VN Ren'Py Abandoned Tides of Succession [Ch.3 v0.3] [TakMycket]

[slick97]

It very much reads like the dev got bored of ToS, since all the excuses given so far don’t really check out; apparently, adding actual sex scenes to ToS can’t be done because the game was envisioned to be… a softcore romance??

The reasoning does check out, but most of us personally disagree with it. Tides is a well fleshed out story with a very specific setting in mind, one that makes pursuing a commercially viable product as a full time AVN developer difficult to sell (thus the new product with a college setting).

Damn, another one abandoned, as I'm reading through the pages and to me it was cancelled just because the dev didn't feel it anymore with the game? Am I wrong to assume this? if I am please correct me. I have about 15 Patreon/Subscribestar memberships and I'm very happy that all the devs that I have memberships with want to finish their games. It's very sad, many many games have become abandoned this year

To give a brief answer: the project is on hiatus while Tak pursues a full time job as an AVN developer. Tides is too well established to convert into a product he feels is commercially viable (subjectively, IMO). The reason he went this route is a mystery (I'm not going to pry), but when asking the community we chose the traditional career path so that Tides would at least receive updates.

There are some - myself included - who have pointed out that this appears to be habitual behavior since Tides is now the second abandoned project. The reason for the first project being abandoned was because it underwent a significant rework which later became what Tides is now. That's not the equivalent of saying Tak abandoned development because he wasn't interested in the story, and any claims to such are just speculation.

 

[link18]

Yo now im sad RIP

 

[scalibird]

The dev is putting this project on hold because he wants to devote himself full-time to the development of avn and thinks that another project has a better chance of achieving that goal, something I am incline to agree as much as it pains me. However, he also says that he will resume tides in the future, but why return to a project that you think is not successful enough? What if the majority or a large number of new members on Patreon want something different than tides of succession?

 

[EKG]

The dev is putting this project on hold because he wants to devote himself full-time to the development of avn and thinks that another project has a better chance of achieving that goal, something I am incline to agree as much as it pains me.

A project will not have a "better chance" when you establish a reputation of abandoning projects to chase trends like you're EA or something.

 

[Elduriel]

A project will not have a "better chance" when you establish a reputation of abandoning projects to chase trends like you're EA or something.

not even the first project he canned

 

[Krytax123]

The dev is putting this project on hold because he wants to devote himself full-time to the development of avn and thinks that another project has a better chance of achieving that goal, something I am incline to agree as much as it pains me. However, he also says that he will resume tides in the future, but why return to a project that you think is not successful enough? What if the majority or a large number of new members on Patreon want something different than tides of succession?

Lets be serious, there is no "on hold", tides of succession is dead, dead, dead. There is no way back.

Even IF he would want to continue tides in .. what? 3, 4, 5 years (positive thinking) he would 100% start to create it from scratch again. As if he would want to use his old/outdated renders (at this point in the future) for a "new" project.

Just look at how much he improved the quality between spice pirate and tides, he will be way better if he develops a full new game (and even finishes it?) in the meantime.

 

[EKG]

Stranger yet now in hindsight that every LI in the new project was posted on Reddit on the 14th, four full days before the Patreon poll and feedback request that generally favored ToS.

 

[yossa999]

tides of succession is dead, dead, dead

But yeah, I doubt it'll be revived after such a long hiatus, even if the developer will still want to continue it. At the very least, most of the old fanbase will find other favorite games in the genre, and technically, you're right, the game will be significantly outdated.

 

[Hobodouken]

Honestly this game was pretty average. The looks of the girls were great and the renders overall were pretty decent. The story was mediocre at best. The animations were absolutely terrible. Hopefully the new game is an improvement overall.

 

[GeoffG]

The reasoning does check out, but most of us personally disagree with it. Tides is a well fleshed out story with a very specific setting in mind, one that makes pursuing a commercially viable product as a full time AVN developer difficult to sell (thus the new product with a college setting).

I don't get this though. 'Commercially Viable' doesn't mean 'top 5 AVNs raking in milllions every year like BaDik'. All it needs is a couple hundred subscribing fans. In fact all it likely needs is access to the steam marketplace - something ToS would have no problem with.

That's not out of the question for a 'niche' product (not sure i even agree it is particularly niche). It's a matter of people buying into the project, something that had clearly happened with Tides, which got off to a great start in terms of early fans. Dev was doing a great job of sticking to regular releases and content etc which really helps in the early days. It may not have worked out, but there's no reason it couldn't have.


Let's be honest this all really stems from the 'no sex scenes' drama. Dev either lost interest once his vision had been 'tainted' or bought way too much into the 'pander to the fanbase' mentality

 

[slick97]

I don't get this though. 'Commercially Viable' doesn't mean 'top 5 AVNs raking in milllions every year like BaDik'. All it needs is a couple hundred subscribing fans. In fact all it likely needs is access to the steam marketplace - something ToS would have no problem with.

That's not out of the question for a 'niche' product (not sure i even agree it is particularly niche). It's a matter of people buying into the project, something that had clearly happened with Tides, which got off to a great start in terms of early fans. Dev was doing a great job of sticking to regular releases and content etc which really helps in the early days. It may not have worked out, but there's no reason it couldn't have.

It's not hard to "buy in" when you're getting a product for free, that's just the nature of giving away something with high quality. I don't disagree that he should've finished this product before taking the plunge (I even suggested releasing the finished product on Steam to gauge success and cultivate more customers to enable full time AVN development).

Let's be honest this all really stems from the 'no sex scenes' drama. Dev either lost interest once his vision had been 'tainted' or bought way too much into the 'pander to the fanbase' mentality

This project is steeped in upset fans as far back as Tak stating there was a canon ending. Quite honestly I think a more simple reason it's discontinued is due to Tak underestimating how much work it takes to create a rich story with intricate branching paths (ch.3 has an entire branch with Lorelei dressing and acting like a pirate that was gated off).

 

[EKG]

Quite honestly I think a more simple reason it's discontinued is due to Tak underestimating how much work it takes to create a rich story with intricate branching paths (ch.3 has an entire branch with Lorelei dressing and acting like a pirate that was gated off).

It's not going to get easier by cutting and running to another project with higher financial expectations, and Chapter 3 is early to be suffering from "branch panic".

 

[slick97]

It's not going to get easier by cutting and running to another project with higher financial expectations, and Chapter 3 is early to be suffering from "branch panic".

Sure it will since you're starting from scratch rather than editing/refactoring. Starting over is always easier than modifying an existing product since you're applying lessons learned from the get-go. I'm not sure why you're choosing this point to focus on when there are other legitimate criticisms to levy against Tak - such as a portfolio consisting of two abandoned projects, and taking a massive career risk going into AVN development ffull-time.

Any criticisms of his new product is surface level since I doubt he's even started chapter 1. Criticizing Tak any further on both his new and old project isn't going to bring back Tides, so I'm personally just going to cut my losses (time spent invested in the story) and move on to other projects.

 

[EKG]

Sure it will since you're starting from scratch rather than editing/refactoring. Starting over is always easier than modifying an existing product since you're applying lessons learned from the get-go. I'm not sure why you're choosing this point to focus on when there are other legitimate criticisms to levy against Tak - such as a portfolio consisting of two abandoned projects, and taking a massive career risk going into AVN development ffull-time.

Any criticisms of his new product is surface level since I doubt he's even started chapter 1. Criticizing Tak any further on both his new and old project isn't going to bring back Tides, so I'm personally just going to cut my losses (time spent invested in the story) and move on to other projects.

If someone is that in over their head after three updates, that's a red flag that suggests they may either have issues managing a project, or they don't fully grasp the expectations of the visual novel medium. Both are concerning and are not going to be alleviated with a reset button to a derivative theme, especially when said creator already has established a flaky record.

 

[slick97]

If someone is that in over their head after three updates, that's a red flag that suggests they may either have issues managing a project, or they don't fully grasp the expectations of the visual novel medium. Both are concerning and are not going to be alleviated with a reset button to a derivative theme, especially when said creator already has established a flaky record.

If went by your philosophy then I'd have to fire every single associate engineer that comes across my desk since it's such a concern.

Sarcasm aside, I already talked about lessons learned so there's no point rehashing it. However, I will point out that Tak already gave his reason for dropping the project and it has nothing to do with what we're discussing anyways. Whether any of us choose to believe it or not doesn't entirely matter as we didn't pay a cent for Tides, so there's no lost business aside from a potential "well, we could've been paying customers had Tak stuck with Tides and made it premium".

 

[EKG]

However, I will point out that Tak already gave his reason for dropping the project and it has nothing to do with what we're discussing anyways.

Yes, and that reason is undermined by the creator becoming demonstrably unreliable by doing so. If someone is looking for customers that will have the opposite effect. It's kinder for people to say it now than just watch silently as the creator kneecaps their own career before it even starts.

 

[camube]

Yes, and that reason is undermined by the creator becoming demonstrably unreliable by doing so. If someone is looking for customers that will have the opposite effect. It's kinder for people to say it now than just watch silently as the creator kneecaps their own career before it even starts.

i put this game on my backlog due to the ratings and reviews, and it got abandone before i even got a chance to play it. damn

 

[DougDimmadope]

Lets be serious, there is no "on hold", tides of succession is dead, dead, dead. There is no way back.

Even IF he would want to continue tides in .. what? 3, 4, 5 years (positive thinking) he would 100% start to create it from scratch again. As if he would want to use his old/outdated renders (at this point in the future) for a "new" project.

Just look at how much he improved the quality between spice pirate and tides, he will be way better if he develops a full new game (and even finishes it?) in the meantime.

100% agree, I was thinking this to myself.

Tides of Succession is permanently dead. Abandoned. Its gone forever. We've seen devs say "Yeah we'll just come back to it later lol" just to limit outcry and I've never ever seen that work out.

So lets say he is successful and completes this new game in like 3-5 years (with all due respect, I highly doubt, considering he gave up on 2 games very early on), why would he go back to his old game with old renders/old animations. Most of his newer patrons from his new game would be normies or more mainstream fans so it would be Patreon suicide to go back to the old niche project that they might not even know exists. Isn't the whole point of this shift is to to appeal to the more popular fans in a more popular genre, so why would he go back to the (as he described himself) "niche subgenre in a niche genre".

 

[EKG]

I'm genuinely impressed how much negative feedback one can receive on Reddit, Patreon, Discord and here and not realize that they fumbled big time.

I've seen almost nobody, players or devs, have a positive word about the handling of this such that I've begun to wonder if "other developers, my community and the people I trust" actually exist. The "my community" part certainly has a receipt of them saying the opposite.

 

[TakMycket]

I'm genuinely impressed how much negative feedback one can receive on Reddit, Patreon, Discord and here and not realize that they fumbled big time.

I've seen almost nobody, players or devs, have a positive word about the handling of this such that I've begun to wonder if "other developers, my community and the people I trust" actually exist. The "my community" part certainly has a receipt of them saying the opposite.

I admit, it's a sticky situation. The community was always going to be opposed to putting Tides of Succession on hold considering it was the Tides of Succession community. There was always going to be negative feedback. I still stand by my decision as well - I struggle to picture a world in which Tides of Succession was a commercial success. It wasn't a decision I made lightly - I spent many days and nights thinking about this.

I also admit I could've handled this better. If I had to go back and do it all again, I'd still release the poll, but I'd make it much more clear that the poll wasn't going to determine the direction I took, but rather help inform my decision.

However, we live and we learn. No matter how much anyone complains, at the end of the day, not enough people were financially invested in Tides because it just didn't have the commercial prowess other AVNs do. As much as I loved working on it, I couldn't afford to spend 50 hours each week working at 86 US cents an hour. It's as simple as that. So now I'm going to give my shot at another project and we'll see how that goes.