Posted December 31, 2024 by GROVE DEVELOPMENT
Hey all! We hope you've all been enjoying a most wonderful holiday season! The new year is almost upon us! We've been reflecting on GroveDev and our games, and we'd like to share with you our plans for the new year going forward!
We have three big announcements, with some more detailed explanations to follow.
- First: GROVE is getting an engine update and system rework!
- Second: We intend to start a very simple Patreon for those who wish to support us, and improving how often we share news and updates on our game development to those interested!
- Third: We intend to share some development 'Miniprojects' between our major project releases! These will be through the aforementioned Patreon, or one-time cheap itch.io purchases!
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On the GROVE Rework
To that end, GROVE is making the move to RPG Maker MZ, and undergoing a technical reworking!
But don't panic!
(Early location enemies will be redrawn and updated to be in parity with Dark Places pt.1 content)
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On the GroveDev Patreon
What, why and when? We suspect that's the first thing a lot of folks are wondering, so to explain...:
The What:
Patreon will primarily be the home of new, monthly development diary posts for those of you who are interested in more frequent updates from us and more previews of WIP content like screenshots and short recordings (no WIP game builds). There'll also be a special channel on the Discord for these updates and discussion around them, as well as the comments section on Patreon itself.
For those who wish to donate a little more each month, you'll also receive our sincerest thanks for the support, some little Discord bonuses like special roles and some more flair, as well as in-game credit.
In time, all Patrons will also be able to receive cheaper, bundled access to some 'Miniprojects' we intend to release over the coming months!
As for Why...:
We've been asked a lot about Patreon over the years. Besides certain content policies, our main reason for avoiding Patreon was the sense of pressure it would put on us as hobbyist developers to commit to schedules and future content, despite all our real world obligations...
However, after a LOT of consideration, we're hopeful that keeping Patreon focused on development logs, Discord bonuses, and miniprojects will strike the best balance for us not to overcommit and underdeliver, and for Patrons to receive tangible rewards both constantly and monthly, rather than paying for a future 'I.O.U'.
With a little luck, and a lot of your kind support... we may even be able to make game-development a full time pursuit of ours!
As for When:
We're NOT starting the Patreon right away!
We're going to be using this time to gather some feedback and impressions, work out our plans for pricing, and make sure things can go as smoothly as possible with the launch. We want to make sure people who join get something immediately, rather than waiting on the promise of a promise...!
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On 'Miniprojects'
As we've worked on our games over the years, prototyping new mechanics and ideas, we've always used new projects to work on the code in isolation, to prevent any weird issues with the main game project.
Oftentimes what begin as simple concepts end up becoming fun, self-contained little games in themselves! And in the hopes that they will give our audience something to enjoy in the downtime between main project releases... we are thinking about polishing and uploading these Miniprojects in the coming months!
These Miniprojects will be short, hour-long experiences, focused on one or two mechanics, and one or two kinks.
Right now, the plan is to post these Miniprojects on itch.io, where they can be individually purchased for a small cost ($2-$4) by anyone...
Alternatively, if you are part of the upper tier on our GroveDev Patreon, you'll receive bundled access to all of our available Miniprojects!
(This bonus won't begin until the price of the Patreon Tier is less or equal to the cost of the projects we have released, so you aren't short-changed!)
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As you can see from these posts, we've got some big plans for the new year, and you've likely got several questions that arise from reading!
We'll do our best to answer some of those questions here. And of course, feel free to ask us any questions that may remain!
-- Q&A --
Q: What's happening to the RPG Maker MV version of GROVE?
A: It shall remain freely available in its current state for the foreseeable future, but it will NOT be receiving any additional content updates.
Q: Will my old save files be transferrable to the new version of GROVE when it releases?
A: Sorry, but they will not!
A shift to a new engine and a ground up rework makes save compatibility impossible, but we've made sure to spruce up early game content to ensure all players have something new to experience when starting again!"
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Q: Will the new version of GROVE be Patreon exclusive?
A: The new version of GROVE will NOT be Patreon exclusive.
The Patreon will be for development updates, in-game credit, Discord rewards, Miniproject access (after a few are released), and a way to further support us as developers!
Q: How long will it take to rework GROVE, and how much content will be in the reworked version?
A: Right now, our intention is to rework everything that currently exists in GROVE, and implement the long-awaited Dark Places Pt. 2 content. We don't want to put out a new version with less content than before!
Because of that, we can't really give an exact estimate on release, besides our hopeful plan for it to release in 2025!
Q: What kind of content will the 'Miniprojects' include? When will they be released?
A: The Miniprojects will be NSFW in nature, and may cover a range of content including but not limited to: M/M, F/M, bondage, rape, bad endings, corruption, mpreg. More details will be released in time. As for release, we're predicting to release at least two within the year of 2025! After that, we're not certain, but Patrons will absolutely be kept in the loop!