Fool who foolishly dreams of foolish dreams

This post is a bit more personal than usual. As you may know, it is my dream to create virtual worlds for others to enjoy.

I have tried to work 30-40 hours a week on Seven Ducks Studios and Elysian Eclipse for the past few years. I learned a lot and I am very happy with the progress I've made and all the support I have received from the community.

However, I need to somehow pay for food, shelter, and well, the entire development costs of the game. Who would have guessed. So on top of the game development, I'm also working another job in the tech industry to finance all of that.

While my workplace itself is pretty decent, the industry seems to keep getting worse. It's a complete shit show. For more informarion, please contact Schmillbert, our new AI assistant who can't answer your questions, but is a Nazi for some reason.

Have you noticed how almost all the money in the industry is being funneled to Microsoft, Google, Amazon and other giga corparations, whose only purpose is to ruin the internet and our planet? I do not want to use your app. I do not want to talk to your ChatGeePeePoo. What the fuck is even happening anymore?!

I'm pretty much overworking myself by working two jobs, 60+ hours per week, while a lot of the money goes to malicious actors. And as if that wasn't worse enough, I'm living in an ugly city, just so I can get to work easier. (Why do I even have to go anywhere? All my work is digital?) And then I spend the rest of the night playing video games, because I don't have any energy left. Very fun, yay.

By keeping this up, I'm slowly destroying myself. I'm sleep deprived. I have mood swings. My skin is itching. I just can't take it anymore. But my life won't change from ranting on the internet.

So, I have quit my job and moved away from the city and have way more nature around me now. I can now fully focus on what I love. Making video games. Spending time with my (picture related) pets. And just, idk, existing without being pressured to constantly generate profit for other people.

I have saved up a decent amount of money from my job and plan to now live off those savings combined with the donations I get from the community. Yes, I'll have a lot less disposable income and need to be more careful, but it's totally worth it. I am already feeling a little better and there are even (picture unrelated) deer here!

This also means, I am more than ever reliant on your donations. Keep in mind that this is purely to keep me and the studio afloat, and not some kind of product subscription. All releases of Elysian Eclipse and other projects that I post on Ko-fi / Patreon will always become completely free for everyone after some time.

I haven't fully figured out a new work schedule yet and still have to move a lot of stuff over. The things that I had originally planned for the rest of the year were:

Finishing the base of the fishing system

Finshing the plant editor mechanics

Recreating the winning plants from the contest

Creating the second space stage prototype

Holding a new contest

Those should all still happen eventually, with a lot of smaller things squeezed between them. Once I have recovered a bit more, both my morale and the quality of my work should greatly increase! Get ready for more frequent updates and lots of funny creatures!

The August 2023 UMA breed breakdown is live!!

I highly recommend checking out the sheet yourself, for easier viewing, and because I'm too burnt out to type out a proper post here... I'm also leaving the option to put comments on the sheet open for a little bit, if anyone wants to celebrate the winners or pay their respects to the losers.

And speaking of winners and losers, here's a short breakdown:

Most popular breeds: Imperial, Skydancer, Wildclaw

Least popular breeds (accounting for breed age): Bogsneak, Banescale, Mirror

Most popular poses: Skydancer F, Imperial M, Wildclaw M

Least popular poses (accounting for breed age): Bogsneak M, Banescale M, Bogsneak F

Most balanced pose ratio: Mirror (509 M to 506 F)

Least balanced pose ratio: Skydancer (3821 F to 1306 M)

Second Halloween 2023 article: Talia Bob Mair shares the design reasoning, backstories and other in-depth details on a number of creatures from her increasingly popular indie RPG, Brutal Orchestra.

veils: cringe

aether: cringe

aberration: cringe

fae: cringe

guardian: cringe

mirror: cringe

tundra: cringe

nocturne: cringe

gaoler: cringe

banes: cringe

wildclaw: cringe

obelisk: cringe

ridges: cringe

pearlcatcher: cringe

skydancer: cringe

imperial: cringe

coatl: cringe

snapper: cringe

undertide: cringe

sandsurge: cringe

spiral or bogsneak: very cool, epic