Phedro Lipecheno
patreon
On v.0.5 and the future of Thicker Treat
🕑 Added 2022-12-22 04:03:15 +0000 UTCHi. Voca here. Sorry for the silence. More than the now evident delay, there's another matter that recently came up. I've been going back and forth writing this post for the last couple of days after learning some not great information and trying to figure out what to do about it moving forward. Long story short: after talking about side gigs with a coworker, I recently found out that, come 2023, my current company is going to start demanding employees to report all external sources of income. They're creating a new department to look into and then approve/reject side businesses to avoid conflicts of interest. And, while Thicker Treat creates no such conflict, showing income in my taxes from making a NSFW dating sim is not going to get me a smiley "approved" stamp either.
So I find myself writing this, which is hard. I consider myself more of a gamer than a developer, and I know how sh*tty it is to find a nice, enjoyable game in the genre, just to have it cancelled halfway through. On that line, my plan for Thicker Treat has always been (and kind of still is) to see it through to its conclusion as a full game. However, beginning January I'll no longer be able to accept support through Patreon or other channels. In fact, as of today, I have paused all billing for a month and encourage you to cancel your memberships accordingly to avoid any issues.
Where does that leave v.0.5, Gabrielle, Wanda, and Deborah?
Like I suggested above, this does not mean the game is cancelled. It just means that I'll have to cut funding for development and slow things down substantially to manage the costs myself (electricity, 3D assets, etc.) In fact, I'll resume finishing what's left of v.0.5 between Christmas and New Year's Eve and it will be accessible to all Oct, Nov, and Dec patrons as promised. After that, the plan is to add Wanda's and Gabrielle's path for v.0.6 and make it available as early access to all 2022 patrons in 2023. (I figure, it's only fair to have that 'extra' content to thank everyone for their support.) And, after that? I guess I'll move any development news back to the forum.
I know it's not what you all might have been hoping to hear, so I'm sorry about that. I'll continue discussing this (and answering any questions/comments) in a separate post tomorrow,
Comments
XxK1
As I have a few days left in my subscription, this is going to be my final post on this page (baring a response from Voca but I won't hold my breath). Here we are a month later now 4 months since this guy has said a word to anyone on any platform. Can't ask for updates on the WG forum because its against the sites rules, so there's an automatic shield to devs that don't update their fans. He hasn't said a word on Patreon either, and its not possible to see if a creator is online here unless they engage in comments or actually post something. So I sent him a message on another site that he's been active on this entire time and just recently he made his account private. That's the final straw, I have lost so much respect for this dude. So now, nobody can hold him accountable for anything because he's completely blocked any communication from all sites in this scene. I have never seen a dev that has no respect for paying consumers worse than this guy. Life always has other plans for everyone, and things aren't always going to go the way you planned, but at no point could you sign in and tell the hundreds of paying supporters that you're not coming back? You said you halted payment in January but you've had no issue with taking money for these last 3 months. I hate having to comment on this because I have always been a lurker and I just want to enjoy the content I payed for. I encourage everyone that still thinks he's coming back to unsub and stop wasting your hard earned money on someone that doesn't appreciate it. Voca if you're reading this (and I know you are), just do us all a favor, if you don't care about this game anymore and if you don't care about hundreds of paying supports just delete this patreon. ✌
rodney evans
Sucks, just joined to today to get it, well that kinda sucks.
XxK1
When your hobby is making you 4 figures a month on top of your everyday job, there needs to be some sort of moral thought that if I have a setback or whatever the case, people need to be kept in the loop. I sent him a message almost a month ago now and he read it but hasn't responded to it. Not that I needed him to stop everything he was doing and respond to my whims and needs but it just made me laugh that logging in here or the forum to say anything to the hundreds of supports is too difficult. All in all, this game and dev is reminding me of Forks and we all know how that turned out. Spend your money better.
Xander1990
Sadly i think it's safe to assume the game is dead at this point. Like others have said, it's nothing to do with the delays, life happens but since october the impression was made that the update was pretty much done. A message to atleast let people know it wasn't happening is the bare minimum to the people who have paid for months and not heard a thing in a quarter of a year now. To be honest the impression that was given was that the patreon was being taken down due to vocas job but that hasn't happened and bar the odd comment on this post everyone has been pretty patient.
XxK1
I can see that the rep of this game and dev have seriously taken a hit here over the last few months but I think now someone needs to say what I think everyone is feeling right now. A month ago, I went on the forum and vented not just mine, but everyone's frustrations with this whole situation and just wanted to know why everyone just sits back and says nothing when a dev goes radio silent for months and continue to pay for no new content. The last post on this page and the forum was in December, and now here we are about to be in April and we still haven't heard anything. Everyone was so quick to remind me that he told everyone what his status was and just wait until its ready. The last version of this game was in October, and the newest version has been delayed multiple times since then. I'm not upset with waiting this long for the newest version as I've been a Patron of other games with 4-5 month gaps in versions, but the difference with those devs were they would update the patrons even when there wasn't going to be any progress. What I'm upset with is the fact that we haven't heard from Voca in 3 months here, when I know he's been active and online it feels like a slap in the face to not only myself, but everyone that pays to him every month hoping for any news.
Traegerthorn
So it's too much for you to deliver a project to paying patrons, but you're happy to take their money for nothing? Incredibly fucking lame.
Xander1990
Sorry man got to be honest here. Your work is great but i can't help but feel this is getting ridiculous now. 0.5 was meant to be an october release. I understand it being delayed but each month there has been a post saying its basically done and a lot of people paid money for the months leading to the December post. I get and respect the job situation and the reason for no longer using patreon, but you also state here that between xmas and new year you were working on the update. I won't speak for everyone but its been really disappointing the way this has been handled man. Life has other priorities but to post an update letting people who paid you money for months costs nothing and is ten minutes out of your life. For me it's completely disrespectful.
tomoboxy
it just keeps bringing me to the MediaFire home page when I click the link
Xander1990
Fully understand i'm just looking for a bit of clarity. It seemed that the update was pretty close months ago and obviously we've all paid/supported. No doubt voca has stuff going on and i'm not saying i demand it be released just looking to see if it's still happening as he's gone mia on here and the forum for a few weeks now.
Romanska Polanski
I think we just must be patiend
Xander1990
Hey man sorry to pester but is there any update on 0.5?
Matslap203
Hi sorry to ask but do you have more news about the comming update?
Xander1990
Sorry to hear this man. Thanks for letting us all know and i hope either way it all works out!
mrbill619
That's a bummer, glad I could at least support you for a month.
Mr_Adonitologist
Wishing all the best and will follow the project regardless so I'd like to chip in. Not an expert but, you could try a second bank account that isn't for business or at an extreme a foreign bank account where the company doesn't operate? Depending on the laws where you are from it could be declared as an un-earned income and wouldn't need to be handled by the company!
Nick Golden
Thank you for everything and making a great game so far!
DAVID EVANS
Agreed! Could we buy you a coffee on Ko-Fi? Would that count as income?
Natahlia Zaring
Well, feel free to hit me up if you decide to! Especially if you need some copy or dialogue.
Izdar
sad to hear, do you need to include specifics of the income? would it be possible to just declare like "donations for development of 3D art/Interactive visual novel"?
Kiso
really sad... but keep going on your own pace. maybe get some help if needed. the project is absolutly great!
Voca Labs
I've thought about this for long. And, honestly? This might make asking for help a little more likely. The main concerns stopping me were not being able to maintain privacy while sharing Patreon earnings and, on the other hand, to ask people to give a hand entirely for free (which would not be fair at all). So, now I'm thinking about it as a real possibility. If I decide that's the best way forward (I'm still a little on the fence about keeping creative control), I'd welcome help with coding and writing tasks.
Matslap203
Sorry for the bad news. We will stil continue to follow your work. Enjoy the holidays.
Natahlia Zaring
Are you potentially looking for help with development in the future to share some of the workload and potentially help make finishing it more viable?
Varlin
Damn, that is a bummer. Glad to see you are going to continue development despite everything. Pretty much every good game ends up getting stopped before seeing completion it seems like so it is a relief you are hanging in there despite the roadbumps. It feels bad we won't be able to financially support the game anymore but at least we will be able to hang around and at least support the continued development as a community.
Bryan
^totally agree man can’t wait and take care of yourself man…Merry Christmas and a happy new year
necrid110
Obviously sad news (both for you and us) but this does seem to be the best course of action. Still, excited for new 0.5 and 0.6 content even if it's much longer between releases!
