Ren'Py Summertime Saga [v21.0.0 wip.5091] [Kompas Productions]

[Heycock]

It turns out that the overwhelming majority of DC's income is probably getting eaten by processing fees. He made the unusual move of making the game fully available at the $1 tier, whereas pretty much everyone else on Patreon will only give you access to the news feed and a Discord channel. It's safe to assume that the lion's share of his followers are subbing at a level where he nets a very modest amount. Then if he's located in the US, the IRS is making him pay self-employed income tax.

At some point, you do make it up on volume. But don't be surprised if he's still only making enough to barely keep the lights on. He could have twice as many subs as he does not and still not be able to afford a full-time coder or other personnel, because of the way he structured his sub levels.

The team is making around 100 grands a month, or 1 millon a year. Some devs here work for less than 500 dollars a month. DC could easily pay a team of 5 guys if he wanted. If not from USA from anywere in the world were 500 dollars is actually a good income. And even then he would still have 98% of the earnings. He could actually pay 5 grands to 5 different people and still get 75% of the earnings. And 5 thouthands dollars is what the salary of the presidents of my country.

 

[Omnikuken]

The team is making around 100 grands a month, or 1 millon a year. Some devs here work for less than 500 dollars a month. DC could easily pay a team of 5 guys if he wanted. If not from USA from anywere in the world were 500 dollars is actually a good income. And even then he would still have 98% of the earnings. He could actually pay 5 grands to 5 different people and still get 75% of the earnings. And 5 thouthands dollars is what the salary of the presidents of my country.

Weird self-loathing disguised as milking, but at least it's an original take. Grats

 

[Heycock]

Weird self-loathing disguised as milking, but at least it's an original take. Grats

Sorry, not sure what you meant but I didn't say he is milking noone. I don't know what the fuck is going on with this people but I reserve that word for guys like Icstor.

I honestely would like to know why they got in this mess couse more I know about how the game code works it makes less sense to me.

 

[Count Morado]

The team is making around 100 grands a month, or 1 millon a year. Some devs here work for less than 500 dollars a month. DC could easily pay a team of 5 guys if he wanted. If not from USA from anywere in the world were 500 dollars is actually a good income. And even then he would still have 98% of the earnings. He could actually pay 5 grands to 5 different people and still get 75% of the earnings. And 5 thouthands dollars is what the salary of the presidents of my country.

Well, hey! Last I heard - It is a team of 5 people: DC, 2 posers, 1 coder, 1 writer. ( I could be off - but going by what's been presented in this thread)

Your math is off for monthly (but about correct for annual) - it maxes out at 80k USD per month gross (currently) - after Patreon's cut, currency conversion fees, credit card processing fees, national income tax, website hosting, software and app costs, other technology purchases/repairs/upgrades, accountant fees, other expenses related to running a business (before paying 4 other people on contract) - you're looking at about 35k USD per month. Now from that comes salaries, etc etc etc etc.

Spoiler: Minutiae

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For a small business of 5 staff members - a $1 million USD annual income isn't unheard of after 6 years of work. In fact, for a semi-successful small business - that's meh. It would have been considered "average" in the US

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. Today, it would be considered underperforming.

But he's doing something correct. He's the #1 Adult Game Creator on Patreon by subscriber numbers - and has been so for years. Where others have flamed out, petered out, abandoned, etc.

I honestely would like to know why they got in this mess couse more I know about how the game code works it makes less sense to me.

It's been covered dozens of times in this thread if you want to read about it. First DC started coding the game when he probably knew less than you do now. Then, over the years, he's had people come in and code the game - mostly adding to the code, not fixing previous code, necessarily. It's a jumbled mess and that is why about a year ago, DC decided to have ONE person go through 6 years of code from various people within the game and bring it all into one style, better optimizing the game and have it ready for future development. This, rather than continue piecemealing it. At the same time, DC decided to take the game toward the 16:9 aspect ratio (away from the 4:3 standard at the time he started developing) for mobile players and to give the city more locations without needing more than one map screen. yada yada yada yada.

 

[wolfpackjac3]

Sorry, I was going to keep silent and let you whine and throw your tantrum and have others reply to you .... But you thought your tone throughout this conversation was REASONABLE? What the fuck do you call unreasonable? Holy fucking shit.

You talk shit, don't have any facts or basis to make your claims. You don't have the resumes of the people involved on DC's team, you have very little knowledge of the development history of the game, you don't sit in on their meetings, you don't have access to their Trello or whatever project management solution they utilize. You have made statements which show you have little-to-no experience in contract hiring and negotiations, budgeting of projects, or the like. All you do is rant and rave from a Dunning-Krueger level of expertise. But ...
View attachment 1804976

You as the bottom and Omni as the top are the ones with unreasonable tone throughout every conversation you have. How the fuck do you as pseudo thread mods think your tone is taken? Even when someone is not a troll and just stating their opinion on a matter, you swoop in like batman and robin with a MASSIVE amount of tone, talk shit, and talk like you have facts on things like how much coding development would cost and why they are in a bind. You are the one with "little-to-no experience in contract hiring and negotiations, budgeting of projects, or the like". I support this game and the dev and just thought one coder was a mistake and shared why I thought why. Its called REASONABLE DISCUSSION.

 

[Heycock]

Well, hey! Last I heard - It is a team of 5 people: DC, 2 posers, 1 coder, 1 writer. ( I could be off - but going by what's been presented in this thread)

Your math is off for monthly (but about correct for annual) - it maxes out at 80k USD per month gross (currently) - after Patreon's cut, currency conversion fees, credit card processing fees, national income tax, website hosting, software and app costs, other technology purchases/repairs/upgrades, accountant fees, other expenses related to running a business (before paying 4 other people on contract) - you're looking at about 35k USD per month. Now from that comes salaries, etc etc etc etc.

Spoiler: Minutiae

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For a small business of 5 staff members - a $1 million USD annual income isn't unheard of after 6 years of work. In fact, for a semi-successful small business - that's meh. It would have been considered "average" in the US

You must be registered to see the links

. Today, it would be considered underperforming.

But he's doing something correct. He's the #1 Adult Game Creator on Patreon by subscriber numbers - and has been so for years. Where others have flamed out, petered out, abandoned, etc.

It's been covered dozens of times in this thread if you want to read about it. First DC started coding the game when he probably knew less than you do now. Then, over the years, he's had people come in and code the game - mostly adding to the code, not fixing previous code, necessarily. It's a jumbled mess and that is why about a year ago, DC decided to have ONE person go through 6 years of code from various people within the game and bring it all into one style, better optimizing the game and have it ready for future development. This, rather than continue piecemealing it. At the same time, DC decided to take the game toward the 16:9 aspect ratio (away from the 4:3 standard at the time he started developing) for mobile players and to give the city more locations without needing more than one map screen. yada yada yada yada.

I have been reading the arguments here, not everything but some things from time to time.
Ok, it was a little less than 80k last time I checked.
Are you sure about the numbers you are giving?
Couse it's really hard for me to believe this guys spend 45k in doing a game while a lot of devs here work for less than 1k.
Some things you mention barely worth anything. Like software. Wich software? They use renpy and photoshop. The first is free and the second is... what? 10 dollars? They don't need to even buy assets, music or anything.
Now, about the 6 years... it's true, but that can't hardly explain what it's going on now. If something the fact they are doing better should improve their work speed. If the proyect was sustainable for 3 years with a minimum wage, with 80k should go better. If this guy worked on Summertime for 3 years with minimum wage when nobody was doing... ¿What, 10k?, ¿What else did he expected to acomplished? The numbers he has right now should be the maximum of his initial aspiration. I don't see how those numbers could not be, in this field, a completely win.
And yeah, the game it's the number 1 in patreon. That's another reason who makes this wierder. How can you make a mess when you have the golden eggs chicken.
And finally i repeat my statement. Not in the USA but for a lot of people around the world 1k a month is a fortune.

About the second half (that actually i have less clue what's the problem is). The first thing there is: "If it's not broken then don't fix it". The game still works fine. Even if you are a perfeccionist, to lost 4 months ofa proyect valuable like this to fix a mistake that it's not cousing any real trouble...
But let's say at the moment it makes sense, after all just 4 months... Well, as soon as you realize that it's not going to be easy at all then simple change your proyect, make the 16:9 ratio and forget to clean the code. You present the 16:9 ratio as your achieved goal and forget or pospone any cleaning.
Otherwise you get stuck in a position you should avoid. To delay your proyect for a year, a year and a half at its best moment, to fix something it wasn't making any mayor trouble in the begining.
And I don't see how a change in the ratioto 16:9 could be so time demanding for the code. It actually makes more sense for me that it meant a lot more work for art. Even if we consider a 16:9 ratio an important improvement, wich honestely it's not. DC sayd he wanted to change the map and more locations, but then again that's really wierd. Instead of ading a secondary map that you can travel to from the first map... You change the whole game!

Couse this is the main issue for me. As a developer you should try to avoid by any means exactly what's going on with Summertime Saga. To get indefentely delayed at it's peek. That's my take on it.

 

[Omnikuken]

Well, hey! Last I heard - It is a team of 5 people: DC, 2 posers, 1 coder, 1 writer. ( I could be off - but going by what's been presented in this thread)

Your math is off for monthly (but about correct for annual) - it maxes out at 80k USD per month gross (currently) - after Patreon's cut, currency conversion fees, credit card processing fees, national income tax, website hosting, software and app costs, other technology purchases/repairs/upgrades, accountant fees, other expenses related to running a business (before paying 4 other people on contract) - you're looking at about 35k USD per month. Now from that comes salaries, etc etc etc etc.

Spoiler: Minutiae

You don't have permission to view the spoiler content. Log in or register now.

For a small business of 5 staff members - a $1 million USD annual income isn't unheard of after 6 years of work. In fact, for a semi-successful small business - that's meh. It would have been considered "average" in the US

You must be registered to see the links

. Today, it would be considered underperforming.

But he's doing something correct. He's the #1 Adult Game Creator on Patreon by subscriber numbers - and has been so for years. Where others have flamed out, petered out, abandoned, etc.

It's been covered dozens of times in this thread if you want to read about it. First DC started coding the game when he probably knew less than you do now. Then, over the years, he's had people come in and code the game - mostly adding to the code, not fixing previous code, necessarily. It's a jumbled mess and that is why about a year ago, DC decided to have ONE person go through 6 years of code from various people within the game and bring it all into one style, better optimizing the game and have it ready for future development. This, rather than continue piecemealing it. At the same time, DC decided to take the game toward the 16:9 aspect ratio (away from the 4:3 standard at the time he started developing) for mobile players and to give the city more locations without needing more than one map screen. yada yada yada yada.

Pleb, it's 3 coders (possibly the music dude and the website admin/host too) and the amount of $/month shown on Patreon is after they take their cut

 

[JC9750]

is there an incest patch available for the 20.14 update please?

 

[ImTransAndTiny]

is there an incest patch available for the 20.14 update please?

There's no need for one, since there is no new Jenny/Debbie/Tammy content. The old one didn't need to be updated.

 

[Omnikuken]

There's no need for one, since there is no new Jenny/Debbie/Tammy content. The old one didn't need to be updated.

Hope you're prepared to repeat that a few times a week for the next 3+ years, cause no1 will read it and keep asking the same thing anyway

 

[Count Morado]

Pleb, it's 3 coders (possibly the music dude and the website admin/host too) and the amount of $/month shown on Patreon is after they take their cut

I will concede to your knowledge on the numbers of staff, because you seem to follow the staff situation. However, that only makes my information more within reality, unlike the false realities of those who have been whining about the riches.

Until I get further information about patreon's public facing $$$ amounts, I am going to take it as gross before their 8% cut.

Spoiler: stuff

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[Omnikuken]

I will concede to your knowledge on the numbers of staff, because you seem to follow the staff situation. However, that only makes my information more within reality, unlike the false realities of those who have been whining about the riches.

Until I get further information about patreon's public facing $$$ amounts, I am going to take it as gross before their 8% cut.

Spoiler: stuff

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There's also the thing no1 ever talks about when they spew the milking around : DC doesn't do animations, so he has to pay (probably top $) that dude for 6-8 scenes every update. Which could eat a lot of the fabled 100k/month they all insist is the worst thing known to man since the nuke

 

[j4yj4m]

I mean, I seriously doubt there are any limitations because of money. Everybody except for DC is working part time and all he ever asked for to create this game were 25.000$/month, which seems about right to me.

The issue with the tech update seems to be that they (again) started something, just to figure out that it should be done differently and as such the workload increased massively without any preparations having been made. Especially for the planned tech update that's kinda regrettable.

In normal times everything is limited by the art DC is able to produce and as such there's just no need for anybody but DC to work full time, simply because there wouldn't be enough work.
The question now simply is whether they should have outsourced parts of the tech update/hire more people for it to let them go again afterwards or not. It looks like DC decided to get a little help but ultimately decided to manage with what they have.

It's bad for us now because we have to wait, but in the end the game itself benefits from the content that's added in the meantime.

 

[itsyeboii]

There's no need for one, since there is no new Jenny/Debbie/Tammy content. The old one didn't need to be updated.

There are some scenes like the intro where MC refers to the mom as a friend. But it doesn't really warrant an update.

 

[chicho1958]

It's kind of crazy to think that this game has been in development for almost 6 years and it can still go on for another 4 or 5.

Well, when you have a cow that give +70k a month you gotta milk it. The funny thing it's just a normal game, there's better ones out there and completed

 

[Omnikuken]

Well, when you have a cow that give +70k a month you gotta milk it. The funny thing it's just a normal game, there's better ones out there and completed

Gonna have a laugh at your list of hand-drawn, sandbox with 20+ routes games that are better and completed. Anything 3D asset-swapped pre-rendered game will get you insta-disqualified

 

[Lilithblackbriar]

The last time I've played this that version was imcomplete and the main questline ended right after the mafia she's Not Done With You Yet, so any more part of the main quest done yet since that time?

 

[Omnikuken]

The last time I've played this that version was imcomplete and the main questline ended right after the mafia she's Not Done With You Yet, so any more part of the main quest done yet since that time?

Guess I need to update my Engrish stuff, but yes. A basic search around anywhere would have answered the same. And you're barely 2 years late on the main route. Double good job

 

[Lilithblackbriar]

Guess I need to update my Engrish stuff, but yes. A basic search around anywhere would have answered the same. And you're barely 2 years late on the main route. Double good job

I've searched on google and yahoo with no answers you did not even answer my question my question still stands.

 

[Omnikuken]

I've searched on google and yahoo with no answers you did not even answer my question my question still stands.

You didn't search much and my reply answered your question (and 1 more time : search better around here/main page/wiki). Just opening the changelog in the OP already counters anything you can come up with too