Re: [English MonsterGirl VN] Quest Failed By FrostWorks- Demo Available
It's a bit silly to make such a comparison, the people here that are peeved at Patron are most likely the people that have donated before, or have at least considered it and watched the scene unfold into disaster. Piracy is normal on a forum like this, that's true, but keep in mind there are a variety of reasons for that as well (many Japanese games being notoriously difficult to purchase earnestly, or people just not having the financial means to buy these games) but asserting that people are just spiteful and greedy is pointless and senselessly inflammatory to the community here. As for pulling out of projects, by then it's usually too late and nobody likes to spend money on absolutely nothing.
Anyway, I do see some sense in what you're saying, but a big part of a growing industry is the necessity of failures failing, and the Patreon model is simply too exploitable to keep going as it is. We've already seen some very positive changes actually, with Patreon introducing a "per update" payment model and similar systems, but there's still a lot of work to be done for this to be a proper platform.
The main complaint I have is same as with kickstarter, people often put their entire project on the line on it whereas the successful projects will typically only use it as a boost to be able to do more than they initially plan, this attitude simply shows they are committed to their project more so than using it as a financial gain, as such these people/groups are much more likely to stick through hardship in their projects. I find that as a rule it's best to wait until there has been at least some work/progress into the project before deciding whether or not it's worth supporting, an initial demo might seem incredibly promising but all of that is meaningless unless realized, and what someone asking for support would really need to do is show they are actually capable of properly realizing their project.
Currently there's two Patreons I've contributed to; Hreinn games' Noxian Nights and Sierra Lee's The Last Sovereign, and both projects had been well under way before I finally decided to pledge any kind of support as the people behind them had proven to be capable of regular updates with consistent quality. Conversely I had considered Malise and the machine, but ultimately decided against it due to the project being very slow with little to show in terms of progress. Similarly, I have my eyes on Viperv since there's already been good games in the past, though there has been no real visible progress for months. It's not as if Patreon itself is a completely terrible platform, but there is currently very little reason for people to use it as there is no guarantee of quality nor any kind of accountability, the balance of risk vs reward is just harshly skewed and as such it's only sensible for people to withhold support. Adding a kind of accountability would not only improve trust towards the platform, but provide incentive for successful Patreons to keep working and weed out those who would otherwise exploit the model, such a change however is never going to happen unless the patrons demand it.
Another big red flag to me is usually backer rewards (or stretch goals in the case of kickstarter) for something like Patreon which requires a degree of mutual trust, where a content creator is typically asking a kinds of payment in advance I personally feel that too should be mutual and content should be delivered as freely as the support that is expected of patrons, backer rewards also often distract from the main project or are a kinds of "pay to deny others a service" (after all, if a backer reward did not exist it could simply be offered to everyone) It would also help with clarity to show potential patrons that you're not necessarily buying a product but are simply supporting a creator. Take the case of The Last Sovereign, patrons might donate thinking they're buying Sierra Lee's time in creating that game, but recently instead of The Last Sovereign we got an entirely different game which was made in a sorts of hiatus, the creator kept working diligently but wanted a break from the main project, which is something that needs to be clear in advance and not every potential patron might understand that they're not buying something, they're supporting someone, backer rewards might be a nice service in response to that but I feel that should be VERY limited, the content creator should be working on the content, after all.
And finally, in case people are wondering whether or not this is off topic, I'd say addressing and discussing doubts of the platform of Patreon is rather relevant to the nature of this thread, might be for the best to get this out of the way unless the actual OP disagrees.
