Ren'Py Summertime Saga [v21.0.0 wip.6440] [Kompas Productions]

[Badjourasmix]

Just my thoughts on the game currents progression and the nature of Kompass Productions as a whole.

The last update I played was two months ago in April, after a pretty large hiatus. I remember stopping playing before the main quest was completed, so I never experienced the Asian bank lady or any of the completed Russian mob stuff. Still haven’t thanks to this method of chopping off our legs to slowly rebuild them an inch at a time.

But I jumped back in two months ago, hoping to see a crumb of my beloved Judith somewhere with something new (big sad). But I found myself, despite knowing how much content was now no longer present, enjoying what there was! I think the Debbit content is genuinely more enjoyable and I really like the slower build up for a taboo relationship. The highlight for me was the mutual masturbation scene on the carpet. Good shit, I’d say!

But now having gotten this new one, it just feels like… I mean people have said it, how reasonably can you expect people to think your full time job being this would produce this little amount in two months? They clearly have a talented team! And I don’t agree with the sentiment saying “well why would they want to cut their revenue source?” This stuff should be FUN to do for a living! Have a new game planned! Make actual games, it can’t be that hard! Being a porn game dev is the best thing to be, why not expand and make more of it! It’s not like this should be considered a one time golden goose!

It’s just disappointing.

Why would he work harder when he can just release shitty updates like this and still make more money in a month than most americans make in a whole year?
You can clearly tell he doesn't really care about the game anymore. It's been almost 10 years since he started working on it. But it's just safer to keep milking this instead of trying to make something new.
Unless there is a huge drop in support, nothing is going to change. At this point I don't even believe the tech update will ever be finished.
The only reason we even get these small updates now is because the game was tagged as abandoned.

 

[timo103]

There roxxys stuff in the redo yet?

 

[fan765]

DC has no reason to release more content. Since he started working on the tech update the lowest his sub count got, was 25k patrons and now that he is releasing these small updates he has over 30k.
He has more than enough resources to hire people to help him. He just doesn't want to.
So unless there is a massive drop in support for the game, the size and/or speed of the releases will not increase.

Sad state of affairs that if you want more and faster updates, you actually have to pay the dev LESS to get his keister in gear.

 

[doujinftw]

There's nothing to defend, people spend their money on what they want to. I think it's dumb to put your money towards a game that isn't complete and has no smaller 'complete' version but I'm not going to pull my hair out about it.


They don't need an excuse. They only need to command the loyalty of their paying customers.

Who are seemingly more than happy to keep paying money like this. Can't claim to understand it, but it is what it is.

i think this is just some people financial cuckoldry fetish

 

[SemenDaemon]

No, the main story was one part: to find out the truth of the death of Anon's father and that was finished 25 Mar 2021:
View attachment 4907451

As as has been posted here ad nauseum, there have been 3 goals for the Summertime Saga:
View attachment 4907453

1) is completed near the end of completing:
2) which is completed.
3) is not completed and is a major reason for the tech update because the coding was barely holding on as it was and...
View attachment 4907455

So, to a point I agree with you. To a point I agree with the person you replied to.

"main story" is the mafia story, you are correct.

Correction: The "main game" has 2 major "plots" or "parts", one being the mafia/family story and the other being school/prom. Both are equally as big, prom might be bigger depending on how you see it.

Still, "a lot of content" is not the same as "finished". There was still a lot left to do, even without the later aspirations of DC.
It's also not right to call main girls "DLC" simply because they're delayed. I mean, Judith? "DLC"??? I think DC himself would send him to the shadow realm for that one.

If it satisfies him though good for him I guess.

 

[Alfius]

Do you remember this guy, Icstor?

I will defend Icstor, Milfy city was pretty bad, but at least he finished a lot of games before that.

Gumdrop is a more accurate comparison. I fear the outcome will be the same as well. It must be a personality type.

 

[TroubleMaker69]

I feel roxxy content is getting farther and farther.

 

[GhostFaceGuy]

5 minutes of gameplay for Debbie , only blowjob

 

[Alfius]

3) is not completed and is a major reason for the tech update because the coding was barely holding on as it was and...

I have not touched this game in years, so maybe I'm wrong, but if he decided to Re-work the game because of coding issues, surely you just work on coding and not on reworking your art??

I mean if you have a game at 90% completed. (Like you say - Taking your word for it)
Do you
a) Rework the coding - (Let's say it takes a year) and complete the remaining 10%
or
b) Redo a lot of your art and 'recode' everything? (10 years at this rate?)

I mean, I cannot draw 2D art, but I can code for sure. And I can tell you it would not take more than a year to recode a game like this. Coding is almost never the bottleneck when it comes to these games. Creating the assets are for sure.


I'm normally on the side of developers, but DC is really screwing the pooch here. I can understand why... You get a ton of money regardless of how much you produce. But at some stage his good will is going to run out and he is going to start losing supporters. And at some point, further down the line he will lose enough credibility to never regain it back.

It takes a looooong time for that to happen, and it can be reversed if you deliver at some stage, but it becomes irreversible at some stage. I use Gumdrop as a use case.... He was coasting for a long time, until he wasn't.

 

[Narky1280]

Does anyone know what I have to do exactly? I’ve been in and out of the house in the morning and half day and nothing happens

 

[PhoenixAgain]

No, it's Lamba. And I'd be the first person to tell you paying for this is stupid. But every person paying into it is getting exactly what they deserve, and what they paid for so there's no room to complain. Take it on the chin and stop paying them if you hate it so much.

If there's room for you to complain about people complaining, then there sure as hell is room to complain about someone milking his fans.

I'm pretty sure he made no promises. And if he fails them and you don't stop paying him, why would he ever stop? Again, this is exactly what the paying customers deserve and if they're upset, it's on them. I'd never put money towards an unfinished game. Even when it's early access I at least perform the due diligence to make sure the game itself is, technically, finished, and the extra work is side content.

If you're so pro not paying him then why do you keep defending his practices and trying to shut down discontent towards his practices? Again, if they're upset, they're allowed to talk about it just like you talk about how you're upset that others are upset.

In a world where you're accountable to the people paying you money. We've seen nothing to suggest the team is being cheated out of money so...? It doesn't need to be split evenly for there to be little money on the table at the end of it all.

We've seen nothing to suggest the team even exists, or that he promised them any specific salary. He doesn't need to pay anyone much for the amount of work that's being done.

If it were me, I'd be prioritizing employee retention above all else and ensuring my people are duly compensated for their work because I need that consistency in output and because an employer should always act in their employees best interests. None of us have any idea when this kind of windfall will happen again so it goes without saying that being fair by your employees is important. If it happens again I want that kind of, "No, I'm going back to my old employer" loyalty. This isn't a publicly traded company, so there's no board of investors to make happy. Stiffing your employees / contractors for money is a quick way to ruin the project.

Just stop. You say he's not making enough money to work on this full-time, so how would you prioritize employee retention? How are you duly compensating them for work with the pittance you say he's making? Why would you want a consistently subpar output? You're pretending like they're doing excellent work and his supposed team is the geese that laid the golden egg and that can't be further from the truth. He did more work of higher quality when he was solo so pretending like he absolutely needs 6 others to put out 1/10th of his solo output is stupid.

And if you're not getting the transparency you crave.... don't pay the guy? Don't know what else to tell you. I'd love to see what the financials are for his company but he's not obligated to share them.

Obviously don't pay the guy? Where do you see me advocating for the opposite? He's not obligated to share them, sure, and nobody's obligated to withhold criticisms of him. Don't know what else to tell you.

 

[Count Morado]

I have not touched this game in years, so maybe I'm wrong, but if he decided to Re-work the game because of coding issues, surely you just work on coding and not on reworking your art??

I mean if you have a game at 90% completed. (Like you say - Taking your word for it)
Do you
a) Rework the coding - (Let's say it takes a year) and complete the remaining 10%
or
b) Redo a lot of your art and 'recode' everything? (10 years at this rate?)

I mean, I cannot draw 2D art, but I can code for sure. And I can tell you it would not take more than a year to recode a game like this. Coding is almost never the bottleneck when it comes to these games. Creating the assets are for sure.


I'm normally on the side of developers, but DC is really screwing the pooch here. I can understand why... You get a ton of money regardless of how much you produce. But at some stage his good will is going to run out and he is going to start losing supporters. And at some point, further down the line he will lose enough credibility to never regain it back.

It takes a looooong time for that to happen, and it can be reversed if you deliver at some stage, but it becomes irreversible at some stage. I use Gumdrop as a use case.... He was coasting for a long time, until he wasn't.

Everything you are asking has already been discussed ad nauseum.

The game took about 5 years to code - like shit.
While his coder is recoding the game and adding aspects to the game that did not exist before - Dark Cookie has also been revising all background artwork to add backgrounds to the sides - moving the game from 4:3 to 16:9 for better experience for android users (which is his biggest official fanbase), and making the art more consistent. As he is doing so - he has also been updating the layers used to build characters within scenes. And as he is doing so - the posers he has on staff have been posing the layers for the new 16:9 display ratio. To do so, it required his coder to code a whole new posing interface for the posers to use.
etc etc etc.

You can read more in my FAQ: #80,537 - which includes links to the details which have been discussed many times in the thread. Hope this helps.

You say he's not making enough money to work on this full-time

You are putting words in their mouth. They never said that.

We've seen nothing to suggest the team even exists,

Team members have been listed on Patreon and Wiki for years. One or both are not up to date. Team members have talked on the Picarto streams when DC has drawn art. Team members have participated in the Discord.

Just because you haven't bothered to look does not mean they don't exist. As for anything else you posted - Meh. See my FAQ: #80,537 - they may address your questions, issues, comments.

 

[Deyn21]

There roxxys stuff in the redo yet?

Of course not. There was no new content for Roxxy since 2016.

 

[Alfius]

Everything you are asking has already been discussed ad nauseum.

The game took about 5 years to code - like shit.
While his coder is recoding the game and adding aspects to the game that did not exist before - Dark Cookie has also been revising all background artwork to add backgrounds to the sides - moving the game from 4:3 to 16:9 for better experience for android users (which is his biggest official fanbase), and making the art more consistent. As he is doing so - he has also been updating the layers used to build characters within scenes. And as he is doing so - the posers he has on staff have been posing the layers for the new 16:9 display ratio. To do so, it required his coder to code a whole new posing interface for the posers to use.
etc etc etc.

You can read more in my FAQ: #80,537 - which includes links to the details which have been discussed many times in the thread. Hope this helps.

You are putting words in their mouth. They never said that.

Team members have been listed on Patreon and Wiki for years. One or both are not up to date. Team members have talked on the Picarto streams when DC has drawn art. Team members have participated in the Discord.

Just because you haven't bothered to look does not mean they don't exist. As for anything else you posted - Meh. See my FAQ: #80,537 - they may address your questions, issues, comments.

Thanks for the info, like I said, I have not played the games in years, nor have I been visiting this thread very often.

I will also say that I'm normally on the developer's side.

I can see where he is coming from, and also when considering that he still plans to work on the game as an open-ended story, it does make sense to do a tech update, since he is not really 90% completed, but basically open-ended from completeness.

I think what caught people by surprise was the very long delay leading to the abandoned tag. That certainly caught mine and then the subsequent relatively slow and small updates (Taking other people's word here.)

Looking at other developers, (i.e. Gumdrop and ISCOR) it easy to see a pattern where the more successful a developer becomes, the slower the updates roll out. (Up to a point where it can legitimately be called milking)

I do remember DC being very clear on his progress and what he is working on and I'm glad he is still the case.



On a side note:
Please! the game did not take 5 years to "Code". I know coding. The game took 5 years to create assets and code, with creating assets taking up 80% of the time. A developer working full time on the game with all the assets available to him, will be able to produce an exact replica of the pre-WIP project in about 1 year for sure. Renpy is a complete VN game engine so game logic and UI customization is the only thing that needs to be done. (Still a lot of work, but not 5 years)

 

[macca_joe]

Lmao this is it, what an update.... How long till change of plans and unreal engine rework.

 

[DonOps]

The Guy you replied used an outdated Progress on purpose. This is the current one:

View attachment 4906943

Also I consider "Town Minor Characters" also as "WIP" since he draws new NPCs and such for the new Shops etc.

Got it, thanks

 

[Count Morado]

Thanks for the info, like I said, I have not played the games in years, nor have I been visiting this thread very often.

I will also say that I'm normally on the developer's side.

I can see where he is coming from, and also when considering that he still plans to work on the game as an open-ended story, it does make sense to do a tech update, since he is not really 90% completed, but basically open-ended from completeness.

I think what caught people by surprise was the very long delay leading to the abandoned tag. That certainly caught mine and then the subsequent relatively slow and small updates (Taking other people's word here.)

Looking at other developers, it easy to see a pattern where the more successful a developer becomes, the slower the updates roll out. (Up to a point where it can legitimately be called milking)

I do remember DC being very clear on his progress and what he is working on and I'm glad he is still the case.

On a side note:
Please! the game did not take 5 years to "Code". I know coding. The game took 5 years to create assets and code, with creating assets taking up 80% of the time. A developer working full time on the game with all the assets available to him, will be able to produce an exact replica of the pre-WIP project in about 1 year for sure. Renpy is a complete VN game engine so game logic and UI customization is the only thing that needs to be done. (Still a lot of work, but not 5 years)

Since this is excessive discussion about development, I'm moving my reply to off-topic #120

 

[Daedo]

It's all his subscribers' fault, and as long as he doesn't lose money, he'll keep releasing new content bit by bit.
When I was making manga, I should have given up everything and done this

 

[Reese286]

Appreciate what DC built, but the slow 'Tech Update' progress is shady af. And yea, he makes bank. Thing is though, he's no longer keeping the faith with Sub's imho.

 

[Leo D. Marstone]

The thing is...they did finish the game. The story was finished, majority of the side stories had endings. The only thing really missing was the nursery. It is crazy they are just re-doing it intead of doing the honest thing and saying its just a remake of the first game.

The count was faster xD (Always nice seeing you man )

But yes, there was one endgoal missing and that was the prom dates. Basically pick you waifu out of the possible options have a nice scene (possible short epilogue, I mean the MC did left some babys all over the place xD) and roll credits I guess.

The nursery were surely be used an tandem with content revolving around all the kids you made but we never came to that.