2024 Commitment
Hello,
(this was copied and pasted from Patreon just to keep everyone in the loop.)
This is Matthew and I am here to talk about some stuff regarding this Patreon account.
Let me start with the less than good news. I would like to apologize for neglecting my obligations near the end of last year. Parking Ticket Mayhem and Scaling Up Industries did not include Patreon member mentions and I also didn't release early access versions of those games either. Although right now I believe most people supporting me are friends who would support me anyways, it is still a level of disrespect and negligence to your support that I would not like to continue going forward.
So, that leads quite smoothly into the changes I am making. Starting 2024, I am making a commitment to myself to be more professional. I will be taking my commitments more seriously and will be moving forward with more transparency. This restructuring coincides with the rebranding I am doing.
Games from now on won't be published unless the Patreon member mention is added somewhere. I will also been setting a reminder to publish regular written progress reports (either monthly or bi-weekly, to be determined). These reports will be public and probably will be able to be posted on multiple platforms for your convenience. At the same time, the most recent early access versions of my games will be published if applicable. Game jam games or short projects (under 2 weeks) won't get early access versions.
To that point, I want to do more long term projects. Heavy trucking was the only project I spent more than a month on and I think it would be a good idea for me to do more of them. This type of project would be what I would be releasing early access to. I have a couple ideas for larger projects I want to make. That is part of the reason why I am making these changes. Whatever I do end up making, I want to make sure that this is sustainable for long term commitments.
You may have also noticed the new logo and redesigned website, this is part of the rebrand I mentioned earlier. I really want to make this year the year I do big things. I want to make this dumb hobby project mine into a brand that can be recognized for it's quality, consistency, and commitment to transparency.
So, with all that out of the way, let me get into what I'm actually doing.
Yesterday, I published The Pig Pen, a small, minimalist arcade action game. This game is a landmark for, among other things (First to fulfill the commitment of patreon thanks, first to have the new logo. first game I've made to have an online leaderboard, First godot 4 game, ect.), being submitted to the first ever game jam I have hosted. The jam was called One Last Game 2023 and it took place between the 29th of December to the 1st of January. This game jam was not only a success, it completely blew expectations out of the water. With over 100 people joining and over 30 entries.
As for my other projects, Scaling Up Industries was a ton of fun to make, gained me a bunch of experience with working in teams, and I believe we made a really quality game considering the time restraints. Parking Ticket Mayhem exploded in popularity right after it's launch, it is now sitting at ~8,700 views on itch.io and another 8,100 views on newgrounds.
Heavy Trucking has made $304.69 (USD) to date, most (about $208.59) of which coming in the first few weeks. It has also gone on sale during itch.io's offical halloween sale and winter sale (which is still going on during the time of writing), making $46.60 and $24.50 (gross USD) respectively. Leaving $25 of copies that were sold for full price. Of this, ~7% goes to payment processors, ~10% has been chosen to go to itch.io, and then ~24% is taken by the tax man. Leaving ~$200 net. ~$40 went to getting me a new mouse after my dumb stupid razer mouse started double clicking and flaking out one me.
I am planning on making and maintaining a page on my website for statistics for people to look at so they can see how many videos, downloads, money, ect. my games make. Transparency is important to me because I believe withholding information only leads to speculation and conspiracy. Which is why (most of) my projects are on github.
Speaking of github, that is another thing I would like to talk about. All of my projects will be published publicly on github with two exceptions. One, if the game has online or proprietary software in it (such as The Pig Pen with it's online leaderboard or if I published a game on console, which i doubt will happen this year, that will probably not be allowed to be published). This is to ensure safety with these online services and so I don't get sued by Big Nintendo. Two, if a game contains NSFW (adults only) content. Github has a strict content policy and because of that games with NSFW content would be violating their policy if I were to publish them there. So, to solve that problem, I have made a git.gay account for if I want to do that.
Also, late last year I uploaded the source code for an unfinished project I was working on titled Cranky Raccoon for playdate. I had no plans on finishing it any time soon, so I thought it would be best to publish it on github and let people study it if they wanted to.
Alright, I've been rambling for a while now, so I will give a TL:DR and see you in the next progress report that will hopefully not be as lengthy as there won't be as much to catch up on.
TL:DR - Thank you for your support. Sorry for not doing the things I said I would. 2023 was a great year and I plan on making 2024 even better. More frequent updates are to come.