Full Steam Ahead with CurseForge!

My New Year's resolution for 2022 was to revive my Patreon and stick with it for the full year. No getting discouraged and quitting when things aren't going well. Push through and keep at it until 2023.

I'm proud to say I did this even though it was tough to maintain my motivation sometimes! While I don't necessarily have a resolution for 2023, I have been thinking a lot about my experience as a content creator throughout 2022. What worked? What didn't? What can be improved and how?

One thing is for certain; I love creating stuff for The Sims 4. Whether it's poses or fun recolours, I just love being creative and sharing that creativity with you guys. I need to take breaks sometimes; no one can be productive 24/7 but overall, it's been a great experience and I want to continue doing it in 2023.

That said, there were also a lot of things that just didn't work so well for me in 2022. I tried out a new tier system and made some changes to my Patreon in the hopes that it would streamline things more and give me more time to do what I loved; make cool stuff for The Sims 4! In reality, these changes ended up doing the opposite. I spent more time trying to micromanage too many tiers and release schedules at once and not enough time actually creating. In short, I burned out. Hard.

But near the end of 2022, something really cool happened! CurseForge was launched for The Sims 4! An official EA-endorsed mod sharing platform designed for Simmers where creators could earn money for doing what they love without having to charge anything. It seemed too good to be true but I was excited about the possibilities so as soon as the platform launched, I signed up and started submitting my content!

My experience with CurseForge? Overwhelmingly positive! I was seeing download numbers on my stuff that I had never seen before and as a result, I was better able to support myself than I could with Patreon alone. But most importantly, I could focus more on creating again and you guys didn't have to pay a thing to support my work! I balanced Patreon with CurseForge for a couple months just so I could weigh the pros and cons of the two side by side for a trial period of sorts.

Going into 2023, I've decided that ultimately, it's going to be a good thing for both me and my supporters to move almost exclusively to CurseForge! I won't have to deal with managing tiers and staggering early access release schedules. I can just spend all my free time creating content. You'll get everything for free right away on CurseForge and you'll be able to help support me at no cost to you!

So where does that leave Patreon? One con to being a CurseForge creator is that I don't have full freedom to host what I want there. NSFW pose sets and content that makes reference to real-world brands and public figures are not permitted on CurseForge, for example. These are perfectly reasonable guidelines; however, I do still want to have the freedom to create what I'm inspired to make. Patreon is where I'll host anything that I can't put on CurseForge for whatever reason, but with one major change. Everything on my Patreon will also be free from day one going forward!

I will also be getting rid of most of my tiers and leaving up one donation tier. This tier does not offer any specific benefits; it will just be a way to say thank you if you really love what I do and wish to support me further and it will be 100% optional. You won't be required to join the donation tier to get access to anything.

I have already paused billing for all my patrons while I get all these changes into place so if you're a patron, don't worry! You won't be charged from this point on. I will post when the donation tier becomes active and all the changes are finalized.

I am really excited about this new venture and I hope you are, too! Sul-sul!