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Winning Big on the Crapps Gamble

5 years ago1,808 words

As much as I'd rather not, I wonder whether I should try making some short, simple apps in the hope of earning money, which I could then use as a place of stability so then I might be able to work on my passion projects with less worry...

I've been having radiotherapy; my fourth session was today. I've been anxious about it, though that anxiety is subsiding now, thankfully. I was actually given pills to take for the anxiety, but I chose not to take them, to instead just endure the experience and use mindfulness and breathing practises to control it as best I can. Every time has been an ordeal so far, but I'm getting better at it. Just 26 more to go now!!!

I've been sloooowly working on this game I've been mentioning but not actually showing for a while now. Progress is slow because I've been spending half my time in bed, incapacitated... Partly due to the brain thing, partly due to the depression of being in the situation that I'm in. I've talked about all that before.

I've been wanting to write about the characters and general game format I'll be using, but I haven't got around to that yet. I have however got a basic pixel engine working in Unity, similar to the one I used in my old Flash games. I wanted to write a post about that, about the struggles of getting it to work in the first place, about how my newest pixel style compares to my old work, whether I should even be sticking with this in this era... but I obviously haven't written that post yet either. I'll try to soon, maybe.

I want to talk about something else though. I've been going to the BRAIN CANCER HOSPITAL with my mummy dearest so far, but this time I went with my step-dad for a bunch of reasons, who in the past I've been uncomfortable around because we're very different people. My mum's neurotic and introverted like me - I wonder where I got that from - but my step-dad is outgoing and, well, not anxious. She gets upset about how often they go out with people, he talks to anyone and everyone. I felt anxious about going with him because I'd be trapped in a car with him for like two hours (an hour there, an hour back), and would have to have an awkward conversation and I didn't know how that'd go. Worried I'd say stupid things, etc.

As it turned out, it was... interesting, inspiring even, but hmm, I feel torn, concerned perhaps. But motivated?

He used to be quite wealthy, my step-dad. Maybe not "we have three mansions" kind of wealthy, but apparently he ran a business that he built up from the ground following a poor childhood, which at one point was earning 70 million pounds a year (I didn't know this, and it took me by surprise). Now, he's a simple gardener because that business fell through... and he isn't exactly satisfied with going from being a high-flying businessman, with meetings all across the world all the time, to cutting grass in the rain for a fraction of what he used to earn. I don't blame him.

He's been surprisingly supportive of my current position in life, which I think is because there are parallels between it and how he's approached life. Sort of. He was poor and had dyslexia, so the world was full of challenges, which he saw as things to conquer; he went out there and became the boss of his own company, and he felt at his happiest when he was wealthy and ordering other people around. He'd hate to work as a lackey for someone else, which is why he decided to set up his gardening business. He sees me as being out of the 'rat race' like he aspired to be, and I've talked before about how my games might have the potential to make a lot of money, which he seems to see as his ticket out of a job he hates. I become wealthy, he becomes free... That's what he sees.

It's difficult then to explain how much the anxiety is a barrier for me. He's outgoing, and he's the kind of person who's comfortable manipulating others, or lying about what he's capable of or what he knows. It's served him very well in the world, and that's definitely the way to get by. I, by comparison, am overly cautious, too open and honest about my faults (clearly!), and I repeatedly doubt myself, openly, which doesn't exactly inspire the majority of people to look up to me or give me things. I wouldn't even want most people to look up to me though, or to give me things. I don't care about being wealthy... Living a frugal life would be okay for me.

But I know that he and my mum have poured a lot of money into looking after me during this difficult time, and I want to give something back... That's the biggest reason I'd hope I could one day earn some considerable amount of money. So then I could give it back. Make others happy. And so then I could of course pay the day-to-day bills which everyone has to pay by working jobs they hate.

He sees me as this tech genius type who'll strike it big and earn millions one day soon, and to a small, delusional degree I've seen myself that way too. The success of games like Undertale make me aware that it's possible... though I'd be very surprised if, realistically, I ever achieved anything like that kind of success. Especially considering how much these mental things impair my ability to produce anything.

Oh, we also talked about anxiety... and he's well-meaning, but doesn't exactly understand what it's like. He was telling me how he's been anxious in the past, but has pushed through it... because that's how anxiety works for most people. It's a natural reaction to difficult or frightening external stimuli. He told me how for example he was anxious before starting up his business, or when arriving in new countries alone for the first time. I imagine it wouldn't make sense to him how I could stand at my bedroom door in the university halls, paralysed, heart pounding, telling myself that I know the people in the kitchen and they won't dislike me going in to get food, but just standing there for like an hour unable to act before finally going to lie on my bed in shame, starving. One of those things is part of the human condition, the other is an aberrant disability... but unless you have that quirk in your mind that makes the simple impossibly difficult, of course it's not going to make sense. We all try to understand others from our own standpoint. We all assume they have essentially the same minds as us, and it's difficult to assume otherwise. It seems.

But back to games... Apparently there are a lot of games out there that might not be on the typical serious PC gamer's radar, but which make boatloads of cash because everyone and their grandma can play them on their phones while sitting on the toilet. "Hyper casual" games, like Flappy Bird, which are ridiculously simple to pick up and play, but addictive so you stick with them and tell others about them.

I've been aware of those for a while, but I've been seeing games development as a binary thing. Maybe I could make those, I thought... but I hate them, and I'd rather do something serious that communicates my values, like I've been planning to. I'd be fine making pennies if it meant what I produced was adored by the players. I'd rather make a big impact on a small number of people than a small impact - if any - on a large number of people. I'd hate to produce some "crapp" that might feed into people's addictions for a couple of hours before being lost in the tide of other, similar rubbish.

And yet... Talking with my step-dad made me wonder whether it'd be possible to do both. To try to make some money-making simpler app to get stable, then once I have stability I could focus more comfortably on my passion project(s).

At the moment, the thought of not having money is on my mind all the time. While I hope that these passion projects might make some money, through Patreon if nothing else, that'll take ages, and it might not be much at all. It probably won't be, realistically. Not enough to give back, or to mean that my parents never have to work again, anyway.

So unless some deranged millionaire is happy to give me a million poundollars for no good reason, perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea to devote at least some time and mind-power to some far, far simpler game that I could make it a weekend or less and try to turn into money. Maybe a few, see what sticks, if anything.

Who knows, maybe I could even tie it into my more worthwhile ideas, somehow.

I don't know. He was only talking about this mere hours ago, so it's still fresh in my mind. Perhaps I'll try reading about this kind of game, even playing some, and see what I can learn. I know there are books my successful people about the apps they've made, talking about how they got to the point that they did (though I feel it's mostly about luck).

As I said, I don't particularly like simpler barely-games that anyone can pick up and play for five minutes, without characters or writing or a plot or meaning or anything, but since they target the lowest common denominator, they'll necessarily have a larger audience than my more targeted niche game would.

Honestly, I'd rather just be focusing on that niche game. But money really is an issue.

I've noticed that on the rare occasions I play impressive, long apps from the app store, and check the developer's other work, they typically have a series of these "crapps" to choose from. I disregard them because I don't care in the slightest about Word Match Orgy or Feed The Elephant Lollipops or whatever, but I wonder if this is how they make a substantial amount of their income. I'd guess that most such games fall completely flat and earn nothing, but perhaps one or two succeed and generate enough money to fund the development of more important projects. Hmm.

Most Flash games were like that too, but they're the ones that nobody really talked about because they didn't earn a lasting place in any hearts.

I wonder what thoughts anyone else has about this, anyway.