October 7 Update
Added 2018-10-07 20:22:48 +0000 UTCWell, this week I did an adequate amount of stuff, if not quite as much as I wanted. I got wrapped up in several major pieces of work:
1) The release of Crimson Gray 1.5 on Steam and itch.io. It's selling faster than the first, and it's almost to the ten review inflection point, but at half the price and greater costs than the first, it has a higher bar to reach profitability. Setting a lower price may have been a mistake from a financial perspective, but I think the price seems fair and this one was always for the sake of the story, anyway.
2) Spent a while bugfixing for the TLS public release, of course. That seems to have gone okay, so the way is paved for work on TLS 0.39.0.
3) Responding to feedback on The Brightest Shadow and doing edits. Looks like this will just be an ongoing background thing for a long time. On this note, the picture for this post is a key character who only gets a couple scenes in this book for overall plot reasons.
4) Since all of this made it pretty hard to do creative work, I spent some free time jumping through tedious/administrative hoops for side projects. Expect to see Steam pages for The Last Sovereign, Don't Save the Princess, and Once Ever After eventually. But I won't dump them out because I want to give them proper attention.
5) I had aspirations to accomplish more, particularly doing more writing or work on Once Ever After, but I failed to do very much along these lines. I also apologize if I've neglected anyone's messages or comments - consider asking again.
Though the majority of the business work is done, next week I'm going to have to do some more to release CG 1.5 on other stores. I can stomach it for Steam, and itch.io makes the process easy, but my motivation to jump through hoops for the other stores will be near zilch. -_-
Hopefully I will be able to shake that off, won't have anything nasty pop up, and can sink into pleasant creative work again.
Comments
Oh! That's a pretty nice style, I would definitely consider it for one of the maps - I want them to feel different, so I was assuming I'd find several cartographers. Right now I'm more focused on TLS and I don't actually have my own map properly updated. But I will seriously keep you in mind and maybe contact you in the future with more info!
Sierra Lee
2018-10-09 20:36:19 +0000 UTCIf you need a map for your fantasy novel I'm the one who did: <a href="https://practicalguidetoevil.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/t2iwdoy.jpg" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://practicalguidetoevil.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/t2iwdoy.jpg</a> And that is the totality of my portfolio. Yet if you need a similar style map and have found no one else yet, give me a rough sketch.
snusnumrik
2018-10-09 15:57:47 +0000 UTCIt's a little bare bones, but somebody has already made a guide: <a href="https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1531436693" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1531436693</a> Hope that helps!
Sierra Lee
2018-10-09 12:15:26 +0000 UTCWhile I want to see a little more information about how Steam treats adult games, yes, I would like to update past titles! Not sure whether it makes sense to update them or to do DLC - either will involve doing a lot of administrative work for Steam, so I will have to devote a chunk of time to figuring that out at some point. I can't say exactly when TLS will be getting a Steam release. Valve has approved the page, and the page needs to be up for two weeks before I can officially launch. However, doing that will require spending another chunk of time on marketing instead of making games, and right now that doesn't appeal. Thank you for purchasing the new Crimson Gray! While I'm grateful for your support and especially your review, if you stick around as a patron, you will earn free copies of future games - just ask!
Sierra Lee
2018-10-09 12:14:29 +0000 UTCIs it possible you or someone else can create a guide for Crimson Gray 1.5 on Steam? I know that this may spoil some content but it would be very helpful for some people and may even attract others to buy it. (I personally have bought some games after reading the guides as they made me more interested in playing the games myself)
Belly97
2018-10-09 12:04:21 +0000 UTCNow that Steam is allowing adult content onto their site will you be updating your games to natively have the adult patches content or releasing free adult content DLC? Also, you kind of mentioned it but will The Last Sovereign be getting a Steam release and if so can you say when? I just bought Crimson Gray 1.5 on Steam and I am looking forward to playing it and I will be reviewing it on there later.
Belly97
2018-10-09 11:52:17 +0000 UTCUp to nine reviews, Steam labels the game only as not having enough reviews to give a rating. This is effectively a score of zero, even worse than a game with 90% negative reviews. Now that I have 10+ reviews, I get a little thumbs up icon and the game's rating is declared "Positive." This rating determines how high a game is listed relative to others at various points on Steam, so getting to this stage helps the game's visibility. After that, the next inflection point is 50 reviews, which unlocks the "Very Positive" rating and lists a game higher than most on the site. None of this makes or breaks sales, of course - there are way too many variables involved. But it's one of the few metrics that matters and is within a dev's control, so it's nice to get.
Sierra Lee
2018-10-09 03:23:53 +0000 UTCI'm curious what do you mean by "ten review inflection point"? What is the significance of having ten reviews?
2018-10-09 02:51:52 +0000 UTCThank you for your support, glad to have you with us!
Sierra Lee
2018-10-08 10:50:27 +0000 UTCJust found your patreon, sometimes I really wonder how I missed gems like this for so long. Love that artwork, really like how complex his armor is. :O
Gurdin Alehammer
2018-10-08 08:13:37 +0000 UTCLooking forward to seeing the Last Sovereign on Steam!
2018-10-07 22:45:34 +0000 UTCThat art... Not bad. Another! I wonder if your concept artist is now wondering how the hell to sell his/her payment of a crumpled golden helm.
Lamsey
2018-10-07 20:31:32 +0000 UTC
