General Update.

Hello,

It's been a while since my last "state of play" or "General update" on things other than just development. Strap in, this is going to be a very long post.

Topics to cover are:

- Development update
- Steam Release news
- Improvements to the Patreon page
- Changes to the goals
- Prospective release date of v0.4.0

The development update was covered in a public post here: LINK 

STEAM RELEASE

There wont be. I setup the game page, updated the build and added achievements - the whole lot and submitted the game for review to be added to Steam. I mentioned about the daughter, and that there are no lewd scenes with her in. I figured why hide things, be open and honest about the content in the game.

Steam have no problem with the relationship between the MC and Melissa, so on that front I had no worries.

Steam rejected the game because of 'u-age content'. Now I know we're all here shaking our heads and thinking, "what?" because there is none, nor will there be. My initial gut response was to question why they had taken this decision. I assumed it was in relation to Emily and I pointed out she is not included in any adult scenes and is in fact killed off early in the game.

Steam wouldn't offer any reason why the game was rejected. There is nothing I can do to change this, once Steam blacklist your game, that's it - they wash their hands of it. I cannot even make changes (though I do not see what I could change at this point). The only exception would be a large game studio with lots of money, Steam would bend over and spread their cheeks for that.

Am I salty? You can bet your arse I am. So, the Steam release is dead in the water. I spent a lot of time and energy working on this. I have, however, learnt a few things along the way, chiefly that even though games with similar content are on the platform (and wholly offensive games such as "sex with Hitler" are seen as acceptable), that doesn't mean your game will be accepted.

So what does this mean for Dreams of Reality? Well, I will have to scale back some of the ideas I had for the game. I was hoping to use the possible income from steam to allow me to complete longer and more detailed animations. This is an area I could see some real improvements in, if I could off-load this to another PC.

Does this mean development will stop? Absolutely not. Scaling back the animations does not mean no animations, and I hope one day with your support I can get to a stage where I am able to increase the amount of them in the game.

I know some of you will be disappointed with this news, Honestly, it floored me as I was not expecting it - that's one of the reasons it's taken me so long to give this update. The single most annoying thing is, it still shows on my steam games list.

It's like it's taunting me...

IMPROVEMENTS TO THE PATREON PAGE

I have a google analytics account set up for Patreon. It shows basic information like how many people visit the page, how long they stay and where they came from (referral, search engine, or a direct link (like from discord)). No personal information, just general stuff.

One of the metrics is bounce rate, these are visitors who view the home page and then close the page without clicking or interacting with the page itself. My Bounce rate is around 85%, which is very high and it got me wondering "Why did they choose to leave the page?". I believe a large part of this is down to the initial 'welcome' post that non-supporters see when visiting.

Although that page has been updated a couple of times in the past, a lot of the information is outdated (the release cycle for one - hah, the wishful thinking of a dev!). The images are... Well, we all know of what I am capable of now, compared to what I used to do 3 years ago when the page was created.

There are also no images actually from the game, nor any mention of the other projects I do, YouTube and digital artwork.

So I feel it's long overdue a refresh, a new lick of paint. This is something I will be doing over the next few weeks (In between downtime from the game itself). My initial cursory glance produced the following list of things to improve:

- Improve Images + more of them
- About me section
- Details about DoR
- Details about YT/Art
- Links to social media
- Mention the tiers
- Mention upfront billing
- DoR Trailer video
- Update the goals
- Additional Tier(s) / Rewards?
- That "thank you" message... that's a very old image.

Some of these elements are already present, some will be new sections I add. Expect to see some changes soon!

CHANGES TO GOALS

When I initially setup the goals I had very little idea of what is achievable, designing a set of wallpapers (at the time) seemed a big task. Back then I was rendering via CPU, now I have a GPU and producing a 4k render is not as much of an issue as it once was.

I will be adjusting the goals to be more in line with what I actually want to achieve, rather than a blanket copy + paste of someone else's. The ultimate goal of being self-sustained is, well, a goal. But I think we can add a few more into the mix.

The initial goal will be the wallpapers at 50 supporters. I still will retain the animation goal, but this can be expanded to the graphical update of previous animations.

There will be more details on these in the comming weeks. If there is a goal idea you think is a good one, let me know.

Part of this update I want to focus on the tiers themselves. I've always had a feeling that the rewards for each tier are not as attractive as they could be. I'm going to be looking at each tier and adjusting the rewards given. I will not be removing anything (although the poll votes are... pointless) But I do want to add some more distinctive rewards. Of course, these also need to be achievable. It's all well and good saying "Get X every month" if It ends up being too much of a drain on my time.

Frankly, my time is limited, and I have to spread it around many different areas, even writing updates on patreon is a time resource. I also need to remind myself to take at least 1 day to myself every couple of weeks.

Here is an example of the type of image I want to 'improve' for the welcome page. (note: I've not post-worked it yet, it's literally just finished rendering as I type)

DREAMS OF REALITY CHAPTER FOUR (0.4.0) (PART ONE) RELEASE

If you've made it this far, you deserve a reward. Have a cookie. What do you mean you scrolled and skipped?

In the development update I mentioned I was about 50% done with this updates... update. I am aiming for a summer release (June / July). Of course, things may change. But this is a reasonable timescale for me to work towards.

Well, that was a very long-winded post. I will finish with the fact I am grateful for the support of all of you, from $1 to $35. I'm blown away by those who do that every month. Some of you have been with me from the very start, that's a humbling thing.

I am genuinely interested in your thoughts and feedback, even if it's negative. Let me know some ideas for tier rewards you would like in the comments, or perhaps a Goal reward. For now,

Stay safe all.

Cenc