Don't take it as an insult but this is just re-arranging deck chairs on the Titanic. The fact of the matter is that the numbers might as well be made up (and probably are) given that we have no tangible proof that any progress has been made.
Also, to the people making the excel docs and animations of the fake progress. I like the gumption but you guys are putting more work in to this than the dev is in to the game. If you are enjoying yourself then have fun but don't get worked, it's not worth your time.
I literally grabbed a handful of screenshots over the last few pages and appended them to the last gif. Looking at the timestamps on the files I saved, it took 4 minutes, so no skin off my nose for a laugh.
But I personally don't think the devs are completely bullshitting everyone. They did work for two years since 2020 and create a solid little game here, and even if the last two years haven't been at the same capacity, I don't see why they wouldn't finish this release, I mean, they have the skills to do it, so why not?
If they have been bullshitting all along, they've kinda painted themselves into a corner by pretending they've done everything and are now just doing the final touches, I mean, if I were lying about this shit, I'd make it look like I was deep into the thick of it, not on the tail end, otherwise, after another month or so, they're seriously gonna have a bit of a subscriber exodus on their hands.
I can't see this "polishing" bullshit dragging on for another 2 months though. I guess they could have a computer malfunction and have all their work destroyed and the cloud crashed and all matter of shit happen that they could justify to 1000 or so gullible people to keep paying them to redo it all, but barring an act of god, the episode's gotta surface eventually.
If it's as long as the last episode, people can't really complain too much (because the last episode was pretty long). If it's a significantly shorter episode, then I think they don't have much defense.
So yeah, it's all speculation on both sides of the fence, but it's fun to talk shit, so we talk shit.