and fast.

 

[Mommysbuttslut]

It's funny how you make the same assumption as big corpo, that if people didn't have access to the build earlier they would immediately jump onboard and become higher tier patrons. It does not work like that. If someone isn't already a patron, it is highly unlikely that he will become one, just to skip few weeks of waiting.

Early access is a nice bonus but that's all it is - a bonus, not the main reason people support a creator.

Also, it might sound brutal but I can easily name as least 15 or 20 projects on this site worth supporting. The competition is severe and the economy sucks even is first world countries. Expecting you will make a living in western Europe from indie, adult game development, when you can't even legally sell it on Steam or gog because of using copyrighted assets, is simply being not realistic.

My only advice to Flynn is: go back to thinking about Stray Incubus as a nice, creative hobby. If that means 1-2 updates a year - so be it. Don't make it about paying the rent because you will burn out and fast.

Except a lot of devs have shared analytics that pretty well prove that early leaks hurt their earnings. This is completely different from major corporations who make more than enough surplus revenue to eat the losses. You're comparing projects that sell in the hundreds to low thousands at best to projects that can sell in the millions.

 

[Gtdead]

My only advice to Flynn is: go back to thinking about Stray Incubus as a nice, creative hobby. If that means 1-2 updates a year - so be it. Don't make it about paying the rent because you will burn out and fast.

While I pretty much agree on the rest you said, putting the development on the backburner without trying to capitalize on the existing popularity is a huge missed opportunity, especially since his plea is reasonable.

If his Patreon income was 50 euros and he was asking for 750, that would be unrealistic. But since it's near the mark, it can work.

At the very least it may deter people from leaking it early, which for some reason that I personally can't understand, seems to make a difference.
Even if it's not enough to persuade people who never cared for being patrons, it may persuade a few to spend a bit less on other games and support this one instead.

 

[Mr_Sel]

Except a lot of devs have shared analytics that pretty well prove that early leaks hurt their earnings. This is completely different from major corporations who make more than enough surplus revenue to eat the losses. You're comparing projects that sell in the hundreds to low thousands at best to projects that can sell in the millions.

Got any links? Sounds interesting from business point of view.

While I pretty much agree on the rest you said, putting the development on the backburner without trying to capitalize on the existing popularity is a huge missed opportunity, especially since his plea is reasonable.

If his Patreon income was 50 euros and he was asking for 750, that would be unrealistic. But since it's near the mark, it can work.

It can work for a month or two, but gamedev is currently letting people go left and right for a reason: people spend less money on games. And here we're talking about voluntary donations. I just don't think relying on this as his main income long term is a good idea, but hey, I can be wrong.

 

[Mommysbuttslut]

Got any links? Sounds interesting from business point of view.

No, off the top of my head Selebus has mentioned it after being leaked a few times and Azienda has shared comparisons of patron games on leaked vs non leaked versions before. I've seen other devs say the same thing before too but I can't remember them off the top of my head and I don't bother recording this stuff.

 

[Giggling Raven]

Leaking was bound to happen with so many tiers with different release dates, but it definitely sucks that it happened so early. I love this game and many others, so I can't realistically support all of them at the same the time, especially considering the difference in currency from my country to USD or even EUR in Flynn's case, but I do try to rotate a few months on who I subscribe for, which means I will have to choose which game I wait for the public release on certain months.

I really hope Flynn gets the support he needs because Stray Incubus is an amazing game that gets regularly updated pretty quickly in comparison, and ideally I would also hope that people stop leaking games (not only his, Cosy Cafe got leaked very early this month as well), especially considering they get eventually publicly released in a few weeks since expecting leaks will eventually kill some of them.

I get the irony of commenting on a pirate site about not pirating games, but I honestly use it to discover good games more than anything, so I really wish people will support the creators when they can.

 

[Giggling Raven]

If all the members in his discord were at least white belt he wouldn't have a problem just over 600 members and only 1/3 of that are subscribed

I subscribed but I'm not really a fan of Patreon since it's being acting up against some creators and deleting their pages and I'm sure many others feel the same. Flynn said in his Discord that he'll probably be setting up a Subscribestar by the end of the month so maybe things will improve by then.

 

[DudePersonA]

I subscribed but I'm not really a fan of Patreon since it's being acting up against some creators and deleting their pages and I'm sure many others feel the same. Flynn said in his Discord that he'll probably be setting up a Subscribestar by the end of the month so maybe things will improve by then.

Probably should also set up ko-fi and pay for the gold plan. $6-$8 monthly for no platform fees. Or start at free and then switch to gold later. Ko-fi is probably the cheapest platform of the three.

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[Alandir]

No, off the top of my head Selebus has mentioned it after being leaked a few times and Azienda has shared comparisons of patron games on leaked vs non leaked versions before. I've seen other devs say the same thing before too but I can't remember them off the top of my head and I don't bother recording this stuff.

In that case that's just two guys opinion though. I heard devs, like the cost cafe, say that leaks don't impact their subs.
I think stray incubus pricing structure also didn't do it any favors. TM, which released an update around a similar time, got leaked in less than 24 hours and is on a less popular platform. But he gained tons of subs both before and after the leak, because his barrier to entry for early access is 10 dollars.
It's easy to get someone to become impatient and fork over some dollars for ea if your price is 5 or 10. But it's way, way harder if your ea price is 35 dollars, half a triple A games price. That sort of pricing structure works for something like Eternum, with a huge, fanatic fanbase. But if you are just growing your audience, I don't think it's very smart.

 

[thememeguy123]

would be sad to see the game dropped. but by the looks of it its close to the goal now or even above that unless every single one of the subscribers has lowest tier. wish people would stop leaking so early, we get the game for free, give it some time you aren't gonna die if you wait another week or 2. living in germany too and I know how expensive it is (got) here. maybe it makes sense to reduce different tiers to 3 tiers or so to make things less complicated idk if that makes sense though, haven't really gone into deep thinking here just a thought. good luck to the dev

 

[Mr_Sel]

It's easy to get someone to become impatient and fork over some dollars for ea if your price is 5 or 10. But it's way, way harder if your ea price is 35 dollars, half a triple A games price. That sort of pricing structure works for something like Eternum, with a huge, fanatic fanbase. But if you are just growing your audience, I don't think it's very smart.

True, also worth remembering that Caribdis has been building this audience for over 4 years now and this is his second game, with first also being one of the highest rated titles here. It didn't happen over night.

 

[Alandir]

True, also worth remembering that Caribdis has been building this audience for over 4 years now and this is his second game, with first also being one of the highest rated titles here. It didn't happen over night.

I dont think its really fair to directly compare the two, because they both started at completely different points where the avn industry was in a completely different state. I just used Cari because hes one of the few I could think of that used a similar pricing structure to SI.

 

[Badjourasmix]

Man it would suck if this game got abandoned. This is why I think it's really fucking dumb when people leak updates when devs do public releases anyway. For the bigger devs it might not be a big deal if people leak the updates but for smaller devs it can make a huge difference.