Where are we? The Unity Kerfuffle and a Poll

Alright, so sorry about going radio silence there. I have a lot to say, so be ready. If you don't read it all, at least read the last topic. It's relevant to everyone.

What got Done

First off, let's talk about how much I got done for the game this month. The short of it is: not a lot. I have two drafts of new events: the conclusion to Bersa's story, and a sex scene for Jonathan. I have also managed to fix a bug that has been haunting the game for a while regarding having a party of four (this one was way too time-consuming, honestly). Basically, to my chagrin I did not manage to do enough for an update.

There is another reason for that aside from that opportunity I mentioned previously, which kept me busy. The whole Unity bullshit situation that happened recently.

Unity

I won't explain what this is about to keep this long post short. Google it, if you need to.

Now, as far as I know, their new policies, even if implemented, would not affect us. However, I have been skeptical of Unity for a while now. I saw someone phrase one of my major problems quite eloquently:

"Unity has a ton of features, old and new. But the old are all deprecated, and the new have been in beta for years."

Case in point: their UI. For those who don't know, Unity has actually three types of UI systems. The original, the revamped one, and the new one that borrows heavily how it works from CSS and HTML. The first one has been deprecated for a long time; the second is, to put it mildly, absolute dog shit and a bitch to work with; the third one is great, but although Unity claims it has been fully released, it's still filled with bugs; lacks features, documentation and customizability.

Since the game is text based, I put my faith in them and decided to use the new UI, despite getting the shitty old one to work. I think it was a good decision, but it led to a lot of bugs, since I had to redo a lot of the back end, along with the front end at once. Not to mention the bugs that were entirely Unity's fault.

But fine. It is what it is. Software development can be like that.

My other major problem with Unity was their leadership. Since their CEO said the monetization thing, I've been just waiting for the other shoe to drop. I knew something sketchy was on the horizon. And lo and behold, here it is. Their new monetization policies.

I really feel for the Unity devs, I have interacted with many of them, and they all seem like passionate, good people doing their best. Fuck those scummy suits.

But to put it bluntly: I do not want to work with Unity anymore. As such, I have taken this month to explore other alternatives to port the game to.

Now, I know for a fact that the biggest pitfall that an indie dev can fall into is rebuilding their game over and over. I have seen it before. I do not wish to fall into this, but due to the extenuating circumstances, I feel as if I have no choice. This would be the fourth time I have to redo the game's inner workings, but alas.

Godot

The engine I have taken a liking to is Godot. I had toyed with it before. It's a good alternative: it's open source (which I always prefer), has many features, and has C# support which would make porting the game much easier.

I am still in the early stages of it, though, and rebuilding the game will definitely take time. So I see two options. Vote for them in the poll, please, so I know which you would prefer.

Refunds

Now, due to how both last month and this one went, I feel it's only right to offer a refund of this month to anyone who wants it. Just contact me privately or in the comments, and it shall be done.