Games by JimD Newsletter – Good News, More Good News…Bad News?

Welcome to my 47th newsletter! Today is a huge newsletter for me, because there’s a lot to reveal. Normally I would use this first paragraph to talk about my personal life, but for a change my health has been getting better and not been much of a concern this month. I also have lots of news to share and though I’m excited about most of it, I do have some bad news as well. We will get to that in a bit.

One thing I always strive to do is provide candid information to my readers. I don’t want to hide anything about the writing process or game development or even my personal life. I feel like this is important in a community of people who may have been with me for up to ten years. Some of you remember the first release of Zombie Exodus in 2011 and have followed me since. I really appreciate the continued support and want to share with you the ups and downs of writing choice games.

Let’s get started.

Zombie Exodus: Safe Haven, Part 3

Part 3 is currently at 554,475 words! That’s over 18,000 words written since my last newsletter. I still have several thousand words to go which will put this next beta release over 20,000 words.

Good News #1 -- Chapter 12 is almost complete! Today I will be writing one of the final scenes at the Silverthorne’s camp. This weekend I will be starting the final scene which wraps up Part 3 and sets the stage for Part 4. Once I am finished with the main storyline, I will go back and fix all of the issues that have been reported to date and also write some of the missing scenes, most notably RO scenes. This will take me all of September. This means that I will start writing Part 4 in October, and patrons with access to the beta will be able to see the first release of the newest part at the end of October.

Good News #2 -- I have contacted Hosted Games and made my intention to submit to them by the end of September. Normally they wait until they receive files to set publication dates. Due to the success of Zombie Exodus: Safe Haven, they placed me in the development queue and gave me a tentative month for release. The condition is that I have to submit files by the end of September or I risk losing my spot.

Bad News -- The tentative release month for Zombie Exodus: Safe Haven, Part 3 is April, 2022. At the moment, Hosted Games has an 8-9 month delay between submission and release. They have so many games in their queue that this is the fastest they can produce a new release. It was a gut wrenching realization when I heard this news, but this is the reality of publishing today. Since I started writing for HG, there were few games in production. Nowadays with the success of my series, games like Fallen Hero and Wayhaven Chronicles and other successful games, and the explosion of new writers, Hosted Games is incredibly popular. They also make it fairly easy for new writers to publish through them, which is a good thing. It just means popular series get stuck in a very deep queue.

Ultimately, I need to factor in the publishing delay as I continue to write for Hosted Games. I had no idea the queue was so long. When I published Part 2, the delay was only 4-5 months. I can only imagine it’s going to continue to grow. I’m going to assume I will need at least a year before Part 4 is released after I turn in the files.

For many of you, this bad news will really not affect you at all. A large number of you have already played Part 3 and will have access to it for at least the next few months. I will also be releasing Part 3 in open beta, which is a requirement set by Hosted Games. Therefore everyone will be able to play Part 3 this year. It just means the app will not be updated until the spring of 2022.

Also realize that Part 3 will only be available in beta until the files are submitted to Hosted Games. I may be able to stretch this into October, but writers are not allowed to beta test games that are currently in the publishing queue. I will give at least a few weeks’ notice to let you all know when I will be taking down the beta links.

Vampire: The Masquerade - Out for Blood

Vampire: The Masquerade - Out for Blood released on July 29. If you are interested in this game, you can play the demo right now over on the Choice of Games website.

https://www.choiceofgames.com/vampire-the-masquerade/out-for-blood/

This was a tough release for me. While most of the reviews are positive, a fair number have been negative and thankfully some have offered constructive criticism. The majority of those criticisms suggest the game feels unfinished or short, and I don’t disagree. I definitely felt a bit rushed at the end to meet the deadline for publication. This is ultimately my fault for not planning ahead and also not putting in as much time and effort as I may have needed to. I’m not sure how much more time and effort I could have provided, but I do feel it was not a finished product. My ambition for writing so many storylines and having numerous paths throughout the game hindered my ability to give satisfying conclusions to those storylines. In a game like Zombie Exodus: Safe Haven, I can push back the release until I feel the game is ready. Even though I get pressure from readers to release the game, it’s not the same level of pressure as editors and contracts that dictate fixed dates.

I’m not sure if I will ever write another official title for Choice of Games again. That’s not to say I had a terrible time writing for them. In fact there are many advantages to writing for CoG. They provide a considerable amount of editing and coding support I do not receive on ZE:SH. They also paid for all of the artwork which consisted of 13 character portraits and an amazing splash page. I also enjoyed working with my primary editor who gave a lot of advice and ideas that made the game so much better. However, I preferred the freedom of writing for Hosted Games. I want to set my own timelines along with my readers and also enjoy receiving feedback from the community during development. For the most part, all beta testing for official titles occurs at the end of the game when you don’t have as much opportunity to make major changes in the story. I would say this is the major disadvantage to writing for them.

The saving grace of this experience is that I can continue to add and change content even after the game’s release. I will continue to make changes to improve the story and am also working on a major patch to add a lot of new content and fixes that have been requested. That’s the advantage of writing a textbased game. I can make changes even after the game has been released without as much difficulty as typical graphic based games.

That’s all for this month. Until next time, stay safe and thank you for all of your support!