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RPG Unknown/Hiatus Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!


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AltairPL

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

To clarify; my previous post was aimed at Patreon in general since it came up again, and the previous posters described a scenario we're all too familiar with. If it came off as personal, I take that back, my fault. Its up to the Patrons to decide whether what I've said applies to this project or not, I obviously don't have much to work with.
Don't get me wrong, I understand and agree with your point of view. However, posting it in a patreon-funded game thread can give someone not knowing the game or its creator wrong idea about them, so clarification is much appreciated.
 

dfxtent

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

At first I wanted to make only a short post to let you know that we're still here on ULMF, but I decided to go a bit more in depth.

To those having issues with MatM per month campaign and to those thinking/insinuating that we're doing nothing, abusing Patreon, milking patrons, etc.:
Instead of assuming things based on your possible past experiences with some other Patreon campaigns or what you read about them, just sacrifice 5-15 minutes of your time to actually visit the MatM patreon page, read the overview and reward tiers descriptions, and you should see how the campaign itself and its rewards is structured and how it's different from oh so many other monthly patreon campaigns and how similar it is to previous per update version. If you are or were patron since campaign was switched to monthly, you should have a better picture of it and understand more clearly what I'm talking about.

To those having issues with lack of updates, thinking progress is insufficient, not liking what we're working on, or having the impression of being milked:
- if you weren't, aren't, and don't plan to support MatM campaign... why do you care? If you're waiting for a full game however, please, be patient...;
- if you were a patron and pledged enough for a free copy of the game upon release and you're waiting for it, please, be patient...;
- if you are a current patron, feel free to remove your pledge and come back (or not) later. I think our monthly progress reports paint good enough picture or what we did and what we intend to do - if you have questions about something, feel free to ask them in the comments to the progress report post.

Anyway, info about every newly released build will be announced publicly shortly before or shortly after the release, so you won't miss it.

@Enlit3D
You patron stealer, you :p. Seriously though, good luck with your game and thanks for directing discussion about it to a more appropriate place :).
Background:
-Due in part to the overwhelming saturation of RPG-maker games on these boards, I typically ignore them as a rule. Also as a rule, I am a dedicated lurker and almost never feel the urge to post.
-MatM impressed me enough to give it a try on the public build.
-That was good enough to garner a month's pledge to see what the "supporter" build was like.
-The rate of progress did not seem sufficient to warrant a continued pledge. I will probably revisit this project in a year or so, to see what (if any) new content has been added.

Since by your own admission, this isn't your area of authority, I'd respectfully suggest you grab Ero's attention and ask him to chime in here as well. Other than slow progress, the only real sin I see with MatM (and Patreon) is keeping communication behind a paywall - and a higher paywall than the game itself! As others have said, good communication is essential to keeping public interest in the project, and avoiding the appearance of stagnation.
-MatM has two public posts on its Patreon, and both are more than a year old. Neither gives an indication of what's being worked on, or the current state of the project.
-Corollary to this, progress updates (even the monthly ones) are behind the paywall.

Is it really a surprise that your Average Joe assumes this is dead in the water and milking its supporters?
 

demilupo

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

I'm a $3 supporter, and just wanted to chime in. Yes, I see in every patron thread descend into devs are lazy/taking the money and running, and yes, it is silly every time (except in some rare cases like Wootch and Breeding Season).

I see you guys do a post for the inner circle consistently every 2 weeks, and that's fine. It's a bit annoying that people who shell out $120/year rather than $36/year get exclusive updates, but y'know I remember we do get our own update every month, and I would much rather you use your time to develop the game rather than diverting that time and effort to constant PR and community management (seriously, it might not seem like a big deal to some supporters, but with a small ass team that can become a huge commitment/timesink).

Some developers like constantly streaming their work, or giving us a status update every week that they fixed a bug that none of us will understand, while other developers just want to develop. And that's fine. Only a minuscule portion of games ever hit their development deadlines, and that's fine too.

Altair & co, you guys have done great work, I look forward to the next update, and I'll reserve all judgement until then.
 

Jesus

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

Background:
-Due in part to the overwhelming saturation of RPG-maker games on these boards, I typically ignore them as a rule. Also as a rule, I am a dedicated lurker and almost never feel the urge to post.
-MatM impressed me enough to give it a try on the public build.
-That was good enough to garner a month's pledge to see what the "supporter" build was like.
-The rate of progress did not seem sufficient to warrant a continued pledge. I will probably revisit this project in a year or so, to see what (if any) new content has been added.

Since by your own admission, this isn't your area of authority, I'd respectfully suggest you grab Ero's attention and ask him to chime in here as well. Other than slow progress, the only real sin I see with MatM (and Patreon) is keeping communication behind a paywall - and a higher paywall than the game itself! As others have said, good communication is essential to keeping public interest in the project, and avoiding the appearance of stagnation.
-MatM has two public posts on its Patreon, and both are more than a year old. Neither gives an indication of what's being worked on, or the current state of the project.
-Corollary to this, progress updates (even the monthly ones) are behind the paywall.

Is it really a surprise that your Average Joe assumes this is dead in the water and milking its supporters?
I'm pretty much in full agreement. As unfortunate as it is, people will jump to conclusions. I'd like to think I know better, but at the end of the day the only real signs of life are the fact that patron-only posts are getting made, and continued activity here. Other than that, it's pretty much faith alone which is alright cause I'm Jesus and all, but most people aren't. I'd wager that most of those pledging at $10/month are doing it to support the project with the biggest incentive other than that being the artwork PDF. I think it's in the project's best interest to at least give the public something just a bit beyond the introductory blurb and the once-in-a-blue-moon public demos to go on to attract more funding. MaTM's success is what I want to see the most here as with everyone who's put money in so far. It'd be nice to see that stretch-goal reached cause it means either faster development or more content, but keeping everyone but those who have already committed mostly in the dark can only hurt the chances of it being achieved.
 

Mamono Assault Force

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

Having pledged 3 bucks myself to check on progress, I will say that having public progress updates might give more insinuation for people to make pledges. When I made the pledge, I had no idea you guys had another update in the works, and I won't know when you release it without keeping my pledge in your system.

I kind of want to gently work my 20 dollar pledge in as meaty updates are released. The fact that it's all hidden makes it feel like too much of a dive, and that scares people.

Edit: Those updates are apparently on Blogspot, sort of. It gives me a vague idea of what's new, since the update list is a generalization. This makes me believe even more that the same updates to the patreon page should be just as public as the blogspot ones, just in case someone clicks on one but not the other.
 
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Eromancer

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

Apologies for not dropping by in so long!

I'll always be around when there's a major update on the horizon, but we've been working on so many various features for benefiting the long term goals of the project that new playable content got sidelined a few times.

I really enjoy talking with everyone here about the game, and I fully appreciate the fact that it looks good to be present all the time, but the nitty-gritty truth of it is that it takes a hell of a lot of time and energy to communicate minor updates on an individual basis with every community we've posted about the game on. Drawing the line in that aspect has been an important step for me in freeing up time and energy to devote to development. Some may argue it's time to have a community manager (which would be great), but I've chosen to appropriate those funds toward a very talented audio professional because he was available and ready to work.

Simply being around to show things are progressing admittedly does help with gaining pledges, but it won't net us enough funds to hire additional help and artists. From experience, showing off fresh content of the adult variety is infinitely better for that, and I figure that's what most of the people here want to see as well (as opposed to technical and even story related stuff). To really accomplish growth at this stage we'll need to run promotional campaigns to get the word out further than it already has, and I plan on doing that once we get new playable content out.

It's important to mention I'll definitely poke the community at large a lot more once we need more feedback, but right now I have a document over 40 pages long containing notes for features we intend to implement (including various ideas we've talked about with users on this board :D) after the next playable content update goes live.

If you're truly interested in the state of the project and want the very latest information you can pledge once to get all of the posts and then drop until you feel the need to do so again. There's nothing to say you have to pledge continuously if you're not interested in getting every news update.

All of that being said, expect me to be around more in the coming weeks as v0.06 gets nearer! I haven't abandoned you! We're just busy as hell :D.
 

buddy

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

From experience, showing off fresh content of the adult variety is infinitely better for that, and I figure that's what most of the people here want to see as well (as opposed to technical and even story related stuff).
Actually, I like story related stuff, as do quite a lot of your patrons if I remember one of your polls correctly. As long as it doesn't spoil too much...and yeah, that's a slippery slope, I get it. Would like to know a bit more about the characters, if that fits into what you're comfortable with sharing at some point. Like...who are they? Obviously, Malise is the big mystery which shouldn't be spoiled...but what about Neon? What IS she, and how did she end up working with/for Doc? And Doc...is he/she/it just a machine, or is the "Doc" character just a remote controlled drone, with the real Doc safe and sound somewhere else? Questions, questions...I want to know, and yet I DON'T want to know if it spoils future surprises...and in the meantime we're all just waiting. The reality of it all is killing me...
 

Jesus

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

I do get where you're coming from Eromancer, but what we're (at least I am) saying is that dead air between publicly advertised content updates gives people outside the patron base too much time to speculate and spread falsehoods like "it ded". I'd be happy enough with just a short blurb on what's currently being worked on - X engine feature, Y enemy, Z level design. Nothing too in depth, save that for the supporters, but adult games are a very fickle thing - knowing what to expect in terms of the fetishes that'll be covered in advance of the releases containing them will encourage those who seek them to lend their support earlier and help ensure you have the resources to get there.
 

dfxtent

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

I do get where you're coming from Eromancer, but what we're (at least I am) saying is that dead air between publicly advertised content updates gives people outside the patron base too much time to speculate and spread falsehoods like "it ded". I'd be happy enough with just a short blurb on what's currently being worked on - X engine feature, Y enemy, Z level design. Nothing too in depth, save that for the supporters, but adult games are a very fickle thing - knowing what to expect in terms of the fetishes that'll be covered in advance of the releases containing them will encourage those who seek them to lend their support earlier and help ensure you have the resources to get there.
Having looked at this a little harder, I agree, but with a caveat:
-Roughly $3,000 of MatM's current funding is from the 1,000 or so pledging at the $3 mark. Conservatively, let us say maybe 50% of them are there for the monthly updates (likely more).
-While I think it would be / would have been wiser to simply make Monthly updates available to the public, doing so now could very well result in a substantial dent in Patreon funds.
-Making additional status reports, even basic ones, does put a strain on Ero & Team's time. I have done game development before, and fully understand the point that Time must be budgeted as well as funding.

Personally, I think the project's Patreon needs an overhaul, to allow those Monthly updates to go public while retaining some incentive(s) to keep those $3 pledges on-board (*safe to assume "Game Download" is a one-and-done most of the time, until a new version is out).
Obviously not my call to make, simply the opinion of an interested observer. Perhaps after the 0.6 update, there will be a little more Time in the budget to give that idea some consideration.

Currently however, I understand that the current state of things leaves MatM's public communication somewhere on the intersection of Rock and Hard Place. I staunchly believe that needs to change, but accept that it isn't likely to at this time.
 

sanguis3k

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

I actually agree with dfx here, I am only keeping my piddling $3 pledge up until it ticks over into I get the game when it's done territory because frankly I don't feel it is worth even the miniscule amount I can contribute for what I am seeing and I don't think that getting the $10 tier for weekly updates would be worth the money. seeing so much radio silence and so little progress reported is pretty disheartening for projects and while I understand updates and posts take time a quick one paragraph once every 2 weeks this is what we are up to for the lower tier would do a lot to help with making it feel like something was being done and might even make more people who are sitting at the same place I am interested in going up to the inner circle level because we want to know more about what we are seeing and hearing is being worked on rather than being forgotten about until the start of the month
 

drossvamp

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

all of this stuff is why I don't ever bother with patreon. i always wait for the full game to come out and if I enjoyed the demo or am already a fan of the circle then i buy it. simple as that. I feel like anyone who complains about patreon should just either do what I do or clam down and accept the extra content demos. Its not worth it to complain about the patreon system here either, MatM is one of those high quality artwork games that i expect 2-5 years tops to actually get to version 1.0. just get a bit of perspective, because programming and artwork takes time, and 1 month wont show that progress like 6-12 months will. And in 6-12 months if nothing significant happens, then all of you can quit pledging and call it dead. but right now all those 3$ patrons are a-ok which tells me they are happy with progress, therefore i am happy to wait for this game and you guys should too.
 

Mamono Assault Force

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

Wait, does my donation of 3 bucks show up on your Patreon list, even though I canceled it? Cuz I did get charged. I was half thinking that I'd just boost myself up to around $20 and then collect my copy of the game when it came out. But that suuuucks if you guys can't even verify if I did that.

My Patreon name is "Ar Jay" if that matters. First and last relatively.
 

censuur

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

So your brilliant strategy is to cut all funding and wait for the product to be finished... okay, and you don't see some really glaring flaws there?
 

AltairPL

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

Wait, does my donation of 3 bucks show up on your Patreon list, even though I canceled it? Cuz I did get charged. I was half thinking that I'd just boost myself up to around $20 and then collect my copy of the game when it came out. But that suuuucks if you guys can't even verify if I did that.

My Patreon name is "Ar Jay" if that matters. First and last relatively.
IIRC, there was a problem with this when Patreon just started implementing instant charge feature - if creator requested pledge history from the system, patrons not pledging at the moment were not on the list. Data wasn't lost, only inaccessible for some reason. AFAIK, everything is OK with it now.
 

Potato

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

So to make it clear, people that donated 20$ or more will still get their free copy of the game?
 

drossvamp

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

So your brilliant strategy is to cut all funding and wait for the product to be finished... okay, and you don't see some really glaring flaws there?
This patreon complaining is something i just cant stand seeing for any game, and that was the main point of my last post. I was directing that to people who wasted time here complaining about the patreon paywall for progress updates. Obviously any game could use funding while being made, but complaining about how a creator chooses to go about his/her path of funding is their choice. If a consumer doesn't like the way that the funding is being handled, rather than wasting time complaining about it, should either just go with it or pull out. Game making is about making something you would want to play, of course taking polls for a few features will help get people to help you out, but in the end, the creators have the final say.
 

Jesus

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

> pay 20 bux
> free

pick one
A copy of the full game as a reward for supporting its creation with $20 isn't the same as buying the full game for $20 (Which is probably cheaper than what it will be). A lot of crowdfunded games still charge their backers to play it once it's complete
 

dfxtent

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Re: Malise and the Machine - Public Demo Available Now!

This patreon complaining is something i just cant stand seeing for any game, and that was the main point of my last post. I was directing that to people who wasted time here complaining about the patreon paywall for progress updates...
Since I feel this is at least partially directed at me, I wish to clarify that I am "complaining" about the lack of communication, and acknowledging the fact that MatM's Patreon is set up in such a way that it limits that communication only to paying supporters. In doing so, I also have to acknowledge that changing their structure would result in a substantial amount of lost revenue - since I want the project to succeed, that would obviously be a bad thing.

That said,
...If a consumer doesn't like the way that the funding is being handled, rather than wasting time complaining about it, should either just go with it or pull out.
While you are correct that it is the Patreon owner's prerogative to structure their project as they see fit, there's a vast difference between suggesting that change is needed and pointing out the reasons why, versus whining / demanding change and acting like an entitled twat. Having lurked on these boards for years now, I completely understand if you've seen a bit too much of the latter and are a little bitter or annoyed over it. ;)

Anyway, a bit more on-topic, I'm looking forward to seeing what the next has to offer. Since our dynamic duo is headed into the city, does that mean we'll be seeing those gas-mask enemies from the trailer making an appearance?
 
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