I don't want to just abandon this project. I've sunk years into it, and if it wasn't for this I would have never gotten into music composition, which is something that I'm aiming to pursue professionally once I'm done with school.

However, school is the issue here. I'm in my schools show choir, and as stupid as it sounds to anyone who doesn't live in the Midwest and has never been a part of a competitive show choir (which I'm assuming goes for everyone following me), it's stressful and keeps me so busy that I hardly have any free time. And when I'm not busy with show choir I'm busy with my job.

I was already getting burnt out on game development before I had so little free time, but adding all of these other responsibilities into my life pushed me so much that I just didn't have it in me to spend even 10 minutes a day on this project, let alone the hours I would spend on it before.

I think a part of the reason I was so hesitant to finish this game was because of how disappointed I was in the demo. I put so much hard work into it, and the result just wasn't very good. I've since significantly improved (mostly in regards to music composition, but I think my workflow, writing, and my pixel art skills have slightly improved since then too) but if I had to go back and change everything else so that it'd be on a level I feel appropriately reflects the space I'm in now, I'd never finish the game. So here's what I'm doing instead:

I'm cancelling this version of the game, as in the playable version that's out right now. You can play the demo if you want (not that I'd recommend it), but it is no longer representative of the game. This game page will go through significant changes within the next month or so in order to more accurately reflect what the end product will be.

This game will also no longer be titled "Debt, Money, and Death" but will instead revert back to "Devil Must Die!". Devil Must Die was meant to be the title of the third and final game in the DMD trilogy I had planned, but I hardly have the time to finish one game, let alone three. So instead I'm condensing the games all into one game which borrows from each of them. It will mainly consist of what the third game would have been, but some parts will be changed (like the beginning of the game having more similarities to the current demo out now than it would have if it had followed the original plan).

Although this game will technically be a combined version of the planned 3 games, it may not end up being super long (especially by RPG standards) just due to the fact I don't have time to make a super long game, but ideally it will be around 10 or so hours at least.

My winter break starts at the end of this week, so although I'll still have work I won't have school and so I'll have much more free time. I hope to use this time to create some content for the new version of the game which I will release here eventually. Don't be super hopeful of getting anything very soon but just keep an eye out if you're interested