I don't think every gameplay video has to be a full 10 minutes or anything, just having footage to show of the 5% newly added content should still be enough to catch people's attention! Demo releases don't need to be as frequent, people are indeed not going to play the whole demo over just for a tiny bit of extra content, except perhaps for Patreon users who can always have access to whatever the newest version is.
I can't say what it is about LotR myself either, I had a discussion some time ago about RPGs (specifically about Always Evil species, which is a trope I really don't like) and whatnot and the topic of LotR came up as a foundational work for RPGs as a whole but I just saw no value at all to clinging on to it, I'm much more excited by stories that subvert or go in entirely different directions entirely.
You did say they looked like Pacman ghosts! I assumed that meant they have an arrangement of tentacles hanging from their body arranged in a way to both evoke squids and ghosts... Sort of like those Squisps, I suppose, but also somehow Aztecian, and owlish, and Goblin-y?! I really should draw that.
I KNEW DEEP IN MY HEART ALL ALONG THE ELARNA WERE INNOCENT! I'm glad to hear that, since I've been hoping that would be the case ever since the Elarna were first conceptualized as a typical Always Evil species.
I actually saw a post not too long ago where people speculated on who the default example of an evil person was before Hitler, giving examples like Napoleon, Attila the Hun, Nero and other such historical tyrants and warmongers.
The limitations on self-expression from reverting to a pre-agrarian society would come from the harsh and rough conditions of nature relative to the comforts of societal life limiting how people can express themselves! Reduced access to medicine, artistic tools and means of producing media would impose more limits on self-expression than societal constraints.
Besides, nudist communes can exist within a society in which people can run around naked, optionally whilst having painted themselves!
It was interesting having to work within the means allowed by the engine and its assets! I like to think such constraints fueled creativity. I particularly like using the spell flash from the Lionblade spell to simulate bleeding! Very wholesome content, yes!!
While it was fun to make these quests, and I really enjoyed it when someone did play them and give feedback, the fact that they got so little attention pushed me to stop making them entirely, since it started to make me resentful towards people and their lack of interest. These thoughts started to even become pervasive and create rifts between myself and others.
I just can't get any value out of creating something if others aren't going to consume it and tell me they like it. It just feels like all that time and energy was wasted altogether, to spend dozens of hours on something that one person will finish in an hour or two. Even if that person really enjoys it and I'm earnestly grateful that they did, what I get out of it is just not proportional to what I put in.
3
Tobias 1104~4Y
I can't remember how I last described the Elarna, but they're like pacman ghosts or imp-grey-alien-octopuses wearing ghost-reminiscent ponchos! That is, their spindly black limbs are underneath the ghost bit rather than an extension of it. When I actually show off a picture of them - which I might do soonish if I'm going to be including them in this Atonal Dreams thing or whatever I call it, probably on Patreon - I bet they'll be very underwhelming!
I don't remember if I ever planned for them to be Always Evil - that annoys me too - but rather they ran away with destructive technology or something? Kind of like the speculation about humanity wiping itself out due to our warmongering ways. It wouldn't be all of them contributing to that, but a crazed few who took things too far. All the races the Aolmna took wiped themselves out in that way originally, so that would have been a repeat of that; a harsh reminder that the Aolmna couldn't reprogram nature, or something. What I've got now is probably better though, or at least it's something based in individual personalities rather than something on a species level.
The Bold has a mediaeval-ish level of technology anyway, so there wouldn't be all that much difference in terms of societies between ordered towns and chaotic bandits! And the Blight Wolves would have settlements; they wouldn't be sleeping in the dirt or anything. I'm imagining the Seraphim and Blight Wolves as fantastical versions of conservative and liberal mentalities, or at least the extreme, caricatured versions of them. Or maybe the more appropriate terms are things like authoritarian, libertarian? I don't understand politics enough and don't intend to make it political, though, god no. But it's essentially "we'd be better if the government controlled us" vs "we'd be better if we could do whatever we liked". Or something. They probably don't correspond to conservative/liberal, actually, considering all the American conservatives refusing to wear masks. It needs more planning!
That Samuel + Agatha thing looks quite interesting, and I've never seen that before! The Pokedex-before-they-were-invented is quite inspired! Is that just a one-off concept image, or did people try to make a mod, like they often do with those things?
I can definitely understand your frustrations about pouring all that work in and people just not caring. It's something I deal with every day, and I feel so sorry for other game devs who pour years into pet projects only to get less than 100 sales in the end and a couple of mediocre reviews. Sindrel Song is that for me, considering all I poured into it - not just time and energy, but heart too - and how little of a response it got. It gets to me all the time.
One of the frustrating things about it is that expectations scale, too. Sindrel Song didn't get zero response, and comments from you in particular and the other testers were thorough and fulfilling and I'm very grateful for those! But compared to what I was used to from MARDEK, it didn't feel like enough. Then when I ported MARDEK to Steam, the feedback was a fraction of what it originally got too, so that hurt. But then I feel so ungrateful.
Also, the only people who care about the things I've made are online people who found me because of those things! I've never known anyone in person who gave a damn. Some of them have shown polite interest, but obviously zone out quickly, so I just stopped even expecting anyone to care. It still hurt though.
And now I'm concerned that all the work I'm pouring into this thing will be for nothing. It's even worse that it's not just feedback I'm hoping for, it's enough money to keep doing it! I keep looking at the number of views on these blog posts, and feel worried and upset that they seem to be going down over time.
So I do understand that, and this seems to be a common thing about making anything. Makes me wonder why anyone sticks with it, honestly. I feel I sort of have to at this point because of how far I've come, but one of the reasons making this shorter one before committing to years of work is because if it doesn't do well, I can give it up and do something else!
3
Maniafig219~4Y
Well, I look forward to seeing the Elarna! They sound a lot more interesting than how they looked back in Miasmon!
I think think that in the very earliest works set in AF NPCs talked about the Elarna as if they were just Always Evil, so I'm happy the current plans seem much more interesting than that!
The dichotomy you describe fits better on the authoritarian/libertarian scale, yes. Of course these things are much more complex than just a simple 2D scale. I assumed the dichotomy was society vs. no society, but it seems to be more government-run society vs community-run society.
I think it was just a one-off piece of concept art! It does make me wonder how many of the Pokémon fangame projects that are started actually make it to a full release.
I've seen people compare happiness to a treadmill to some degree, the better things are, the higher our standards and expectations become to be happy and the more the status quo is taken for granted. It's why people in the past who lived in outright worse conditions weren't miserable all the time. Of course that phenomenon has its limits too
Anyway, I did enjoy Sindrel Song a lot, yes! I'm also following Divine Dreams development with interest!
I can't say what it is about LotR myself either, I had a discussion some time ago about RPGs (specifically about Always Evil species, which is a trope I really don't like) and whatnot and the topic of LotR came up as a foundational work for RPGs as a whole but I just saw no value at all to clinging on to it, I'm much more excited by stories that subvert or go in entirely different directions entirely.
You did say they looked like Pacman ghosts! I assumed that meant they have an arrangement of tentacles hanging from their body arranged in a way to both evoke squids and ghosts... Sort of like those Squisps, I suppose, but also somehow Aztecian, and owlish, and Goblin-y?! I really should draw that.
I KNEW DEEP IN MY HEART ALL ALONG THE ELARNA WERE INNOCENT! I'm glad to hear that, since I've been hoping that would be the case ever since the Elarna were first conceptualized as a typical Always Evil species.
I actually saw a post not too long ago where people speculated on who the default example of an evil person was before Hitler, giving examples like Napoleon, Attila the Hun, Nero and other such historical tyrants and warmongers.
The limitations on self-expression from reverting to a pre-agrarian society would come from the harsh and rough conditions of nature relative to the comforts of societal life limiting how people can express themselves! Reduced access to medicine, artistic tools and means of producing media would impose more limits on self-expression than societal constraints.
Besides, nudist communes can exist within a society in which people can run around naked, optionally whilst having painted themselves!
I was thinking specifically of this! [LINK]
It was interesting having to work within the means allowed by the engine and its assets! I like to think such constraints fueled creativity. I particularly like using the spell flash from the Lionblade spell to simulate bleeding! Very wholesome content, yes!!
While it was fun to make these quests, and I really enjoyed it when someone did play them and give feedback, the fact that they got so little attention pushed me to stop making them entirely, since it started to make me resentful towards people and their lack of interest. These thoughts started to even become pervasive and create rifts between myself and others.
I just can't get any value out of creating something if others aren't going to consume it and tell me they like it. It just feels like all that time and energy was wasted altogether, to spend dozens of hours on something that one person will finish in an hour or two. Even if that person really enjoys it and I'm earnestly grateful that they did, what I get out of it is just not proportional to what I put in.
I don't remember if I ever planned for them to be Always Evil - that annoys me too - but rather they ran away with destructive technology or something? Kind of like the speculation about humanity wiping itself out due to our warmongering ways. It wouldn't be all of them contributing to that, but a crazed few who took things too far. All the races the Aolmna took wiped themselves out in that way originally, so that would have been a repeat of that; a harsh reminder that the Aolmna couldn't reprogram nature, or something. What I've got now is probably better though, or at least it's something based in individual personalities rather than something on a species level.
The Bold has a mediaeval-ish level of technology anyway, so there wouldn't be all that much difference in terms of societies between ordered towns and chaotic bandits! And the Blight Wolves would have settlements; they wouldn't be sleeping in the dirt or anything. I'm imagining the Seraphim and Blight Wolves as fantastical versions of conservative and liberal mentalities, or at least the extreme, caricatured versions of them. Or maybe the more appropriate terms are things like authoritarian, libertarian? I don't understand politics enough and don't intend to make it political, though, god no. But it's essentially "we'd be better if the government controlled us" vs "we'd be better if we could do whatever we liked". Or something. They probably don't correspond to conservative/liberal, actually, considering all the American conservatives refusing to wear masks. It needs more planning!
That Samuel + Agatha thing looks quite interesting, and I've never seen that before! The Pokedex-before-they-were-invented is quite inspired! Is that just a one-off concept image, or did people try to make a mod, like they often do with those things?
I can definitely understand your frustrations about pouring all that work in and people just not caring. It's something I deal with every day, and I feel so sorry for other game devs who pour years into pet projects only to get less than 100 sales in the end and a couple of mediocre reviews. Sindrel Song is that for me, considering all I poured into it - not just time and energy, but heart too - and how little of a response it got. It gets to me all the time.
One of the frustrating things about it is that expectations scale, too. Sindrel Song didn't get zero response, and comments from you in particular and the other testers were thorough and fulfilling and I'm very grateful for those! But compared to what I was used to from MARDEK, it didn't feel like enough. Then when I ported MARDEK to Steam, the feedback was a fraction of what it originally got too, so that hurt. But then I feel so ungrateful.
Also, the only people who care about the things I've made are online people who found me because of those things! I've never known anyone in person who gave a damn. Some of them have shown polite interest, but obviously zone out quickly, so I just stopped even expecting anyone to care. It still hurt though.
And now I'm concerned that all the work I'm pouring into this thing will be for nothing. It's even worse that it's not just feedback I'm hoping for, it's enough money to keep doing it! I keep looking at the number of views on these blog posts, and feel worried and upset that they seem to be going down over time.
So I do understand that, and this seems to be a common thing about making anything. Makes me wonder why anyone sticks with it, honestly. I feel I sort of have to at this point because of how far I've come, but one of the reasons making this shorter one before committing to years of work is because if it doesn't do well, I can give it up and do something else!
I think think that in the very earliest works set in AF NPCs talked about the Elarna as if they were just Always Evil, so I'm happy the current plans seem much more interesting than that!
The dichotomy you describe fits better on the authoritarian/libertarian scale, yes. Of course these things are much more complex than just a simple 2D scale. I assumed the dichotomy was society vs. no society, but it seems to be more government-run society vs community-run society.
I think it was just a one-off piece of concept art! It does make me wonder how many of the Pokémon fangame projects that are started actually make it to a full release.
I've seen people compare happiness to a treadmill to some degree, the better things are, the higher our standards and expectations become to be happy and the more the status quo is taken for granted. It's why people in the past who lived in outright worse conditions weren't miserable all the time. Of course that phenomenon has its limits too
Anyway, I did enjoy Sindrel Song a lot, yes! I'm also following Divine Dreams development with interest!