The contents of today's post had been posted on our Patreon months ago, as well as have been throughly discussed on our Discord server multiple times, which you can find in the link below.
It's a publicly available Discord, so feel free to join!
Discord: https://discord.gg/DB3F9jN
This blogpost also serves as a summary for 2020 kinda, so I don't need to repeat answering questions that are regularly coming up.
2020 was frankly spoken a disaster for me on a personal level.
I get that everyone had a horrible 2020, but added to all the covid shenanigans and everything that was going on in the world, I had some really devastating "personal" problems that were not related to that at all.
Let's get right into it.
In 2018 I expanded my team using my own savings.
Most of this money was actually inherited money from family members that passed away.
The people I hired, I of course paid regularly and in full.
I never failed to pay wages, and I always upheld my part of the deal.
Deathblight Guilty Raid was ENTIRELY self funded.
That explains where the money I had came from, and why I had such big expenses in the end.
The expenses are documented, and MOST of the people I hired actually finished their work.
Anyone who disbelieves this can hop on our Discord and just ask around, there's enough people who can confirm that I paid them thousands of USD over the course of many many months, and those are also the people who delivered.
Now throughout 2018 to 2020 we've been working on Deathblight Guilty Raid.
And the expenses hit roughly spoken 50 000 USD in the end.
The first demo version should have come out in April 2019, and it would have been possible.
But there's been delays and I was too nice and understanding to certain people, so instead of firing them I gave them the benefit of the doubt and pushed on.
I continued paying wages of course.
I also dealt with burnout around that time due to the sheer amount of stress and extra work I had, but I somehow managed to move the project forward.
In February 2020 I learned from a friend of mine that my programmer, BladeFire, lied to me and hated working on the game.
Roughly spoken, he admited to my friend that he was not doing his work properly on purpose.
I gave him a chance to come out himself, but he didn't do so, so eventually I confronted him about it shortly before the demo release of DBGR, and he gave me a bunch of excuses, nothing more than that.
Deathblight Guilty Raid had it's demo release in April 2020, but I suspected that this would be the end of the game due to BladeFire's dishonesty and lack of work ethic.
The way I planned the project, he was to finish all the remaining programming, I didn't have any time in my own schedule to do that myself.
And with him not doing his work and backstabbing me, there's just no way it can ever be completed.
Since then he repeatedly told me that all of this "was just a mistake", and that he "didn't mean it".
So I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt, but not give him any more money.
After all he failed to deliver what I already paid him for, and I wouldn't give him more chances to exploit me.
He delivered, at most, 33% of the work I paid him for, and I'm being very generous here.
Promising me he would finish the game "without further payments", as I already paid him for it to begin with, I decided to give him several months before I make any public announcements.
(we talked with our fanbase on Discord about it though)
And well, to this day, there never has been a single something on DBGR he could show me.
So with this blogpost, I hereby "officially" announce that the project is absolutely dead.
I invested 50 000 USD into it, with the exception of BladeFire, everyone did their job and what I paid them for.
It's just that the programming is the critical component missing, and thus the game can't be delivered.
I am not willing to hire someone else to do the job.
Nor do I have any savings left to pay another programmer for work I already paid Blade for.
I can't do the work myself due to being busy with all my other work.
So the game is simply dead.
Unfortunately, this wasn't the only bad thing that happened to me in 2020.
Patreon contacted us around October 2020 and asked us to make changes to our content and to drop Deathblight RPG entirely.
We had a lot of back and forth, trying to figure out what needed to be done and where the issues lay.
In the end we decided to remove all adult content from Patreon, because the way they "judge" if something is okay or not is really blurry and not quite consistent.
So in the end, to stay on the safe side, we decided to drop all adult content completely from Patreon.
There's only ecchi and nudity at times, but I believe that falls into "mature content"?
At any rate, that's that.
With Deathblight RPG no longer being funded, and with the game never going to be sold (that was our promise from the beginning), there is just no way it can go on.
So this project is dead as well.
Will there be new games in the future?
Sooner or later, yes.
I started making hentai games as a hobby back in 2012, and I became a full time developer out of necessity.
Since I really love hentai games, I always want to create some.
But I can't say when or what the next game will be at this point in time.
They will most likely be self funded and NOT funded by Patreon or anything like that.
Which means I need to recover my savings first and establish a budget to work with, or perhaps find some other way to pull this off.
People who work on projects like to be paid, so without money I can't possibly do it as noone worth their salt would work for me for free.
Until then we will just be doing webcomics since that has proven to be the only reliable source of income we had all these years, and you gotta stick to what makes you money.
Finally since only Crescentia and I (Wolfenstahl) work on these, there are no delays and no disruptions, as we never failed to deliver a webcomic page in like 5+ years and more than 450+ pages of doing this.
Which speaks for itself.
If it's just Cres and me, we can pull things off no problem.
If we need to rely on other people, which unfortunately for game projects we need to do... it get's wonky.
Still, despite these bad experiences, once I recovered from this I do want to try hiring people again, someday.
That being said, feel free to join our Discord and hang out with us over there!
Discord: https://discord.gg/DB3F9jN
See ya around.
Hi Wolf
ReplyDeleteThe update with catheline's Job was planned and almost finished, you had announced to release it one day in spite of all that, she also gave up?
The problem is that there is no one to finish it and there's still a lot of work left to do.
DeleteOriginally BladeFire was supposed to finish the job, but as I explained above, he didn't.
There's not much I can change about that, unfortunately.
I don't see what Bladefire's got in there,
DeleteYou had announced on Patreon that you will finish the patch of Catheline yourself on your free time, I still have the mail
Finally it's still a game to be abandoned like almost all of them...
I have supported you for so many years, I feel betrayed that you have given up the games and all the nsfw content on Patreon.
and I'm not the only one the results speak for themselves
The confidence is broken... :/
I know that english isn't your native language and that you probably misunderstood what has been said?
DeleteThing is that we did not remove the NSFW content from Patreon because we wanted to, but rather because Patreon forced us to do so.
It has already all been explained and I'm not sure how to explain this to you in a way so you understand this.
There is nothing I can do to change anything in this situation.
Still I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience, despite I can't change anything about this as it's completely out of my hands.
Hm, sad. You guys were one of the few devs that I believed were honest and I gave you guys the benefit of the doubt when GR was as good as dead. But the reasons why both GR and RPG are cancelled at that point don't make any sense. I mean the reason why GR is cancelled might be true, but 50k is just way too ridiculous and either made up OR you wasted a ton of money on too many unnecessary things.
ReplyDeleteBut the RPG cancellation drew that line, from the start it was supposed to be a reward for the backers which was solely funded from the webcomics. You especially advertised something along the lines of "If you are here for Games, you're wrong here" as RPG was only an extra reward for backers for the comics and not a project that got backed on its own. So the forced removal of it on Patreon should've had no impact on the developing side of things AT ALL.
Honestly just telling people that you don't want to work on games anymore and just stick to comics would've been the better way than these cheap excuses. Because that's all that RPG was right? An extra reward that was theoretically never promised to be finished if you decided you didn't want to work on it anymore. Something like an artpack in game form. The only reason RPG was made was because you wanted to give people something back and you loved to make games, so it was an easy fit. Maybe you aren't into game developing anymore, or atleast burned out. But that would've been a way more honest reason than the sorry excuses you guys came up with.
The 50 000 USD is not made up and there are several witnesses you can ask over on Deathblight Discord.
DeleteJust hop on and ask the people in question directly.
For the reference, I paid Zhuan 1000 USD a month for about two years, this involves his work on Empress CYOA, Dark Alley Elf, and Deathblight Guilty Raid though.
BladeFire also received 1000 USD per month for more than two years.
Furthermore, the pixel art (Boxman, Arsministrator, Gillenew etc.) cost a lot of money, and Crescentia's art cost a lot of money too.
Everyone except BladeFire delivered their work, and thus the costs are warranted, but the work had also been delivered and thus I have no reason to complain about that.
It is just the unfortunate truth that despite writing, graphics and art being done, none of that matters because the programming isn't done.
A game without programming can't be shipped out.
I hope this makes sense?
If you do not believe me, go over to the Discord and ask people directly.
If you don't do that, you have no right to call me a liar because that is just what you made up in your mind without checking the actual facts.
And I have no reason to lie or make any of this up.
Technically, I do not "owe" anyone an explanation in terms of Deathblight Guilty Raid, nor do I owe anyone the completion of the game project.
No one paid for it.
I can do with it whatever I want.
Me giving an explanation for it's cancelation is merely a courtesy on my part.
As for Deathblight RPG:
What you said isn't true.
DB RPG was originally Patreon funded, and I ALWAYS said that if funding was cut for whatever reasons, the project would be dead.
In case you're refering to what our Patreon campaign currently states:
That was edited ~4 months ago when Patreon asked us to change things, we completely removed all mentions of games from it.
In case you don't believe me:
Head over to Deathblight Discord and ask the community directly.
I'm sure several dozens of people will be happy to fill you in on the details.
Deathblight RPG has always been a very ambituous, and very expensive project to make.
Doing it without a significant amount of funding is frankly spoken impossible.
Now if I go by your words that it was never funded by Patreon, if we "assume" for a second that what you said is true...
You would have no reason to complain?
No one would have paid for it, and same as DB GR no one would have a "right" to ask me to work on it?
If it was never Patreon funded and always was my own thing (like Deathblight Guilty Raid was), what is your point?
If it was only my thing, I can do with it whatever I want.
You'd have no right to complain about it, as mean as that sounds, it would be the harsh truth.
Also if you know me, you know that I'm famous for speaking the truth.
Literally everyone over on DB Discord can attest that, and there's like more than a thousand people over there.
If what you said was the case, I would have exactly done that what you suggested and would have just stated outright that I don't want to work on games anymore ^^
Because no one would have a right to tell me what to do with my own time if it's just my own money in it.
I'm not afraid of stating such things if that was the truth.
Makes sense, doesn't it?
At any rate, just think about it.
And if you're really in doubt, go over to Deathblight Discord and ask people about what's really going on.
If I don't feel like doing a game anymore, I'll just drop it and say so.
There's no one who could tell me otherwise if they didn't pay me for it.
See Deathblight Guilty Raid.
After all in that setting, I'm my own boss and can do whatever I want, and no one can stop me.
Because that's the kind of person I am.
Cool story. There are many words in it, but they are empty as slag. Learn to lie more effectively
DeleteWow you have provided so much proof that I am a liar, I am impressed how you digged all of that up on your own!
DeleteI congratulate you for your flawless wit and impressive and absolutely on point argumentation as well as all the well documented evidence you provided ^^
I'm absolutely baffled!
What a true chad.
Much wow.
*tips hat*
I stand corrected on the 50k part, I'll give you that.
DeleteBut I never claimed that you owe us anything, even if it would've been a community funded project. I was merely baffled that what little we saw from GR was worth anywhere near 50k so I didn't believe it.
As for RPG, I wasn't "complaining" about the cancellation of it per se, but the reason for it. Technically, you didn't need a reason to cancel it. It wasn't your main project, it was a side project that hijacked the funds from the comics as a reward for patreons. So the forced removal of it from Patreon should have barely any (if any) impact on the funds for the game. Because anything that made money for the game, the comics, are still up and running, for example on subscribstar. While yes, you probably lost a bit of support for it, I doubt it was enough of an impact to cancel RPG entirely, especially with GR completely out of the picture.
Thinking about it though, you said only the coding part of GR is missing since the coder didn't deliver. But you can't do it yourself because you are already doing enough coding work for your other things, high up there was probably RPG.
So when RPG isn't worth it anymore and is cancelled and GR is done except the coding, shouldn't you now have enough time to do it yourself?
(My response was actually so long I had to cut it into several parts, my apologies)
DeleteAh, I can see where you're coming from.
The thing is, as I said "everyone else did their job and finished what I paid them for".
There is a lot of content that isn't in the demo version, like the entire set of Faye graphics that has already been completed, here are some samples:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/288672787076349952/812331338215587912/unknown.png
(copy and paste the link into your browser as I can't make it clickable in comments)
Even if this is just a small selection, in reality all of Faye's combat graphics had been completely finished already, most of them had been streamed live as our regular viewers on Picarto.TV can attest.
So they do indeed exist.
Also all of the writing had been completed, though some of it needs a final edit.
As for the pixel graphics, I believe only the final boss is missing and everything else had been completed as well, even if it's not in the demo version.
What's missing for the game to ship out is implementing all these things into the game.
But we're speaking of 6 months of full time work (40+ hours per week) in terms of programming and level design, and there's no programmer to fill that gap.
Roughly spoken, what you see in the demo version is less than half of what has been worked on.
Crescentia (artist), Zhuan (writer) and OverCoat (SFX/composer) over on the Discord, had a talk a while ago about how they regret it that most of their work will probably never be seen.
I of course paid everyone in full for their work done, that's where the costs come from.
The demo version is in no way representative of the amount of work (and money) that went into the game up until it's cancelation.
In terms of DB RPG I think there's a misunderstanding:
DeleteIt actually was the main project before October 2020, alongside the Deathblight webcomic at least.
DB RPG was listed as main project on Patreon, and when Patreon asked me in October 2020 to drop it, there was a gap that was filled by the "Demon Hunter Red webcomic" which had it's first pages released in November 2020.
(our Subscribestar didn't exist prior to this)
And yes, Patreon did ask us to drop DB RPG specifically, a thing they wouldn't have done if it wasn't listed as main project.
There's a lengthy e-mail correspondence with Patreon about that which had been made available to the Patrons too.
The slow progress on DB RPG is mainly explained due to soft-shading coloring technique and crazy amounts of variations on the CGs.
On live stream (Picarto.TV) it was regularly visible that the more elaborate coloring of DB RPG took about twice as long as the simpler coloring we usually use for other projects.
Crescentia usually finishes an artwork in a day, but DB RPG graphics took a minimum of 2-3 days each.
Here's a comparison of the same character, you can see that the coloring is much more detailed (and thus time consuming) with soft shading:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/288672787076349952/812334178053914625/unknown.png
(copy paste into browser)
To put the "weight" of DB RPG in perspective:
It actually took us about 2000+ USD each month to pay for graphics and other things like programming, writing etc. (it was the main project after all)
A gap we can't possibly fill without any funding.
When we announced that DB RPG is dropped due to Patreon asking us to drop it, we actually lost a huge amount of our supporters.
I'd say about 33% or more, which shows that a lot of people did, in fact, support us for the game and not the webcomic.
Here's a screenshot of the Patreon drop from our actual statistics, when in doubt check Graphtreon which shows similar numbers:
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/288672787076349952/812335549167173702/unknown.png
(copy paste into browser)
The drop happened in November after the announcement of DB RPG being canceled was posted towards the end of October, when we settled the case with Patreon.
We also set up a Subscribestar in October/November 2020, so some people settled over there, but the net income currently is still about 10-20% lower than it used to be, and most of the increase in new supporters throughout January and February 2021 is actually attributed to the new Demon Hunter Red webcomic.
The Demon Hunter Red webcomic that we started as replacement, takes 2 entire work days per week and keeps us busy pretty well.
DeleteAs for my own work:
I had not been programming for the last 2-3 years.
After all I hired someone (BladeFire) to do it, why would I do the work for them?
There was this one week in 2020 where I "disappeared" (and no one really could contact me) and coded a simple prototype game for RPG Maker MV, but other than that I didn't programme anything.
The community management (Discord), team leading (throughout 2018 and 2020), like, distributing work, checking on work, giving feedback etc.
As well as my work on the webcomic (Deathblight) and planning of future projects (for example the RPG Maker MV prototype I mentioned above).
All of that is completely eating up my work time.
In fact throughout 2018 and 2020 this caused me to work overtime, never going below 10-12+ hours of work per day.
(and often even working on my weekends as well)
I don't have much of a team right now, and my workload had dropped to "normal" levels of about 8-10 hours each day and a "normal" 5 work day week.
But with the new Demon Hunter Red webcomic (since November 2020), and the Deathblight webcomic side by side, combined with community management and everything else, it's just too much for me...
I also have burnout on game projects due to having lost so much money and I actually blame myself for selecting the people I did, more specifically, that I trusted Blade way more than I should have, so I see myself in the responsibility of losing that much money, and it kinda "paralyzes" me when it comes to investing more money into game projects or trusting a new person with programming.
I absolutely love hentai games though, but as if working on games isn't hard enough already, having to deal with sabotage, backstabbing, and cutted funding is really making it worse.
I currently can't trust a new person (nor do I have funds to pay them with) but I "need" a dedicated programmer since I just can't do these games all on my own...
At least not anymore, with all the other work I have.
(Dropping the webcomics or turning away from community management long term would be fatal, so I can't do that)
For reference, in the past I would just "shut myself in" and programm for a game the entire week, 40-60 hours if I got into the flow, I'd keep that up for months since I had no community to manage, no questions to answer, no publishers to respond to, no other developers or teammembers to keep in touch with etc.
Delete(except for Cres but she's with me in RL, so I can just stay offline, she's interrupting me frequently, but I can manage at least that much or assign her work for the entire week and then focus on coding)
But nowadays I rarely get 2-3 hours to myself, even less so an entire day.
When I shut myself off from the world for a week, people start asking questions.
Assuming I could take about 4 hours per week to programme on things instead of full time 40+ hours.
A game like DB Guilty Raid that "should" have it's programming finished in 6 months full time work, would take 60 months (5 years) with 4 hours per week.
The added problem to that is, that with only 4 hours per week, frequent interruptions etc, I would have a hard time to "get back into it" each subsequent week.
And I know from experience that usually I can't finish programming systems in a game in 4 hour intervalls.
(I usually need 2-3 days, in some cases 2 weeks to finish the more elaborate things)
Meaning that there would be a lot of bugs and issues since I most likely forgot where I left off and what's left to do, since I work with way too many interruptions in between.
The same problem can be extended to DB RPG, as programming is programming.
This is precisely why I wanted to have a "dedicated programmer", especially when I set up the Discord in 2018 and shifted my work over to community management and team leading instead.
So when Blade backstabbed me, I simply was fucked big time.
I admit I actually hoped his "claim" of being innocent was true or that he at least made up for it, but to this day he hasn't delivered, and that's why I made this public post.
Since I just have to admit that I can't handle the workload on my own, and he wouldn't do what I already paid him for, so it's simply over...
Back then I only had one webcomic, but now (since November 2020) I have two webcomics.
That really adds a lot of work onto my plate, seeing that I need to plan out the plot, the panels, the characters, the dialogue, well basically everything.
I actually tell Cres in great detail what she has to draw, "why", and in which way.
It's a quite time consuming process.
When Patreon asked me to drop DB RPG, I had to replace it with something, and the Demon Hunter Red webcomic was the quickest thing I could deliver.
Making a new game project that quickly wouldn't have worked out, and I was afraid to lose even more supporters if I didn't quickly come up with a replacement project.
And "continuing DB RPG without having a replacement project" would have led to Patreon asking questions.
I know a couple other developers tried similar things, they "pretended" to have dropped a main project, but continued it in the background without a replacement project.
Patreon caught wind of that, and ultimately it just made it worse for the developer, as you may imagine.
That's something I wanted to avoid at all costs.
Thus the Demon Hunter Red webcomic was a necessity I had to take.
Even though the extra workload due to the webcomic bears down a lot on me, it was preferable to losing everything I built up since 2012.
I'm not saying that the decision I made was great, but it was the best thing I could do given the situation, sometimes a "bad solution" is better than "no solution".
I just have to go from there and do my best.
I hope I could answer your questions!
In case I overlooked to address something, or something isn't clear, please feel free to ask.
And my apologies for so much text.
I did my best to provide as much context as possible.
I think you cleared up all doubts here, I have nothing else to ask.
DeleteDefinetly a fucked situation, I was just, uh let's say, disappointed to hear that RPG was cancelled. I wasn't too invested in GR since there wasn't much I could be invested in there yet so that was more of a "Hm, shame" thing. But RPG was one of the few h-games I was actually looking forward to, especially since most of it's mechanics were things I wish more games did. The world needs more "rescue missions" after defeat instead of game over/ spawning back in base. Stuff like that plus Cres top notch art made the game (albeit on VX Ace if I remember correctly) something I very much looked forward to and I still hope that someday when everythings back to normal it get's finished.
Best of luck to ya and, as we say, keine Schwäche zeigen bro.
*thumbs up *
DeleteYeah those games are among the best and I also wish there were more like that.
(and yes the VX Ace part is correct)
Thanks, or in other words "vielen Dank"!
I gotta be honest. I didn´t read that long clash of you two.
DeleteBut usually people who haven´t had a real job yet and / or don´t know much about the working world, don´t have a feeling for how much things cost.
Especially workers you pay.
I know you guys are honest and really cool dudes.
SO I am sure I speak for the majority of your community and say it out loud because its done so rarely.
Yeah it's always difficult to understand a situation if people didn't experience similar things themselves.
DeleteThank you very much! ^^
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletewhat a joke
ReplyDeleteThanks for the update Wolf. It's a shitty situation all around and it's unfortunate that you're having to can the game, but I appreciate you keeping us updated. Here's to 2021 being more prosperous!
ReplyDeleteYou're welcome!
DeleteI also hope 2021 will be better for everyone and the world goes somewhat back to normal.
Thank you very much!
I know you guys since the day you started and (unlike those whiny little hater bitches) I trust you! Always did and always will!
ReplyDeleteDon´t listen to those lowlifes!
You guys are awesome! I supported you right from the start and I have no intention to ever stop doin so!
I will stay your Loyal fan no matter what! >= 3
Thank you very much for the faith in us!
DeleteI understand that people are frustrated though, which is why it's important to talk and address these frustrations.
I just hope we can talk about it peacefully and respectfully, since there's no reason to be rude to each other.
damn that must really sucks i really hope that it'll get better in the future and i hope that you can continue your webtoons comic as i currently loving it so far. and i hope that this game could be revived as i love it a lot.
ReplyDeleteThanks!
DeleteThe webcomics will be ongoing for sure as it is what sustained us for the last couple years.
As I said, I'm not sure these games can be "revived".
But later down the line we will get back into games when we can.
At any rate, thank you very much!
Is there a chance for the finished art etc to be released at some point (either for free or on patreon or something else)? I understand if not, but it looked so good and there's not enough of this type of quality art out there imo.
ReplyDeleteWe'll consider it!
Delete(no promises though)
Most likely, since it's NSFW art, it would be put onto Subscribestar though.
Not on Patreon.
I hope you release some of the art! I really enjoyed it, especially the starfish stuff from guilty raid
DeleteHonestly, it just sounds like you guys should drop Patreon entirely and go with Subscribe Star which are more open without the nazi censorship patreon enforce, if, you guys didn't already made one of course.
ReplyDeleteMight be hard to drop a huge number of Backers and it might not be safe, but i believe everyone would understand if they were to be asked to move on their payement to Subscribe Star.
I'm oblviously really disapointed for the amount of projects that end up dead, but i understand the reasons of why we're here today. And i'm still looking forward to what comes next.
But i can't help but think dropping Patreon for Subscribe Star like did so many other developpers would be a good idea, just for more creative freedom.
Good luck to you two and the rest of your team. <3
We actually have a Subscribestar!
DeleteYou can find it over here:
https://subscribestar.adult/deathblight
(copy paste link, as I can't make it clickable in comments)
But we do need our Patreon for our SFW webcomic and to pay our bills.
So dropping it is not a realistic option.
The Subscribestar currently is for NSFW art (general) and for funding the NSFW webcomic.
Hey,
ReplyDeleteI know that both games where cancel, do to some unfortunate events, but I saw that you had written that you are created other games. Would they be like Raid or the RPG one just curious.
best of luck
Hello ^^
DeleteCurrently we are not working on any games!
So I can't really answer that question.
If I were to take one of my prototype games (code already done), it would probably be an RPG though.
I'm not working on any games right now though.
So no promises!
hey thx,
Deletei am really happy about the answer, like RPG more
What about the CYOA project? is there any chance that the project continue?
ReplyDeleteI paid for the Empress CYOA chapter 3 and 4.
DeleteWhile chapter 3 only needs one more scene as well as editing (aka almost done), chapter 4 needs to be written still.
I can't say when it will be done though.
But you can hop over on Deathblight Discord and ask Zhuan about when he's able to do it.
He had some serious RL issues a while ago, so he wasn't able to wrap that up.
And since I can't speak for him, that's the best answer I can give you.
I've been sticking around since October hoping that things would get smoother in the following months. But now it seems that things are still up in the air, and shakey at best I have decide to cancel my pledge on Patreon. Sometime in the future I might make a Subscribe Star account to see if the content on that platform is more in line with what I pledged for.
ReplyDeleteThat's fair, and thank you very much for your support.
DeleteA lot of creators were asked to drop their projects by Patreon and from what I've seen 2020 wasn't really nice to the adult game community as a whole.
So that's absolutely understandable.
However, note that our current Subscribestar only supports adult artworks and webcomics and stuff.
(we didn't want to start a game project tied to Subscribestar only to potentially be told in a year or two mid development to drop it)
Yeah, adult content creators are facing hard times recently mostly due to political shift in USA. And make no mistake people, the "blurry and inconsistent" rules are not accident, sites like Patreon and others are making them such on purpose, cause they are not there to ensure any standards or whatever, they are there for one and one reason only: to easily cut off creators and content deemed "problematic" by some loons on social media.
ReplyDeleteDealings with Blade and Patreon were bound to fuck you despite the convenience they provide, you should've been more critical of both(and gave Patreon the finger, frankly) but hindsight 20/20 and all that. Secondly this circle went from producing genuinely unique games like LDH/Paperheads to pumping out random poopoo art for the usual Patreon speds and DBRPG which was a frail shadow of what were quite respectable games. I'm not expecting you to chase the money or to create shit you don't want to, but am I saying this place was once pretty interesting and a breath of fresh air and it's a damn shame it isn't. Though, GR was a good try I'll give you that.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much.
DeleteAs for making "interesting games".
It is important to note that RPG Maker Games (like DB RPG) are something I can make with my artist alone.
For anything else I'm required to hire external people, like Blade.
(which yes, is not a good idea to rely on, but it's impossible to do without such people)
Furthermore, funding is needed in one way or another.
Either you need a lot of money on the side (as I used to have) or you need a website like Patreon.
(which again, is not "good to rely on" but it's impossible to do without...)
Otherwise you can't do games like LDH, Paperheads etc.
They are just too ambituous and cost too much money to make.
You need to pay your bills, your rent, people you hire, all of that costs a lot.
None of the games I finished and sold made enough sales to "justify" their production.
I'm losing money all the time (lots of money, thousands of USD/Euros) even if a game is finished and sold, but I'm still making them because I'm passionate about those games.
The artworks you dismiss as bad art are actually the thing that enables me to pay my bills.
And only because of them I can continue making hentai games.
Without them there would not be the occassional project like DB Guilty Raid.
At any rate, currently I can't work on games due to the general situation.
But one day I'll get back to it.
It's an understandable situation and actually I meant to say not chase the money(people pay big dough for that art lol), my bad. The current state of western hentai games scene is pretty bad so you know, I hope you make cool shit like paperheads which was ahead of it's time imo but I'd be insane to expect you to. Hopefully you have something better to work with next time(better than patreon and blade, at least).
DeleteThank you very much!
DeleteWhile I love such games, it's a lot of work to make them.
I hope that one day I can find a reliable pixel artist so we can tackle such projects again.
At any rate, thanks for your kind words ^^
"Until then we will just be doing webcomics since that has proven to be the only reliable source of income we had all these years" Maybe dont be allergic to trying new things and try a male protag?
ReplyDeleteIt's not about being allergic to new things, it's about making a decision that is leading to positive results.
DeleteThere is no safety in experimenting or "trying something new", and we can't afford any risks in the current situation.
Besides, we're not into male protag games and will always do female protag games only.
It's just our personal interest and personal preference, and our fanbase is built on that as well.
But I perfectly understand that some people also like male protag games.
However, we're not the developers for that kind of content.
I hope you understand ^^
Yass! Never a male protagonist! Yet another reason to stay loyal to you guys! (Not sarcastic!)
DeleteI personally cano´t do anything with hentai games with male protagonists. But that is just preference obviously.
DeleteHowever, Lesss, you gotta take a look at the market and you probably realize that the largest majority of games present female protagonists. Therefore you could guess about the playerbase wanting that for the most part.
That makes it quite risky in terms sales numbers to try out a male protagonist.
If you create a game innovative enough to work with a male protagonist, I think you could do at least as well with a female one, if not being more successful.
With the small exception that the innovation comes from a very specific mechanic bound to a male protagonist.
Heya Wolfenstahl-Team!
ReplyDeleteI am just here to remind you of how awesome you guys are as a team!
I am following you since your creation and gotta say once more that all the games you made glow of dediaction and greatness. There surely are so many to think of it this way but I just decided to say it!
Not to forget your well made lore and the highest quality pictures you draw.
Thank you very much!
DeleteHearing that means a lot to us.
Cres draws the pictures though, while I do the lore and everything else, I figured I should point that out.
Thanks and stay awesome ^^
I hope you will one day make a Jumble Jokers/Jumble Strikers style game. If you don’t know what they are then I highly recommend you try them. Great stuff and there is an english translation for jumble jokers.
ReplyDeleteI hope you will one day make a Jumble Jokers/Jumble Strikers style game. If you don’t know what they are then I highly recommend you try them. Great stuff and there is an english translation for jumble jokers.
ReplyDeleteI hope you will one day make a Jumble Jokers/Jumble Strikers style game. If you don’t know what they are then I highly recommend you try them. Great stuff and there is an english translation for jumble jokers.
ReplyDeleteSorry for spam. Something went wrong and I dunno how to delete
ReplyDeleteThats some dedication right there! xP
DeleteWhat is BladeFire doing nowadays?
ReplyDeleteWho knows?
DeleteI've not been in contact with him ever since the incident.
And frankly spoken, I don't want to see him ever again.
as someone reading this having no knowledge beyound the post of the situation, you have 70% of the assets to a game all the art and work put in and need a proper programmer to put it all together but can't afford it if you don't sell it per unit, I think fans would prefer you to sell it per unit then drop it wholesale. I am sure even you would want to get your work out into the world then letting it rot so you may try giving a portion of each sale o te programmer for being a cluth player since everything else is done if you have to under pay them even.
ReplyDeleteI have no money to hire people.
DeleteNot "little payment", I'm talking "no payment" here.
First of all, I will not have someone work for free for 6 months full time.
(we're talking 40 hour job here)
Then, afterwards "maybe" give them payment if the game does well enough?
That sounds like I'd scam a programmer.
I'm not that kind of person.
Furthermore, any further investment into the game is another loss of money for me.
There's no winning it.
I already lost 50 000 USD.
I do not desire to lose a single cent more on a game that "maybe" will be finished.
(there's no guarantee the new programmer will make it.)
And I can't ask of some random person on the internet to work on it for free.
No matter how I look at it, "the game is up", it's over.
Also it's almost been two years ago.
Some things are better left to rest.
I hope you understand ^^