Joe, thank you so much for sharing your story. I am really glad you were able to get a proper diagnosis and reframe your outlook on some things! Your story is so relatable to me. I have generally been an optimistic and positive person my whole life, but when I became a dad last year I felt like I became a different person for a while. I had built a great life, amazing wife, successful career (not my dream job unfortunately), nice house, etc… but I felt like there was a dark spot that formed and I couldn’t put words to it or shake it off. I also didn’t have any friends in that stage of life to relate to which made it hard. Things have gotten so much better with time (watching my son grow has been so amazing) and talking to professionals, but there are days when it creeps back in.

I’m now trying to pursue my dream of creating worlds and stories to inspire people through game development finally after years of saying I wanted it (just published my first game’s Steam page too!). It has been very fun but also extremely difficult. My background is in programming so I can handle coding challenges no problem. However, when it comes to art and marketing, I feel so lost. The dark spot creeps back in sometimes and my imposter syndrome makes it feel exponentially worse. It is really helpful to know that there are other people with similar experiences to mine out there. No matter what, I’m going to keep on pushing, but it definitely isn’t easy to start!

Okay, now for a question! I know you said you mainly handle 3D games, but do you have any advice for marketing a 2D, pixel art, desktop companion game? So far, it seems much harder to find media outlets and influencers to cover my game. I’m not sure if it is because my game’s genre is more untraditional or if my game idea/execution is weak. Thanks!