## 63 Wishlists

63 Wishlists

Note: in this post I’m going to be talking about my frustrations with making and publishing games. It is by no means an indictment on anyone for not wishlisting my games on Steam. Y’all are wonderful. This is more a personal re-centering. With that in mind I have intentionally left out links to the Steam pages here.

At some encouragement, I submitted ProtoDungeon Episodes I and II for Steam. The announcements for Episode I being available for wishlisting received little attention, and most of the posts I sent out on social media fell flat and mostly unnoticed.

I knew it wasn’t going to get much. I haven’t been consistent on socials. That has been fantastic for my mental health, but it also means it wasn’t going to get very much interaction. I had prepared myself for this. However, after a week, I’d gotten a total of sixty-three wishlists, and by last Saturday I still couldn’t stop myself from feeling really down. As much as I’d mentally prepped myself, I wasn’t emotionally prepared.

What was the point of all this? I need to start with hundreds of wishlists in the first week to make any kind of feasible launch. I need thousands (5,000 seems to be the minimum number these days) for a successful release. With roughly a month to go until release, that’s just not going to happen. It was never going to happen this way, and I knew that going in.

Sooo I spent the past few days thinking about all this.  The original purpose behind putting ProtoDungeons on Steam was to:

• Get experience publishing on Steam (and holy wow I have learned a lot, that alone has been so valuable)
• Use each episode as soft marketing for each next episode, and eventually as a series for getting word out about The Waking Cloak itself
• Maybe make a few extra bucks so we can pay bills and medical stuff
• Best case have a “long tail” where people enjoy the later games and come back to enjoy the earlier episodes

These don’t include “become wildly famous on your first small game on Steam” or “make a ten thousand dollars,” and I need to pause and remember that wasn’t my intent anyway.

That helps.

If I’m honest, though, it all still hurts, and I still have a lot to reckon with in terms of my own reasons why I make things. Do the emotional work. I still feel like I’m running out of time, like I just don’t have the ability to keep up with other devs and games. I’m still seeking approval and validation and wanting to be Seen. These are things that ultimately can’t and won’t satisfy me.

I have a family with three kids, one of which is a newborn. I have a day job. I’m not growing younger. These are all blessings (yes, aging is too, even if it freaks me out), and I wouldn’t trade them for anything, but it’s crazy to suggest they haven’t slowed me down (I mean, I released episodes 1 and 2 in a year, and then we had kids and six years later I’m still working on 3). Time, time, time. At what point will people no longer care? When comes the expiration date on their interest? Has it already expired?

Worst of all, even when I do finish, will it be enough for those few who were interested at the beginning? Will it meet expectations? Will it matter to anyone? No, I can’t rely on external validation to fulfill me, but will it even matter to anyone?

.

I don’t remember where I heard this concept used before, but:

If sixty-three people all showed up in my office and every single one said they liked something I made, that would be bananas. I would be floating for weeks.

It’s not what this is about, likes and follows and attention, but it also kind of IS, right? What is art if it’s created and there’s no connection with other people? Is it still communication if there’s nothing communicated? I mean, yes, I still think there’s value in the making of the thing, that creating is not a waste. But it would still be a shame if nobody played it. It would be a shame if nobody even put it on their wishlist.

But sixty-three people isn’t nobody. Ten people isn’t nobody. One person isn’t nobody.

If I connect with someone, somewhere, even in a small way, that is enough. It HAS to be enough. That’s what life is made up of, mostly. Small things. Even big things are made up of small things. If we undervalue small things, we undervalue our lives.

And one person isn’t small, either. They are a whole world.

.

I don’t know what this means for my Online Plan. Earlier this year (I think? time has no meaning with a newborn) I posted about how I was going to take a “I do what I want” approach to socials, and that is what I want, because in the overall scheme of things, what I want is to not drink from a firehose of sludge, and the plan is absolutely helping me. It’s working.

(I’m not head-in-the-sand, I still hear about important stuff, that’s a whole separate topic, please don’t @ me)

But if what I also want is to actually get my games out there in a healthy manner, I can’t just be a total hermit who occasionally posts a game and then disappears back into the woods for six more years. There’s going to need to be some kind of third way here. Something sustainable with at least a little effectiveness.

So… I’ve been chatting with a few friends about this, and think I’m gonna Try Some Stuff??