Hey guys,
Unfortunately, things don't always go as planned or how you want them to go. Also unfortunately, I happen to live in a backwards ass, actual joke of a country. Some of you may be aware or have heard the UK is currently trying to push through an amendment to the upcoming Crime & Policing bill that will see possession or publication of "simulated incest" become a criminal act, punishable between 3 and 5 years in prison (
https://bills.parliament.uk/publications/65134/documents/7933 - the amendment.) Some places have already (mistakenly) reported that this law has already come into effect.
The bill is currently in the Reporting Stage for the House of Lords, which means it could potentially become law imminently. While the law seems to be geared towards real life or AI simulation, unfortunately the law isn't so ironclad to exclude the stuff we create here. It all comes down to whether a "reasonable person looking at the image would think that A and B (the characters) were real". Obviously we can all agree that no one would consider Brigette or Peter to be real people. And I agree, it is extremely unlikely. But it does come down to what a jury (or single magistrate) deems at the time.
The main point is that under this new law the content we make here could put us into legal trouble (even if we were later proven to be innocent). Going through the legal process, having to hire lawyers, it's not something I want to indulge. I do not consider it worth it, and it's not a battle I am passionate enough about to fight. Especially with the chance (no matter how small) I could end up in prison for 5 years.
That's where we are at now, so lets talk about solutions.
First things first, the game is not ending. In the immediate, I've done some tidying up on the subscribestar so that we are ready for when the bill goes live. The next build, 0.10 will see the (temporary) removal of both Brigette and Sydney. Their content will not be accessible within the game. After that we will be looking at completely rewriting both Brigette and Sydney to accommodate different roles within the game. They will eventually return, but not anywhere near the same manner as what they are right now.
Now I know a lot of you are thinking. "Why can't you just rename them to step/adopted/land lady? Or let the player choose the relationship?" The one thing the bill does well is define what it considers incest which includes all the aforementioned possibilities, including any sort of "guardianship" style relationship (raised from a young age scenario).This effectively removes any possibility of an easy rework like that. And a lot of these options puts us in this exact same "grey area" that I do not want to be in when there is a potential prison sentence on the line. I'm certainly hoping you can all understand and agree with that.
So at some point in the future, Brigette and Sydney will return, just in a different form from what they are now. We hope to make their storylines still engaging, fun and sexy, but they will be very different. Please keep in mind any future planned incest content in this project has now also been scrapped.
I know for a lot of you that is the only reason you are here, and if you no longer support the project, I completely get it. But I hope you can understand my position on the matter and why I have to make the decision I have, not because I want to, but because I have to. We will continue to soldier on in any regard. There are plenty of hot milfs in this game that have no relation to each other that I think still makes this a great project and one I will still be just as focused on.
I have made a separate post that makes 0.9 freely available to all, but this post will be removed once I get the notification the law will be going live.
There is probably a lot of anger and sadness at this news and I totally understand. But please keep in mind this isn't a decision I want to take. If it were some platform who was trying to enforce this, I would just ride it out and change platforms when we eventually get kicked. Unfortunately this time, it's my own ridiculous government. (The same government that recently booted a bill that would outlaw cousin marriages. Marrying your cousin? Fine. Getting your girlfriend to call you daddy and filming it? STRAIGHT TO JAIL. Fucking idiots.)
If you have any questions, I will do my best to answer them and I'm happy to hear suggestions. Just keep in mind anything that puts me in a "grey area" is not something I will consider for the reasons I've already mentioned.
I hope we still have your support with the project, but I also understand if this now greatly reduces your interest in it. We still have a lot of content to release this year and I'm looking forward to delivering it to you!
All the best,
- Nergal