[Strygon]

So, I have some good news.
Development of Act 1 is nearing completion.

Bad news is, the VN Sequences are nowhere near finished. The art assets suffer from incosistent quality, bad shading and overall are just not up to my maximum I could bring. However, redoing them all would take months, possibly push the release date all the way to the latter half of 2022.

Now I could either do that or I could release the mod with the assets in their as-is quality. If you're okay with, in my opinion, sub-standard quality art, then I could do that. All that'd be left would be writing and that's sort of it.

Or I could release Act 1 and keep the VN Sequences out entirely until either a future update or the release of Act 2. Of course, that obviously means you won't be getting these VN Sequences until much later. If you never cared for this content to begin with, you probably won't be affected, but if you were strongly hoping for this sort of content, then you may not like this option.

I'd like to run this as a poll first before felling an ultimate decision.

[Goober5000]

JAD 2.21 went through multiple iterations of art for the VN sequences.  First it used the fiction viewer, then it had some art that was reasonably decent, and finally it was upgraded with the art that is now in the latest versions.  I would say release it as-is, and then upgrade the art later if you need to.

And keep in mind an artist is often his own worst critic.

[Novachen]

Do not make the same mistake as most of Game Development Studios do today.

You do not have any reason to release a game prematurely. There are no financial reasons involved, no shareholders etc.
So the best release is always the version you actually think you can offer to the players.

At least that was always the way how I released my own games so far, even it causes that some of them are still unreleased.

[Nyctaeus]

Go ugly and lazy. It's noble tradition of the community. Ugly and lazy is better then none.

[Mobius]

Release the first chapter and whenever the extra content is ready, add it to the modpack in a future release.

Keep in mind that you will most likely release several updates for FSO and eventual MVP compatibility so it doesn't hurt to add some extra content in the process. Updates are already part of the plan. 

[Strygon]

Release the first chapter and whenever the extra content is ready, add it to the modpack in a future release.

Based on the advice I've been getting, that does sound like the best course of action.

Keep in mind that you will most likely release several updates for FSO

21.4 is perfect the way it is for what I need, I see no reason to change it.

and eventual MVP compatibility

...Why would a Total Conversion need MVP compatibility?

[Mobius]

FSO updates over the years have resulted in the creation of new MVP effects and graphical content that any given TC can borrow, so you may need ad hoc updates for that. It may or may not happen. 

[Strygon]

Well in that case I'd just integrate them directly rather than make a Standalone dependent on it, which would sort of ruin the point of having a Standalone.

Even then, I think the effects are all fine as-is.

[Assassin714]

For every mod I've played with 'VN sequences' (or really any kind of extra long briefing/non-mission content that doesn't have that much relevant information regarding the missions themselves), I just try to skip over them as fast as possible. So even if you perfect what you want to do, perhaps you should release a version without it anyway.