I was considering a post titled “We have made the difficult decision…” – but that feels almost absurdly contrite in an industry where 1/3 of the people have been laid off in the past few years due to an array of reasons. It began with examining scope in my role as executive producer combined with the feedback from our first micro-poll and making the decision that we shouldn’t focus on making our own assets when feasible assets already exist. This expanded into many of my remaining roles, considering the lessons I learned through previous projects and releases, and realizing that it would be wiser to focus on making the game the right way from the beginning – rather than doing what I felt was easy and possible quickly to generate revenue to make future ideas more feasible.
I have been feeling like I have been doing things too slowly… but then I realized that was only due to my own artificial timeline. After watching money flow only out for the past year, I grew hasty and had planned for a Kickstarter campaign, a MegaGrant request, and other efforts to bring in some capital sooner than later to keep things afloat. I used to run often and raced (poorly) in mid-distance races. Something I learned along the way was the fact that, “If you feel like you are running too slowly, you should slow down.”
We have decided to slow things down – to stop rushing for capital and focus on the purpose of this whole endeavor. This is something I personally posted in 2024 – long before this was a serious project:
We are slowing down to make this wish come true.
Stardew Valley took four and a half years of solo development. Even large teams take years – six for Baldur’s Gate 3, and around a dozen (so far) for Grand Theft Auto 6. If we wish to truly bring players to this dream, I must put away my hubris and fears. We will see this through, though it will likely take longer than I had originally planned.
Nevertheless, the important part is that we are going to bring all of you along with us on this adventure – and the project will be better for it. You’re reading this, so follow along at mischief-games.com. Join us on Discord – where we’ll be opening playtests and requesting input on direction and rewards throughout the project. Let’s realize this dream together.
Mischief Games 
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