After collecting feedback throughout yesterday, on behalf of the development team, I want to thank everyone for your input. I’d like to share my personal thoughts in full below:
1. Expectations vs. Trade-offs (from the developer’s perspective) | Expectations vs. Disappointment (from the player’s perspective)
Feedback surrounding the storyline makes up the bulk of all comments, so I’ll break this topic down into these two angles for a detailed explanation.
Let’s start with the player side first.
When you booted up Inner Scales 1 and saw all your favorite voice actors featured in the title, it was only natural to anticipate a blockbuster experience paired with a gripping, well-crafted narrative—and I fully agree with this sentiment. I held the exact same expectations myself.
To draw a parallel: my eldest kid just sat for Shanghai High School Entrance Exams recently, and I hoped wholeheartedly they could get admitted to the "Four Top High Schools & Eight Elite High Schools", the collective moniker for Shanghai’s most prestigious senior high schools.
Unfortunately, the exam results fell short of our hopes. I got snide remarks from some relatives, while friends around me also voiced that the outcome failed to match expectations.
Truth be told, I felt no disappointment whatsoever. For years, my child has poured in every ounce of effort, and our family has done everything within our means to support them—efforts that no outsider gets to witness or appreciate.
The same applies to the storyline of Inner Scales 1. All I can say is we gave it our absolute best. It is completely reasonable for players to feel let down by the final story quality.
Your grievances and critiques are all valid, and I acknowledge every single one.
Now moving to the developer’s perspective, which is far more nuanced: expectations and unavoidable trade-offs.
I have no intention of demanding players sympathize with our team. There exists a clear boundary between consumers and service providers; product quality speaks louder than any explanation, and you are entirely right to hold us accountable.
That said, I am just an indie developer running a tiny, understaffed workshop. I do not communicate with players purely from a formal corporate standpoint. If I were adopting a standard official stance, I could simply issue a generic apology or stay silent entirely—tactics I am fully aware of. However, as I’ve mentioned in previous posts, these reflections are meant for long-time players who have grown from game consumers into mutual acquaintances. I open up about our real development constraints and decision-making process, while you share your honest feedback with me; that is the sole purpose of these write-ups.
Back to the original expectations for Inner Scales 1.
I foresaw this wave of negative feedback back in April, when we first drafted the game’s script—public reception has unfolded exactly as I predicted. We were upfront both on the store page and launch day, openly stating the storyline could be regarded as a weak point, yet I personally had a rewarding experience crafting this project (details can be found in our official announcement). This admission is never meant as an excuse for the subpar story quality; I have never shied away from taking responsibility for its flaws.
I know many of you are wondering: If you knew the story would turn out this way, why not polish it properly from the start?
Let me circle back to my child’s exam analogy: Why couldn’t they study harder to get into Tsinghua or Peking University? Was it a conscious lack of motivation?
The plain answer is a lack of capability—both my child’s academic capacity, and our capacity as parents. As ordinary salaried workers, we lack the spare time for intensive tutoring supervision, nor the financial means to afford full-spectrum premium extracurricular coaching to compete with other families. Short of being a once-in-a-generation prodigy, falling behind in such cutthroat competition is inevitable. This is the harsh reality of life. But does falling short of goals mean we stop striving entirely?
That is precisely why I push forward with game development as a startup founder: to earn more income, secure better resources for my kid, and support their three years of high school studies. I will keep fighting for my family.
By the same token, I have full confidence our screenwriter is capable of writing exceptional narratives. Regrettably, I cannot afford to reserve their services for a full year to refine a polished, sophisticated script. Given our tight budget, the most feasible solution we could devise was to allocate limited funds toward casting top-tier voice talent. The revenue generated from this installment will be fully reinvested as funding ammunition for Inner Scales II. This is the classic chicken-or-egg dilemma we are trapped within.
Most of you are seasoned interactive movie game players, myself included. Allow me to pose a few hypothetical scenarios for reference:
What would the final product look like if a beloved spy thriller masterpiece was only given a development budget of several hundred thousand RMB?
How would the sequel to a hit romance title turn out with merely a few hundred thousand RMB in funding?
What quality standard could a viral social-themed narrative game possibly hit under the same constrained budget?
(At this point, some readers will accuse me of playing the poverty card—and you are justified to feel that way. “If your games turn out mediocre, your financial struggles are your own fault.” I will not argue against this viewpoint.)
Hard choices had to be made. I had to prioritize certain elements to eventually deliver projects that meet my own quality standards.
Like most ordinary people, progress toward long-term goals is always winding and incremental.
My core trade-off for this title was focusing our finite budget and manpower on one standout highlight: our cast of professional voice actors. This has been our core priority from day one.
Only with this selling point could we generate sufficient revenue to iteratively upgrade every other component in future projects.
Information asymmetry has also created a lot of misunderstanding. One negative review assumed our three years of operation meant we owned a large, mature development team. To set the record straight: our team has shrunk from 5 members to 4, then 3, and now effectively only 2.5 full-time staff over these three years. I would update the UI assets if we had available personnel to handle the workload.
Aside from the storyline, nearly all other complaints have straightforward resolutions:
Bonus Video Access
We clarified this yesterday: veteran players gain full access to all bonus footage several hours in advance. New players unlock 3 videos on launch day, with the remaining 5 available the next day.
Some of you interpreted this policy as unfair differential treatment toward new users. It is intentional preferential treatment for our long-term supporters, which I believe is reasonable. We can brainstorm fairer reward mechanisms for veteran fans moving forward, yet I stand by the original design choice and accept all backlash it has caused. We will optimize this system in future updates.
Achievement Glitch
The eight problematic achievements were unintended bugs that were never supposed to go live. The issue has already been patched, so I will not elaborate further.
Story Tree Layout (a repeatedly raised complaint)
I have addressed this countless times in comment replies: our game does not adopt a branching narrative framework. What players perceive as a branch tree is actually one continuous linear timeline. Traditional branching systems display story paths horizontally, while our current save-file navigation scrolls vertically down a single storyline. We have built functional branching tree systems for our previous titles; the feature already exists in our codebase. We opted against implementing it here purely because the game’s content structure does not match that layout. This is purely a gap in shared information. I keep reiterating this explanation because many players have overlooked previous responses.
No other pressing issues come to mind for the time being, so I will conclude this statement here.
Once again, thank you to every player for your continuous support. If sales performance and crowdfunding returns for Inner Scales 1 exceed our previous projects, all additional revenue will be injected comprehensively into every development facet of Inner Scales II, as I promised earlier.
I understand most harsh criticisms stem from your genuine wish to see our work improve, and I hold no resentment toward these comments. We will press forward together. Perfection cannot be achieved overnight.
Longtime followers who have tracked our project iterations over the past three years can attest that I have been steadily seeking breakthroughs and building our technical capabilities to craft higher-quality games step by step.
Let time pass judgment on all disputes and disagreements.
Thank you for taking the time to read this lengthy note.
Humble as my station may be, I never cease to care for my cause; the merit of my deeds shall only be judged when my journey draws to a close.
(Original ancient poem: Low rank cannot erase devotion to duty; final verdict awaits the closing of one’s coffin)