Yep this just about sums it up...
https://epicmeal.wixsite.com/watashinomono/post/november-23rd-update Yeah, its the other way around seeing as from their blog, there hasn’t been an update since November 23 2019.
and unless they switched channels, their videos are gone.
Watashi no Mono is completely and utterly dead, and from what I can gleam from the blog, there wasn’t any build release for anyone to play until its been ‘completely finished’ which as you can see, it hasn’t been even marginally close.
It’s still extremely sad that this developer was unable to do anything because of an extremely common problem that happens with indie game developers.
Volunteers and loyal support are the heart of all indie game development. No one on the entire planet is talented enough to code a quality game, AND make their own 3D models, AND do all of the voice acting, AND make every single animation, all on their own. Game development requires a dedicated team with a wide variety of skills in order to bring it to completion. And because most indie games are developed by completely freelance developers, it is absolutely crucial to have a steady stream of volunteers available to create and maintain that development team.
It’s difficult to code productively without assets. A vast majority of game scripts rely on certain conditions (which we’ll call “flags” for the sake of simplicity) in order to execute, and many — if not all — of these flags are attached to certain game objects, such as a particular object/character/sound/etc. performing a certain action. If that object isn’t in the game, it obviously can’t perform the action necessary to trigger that flag, thereby making it impossible to test the script as intended.
This is why volunteer assets are so crucial to indie game development; if you don’t have enough volunteers to make the assets you need, it essentially throws a monkey wrench into the entire process. Whenever an indie game’s development is delayed or cancelled, it is — more so than not — due to the lack of available volunteers to create the necessary assets, not just the fault of the programmer(s) themselves.
I wish more people would understand that game development is a team effort, not just on the shoulders of a single programmer or director. If you want a game to succeed, and if you want to minimize delays, you have to be willing to support it throughout ALL of its development, not just at the initial hype stage. Because the minute that support disappears...is the minute the first nail is driven into the coffin.
