The Trouble With Laziness

[Kyonko802]

This will get a bit wordy, so I hope I'm not eating into anyone's time.

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I like the think I'm a competent person, we all do. God forbid we all start acting like idiots and ruin everything around us.

However, I, just like the rest of you, am human. Because I am human I have vices, and one of these vices is something I struggle with to this day, in the development process as well as my personal life. I am a notoriously lazy man.

I'm going to relate my story and experiences to you guys as a display of what not to do.

Back when I started the development on Yukionna I was starry-eyed and rearing to go. I was a little kid that found a new toy. I could CREATE visual novels. I mean for God's sake I've been reading the things since I found out they existed, the fact that I could create one was absolutely astounding to me. Not only that, but it was super easy. Ren'Py is easy to use, and if you're just making a game with choices you only need simple code.

My body was ready.

I began discussing this with my close friend C, who is now also my Australian co-writer with an attitude. We hashed out the story together. I pitched him the idea, a Yukionna sealed in an ear ring for two hundred years could be the main love interest. He was sold immediately.

But then he pitched me an idea that made what I came up with about twenty times more awesome than it already was.

What if the main character and the selected love interest started hunting ghosts and other boogey men of the night?

I am a HUGE Supernatural fan, so this was like idea gold to me. I cherished it and loved it.

Then I started writing.

We both agreed that there was one tiny little problem. I don't mean to toot my own horn, but I'm a pretty good writer, and so is my friend, but neither of us can draw for crap.

'Okay', I thought, 'Then we need an artist.'

"C," I implored, "Do you know anyone that can draw?"

"Yes, my girlfriend in fact."

And Yukionna was on the road to completion...

Or so I thought.

She drew a nice concept piece for Yuki, my main heroine, and had even started to color her. Three days after I got a partially colored piece she told C she was way too busy IRL and couldn't work on a project like this.

This was the first artist who abandoned the project.

I asked C once more if he knew anyone that can draw, and he said, "Yeah, my other friend won't have a problem with this, she's a genius, you'll love her drawings."

I kept writing, and actually got a good chunk of Yuki's route done, then I contacted C's friend and she drew me up an amazing concept piece of Kyle and Yuki with all their hunter gear, you can view it in my project thread. She didn't like drawing 'weeaboo crap'(her words, not mine), so I told her she could give it a Ghost in the Shell kinda feel if she wanted. She seemed okay with this, almost excited even, but her tablet was broke and she couldn't get started until getting a new one.

I offered to buy her a new one and she said she would think about it.

Her turning down the payment/charity I was giving her should have been the first red flag I got, but I ignored it and kept writing.

A week later C told me she went off on a tangent about hating anime stuff, even the kind of concept piece she drew for me, then she refused to offer to buy the tablet and left us dead in the water.

And I kept writing.

But eventually the Air Force life consumed my time. I would get home and play video games and hang out with friends.

Work after I just got off work? Blasphemy! Heresy!

Fast-forward to a year later and Katawa Shoujo hits the internet shelves.

Everyone is astounded and breathless, including myself. I read KS and was absolutely blown away. I realize that not everyone liked it, but for a VN that was done with no budget it was amazing.

Under a whim, a sort of nostalgic longing for the past, I download Ren'Py and just start writing.

Then I come back to the Lemmasoft forums and find an artist, SweetDreams, who's pretty damn good at what she does.

I decide to hire her.

Because I've grown up a bit, and I've realized that for a project like Yukionna you can't have an artist working their ass off for you pro bono, it's just not done.

And now I'm writing again.

You see dear reader, it was my own fault that Yukionna has yet to be finished. If I had just kept on trucking and found another artist and HIRED them, I would have made progress. Instead I trusted in the words of people I barely know and gave them little more than faith that the project would work out in the end.

I'm not putting Yukionna on a budget, I'm not selling Yukionna.

I'm paying my artist as she goes and asking her for what I need as the story is fleshed out, because I have the money to do that, and the fact that Yukionna will be free gives me the freedom to not worry about profits.

I remember Four Leaf Studios saying "Asking for money would destroy this project." and now I realize why.

I can pay my artist, but if I start worrying about budget constraints and profit margins I'm gonna go insane, and Yukionna is gonna be half of what it could be at best.

I'm paying for this out of my pocket, and it is going to be worth every penny.

I got off my ass, and set out to finish what I started.

I hope this was at least somewhat enlightening, if not a bit scatterbrained.

[KomiTsuku]

Actually, this sounds exactly like the early days of IDHAS vs nowadays, down to the part where the AF absorbed (and still is absorbing) my time.

In the early days of IDHAS, I was unemployed. I had zero budget, and though I was not as dependent on outside help as I am today, I was very dependent on volunteers. I think I lost a total of 6 artists in the first year of IDHAS. Not being able to dangle a carrot in front of them is what I feel ended up causing them to drift away. Those scripts are still here, still sitting on my desk like the sad abandoned puppies they are. Cute puppies. Some of them did survive, but I did the art and it turned out crappy. Other are being redone, revived under the new budgets. Sadly, there are some that will likely never see the light of day. If I had pushed harder, looked for more help, could I have had a better chance of succeeding despite my lack of art talent and fiscal support? I do not believe so.

Being armed with a budget and a decree that all games other than H made by the studio really does give you a remarkable amount of freedom. Despite the fact that I could very easily turn Anima into commercial game, that making back some of the $15,000 going into it would be wonderful, I'm positive it would drive my sanity over the edge even more. When it comes down to it if I was really interested in making a buck I'd keep the one I earn saving the world. Statistics have shown me that I make more this way than being an indie. Without the worry about making my money and paying the bills, I can make games that I want to play. For me, this is a hobby, albeit an expensive one. The more I realize that, the more the answer to everything becomes apparent.

How much is it all worth to you? Once you figure that out, the road becomes remarkably clear. Not any easier, as the dozen or so games that are still awaiting release by me can attest, but much clearer.

[Applegate]

I've found that the problem with looking for artists is that, indeed, as a writer you start with an idea and you are driven and excited. Sadly, this excitement may not get your artist in. When I was looking for artists for "Nice Day", initially I had thought that, "Well, I am not asking for much. How hard can it be?", and then numerous artists later I knew! I did find one, of course; one who offered because they enjoyed the story I'd written.

For me, this is a hobby, albeit an expensive one.

Treating it like that, it's just like all those other hobbies, isn't it? If I look back now at how much money I'd spent on Pokémon cards I want to throttle my past self...

[applegirl]

Reading this gives me greater appreciation for you guys for pouring so much work/love/resources into each visual novel. I can't imagine pouring so much money into something that is given away for free. Here, it seems to be a norm, which really astounds me. For that, I thank you all for pursuing what you love. While the appreciation will sadly rarely reach the level its deserves (as many great visual novels are given lackluster number of responses/downloads), I'm sure there will always be one reader who downloads your future visual novel and finish with a huge smile.

Really, it is amazing what you guys work on and sacrifice for your art. Thank you.

[Kyonko802]

Considering limited downloads, it's all about the advertising pitch. I'll be giving this to family and friends that I know are into anime, I'm kickstarting a blog and a website, and hopefully shouting loud enough on Youtube gets the attention of the thousands of people that never visit my channel. Ultimately it's up to the project lead. There was a fascinating article that was linked in a thread here somewhere about being an indie developer and how you have to be a little bit of everything, writer, designer, artist, coder, marketer.

I've pretty much got everything down except for artist, which I've hired.

I doubt I'll get as many downloads as KS, but damn it people will love what I'm writing and it will be downloaded more than ten times because I want it to be worth the money I spend on it.

[Taleweaver]

I'm usually very lazy about marketing my own work. I put all my creative energy into completing a project; I usually don't put any effort into advertizing my finished stuff afterwards. It's probably because I work in sales; selling myself after hours doesn't really fit my definition of "free time". However, this has brought me the usual problems with low recognition. My best-downloaded game is "Daemonophilia", and that's the one DaFool made me a Google site for. And the best recognition I received was a mention on jayisgames for "Thirteenth Year", and that one was put on indiedb.

Aside from that, my recommendation is putting a game on download.com. Even my first piece of VN was eventually DLed a few thousand times from there, probably out of curiosity.

[Applegate]

I usually don't put any effort into advertizing my finished stuff afterwards.

I'd think more of us are lazy like that: finish a project and then uh, yeah! We're done, post it up, on with our lives. I just wouldn't even know where to start advertising yourself, given we are working with a niche thing and all. I know it's off-topic by quite a bit, but what ways would one go about advertising their Visual Novel in an effective way anyhow?

Effective meaning not mailing it to CNN and hoping they'll do an article on it. Rinse and repeat with all other well-read web sites.

[Kyonko802]

First of all theres this site. People on the LS forums are obviously going to give it a try. Secondly you can create a blog, but that alone won't be enough. If you just throw up a blog and leave it that counter is gonna be stuck at zero hits, you need to spread your advertising. If you have accounts on sites where people follow you post up a link to your blog. I have a fanfiction account and people tend to love my stories, and even with the 'no advertising' rules there are ways you can be sneaky with it. Also, remember the OELVN community as a whole, there are always people waiting for a good english VN.

[Applegate]

Well, I know those things already. Having a website obviously improves the odds of people finding your stuff, or at the very least making it easier by now forcing them to crawl through forums to find your specific story.

I mean more the exact way of "selling" your product to other people through means other than simply posting it here, linking to your site and calling it a day. Are there specific sites one could/should contact that can expose your work to others? A specific website related to Visual Novels, an indie website that is interested in Visual Novels, search engines or social groups dedicated to (E)VNs; those're the things I'm specifically interested in.

Once the android thing is done the obvious way is to shell out a one-time fee of $25 and uploading to the app market, but in the interim (and afterwards), which websites are appropriate to approach?

[DaFool]

Asking for money would destroy this project.

Depends on the project, really. Are you the copyright owner of the original concept for this project, or Raita?
Did countless people spend time working on your project that receiving money for it would be unfair to some contributors... or are the only ones working on your project you, your co-producing partner, and paid freelancers? If you feel your effort and investment is worth charging for, feel free to do so regardless of what people may complain "it's not up to commercial standard" whatever that is. But I personally only get into commercial release if the effort is just too much for me that it's becoming an unhealthy lifestyle... I would rather not deal with customer complaints and reporting income and other bureaucracy -- at least with a free game I can just forget about and go F- U to anybody who complains.

I only recognize two kinds of projects: freeware, where no money changes hands whatsoever, and commercialware, which are made with the best custom assets money can buy. But it seems like there two other models in increasing usage: donationware and what I'm now calling "investmentware" where higher quality freeware is made possible either by user contributions or with the writer/project leader just investing his own money into it. I'm thinking if anybody here is going to make a mecha VN it'll have to be investmentware since finding anyone to draw mecha at all, much less someone who can draw mecha really well, is damn near impossible to find.

[Kyonko802]

Yukionna will be completely free 'investmentware', I like that name. The only ones on the project are me, my co-writer, and my artist, and probably a BG artist if she ends up not being able to do backgrounds. All the money is coming from my own pocket, and charging for it would just be a hassle I don't need.

I'm in a very unique position.

I have the money to make a mid-high quality free VN, and I'm going to use it because there aren't many good free VNs.

I thought long and hard about it, and I came to the decision that I didn't want to sell Yukionna, because it gives me more crap to worry about that I don't need to be worrying about.