Probably shouldn't answer this, but fuck it. Just in case, any clown responds to THIS post, pretending they know more about MY situation than me,I'm just gonna ignore so don't expect any follow-on updates, regarding this specific post....
Basically, after costs and tax, the Patreon income worked out at less than minimum wage per hour for me and a whole lot less than what my real-life job is paying me. Costs include paying Cell (plus other members of the team when it was bigger), paying our animator, paying a proof-reader (when I had one), one-off payments to other folks (to save me time to help with code or write a walkthrough - two of many examples), paying for assets (in honesty, I don't pay for all), Patreon's cut, plus a multitude of many smaller outgoings. The small stuff is pretty negligible but just listing some examples, so any potential devs will be aware of stuff to consider: Some examples of very small outgoings are: Money transfer fees, subscriptions to various sites, (such as google play, MEGA, various music, SFX and stock photo sites) and (it's spread out over 5 years, so I'd consider it negligible) spending 9K on 2 rigs plus an extra GPU when one died. All of those last items ares small-fry, but just listing for context.
Plus, I have a pretty decent real-life job, so ALL of my Patreon income was taxable at the highest rate of tax (in my country, this is 52%). One of the terms of my employment was that I cannot set up my own company, so that means that I had to declare WTHI income as sole trader income, so I paid 52% on the gross, not the net and any payments to other team members, etc. couldn't be written off as a cost (because on paper, this was extra personal income, not a company.) And % of payments to other team members was based on gross, not net, so I was paying tax first and then paying everyone else their gross % (I can't expect them to take a hit on my country's extortionate tax rate.) So, that meant after Patreon's cut and tax, I had about 2.4K a month to pay all those other expenses mentioned above, including Cell's paltry wage and pay myself. That might still be a lot to some folks, but where I live (average 3 bed house is $600K), it's not.
So, I was really just working on WTHI because I enjoyed it... My real life job was paying a LOT more per hour (but I enjoyed it less), so I was never short on cash. But to work on both my real life job and WTHI, was taking about 100 hours per week. And I decided, I just couldn't do it any more, as I was burnt out after 5 years and running on 4-5hrs sleep a night. Rather than abandon WTHI, I decided to quit my IRL job and try dev as a full-time gig. The only way I could do THAT is if I get on Steam ASAP. Next week is my last week in my real-life job, and then it's WTHI full-time. If it all goes tits up, then I'll look for a new job next year and WTHI will become a hobby (but it will still get finished). If it all goes well, I can build a team, finish WTHI and move onto new games. If I finished episode 25 instead... that would mean another year working 100hrs a week. And if I THEN wanted to get on Steam, that would mean another 6 months+ on top of that. Wit quitting my real life job (gambling on Steam success), at least I have a chance at making it as a dev, and if I can build a team (using $ from steam), that will significantly speed up progress!
Nope, we need to re-do the remake of the re-do. And then do a redux of that! Clear? Wait for the hate once I announce the directors cut version!
