Working on a game, considering finding a writer

[shapersoul]

That's kinda an oxymoron. If better writing makes a game better then the audience is going to acknowledge that it is better than another game. They're going to, when playing a new game, give the game that they find better their support. If you put your game out with less quality writing than the other guy who puts his out the same week, who's going to get funding?

If we were're talking about only VNs I would agree but I can think of a few very popular games on here with bad art+bad writing.
these are still games we're making and gameplay mechanics play a big part too not to mention included fetishes.

 

[Kaiww]

So I'm working on a game and should have a demo showing off it's unique feature in about a week or 2. I can do the programming and artwork myself and have an overall story and character back stories planned but I think a competent dedicated writer will really bring it to the next level.
If I were to offer a % of patreon income what do you guys think would be a fair amount?

From a personal point I would not be so fast with offering anything so easy.

Mind you I am not a developer because I lack the programming skill, but it can be dangerous to bring in somebody that might, might not share your Ideas for your Story.

Different People have a different point of view on things, so a writer might not deliver what you would imagine. Best thing coming up in my mind is first test the person. Let him write you a very small part of something you need done.

If you find what he shows you agreeable, you could start offering him something small and increase the payment, if he delivers qualitative work over a few weeks.

The thing is that of course for somebody like you writing might be difficult but its much more difficult to code a game. I have done some writing over the years and I have done some modding, so I know both sides and writing is much less complicate in my opinion.

But like I said its only my point of few. English is not my first language so I can not offer you help with writing.

But if anybody is interested my strong points are Project Planing and Storyboard development if anyone needs some help there. (and I work for free )

Merry Christmas

 

[DarthSeduction]

If we were're talking about only VNs I would agree but I can think of a few very popular games on here with bad art+bad writing.
these are still games we're making and gameplay mechanics play a big part too not to mention included fetishes.

Aside from incest your game is going to get played regardless of included fetishes. Some fetishes would actually bar your game for a lot of people, like watersports or femdom, for instance. This is part and parcel of the mistakes the old devs made. They came up with a list of fetishes and tried to design a game around that, rather than coming up with plot and seeing what fetishes they could pour into it sensibly, and designing their game around that.

Gameplay mechanics matter, but they also don't actually limit a story. I've got a vampire game in mind. Ideally I'd like to make it a Turn Based RPG. However, it would work just fine as a VN or a Life sim with very minor tweaks, simply making the combat portions into scenes that have to be written rather than played.

Seraphim Academy is a VN, but I could have easily done the same thing as Deluca or Long Live the Princess and made it a Life Sim with more of a story focus. I simply wanted to try and do something more along the lines of Life is Strange, and that game is more of a VN with 3D interaction.

And yes, you're not going do well if you have bad art and bad writing, but I've put up with some bad or strange art for good writing. I wouldn't call Offcuts bad, but on a design and style side, I think it's not up to my standards, I despise sprite based games as I prefer visual story telling, meaning less narration and more being told through the art, not drawing or rendering in scene limits that ability. Offcuts, however, gets away with this by simply being well written enough that I ignore it's limitations.

Similarly, I kinda like the RPGM pale pure. As I'm sure you're aware, RPGM doesn't have a good rep, and the art style, again, is fucking weird. But the game and the thriller/mystery elements of it are really well done.

Then you have the other issue. People sometimes give devs like Dark Silver or Mr. Dots credit for having really good art. They ignore that Dots uses the exact same poses and expressions on repeat. They ignore that Silver has sex scenes with no more than 10 images total and what's worse is you're looking at Max's Ass for half of the scene, rather than anything remotely tantilizing or sexual.

For comparison, when we did a spoof of Big Brother, our sex scenes with Dark Silver's characters were never shorter than 50 images. You can't really compare their art when they aren't really making much of it. That also speaks to the difference between art when you have a writer and art when you don't. If your art is telling a story, you're going to naturally do more images. You're going to want to have something more engaging.

Then, as I called it out already, what are your thoughts on Summertime Saga's art? It has a passable bit of story and character development, for a life sim, but as I called to earlier, everyone has the same face. On top of that, he uses so many lines that even the young characters look old. Is the art bad? I wouldn't say so. Is it 50k dollars a month good?

 

[Snarkfu]

Aww do the emoji make the "big mature man" uncomfortable. You changed it, but I did see you question my age, and here you're calling me childish.

I changed it because I am generally trying not to let my emotions get the better of me and I was annoyed at your needlessly confrontational tone.

Fuck it, I can play your way.

No, writing written with the intention of the visual medium cannot "work on it's own". That's what you're failing to understand. At best, my scripts before I've taken the notation out and plugged the images in could work as screen or stage plays, but never as novels, because the medium is that different.

When you write a novel it's on the writer to mold the images into the person's mind through words. You don't actually see things, so in order to get a feel for things they have to be described in often lengthy segments of narration.

In a visual medium the goal is to reduce the amount of narration to a minimum. Telling as much of the story as you can visually becomes key. And here's where you seem to lose sight of what the writer is doing. The artist answers to the writer because the writer is deciding what's going on in the scene. They're directing it all. It's still a collaborative process, but for the most part, art direction is handle by the writer because the writer is the one designing the scene.

The story you're writing can though, if it's any good that is. Yes you'll have to be more decriptive but you're still telling the same story.

I've written the other way around, the artist designing the scene and me sculpting the script to fit it, it comes out stilted, forced, and lifeless. Knowing what the character says or feels in a particular scene is required to know what expression is on their face. Sometimes, the art direction I'm giving has no dialogue attached to it at all. Writing shapes the emotions, the writing is what gives you a connection with the character and what they're feeling. Without it you get the old guard of games with crap dialogue, no character motivation, and weak repetitive art.

I'm starting to sense a theme, you can't do something therefore no-one else can.

View attachment 206309

Show me, where in Dating My Daughter or Big Brother are you going to find art with that level of emotion? Because I've played big brother, in fact, the artist who did this is a big fan of it and we did a spoof game of Big Brother meaning I had to replay it to really get acquainted with it. Never, never in all the game is that level of emotion conveyed through the art. Why? Because the game was made without a writer. Funfiction didn't make this shot and ask me to write around it, I wrote this shot and asked him to bring it to life.

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There, that goes way beyond the level of "emotion" your scene is showing though quite frankly I'm not sure valium overdose counts as an emotion in and of itself.

That you were being fallacious in even attempting to compare adult gaming to the regular market.

Wrong. This is a completely new industry that has started up on its own due to a consumer demand for such products without a capitalist who is willing to actually make them. We are all indie developers. Even the few groups that have some small amount of money now are indie. There is no adult game market in the west. There is a consumer demand. The only reason that that would be is if the people with the money and power to decide chose not to. The fact that as you pointed out Custer's Revenge was an outlier is my point. It isn't normal. It isn't something that the existing corporate power structure is willing to fund. The worst they'll do is Duke Nukem or Conker's Bad Fur Day. Hell, even in a post Witcher society, devs like Ubisoft fade to black in spite of attempting to add adult romance elements to their games.

I said it's moving in the same way the regular market did, you're literally describing the state of the industry thirty years ago.

And yet here you are admitting it's about size of the developer and the budget of the game.

It depends who you're talking to, if you're in a pitch meeting then you're generally talking about budget and publisher size, if you're talking among developers it's aesthetics and quality.

I'm confrontational with you because you have been dismissive of the person who, without which, I wouldn't even play adult games. Do you think people have a fetish for the Uncanny Valley? That we are here because we really want to fuck Victoria 7 one more time? Because we just love the character design of Sameface Saga?

Without story, without characters to get invested in, games offer me nothing. I play games for the connection between myself and the character. Because I'm able to form some sort of feelings for and investment in the outcomes. If I don't have that then there's nothing in games for me and I immediately stop playing. Porn doesn't have the problem of sameface, doesn't have the problem of uncanny valley. If I just want a quick emotionless fap I'll go to pornhub. I come to games for something I can't get there, and that is all the job of the writing.

Dismissive of who? I have literally no idea who you're talking about here, not once in my original comment did I mention a specific developer or game, whatever dismissal you've imagined is entirely in your head.

Very few games have no story or character, just because you don't like them doesn't mean they don't exist.

That's kinda an oxymoron. If better writing makes a game better then the audience is going to acknowledge that it is better than another game. They're going to, when playing a new game, give the game that they find better their support. If you put your game out with less quality writing than the other guy who puts his out the same week, who's going to get funding?

They'll fund the better game, your mistake is assuming that one game having better writing makes it a better game that more people want to play.
However much you hate them Summertime Saga, Dating My Daughter, Big Brother, Man of the House all made and with the exception of Big Brother continue to make serious money, people like those games.
So are all those thousands of people wrong? Are they just poor misguided fools who have never seen any of these amazing new games that they should totally be throwing their money at?

So here's a question for you, is your writing quality better than Summertime Saga, Dating My Daughter, Big Brother, Man of the House?

If so why are you not seeing the returns your logic suggests you should be?

Why are those thousands of people not fleeing these horrid, awful games and showering you with money instead?

 

[shapersoul]

First of all, Merry Christmas

As for Summertime saga (Love that game) I think its a case of greater than the sum of its parts. the artstyle, while it being good or bad is subjective, it stands out and has character, the cast are all stereotypes but theres a good varity. the writing is simple but fun and the point and click implementation brings back nostalgia of games I played as a kid. I can see why he get so much support on patreon

 

[DarthSeduction]

The story you're writing can though, if it's any good that is. Yes you'll have to be more decriptive but you're still telling the same story.

Moving the goal posts. I could turn Dating My Daughter into a novel. That game has shit writing, inconsistent characters and horrid pacing. But I could adapt it into a novel.

I'm starting to sense a theme, you can't do something therefore no-one else can.

A theme? Where was the evidence to support it? Just this statement?

It takes a very strong visual storytelling mind to create a story that works without the writing and can be enhanced by it. I can think of 1 instance of this in real life. Mad Max Fury Road. But that took incredibly detailed storyboarding and generally speaking had very little dialogue whatsoever. The story was told almost entirely visually. If you can do that, you don't need a writer.

There, that goes way beyond the level of "emotion" your scene is showing though quite frankly I'm not sure valium overdose counts as an emotion in and of itself.

Wow, you're cool. That's a great scene. How and when was the relationship that led to that scene and the emotions therein earned? What? All the "development" of the relationship between Alice and Eric happens off screen? No wayy. While sure, I'll allow that it makes sense that they'd be that angry being walked in on like that, I can't agree that the scene itself is even earned.

That game is one of 3 that made me decide to become a dev. Not because it's a good example, in spite of your seeming praise of it, but because it is so poorly made that I decided I had to be the change I wanted to see in the world.

I said it's moving in the same way the regular market did, you're literally describing the state of the industry thirty years ago.

You did allude to that, but not in relation to what I was responding to. You were criticising his following in comparison to a game released in the normal market. as quoted again for you to remember, here.

Take your numbers as an example, 250 patrons in 4 months, if that was a standard released game it would be an absolute flop but within the adult community on episodic releases it's not bad because you build over time rather than pulling everyone in at the start.

And here, I'm not literally describing the state of the industry 30 years ago. 30 years ago they took their games to publishers and got them made, or took out loans to publish them themselves. We are doing things on our own. Our market is forced underground by the fact that the financial powers that be refuse to let it see the light of day. You disagree with this, try funding your game directly through paypal and see what happens.

It depends who you're talking to, if you're in a pitch meeting then you're generally talking about budget and publisher size, if you're talking among developers it's aesthetics and quality.

Pedantic semantic argument... skip

Dismissive of who? I have literally no idea who you're talking about here, not once in my original comment did I mention a specific developer or game, whatever dismissal you've imagined is entirely in your head.

Very few games have no story or character, just because you don't like them doesn't mean they don't exist.

You thought that when I said one person, in the entire context of this thread, which I've been against you due, directly, to your dismissive view of the writers, that I meant someone in particular? Maybe the reason you don't like writers is your inability to understand context.

Very few games have no story or character, just because you don't like them doesn't mean they don't exist.

However much you hate them Summertime Saga, Dating My Daughter, Big Brother, Man of the House all made and with the exception of Big Brother continue to make serious money, people like those games.

I'm combining these two points. I'm doing so because in order to explain to you what you're missing, in both, I touch on the same issues.

Lets look first at Big Brother. Now, Big Brother actually had some promise, it introduced, through Eric, an overarching plot to the Life Sim format, with the goal of Max being to get rid of the romantic rival. However, he failed miserably in 2 aspects. 1st, he turned the dial up to 11 with Eric. It's like playing a castlevania game but you're constantly facing dracula. 2nd, he failed to actually give the characters any depth. This resulted in the incredibly inconsistent and completely unmotivated/non-proactive characters that made up his cast. Ann was so inconsistent that many joke that she has multiple personality disorder. Lisa would go from loving you to hating you every time you moved her story forward, constantly forcing you to earn her "love". Alice was just a greedy slut, and she never admitted that to herself, meaning that we always had to grind with her too. I won't go on, but the point is, because these characters are so 1 dimensional, they became antagonists as well. You have to fight against them while you're fighting against Eric. This is what resulted in the bad reputation the game has across the internet. You will rarely find someone speaking positive about it outside of it's specific corner of the world.

Now lets talk about Dating My Daughter. Question, how old is D really? I know it says 18, but to look at her she couldn't be older than 13-14, and to read her dialogue and characterization she swaps between bratty teenager and the child-like ignorance of an 8 year old. Mr. Dots still hasn't decided if it's a corruption game or a romance game, and so the MC is also incredibly inconsistent. His existential crisis midway through CH. 1 was designed to make it look like he cared, but the way he still designs the games around constantly pushing D to cross her boundaries lends to the corruption far more than the romance. Most recently, the slutty best friend who was willing to jump the MC's bones in front of the daughter from day one and who more recently has blown her daddie's colleague for a doctors note, had an entire segment where she was a blushing maiden in response to advances from an inexperienced country hick. How does one attach themselves to characters that are so ridiculously inconsistent?

Man of the House is the worst offender on this list. The game, while structurally similar to BB, has none of the attempt at plot or character that Big Brother had. There is no villain, which means once again, antagonists are the girls. You have to grind against their defenses to get a reward. If you described Veronica's plot to me, I'd download the game you were talking about. Playing Veronica's plot however, is bullshit. Oh, you blackmailed me, fine, but I still hate you. Oh? You went too far with it, so I'll just tell mom now (because mom will believe her). Oh? So I'll just blackmail her with her boss instead. Hah, I was out of that and just let you blackmail me because I suddenly after protesting for so long flipped my switch and realized I really liked being dominated by my little brother. No corruption, no actual character development, just, you did enough mundane tasks that the switch is flipped. Little sister... I am a huge siscon. I love the doting older brother, loving little sister archetype. This one has all the right ingredients, but it hands them to us and tells us to make our own cookies. Does she eventually have sex with you? Yes. Do you get a sense that this is because of an improvement upon or change in your relationship? No not really, it's just the result of grind.

And there's the kicker for why these games still get money. All the time people have dumped into them, invested into grinding for small rewards. It's like gambling. They get a rush off that small reward. And at this point, they've invested waaaaay too much of themselves into those games to give up before they see them through. However, if you ask at random, you'll find far fewer people will list these as favorite games anymore, and when they do they're treated like trolls.

Summertime Saga? I don't have an issue with it. I don't think it's special in any way. But it does actually have stories and a central plot, as thin as they are. And the relationship with the mom is one of the few m/s relationships I enjoyed playing in any game. I tend to look at Summertime Saga as the archetype for the new wave of life sims that do a good job of fleshing out and developing their characters. In fact, I'd go so far as to say, I agree with everything in the following quote.

I think its a case of greater than the sum of its parts. the artstyle, while it being good or bad is subjective, it stands out and has character, the cast are all stereotypes but theres a good varity. the writing is simple but fun and the point and click implementation brings back nostalgia of games I played as a kid. I can see why he get so much support on patreon

While I don't love the game, you're absolutely right.

 

[Snarkfu]

Moving the goal posts. I could turn Dating My Daughter into a novel. That game has shit writing, inconsistent characters and horrid pacing. But I could adapt it into a novel.

A theme? Where was the evidence to support it? Just this statement?

Just your general demeanor and dismisal of anything that doesn't fit what you think is correct.

It takes a very strong visual storytelling mind to create a story that works without the writing and can be enhanced by it. I can think of 1 instance of this in real life. Mad Max Fury Road. But that took incredibly detailed storyboarding and generally speaking had very little dialogue whatsoever. The story was told almost entirely visually. If you can do that, you don't need a writer.

Imagine, films told entirely visually! It's amazing that they only ever made one of those...

Wow, you're cool. That's a great scene. How and when was the relationship that led to that scene and the emotions therein earned? What? All the "development" of the relationship between Alice and Eric happens off screen? No wayy. While sure, I'll allow that it makes sense that they'd be that angry being walked in on like that, I can't agree that the scene itself is even earned.

Speaking of moving goalposts...

What emotion was she supposed to be feeling by the way?

That game is one of 3 that made me decide to become a dev. Not because it's a good example, in spite of your seeming praise of it, but because it is so poorly made that I decided I had to be the change I wanted to see in the world.

How's that working out for you so far?
On your way to toppling the old guard with your new wave enlightenment?

You did allude to that, but not in relation to what I was responding to. You were criticising his following in comparison to a game released in the normal market. as quoted again for you to remember, here.

That wasn't criticism it was comparison, you're so tetchy!
The whole point of that was showing that first impressions aren't as important given the slow ramp up time of adult games.

And here, I'm not literally describing the state of the industry 30 years ago. 30 years ago they took their games to publishers and got them made, or took out loans to publish them themselves. We are doing things on our own. Our market is forced underground by the fact that the financial powers that be refuse to let it see the light of day. You disagree with this, try funding your game directly through paypal and see what happens.

I'll give you that, it mas more like 36 years ago rather than 30. The crash was the major change.

Do industry publishers fund their games through paypal? (Hint: no)

You thought that when I said one person, in the entire context of this thread, which I've been against you due, directly, to your dismissive view of the writers, that I meant someone in particular? Maybe the reason you don't like writers is your inability to understand context.

I don't like writers?
You really need to work on recognising the boundries between the things that exist in reality and those that exist solely in your own mind.

Oh and here's what you said:

I'm confrontational with you because you have been dismissive of the person who, without which, I wouldn't even play adult games.

That sure as shit sounds like it's referring to a specific person.

Are you sure you're a writer? Are you sure you should be?

I'm combining these two points. I'm doing so because in order to explain to you what you're missing, in both, I touch on the same issues.

Lets look first at Big Brother. Now, Big Brother actually had some promise, it introduced, through Eric, an overarching plot to the Life Sim format, with the goal of Max being to get rid of the romantic rival. However, he failed miserably in 2 aspects. 1st, he turned the dial up to 11 with Eric. It's like playing a castlevania game but you're constantly facing dracula. 2nd, he failed to actually give the characters any depth. This resulted in the incredibly inconsistent and completely unmotivated/non-proactive characters that made up his cast. Ann was so inconsistent that many joke that she has multiple personality disorder. Lisa would go from loving you to hating you every time you moved her story forward, constantly forcing you to earn her "love". Alice was just a greedy slut, and she never admitted that to herself, meaning that we always had to grind with her too. I won't go on, but the point is, because these characters are so 1 dimensional, they became antagonists as well. You have to fight against them while you're fighting against Eric. This is what resulted in the bad reputation the game has across the internet. You will rarely find someone speaking positive about it outside of it's specific corner of the world.

Now lets talk about Dating My Daughter. Question, how old is D really? I know it says 18, but to look at her she couldn't be older than 13-14, and to read her dialogue and characterization she swaps between bratty teenager and the child-like ignorance of an 8 year old. Mr. Dots still hasn't decided if it's a corruption game or a romance game, and so the MC is also incredibly inconsistent. His existential crisis midway through CH. 1 was designed to make it look like he cared, but the way he still designs the games around constantly pushing D to cross her boundaries lends to the corruption far more than the romance. Most recently, the slutty best friend who was willing to jump the MC's bones in front of the daughter from day one and who more recently has blown her daddie's colleague for a doctors note, had an entire segment where she was a blushing maiden in response to advances from an inexperienced country hick. How does one attach themselves to characters that are so ridiculously inconsistent?

Man of the House is the worst offender on this list. The game, while structurally similar to BB, has none of the attempt at plot or character that Big Brother had. There is no villain, which means once again, antagonists are the girls. You have to grind against their defenses to get a reward. If you described Veronica's plot to me, I'd download the game you were talking about. Playing Veronica's plot however, is bullshit. Oh, you blackmailed me, fine, but I still hate you. Oh? You went too far with it, so I'll just tell mom now (because mom will believe her). Oh? So I'll just blackmail her with her boss instead. Hah, I was out of that and just let you blackmail me because I suddenly after protesting for so long flipped my switch and realized I really liked being dominated by my little brother. No corruption, no actual character development, just, you did enough mundane tasks that the switch is flipped. Little sister... I am a huge siscon. I love the doting older brother, loving little sister archetype. This one has all the right ingredients, but it hands them to us and tells us to make our own cookies. Does she eventually have sex with you? Yes. Do you get a sense that this is because of an improvement upon or change in your relationship? No not really, it's just the result of grind.

And there's the kicker for why these games still get money. All the time people have dumped into them, invested into grinding for small rewards. It's like gambling. They get a rush off that small reward. And at this point, they've invested waaaaay too much of themselves into those games to give up before they see them through. However, if you ask at random, you'll find far fewer people will list these as favorite games anymore, and when they do they're treated like trolls.

Summertime Saga? I don't have an issue with it. I don't think it's special in any way. But it does actually have stories and a central plot, as thin as they are. And the relationship with the mom is one of the few m/s relationships I enjoyed playing in any game. I tend to look at Summertime Saga as the archetype for the new wave of life sims that do a good job of fleshing out and developing their characters. In fact, I'd go so far as to say, I agree with everything in the following quote.

While I don't love the game, you're absolutely right.

Yeah I'm going to skip the majority of that given that I don't trust your views on writing even a tiny bit at this stage so moving on... you're actually going to just try to write it off as sunken cost?

It's certainly a bold move, doesn't explain why the new people, those without insidious ties to these evil games aren't showering you with cash.

Do you have another fallacy you'd like to throw at it?

 

[DarthSeduction]

Just your general demeanor and dismisal of anything that doesn't fit what you think is correct.

Says the one dismissing the new information.

Imagine, films told entirely visually! It's amazing that they only ever made one of those...

One day, you'll wake up from the feverish anger you seem to have at being challenged, and realize how utterly without merit this thought was.

Considering in that exact paragraph you quoted I actually talked about one of the very few films that was made with a storyboard first and a script later, you're really stretching now.

Speaking of moving goalposts...

What emotion was she supposed to be feeling by the way?

I'll admit, that was a bit of a goal post move, but I'm still incredulous that there was something with actual not over the top emotions.

That particular image is actually a part of a series of images that show different cast members looking over the screenplays they'd submitted for entry into the film class they are taking. The teacher, unbeknownst to them had not only read them all herself, but critiqued and proofread them, handing them back with her notes. She ripped into every single person telling them with no uncertain terms what they did wrong, though there was some praise from time to time, the vast majority appeared to be negative. In that particular character's case, the teacher tore her work to shreds, so, as it went on each student's expression gradually getting more depressed over their hard work being so heavily critiqued, that was the look she had when her roommate, the MC, asked to see it.

How's that working out for you so far?
On your way to toppling the old guard with your new wave enlightenment?

Ah yes, personal attacks.

That wasn't criticism it was comparison, you're so tetchy!
The whole point of that was showing that first impressions aren't as important given the slow ramp up time of adult games.

I disagree, sure, many people won't play a game until the 3rd release or so, but that isn't to say that their first impression doesn't matter. These games spread through word of mouth, primarily, so making a good impression as early as possible is the best way to gain an audience, because that impression will spread organically. Time does matter in that over time it will spread more and attract more, but you'll attract far more of them with that good first impression than you will without it.

Do industry publishers fund their games through paypal? (Hint: no)

I used paypal as the "big example" You also wouldn't be able to set up a visa/mastercard/american exrpress etc transaction for it or anything of that sort. You wouldn't be able to walk into your local CitiBank affiliate and take out a business loan for it (at least not without considerable collateral), and no publisher is going to take it.

You really didn't like that I singled out paypal, and based on the rest of your wording you probably aren't as critical of financial institutions as I am, but if you don't understand that paypal is the establishment, they are the same people at goldman sachs and citibank and chase, then you're kidding yourself.

I don't like writers?
You really need to work on recognising the boundries between the things that exist in reality and those that exist solely in your own mind.
That sure as shit sounds like it's referring to a specific person.

Are you sure you're a writer? Are you sure you should be?

You, the entire time we've been in this thread, have been, and still are, dissmissive of writer's value in making these games. Pedantically, you're turning the word, dismissive, which I've been consistent in using on purpose, into "don't like". Nowhere did I say you don't like writers. I said you're dismissive of them. Those are two completely different things. I like Harem Hotel a lot, but if we were talking about quantifying the game of the year, I'd dismiss it out of hand from the running. It isn't that the game isn't good, it isn't that I don't like it, it's that I don't feel it has that level of value.

You dismiss the value of writing. And I believe that your dismissal is due to you not realizing what a writer does. Your entire novel argument is proof of that, as I'm quite sure I made clear.

eah I'm going to skip the majority of that given that I don't trust your views on writing even a tiny bit at this stage so moving on... you're actually going to just try to write it off as sunken cost?

Ah yes, the, I don't like this person because he challenged my dismissive nature toward writers so he couldn't possibly write.

And yes. I spent quite a long time discussing this matter with fans of Man of the House at one point. Those that don't immediately get defensive agree that man of the house is a grind filled mess without much attention to character. They defend it saying that there are cheats to get past the grind, to which I reply that without it there's no value in the outcome, because there's no writing, no character development, no substance, just repetitive grind. At which point they talk about how Faerin is so willing to listen to input and make things better, again pointing to the cheats and in game walk through that were added later.

And then it circles around and around. The common themes being, it's ok because you can cheat to skip the grind, and faerin is a good guy. Both things that are correct, you can cheat and skip the grind, and faerin is a good guy, but not reasons that man of the house is good. Therefore, the only conclusion one can make is that they have either been brainwashed, and that's just fucking stupid to consider (though the whole brother thing in the forum thread is off-putting) or, they've poured so much into it that they have to see it through.

It's certainly a bold move, doesn't explain why the new people, those without insidious ties to these evil games aren't showering you with cash.

Is this about me now? My games are relatively new, and have less content than The Deluca Family, despite being at the same version number. Will I ever make what the old games do? Probably not, but I also don't plan drag it out as long as theirs.

 

[Snarkfu]

Says the one dismissing the new information.

I can't trust a thing you say.

One day, you'll wake up from the feverish anger you seem to have at being challenged, and realize how utterly without merit this thought was.

Notice the discussion I had with the other guy, he actually wanted a discussion though you just wanted to antognise me and then whine when I give it back to you.

I used paypal as the "big example" You also wouldn't be able to set up a visa/mastercard/american exrpress etc transaction for it or anything of that sort. You wouldn't be able to walk into your local CitiBank affiliate and take out a business loan for it (at least not without considerable collateral), and no publisher is going to take it.

You really didn't like that I singled out paypal, and based on the rest of your wording you probably aren't as critical of financial institutions as I am, but if you don't understand that paypal is the establishment, they are the same people at goldman sachs and citibank and chase, then you're kidding yourself.

This is true currently, that does not mean it will always be so. I didn't even go into the possibility of the porn industry itself getting in on the act and that is a shorter term possibility (also shows what financial institutions currently find acceptable).

You, the entire time we've been in this thread, have been, and still are, dissmissive of writer's value in making these games. Pedantically, you're turning the word, dismissive, which I've been consistent in using on purpose, into "don't like". Nowhere did I say you don't like writers.

Ahem...

Maybe the reason you don't like writers is your inability to understand context.

I said you're dismissive of them. Those are two completely different things. I like Harem Hotel a lot, but if we were talking about quantifying the game of the year, I'd dismiss it out of hand from the running. It isn't that the game isn't good, it isn't that I don't like it, it's that I don't feel it has that level of value.

You dismiss the value of writing. And I believe that your dismissal is due to you not realizing what a writer does. Your entire novel argument is proof of that, as I'm quite sure I made clear.

These are all just your imaginings (which is why I dismiss your views in their entirety, not because I don't like you ((though I don't like you, you're a massive prick )).

I don't think that a dedicated writer is necesarilly required for every project and OP should wait and see if their own work is good enough.

That's what set you off, well, that and all the imagined backstory you added.

Ah yes, the, I don't like this person because he challenged my dismissive nature toward writers so he couldn't possibly write.

You've been banging on about how much impact good writing has and the proof, as they say, is in the pudding.
By your logic either your writing isn't good or your argument doesn't actually work all that well.

Therefore, the only conclusion one can make is that they have either been brainwashed, and that's just fucking stupid to consider (though the whole brother thing in the forum thread is off-putting) or, they've poured so much into it that they have to see it through.

Or, and here's a mad thought, for all the flaws they still actually like the game!