Mind Drop #44 (04/03/2022) (Not #43, the update isn't ready for that yet) (Patreon)

Admittedly not the best decision to skip a mind drop on the date that matches the next Mind drop number (43, 04/03)
But here we are. A good number of people mentioned that communication has really broken down as of late and I want to remedy that by starting the Mind drops back up.
And hey, I'm fucking with the timeline of the game, let's also fuck with the timeline of the Mind Drops.
(Mind Drop #43 will still be posted a few days before the update drops)

So, let's talk about some stuff.

What's delaying it now dev wise?
The honest answer is there's a lot of indecisiveness on my end.
My goal with every large update is to give you the best experience you've ever had with the game. It's been tough to reach that bar in my head since there's a pretty drastic change to how days go and I'm not comfortable with the style yet as it's still new to me.

It's hard to talk further without going into light spoilers so please skip ahead if you'd like to avoid little hints at what the update will be like.
This new style cuts a lot of "filler" in the days. Things are overall more bottled and the game has less dull moments and is more action packed... which has honestly led me to worrying there's too much sex in this update.
The best in-game comparison is more so how Day 1 plays out. Where it's a lot of quick sex with some stuff happening in-between that sets up the next quick sex.

After the exhibition game... there's a bit of a lull in the story for reasons I can't go deep into. And that skews it further into the sex filled pipeline.  
Which... it's a sex game so awesome right?
Well... I mostly agree but it's just a bit too skewed for me right now.
My current solution has been to go back and add small scenes with lesser involved girls. Sometimes just a render or two with dialogue that says "You spend some time with Ruby and Moon", etc.
Gets others involved while not bloating up the days or fucking up the story.

The delays have recently been caused because of a lot of little changes like that, that will drastically change the feel of the update.
I chose the least spoilery one to present as an example but there's been a ton of stuff like that.

Furthermore, it's been really tough deciding which scenes to include now and which scenes to push to the next update.
There's really not much I can say on this without getting very spoilery. But like I've said I have a huge headstart on the next update as I moved a ton of scenes to the future a while ago and it's just been tough to decide which ones to include now or later.

What's delaying it personal wise?
I briefly mentioned that there's been a lot going on that I haven't been able to talk about.
Well, I talked to my wife about it as she's part of all of this and I stopped sharing as she didn't like me telling too much. (But she is okay with me sharing this bit.)
Which she has a very good reason not to want to share. There's some fucking weirdos out there. 99.9% of you guys are lovely but all it takes is 1 dumb fuck to ruin it all and make me hide everything.

In February me, my wife, my kid, and my grandpa all had to pack up and move again because of some weird events happening at our new house at the time. (That started early January)
I can't confirm if it was caused by me sharing stuff publicly or if it was just some creep that happened to target us.
But, around the same time our old house (the first, crappy one) was broken into and vandalized and it was too much for me to not fear for the safety of my family.

We were able to move somewhere that is much safer overall and I installed a pretty rad home security system. So it hasn't been a problem since but as a new father whose number 1 goal is to protect my family. I'll admit it was very difficult to focus and even still now, every little noise I'm checking everything out.

Chances are the events were unrelated and we just had a creep harass us since my wife happens to be a very attractive woman and creeps seem to flock to them.
But I wasn't taking any chances and what I share will still be very limited.

That's been the biggest thing but definitely not the only thing and I don't really want to go further than that.
It's not really an excuse for the delays, more so to just why communication has broken down recently and I do apologize for not handling it better.
This also isn't for sympathy, everyone's fine and I trust my ability to protect my family. I just want you guys to know why I've been so vague as of late. It was never anything malicious.

How much longer?
This is a question that I sadly can not answer.
The only thing I can say is that I'm working on it at minimum 11-12 hours a day and it will be out the second that it is ready.
I want to give a timeline but those haven't been working out for me and I'm trying to piss people off less haha

What about other patreon stuff like the polls and bday renders?
I do plan on putting out some other stuff this month but I don't want to commit to any dates or any amount as I'm still focused on the update.
Though I will say I've been working on some bday renders whenever I get stuck on some of the timeline rewriting. So I should have a batch to share of those soon.

Why don't you hire help?
This is a question I've answered a few times before but it's popped up a lot recently so let me give an updated answer:

I am an awful work leader. I have held managerial positions at entry jobs before and I am someone who will take the hardest work and then do the most work at the same time and try to make it as easy as possible for everyone else.
I am someone that is likely to be taken advantage of.
I am shit at hitting deadlines for this game but my work ethic isn't something I'll ever doubt.
And I also don't know anyone I trust enough to hire right now anyway.
I also don't really want to ever relinquish parts of the game I like doing... which is most of it. Besides things like organizing and photo editing.

The only thing I could imagine actually hiring for is a programmer to do some of the things I'm too dumb to do, and someone to create a soundtrack / effects for the game and implement them.


Also real quick, I just know some people will claim I'm trying to be a perfectionist but promise me, I'm not. This update will not be perfect and I'm cool with that. It's just getting it to a place that I'm happy with. It's a new style and it's taking some time to find my spot within it.



Okay, that was a lot and still wasn't a normal mind drop so oopsie.
Returning to the normal format this Friday. (Would've today but I wasn't tracking renders and I don't want to spend the time to count them up right now.)

Thank you guys so much for believing in me and sticking around.
I don't care about the amount of $ because tbh I make more than I should doing what I do but it is amazing to see the amount of people stick by my side through all of this stuff. You guys mean the world to me and I'm excited for the future.
It's gonna be a good update and I'm gonna go write some more but in fantasy fun land.
Have a good week everybody
Love you guys <3