Progress Report 2023.11.29: Try and Fail & Fail Again

Hi friends,

I hope you all had a good November!

This is going to be a bit of a difficult progress report to write this time. I didn’t do as many updates as I had planned coming out of October. Though I have stuck to my challenge of writing 100 words a day, I have had many ups and downs with it over the course of the month. It’s not really the kind of thing that I can write much about, other than “writing was done today!”

This year has been an immense struggle, both in terms of my physical and mental health. I am not doing well right now. Though I was hopeful I could turn things around in the back half of this year, despite my best efforts, I have not been able to.

Last week I was re-tagging some old posts that had fallen through the cracks and needed updating to correspond with their correct tiers. Looking back on 2021, I used to be able to publish 4 pieces a week and work on the game. That time is very much long gone and I am probably never going to be able to go back to working that way without burning myself out. The very blunt fact of the matter is that it is too much work for me to write the game and reliably create Patreon extras on the side. I have fallen off my promised benefits this year very badly and I keep trying to get them done and get them out, but I have no energy or interest in making them. My goal has always been to make my Patreon extras as high quality as I can make them—and with the way I am right now, it is just not possible to keep to those standards while maintaining forward progression on the game. I have no interest in creating off-the-cuff content that don’t meet those standards.

So, I am going to pause bonus content and short stories again until June 2024 at the earliest. The second installment of Ves’ short story is finished and will be released next month. The two pieces of bonus content that I hoped to release in November and December are cancelled.

If you are in a tier that receives the bonus content or short story benefits, you can find a backlog of old posts under their corresponding tags:

• bonus content 
• short stories 

Here are a few of my favourites from past posts:

• Twine Guide: SugarCube Basics
• When Less Is More: Player Characters, Customization and Leaving Room for Headcanon
• Arathian Fashion: A Primer
• Thick Skin: 8 Things I Learned About Constructive Criticism and How to Handle It
• A Map of Wayfarer's World
• Character Agency & Creating Active Characters
• Blood Rites
• Scattered to the Winds 

There will be changes coming to my Patreon tiers in beginning in January. The details of these changes and what you can expect will be announced next month.

Thank you so much for the continued support. It means more than I can say. 💖