Behind Schedule. Billing Paused. Work Continues. (Patreon)

Hello all, 

Apologies for the lack of notice here. For those of you not on the discord, this post is to catch you up on the current situation. Something I intended, but failed to do throughout the month thus far.

A few days ago, I paused this Patreon Page so that no current Patrons will get charged until billing resumes from the 23rd of August. Just to give myself some additional breathing room to focus on releasing something that’s more worth playing than the “ALPHA #4 vibes” the build is currently shaping up to give. And also as an apology for not having anything to show off from the game so far this month, due to not focusing on render work.

Since I continue to lag behind my ETAs (as I unfortunately always do), I became hesitant to start sharing news on anything I was working on that wasn’t 100% complete (where most development items currently sit) in case I had to cut that feature/content for time. I've mostly been working on Game & Audio related work so far and didn't feel I had anything exiting or polished enough to be worth sharing, so never got around to making any kind of update post.

As I continued working toward having some content I was happy to share, time kept passing me by and I understandably began receiving a number of comments and private messages from players across various platforms misreading my silence as a sign that my previous LATE JULY ETA was still accurate (It is not) and still anticipating an immanent release. 

Obviously that's on me, as I need to get my head out of my ass and communicate my current development status more transparently, instead of waiting for "good news" to break the ice with, that sometimes never comes.

Regardless, I wanted to make it clear that I do not do "shadow drops" or "surprise releases" for Terminal Desires game builds. Unfortunately, silence from me is never a good sign, and simply means I don't have any news worth sharing.

Any release from me will always be preceded by plenty of notice. In particular, I do plan on announcing a release date for the next build, once it is actually done. So you’ll know when it’s specifically coming as soon as I do.

The ETAs are always simply my best guess at the time that I give them. They’re certainly not guarantees, as I think my track record with them speaks for itself. I do admit, they’re never particularly helpful for you all or myself. Often ending feeling more like misinformation than anything else. But “it’s done when it’s done” is even less informative for you & less productive for me.

Internally, I indecisively tweak my release plans and associated ETAs so frequently that it’s always seemed silly to update the public facing ETA any more than once per month when I’m this scatterbrained. But I do need to find a more helpful/“live” method of communicating the current state of things outside of a last minute monthly blog post.

In the meantime, I have started making good on my promise to share frequent(Daily-ish) updates in the Discord's upcoming-release channel. That way supporters of every tier can at least follow along with what I’m currently doing with more transparency than my unreliable ETAs. Perhaps this is a fairer way forward.

I will compile the most important information from these daily updates into the next Dev Blog which will probably be before the end of the month, but I won't stop working to force one out if I don't feel I have enough worth showing. 

So, what is the current ETA now? Obviously we've just established that this is a fruitless endeavor, but my best guess is Mid-Late August. I'm not planning on it, but in the event that I'm unable to get a release out before billing resumes on the 23rd, I will pause the page for an additional month.

I'm not interested in releasing what would essentially feel like "ALPHA 4". But I'll continue to work towards that "minimum viable product" type of release internally, attempting to give daily updates on the discord, then assess my options once I have that as my foundation.

Though the goal is still to get something out ASAP, it needs to be more substantial that just the Iris content and working save files. I am willing to compromise so that I can move on, but that's not exactly the v0.10 release that folks have been waiting for all this time.

Sorry for allowing communications to deteriorate like this. I posted some additional insights in the "questions" channel over on discord for those who are interested, it's where I'm pulling most of this post's text from. But I'll leave the "why" of things to some kind of post-mortem once the v0.10 Full Release is out. I just want to get back to work for now and keep chipping away at it.

~ Jim