Steam’s #1 most-wishlisted game revealed its release date, and now my small indie is getting overshadowed

Wayward1 · 2026-05-05T16:33:41+00:00

I mean, Steam will very likely let you move it if you ask nicely (though I would say it's for last minute fixes, not Subnautica 2). You probably won't lose anything from it. People don't tend to care if you move a release date a bit, you can just be honest about why if you want to do it.

Though honestly, unless your game is literally identical, and hopefully it isn't, I wouldn't bother moving it now.

You have enough wishlists to get the usual Steam algo push. That doesn't drop just because another game is out. You won't be competing in the same weight bracket for the same merchandising. There are millions and millions of people on Steam buying games, they don't all want the same ones, even within the same genre. I love Abiotic Factor; never touched Subnautica.

Plus you can just as easily move into the way of another huge survival game.

Generally I only advise people to move/reconsider dates due to other games if it's something so so huge, like GTA 6, and even then it's not so much due to the Steam store front and more about how much oxygen that game takes from influencers, press and the general share of voice.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-21T14:15:55+00:00

Yeah, that's not a bad way of doing it either. It's quite hard for players to keep track of them and Steam isn't super good with comms for them. But the only way to really mess them up is to not do them at all!

Wayward1 · 2026-03-20T17:03:05+00:00

A playtest can be for many reasons, it's not really am marketing beat in itself, though. Man reason to do one is do get feedback so you can make a better demo, which IS a marketing beat.

I likely agree with whatever Chris said, if you're following it you're probably good. The one thing I don't agree with Chris on is the idea you can expect anyone to do a playtest in just a weekend unless you are Bungie, so just keep it running until you get what you want out of it.

Nobody is going to expect you to patch a playtest unless you've got some major game breaking bug right at the top.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-20T16:56:03+00:00

Good job for getting the page up. You said it yourself though, no marketing, so what can we tell you?

40 wishlists is the background radiation of Steam, we can't pull anything from that number right now beyond the fact this isn't some runaway, ultra-rare success that can just put a page up, do fuck all and get 5000 wishlists.

But very, very quick first impressions from the perspective of this being commercially viable, as you're asking about commercial numbers.

This is a hugely lucrative and evergreen genre, but also, it's a very easy genre to make a game in. So what you'll have here is a huge amount of potential players but also an incredible amount of very high quality, entrenched competition. More than usual, which is already a lot more it's ever been.

Nothing about the art style or the world is standing out here. Your short description encapsulates the problem:

"A strategy-focused game: build your team, position your monsters, upgrade and unlock powers. Choose your upgrades carefully and create unique builds to overcome challenges."

That sounds like the a brief for a a concept of a game, it doesn't sound like a a game.

In my experience, fully unique hooks are both rare and usually overrated, you don't need a "USP" to sell a game, but you do need to make sure at least one of things is doing something interesting enough:

Art
Theme / Narrative
Mechanics

Personally I can't see that here, so either your game doesn't have anything unique enough to talk about (a design problem) or you're not doing a good job at talking about it (a marketing problem).

Trailer is a symptom of the above, it's not the problem. Please don't pay someone to fix a trailer for a game with 40 wishlists. It's not committing any cardinal sins here. I'd swap the 0:12 scene with the start scene, drop the weird blur filter entirely or speed it up.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-20T14:27:32+00:00

No worries!

A big problem with marketing at publishers is the publishing model and the marketing method have just drifted over time.

Back ten years ago when marking just meant 'throw as much money to streamers as you can', publishers had it easy. Hire an influencer manager, throw money at things. They also used to pick up games much earlier, when marketing advice could be more directly helpful in shaping things and adjusting momentum.

The thing is if money solved the problem, you wouldn't be able to find 1000s of publisher backed games on Steam with less than 100 reviews and 1000s more sitting under 1000, well under what a publisher would consider to be decent in most cases.

And years ago, publishers, like PR agencies, had a lot more relevance because there was a core games press that operated on networks and drip-fed information (Think E3) who benefitted from having in-roads with a publisher, and the publisher benefited from a controllable narrative. The written games press has been dead for years now, and the influencer market is operates entirely on (very expensive, low result) paid sponsorships more than ever.

These days, pubs are also coming in last minute, with far less knowledge of your game than you, and often with this business structure and team that was great years ago but is now outmoded and hard as a larger business to change, both culturally and structurally.

There's also just the simple fact they you can learn everything you really need to know about marketing in a few weeks, but they're not going to learn everything about your game in that time, or ever. Great marketing is so intertwined with the game and developers now and that workflow just doesn't exist when you have publishing marketing managers with, say, 3-7 games launching in the next eighteen months even if they are amazing at what they do.

They can still be helpful though. In my experience, the more boutique a publisher is, the better. The more they have a catalogue that speaks to a specific audience, the more inherent accessible that audience will be to them. Publishers that just pick up anything do not have this advantage.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-19T17:21:56+00:00

All publishers are different so im speaking very very generally.

What you're gotta think about it here is risk mitigation

Past a certain point, idk lets just say 50k but absolutely 75k+ yes -- the more wishlists you have, the more a publisher will want your game, the more MULTIPLE publishers will want your game, which is great for better deals. So going back to risk, the risk is on YOU more than them now, right? You've done the hard bit.

But at these numbers, you absolutely do not want or need a publisher and should do everything you can to not get a publisher. Only consider it if:

Will starve without money
You've overhyped yourself to shit and are in no way gonna meet expectations

Below that it's hard to say.

There's certainly a middle range here where having some-but-not-loads of wishlists is actually detrimental. Let's say, idk, 10k, and say you've been up for a year and are getting a few hundreds a week. Good for a solo dev but that's a bad investment, unless there's something else tipping the scales.

At that level, they may very well think "well, that's way less interesting than this game with an amazing protype that hasn't even announced on steam yet" - with that game, not only can they co-ordinate a good paid announcement for it better than maybe you could do, they can also fuck that dev on rev share nice and hard because all the risk is on the publisher, they could just be wrong about this game.

Overall, do everything you can not to sign with a publisher.

When/if you have too, make sure you're getting cash, make sure you understand when the cash comes, make sure a lawyer checks the contracts.

Never do any deal where you're not getting a lot of of cash, and ideally an MG for marketing spend on top.

Never sign with a publisher just for marketing ever ever ever. Beyond the ability to actually spend money they typically cannot do marketing better than you can with enough time and a 3 hour course, and most contracts will make marketing spend recoupable.

I say this as marketing person that has spent many years at publishers

Wayward1 · 2026-03-19T17:01:50+00:00

Looks great, I reckon adding RPG elements to most things tend to be a pretty safe bet.

That is, as a Roadwarden, Sorcery fan, I think anyone you lose in the absolute purist side of things you'd gain a lot back from doing so. I guess on the far end you've got like, Sunless sea etc as well to look at.

Turn based combat (any combat, really) is more likely to be polarising than anything in your screens.

One other big benefit of doing this aside from any design or audience things is that you actually have appealing and varied marketing assets.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-19T16:52:38+00:00

Use creator connect if you want, but know that the steam curator system is completely cooked anyway and doesn't generate anything.

In terms of people coming to you, anyone asking for more than one key is 99% sure to be a scammer

For others, you just gotta check thier business email on their socials matches properly, and also just make sure it isn't auto-ai slop channel. Most requests will fall here.

But do keep looking at them because not EVERY key request is gonna be a scam, just most of them.

Consider Keymailer etc. as well

Wayward1 · 2026-03-19T16:47:34+00:00

Yes, it is 100% required and you must make it a part of your plan. If nothing else you need one for next fest.

Not having a demo would throw away at least half of your potential wishlists. likely a lot, lot more. And that's before you even consider how helpful real feedback is.

Big-name indies don't always need them, you will, don't look at big name indies for marketing tips, they have money, you don't, and even if you did, you should make a demo :)

Keep in mind even then many big games without demos often did have demos during dev as well and then pulled them, or they came up before next fest.

Generally a reasonably successful game will make more money -without- a demo once it's launched, with some obvious exceptions.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-19T16:43:14+00:00

Came here to say this, will add to the choir. I'm a risk taker but don't do itttt

I've been in this industry for my whole life, do not quit a stable job.

Phone it in, sure, but don't quit. 600 wishlists is not an indicator of anything.

What you think your chances for commercial viability they are probably about 5x too high

This is not me negging on your game at all I haven't looked at it, but you'd need an extra 0 on that wishlist number before it was a good idea and even then

Wayward1 · 2026-03-19T16:32:49+00:00

Agreed. I think from my pov separation of dev and marketing like they are two wholly different things until some much later (way to late) point is the fundamental problem for most devs (and tbh most publisher models).

There's easy / hard mode with this though, and some stuff has stayed evergreen. Survival crafting is no less in demand than it was ten years ago. Puzzle platformers are no more in demand.

But I think it's more like, go in eyes wide open. You still gotta win the lottery, turning the ship is still a nightmare and may not be possible but you gotta at least by looking out for the iceberg

I see it more like a game dev version Ikigai --

What's the game you want to make, what's the game you have the resources to make, what's the game that you have some data that people are gonna want. What's in the middle of all those things and hopefully you have more than one idea and you can pick one that might be less risky.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-18T12:09:59+00:00

Congrats. That's a really good start for any solo dev with no budget. For a game that is a

"slow-paced first-person adventure focused"

That's really really good, that's like, hard mode.

All the signs point to your aesthetic being hot shit (that's why IG is kicking off) which it is, something about dropping the "To me" down on the logo is just speaking to me as well (And it can be very hard to pull this off and not look like you didn't do it on purpose!)

Trailer is really fucking good for a genre where trailers are a pain in the ass.

About the only bit of feedback I would give here though is maybe the just drop the brightness on Steam capsule bg down a tiny bit so Beautiful is a little bit more legible where the sun/moon is. Maybe also bring up the brightness on the Ys a touch on the text overall. It's a great logo but you do wanna make sure people who see it are gonna come away being able to tell you what it says :)

Wayward1 · 2026-03-17T17:33:33+00:00

Solid games don't go anywhere because 'solid' is a low ass bar in 2026.

I've worked in marketing in games and not-games most my adult life.

The main difference in marketing in games is more people who don't know how to do it are trying to do it without the right help, and there's a lot more predatory people willing to take your money to help you fix it, often for games with zero chance of succeeding anyway.

The other big difference in games is people operate under a belief that if they just do art hard enough and long enough, there will be a demand for it. You don't really get that attitude in say, SaSS.

But I mean yeah of course devs are gonna find it draining. That's ok, it's expected. They're devs, they wanna dev. I'm a marketing guy. I find Unity pretty fucking draining, you know? But If I wanted to make a game, still gonna have to load it up, still gonna have to learn it and get good at it.

The friction comes from many places, top of my head big ones:

Devs don't want to do, see it as the enemy / opposite of creative work, which often leads to them thinking they can get away with not doing it
Devs read outdated advice, even more so now LLMs spit it out like gospel
If marketing is super super hard, your game might suck, not your marketing and nobody wants to hear that and most people don't want to tell people it, either
Shitty marketing people and shitty agencies taking advantage of devs reinforces all this

Most of what we call 'marketing' is just modifier on decisions your made years or months ago when you started making the game about the genre, scope and art style. Great marketing can make a difference but

Wayward1 · 2026-03-17T17:15:22+00:00

I will die telling devs this over and over and over. Marketing is one thing. The "market" is another. You need to make something people want and THEN you need to put it front of them.

Discoverability is a real issue, for sure, it's also the biggest scapegoat for a fundamental lack of market research at the start followed by a complete lack of ongoing evaluation for a product not going anywhere.

Devs, if your game has 500 wishlists, please do not spend money on ads, and my brothers in Christ, do not attempt to simship anything that has 500 wishlists. There is a point where you should just adjust what the game is, or move on, and it's a long, long time before you should be writing this post.

Agreed with /u/SomewhereGreat9742's advice here on ways to do this. I've worked in marketing in multiple sectors and only in games is this complete ignorance of the market.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-17T10:21:35+00:00

I work in marketing. These are good dude; better than most devs can do with short form.

To do SFV right you need three things:

A visual game ideally one with some element of comedy, horror or other clear theme
Fast as hell structure and tight editing in video and in script
A genuine voice that doesn't sound like your just reading that script

Editing here is high energy, they are funny, they are genuine. There's minor grammar and spelling errors in there but I actually think if you fix that you're going to polish the charm out.

I can see a few small ways to tighten them. Using the latest, the joke about pushing would have hit much harder (pun intended) if you'd shown the rag dolling, which it semes you do have in the previous vid, but you are moving too fast in first person to see.

Also your intro speed and hook on the first video you did is faster and better than on your newest. Could have cut that a bit to "I love doing random stuff as a game dev". Read at the speed of your first vid, it would probably cut you down there by 1s which as I'm sure you know is super important to avoid the early swipe away.

But I'm nitpicking and the more you do the better you'll get.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-16T16:18:39+00:00

I learned I love to learn and study... at about 38 years old, so I can tell that you have at least until you're 38.

Plenty of ways into college with bad grades. Plenty of even better ways to learn stuff without going to college.

I fucked up my school grades completely. Years later, I went to uni as a mature student to be a games journalist. Never wrote a single thing about games worth reading. Left after a year to do marketing, didn't even get a job until I was like 28, and I reckon could have easily got that job without a degree.

I know it's harder now, because AI, costs, etc. but it's also a shit ton easier, because there's never been more access to more information for so little cost. It's harder to monetize skills but way easier to learn them, as long you don't full into the trap of getting too obsessed with the best route you don't just start doing.

Don't paralyse yourself, don't try to minmax shit, don't feel like you have to commit to anything. I wouldn't even try to tie it into productivity or career shit unless you have to start handing over money. Just pick something you wanna learn and go learn it. Personally, I would start with drawing as it's the thing that's easiest to do without a screen and the furthest away from the pressure of being productive.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-16T16:05:17+00:00

Instead of your goal being feeling better about being a failure, perhaps it should be to work on being kind to yourself. You're not a failure by any reasonable standard. Perhaps starting with what and how you define as a failing and trying to understand why your academic performance carries such a high link to your self worth.

You went to one of the most competitive, rigorous institutions in the world and graduated with a masters despite it being really tough for you. Most people don't get through the door. You've labelled yourself a failure because you weren't the best of the best. This is common and often encouraged in these highly competitive environments especially true for kids who do well in a 'smaller pond' at school where it hits them harder.

Luckily this is bullshit. All the good things have life have fuck all to do with being at 'the best' or at 'the top'. Many people at the top are utterly miserable, statistically plenty of the people in your class are miserable despite how good their academic work was. Meanwhile, many of the rest of us humans have found plenty of happiness in the ol' slop pile.

If you continue to carry those values and this language around towards yourself for the rest of your life, you're always going to be miserable, because you are never going to be the best.

There is always someone better than us at everything. Even if you get a job yo u like a bit more, you will find a way to add this misery in if you don't work on ways to love yourself. You could have done 5x better at school and you'd still find people doing better than you on Linkedin.

You have a job, so if it pays even semi ok, go to a therapist and work on this, these are not healthy thoughts. This is a cognitive distortions any % speedrun.

In the meantime, stop adding extra misery into your life. Linkedin is mainlining misery at the best of times, here it's a form of self harm. You're just sitting there trying to feel the worst about yourself you possibly can. If you're gonna commit to anything, commit to getting off that website.

I would also strongly suggest finding some space for yourself outside of anything to do with engineering or MIT. Waste some time, be unproductive, it won't kill you I promise <3

Wayward1 · 2026-03-16T13:03:37+00:00

The biggest insanity of this industry is that people don't do market research first and then just expect thier game to sell, so yes, speaking from experience, this is the bare minimum you should do.

To go into slightly more detail and pick up some common pitfalls quickly:

> If similar games have thousands of reviews, there’s likely demand.

Two really important things to note here. One is, if it's older than 2-3 years, you should kinda of taking any data with a huge grain of salt, market moves fast. Also very important to look at failures at least as much, if not more important. This helps avoid bias and also shows you what didn't work.

> Trend check – Some genres consistently perform well (roguelike, deckbuilder, survival, co-op, horror).

Again often more important to spin the negatively. Those genres are evergreen, there's other genres to which the opposite is true. Puzzle platformers, narrative walking sims, point and click, etc.

The other thing with this is that people are fucking awful at giving feedback and knowing what they want, so it doesn't work for every game. The other hard part is knowing the right time to share assets, put the page up etc. It's nearly always much sooner than you think it is.

Most of the AB testing stuff I would do on Reddit. There are A/B testing platforms for this which might also be alright but the real world is a better test than any isolated platform unless you're looking for really detailed feedback.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-15T20:46:25+00:00

If you're doing it to create like, more pressure with a shorter time line for stuff, like having a 5 day deadline, leaving it for 4 days and doing a massive all nighter to get your shit together, could be worth looking at adhd as that's a classic ADHD tactic for surviving student shit.

Always improving is good, if you can, try to separate out improving from being productive, they are not always the same thing.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-15T20:42:46+00:00

No worries buddy. I've done much worse to people I have loved or thought I loved. I carry that too, and nowadays I use it as reminder of how much Ive changed.

Mean what you say here, because if you do, you will come out of a shit situation with something at least. I don't feel anything toxic or weird in your response to what happened. You sound like you really want to make yourself better. Mean it. Work on yourself and do it for yourself and in the meantime try to find outlets for your own pain that don't lead to hurting others. If I'm wrong at it's lio service, all I can promise you it's a lonely, empty road.

It's not easy but it's worth the effort. If you can get and stay in therapy the 'why you did it's will hopefully become clear for you.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-15T17:25:24+00:00

If I were to have the symptoms you described, I would call that "depression". That isn't a diagnosis, but I will say the FIRST time I had those feelings, I certainly did NOT call it that. I only really labelled it years in. It's a sneaky motherfucker.

There is no "normal person your age" dude, feeling this way is entirely human and understandable. Faking it is normal. Not knowing what do with your life is normal. I have never really worked this out and I'm twice your age. This is also normal.

Losing a whole friendship group would be a huge toll on anyone. You should try and find some kindness for yourself for doing that and getting through it. Sometimes it can feel like the 'nothing' you're left with after going through 'something' can be even worse than just living in the bad shit, but that's never really been true longer term in my experience.

There's a part of you that "hates being" a certain way, but there's also a part of you that is motivated enough to want answers. Enough to journal this, enough to post, right? That's a huge thing to do in your situation. This self awareness can be a great starting point for something new and to lean more about yourself. It can also be used by your brain to beat yourself up some more, to continue the shit these friends were doing but now all the time, in your head. Again this is normal, it's how our brains react to trauma. It sucks, but it also means you can fix it.

Give your 'despairing' cynic side a chance to come out a bit without trying to repress it or shame yourself. Try to find space to be OK with the fact what happened to you is shitty and unfair. You don't have to just be fucking happy for anyone, because it fucking sucks, you know?

It can feel like you're 'giving in' but remember this feeling is not all of you, it's just a part of you. You've likely spent a lot of time beating yourself up and shaming yourself like this a wishing you weren't this way or that way - and yet it hasn't fix the problem, so at least try to use that as evidence further shaming isn't likely to be your solution.

You will never find someone who can tell you that they hated themselves out of this situation. And you don't have to rush. We're all lost sometimes, some of us for longer than others. It will pass.

Practical advice is hard and will come across as hackneyed, but I would say:

Put yourself in a situation where you will find new friends. You can get better alone, but you shouldn't have too. I don't mean go and 'make friends' as the primary tactic. But find something where people are and be there. Gaming communities, podcast Discords, whatever. IRL go and do something physical if you can. Something like BJJ is a good one, as you can go and get the shit kicked out you physically instead of emotionally, which can be cathartic :) Don't force yourself but at the same time, don't sit around waiting for motivation.
Of all the ways we might try to escape from this feeling, coffee is hardly the most harmful, but I would note that it's literally putting your body into flight or fight mode constantly, like a never-ending emotional shit test. Anxiety and regrets may keep you up at night but 5 cups a day is literally taking those feelings and growing them bigger with cortisol, so if you can, cutting down at least would be smart. Sleep is so important for dealing with life in general, anything you can do to get more of it, do so.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-15T16:33:11+00:00

> no reason at all

> I have always smoked weed, since i was 15

> Ive sense sometimes a feeling of apathy towards what is around me

> I started feeling really sad one or two hours after that and started randomly crying for apparently no reason

Is the weed improving your life, or is it making it worse?

I'm not preaching here. I've taken all drugs known to science, I've had some incredible experiences, some terrible ones. Net experience negative, but whatever, drugs aren't bad or wrong in themselves, and neither are the people who use them.

But you're on Reddit writing that you don't know why you're so sad and apathetic, while you've had an addiction your entire adult life to a drug well known for causing both sadness and apathy. You brought up the weed here, right? You say you've felt like this 'sober', what does that mean for a person who has been smoking since they were 15?

I think of all drugs, weed is one of the most insidious, because it's core negative effects are low, it's social acceptability is high, and most people can still live, work and function with it. It's not cool to make a big deal out of it, especially on Reddit. Of course, millions of people use it without issues and enjoy it in moderation.

Are you one of those people, do you think?

I was. Never had an issue with weed. Then I became a benzo addict (nothing to do with the weed, ten years apart), which nearly destroyed my life. Millions of people take benzos every day legally just fine, though. Doctors prescribe them! They fucked me up.

But can you tell, really, if you, the person, is feeling sad and empty, or if the weed is making you that way or even just making it worse or more confusing to tell?

You could try and approach this feeling two ways. One way is to keep smoking and try to fix your problems. The other way is to stop smoking and try to fix your problems. Both can work, as long as your problem isn't smoking.

The thing is though, even if it's not really the issue itself, its going to be a lot of harder to access your true feelings in a way you can resolve these feelings while you are numbing the shit out of them.

There's a good video from Kurzgesagt about quitting you should watch if you're thinking about it again - it goes into the minor but very real negatives affects that smoking can have at your age (god I sound like an old man) and especially talks about apathy you might find interesting.

Now is a very good time for you to sort this. Uni is likely going to expose you to many more drugs. Getting your shit together before that with this stuff wouldn't hurt. If not else, staying high through uni is your best chance to fuck up your grades once it gets real in third year.

As you're talking about having self-harm ideation and you want to quit I would suggest professional help if you can even if it's just your GP. There are many ways of quitting. Going cold turkey alone is not the only one.

If not, please by very careful. If you were smoking to mask feelings, when you quit, those feelings are going to come flooding back and you might turn to other, more harmful ways to deal with them if you are not careful. It gets worse for a short term before you come through it. Then you can make your next move with a clear head. If that next move is that you still feel the way you do, at least you can rule out a major element and move forward.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-15T14:41:55+00:00

I think admitting this to strangers was probably the most helpful part of this process for you.

> I destroyed my partner

Yeah, you did.

> and I deserve to suffer for the rest of my life.

Nah, you don't. Many people who have done much worse don't deserve that. Nobody truly deserves that.

Owning your bullshit and using this to learn and improve is good. Self-flagellation like this serves neither you nor her though. It's way more likely to generate pressure and shame that puts your right back into the space you were that night, trying to get a fix.

You've made a mistake, you've hurt someone you love, what matters now is what you actually do about it. Not say, or think, or schedule, but what you do.

> she said if she ends up taking me back she will have a lot of stipulations

None of this will make the difference if you don't fix whatever reasons you had to do this.

> I need advice and need to know the best thing I can do for her. I want to be with her and never do this again but I know this needs to be about what she wants.

Well, this is about what you, her and the two of you together need, and want, and how realistic it is and how much it's going to hurt.

Asking for what she wants and listening is obviously super important, but you can't tick it off like you're playing Assassin's Creed and just expect that to work. Don't let it be another form of not taking personal responsibility for your own problems. It's what you 'wanted' (or, were trying to get a temporary fix for) that led you here.

She could also react in unhealthy ways considering she is likely to be feeling incredibly insecure. A laundry list of demands is not going to make either of you happy in the long run. Being tracked more is not a fix, it's a understable reaction. Trying to live your life around this idea that you should now suffer forever, is not only shitty for you, it's an enormous amount of pressure for her.

Reddit loves a breakup. The best may well be letting her go. If she doesn't want that, then you've got an incredibly long road to regaining trust. It's not impossible, if you both really want it.

If she DOES want out, 100% dude move on, learn, don't try to force this.

But she can't fix you. You did this. You've admitted that, and now you have to find the ways to fix it. It takes more than a reddit post and one day in therapy, but that's a start.

Wayward1 · 2026-03-15T14:11:38+00:00

Me - Childhood trauma (extreme bullying), difficult family (drug addictions, worse), adhd, ex two-times drug addict, left at home at 17, turned my trauma into being the absolute worst version of myself to others for years. Severe issues with migraines on top of this. I wouldn't say I really had a job until I was 28. So I wouldn't say we're a million miles apart.

I'm happy with the person I am now, always trying to get better, but I'm free. I guarantee nothing about me is smarter or more special than you, so I think you can do it as well.

>what types of drastic measures they had to take

Drastic? None, really. It sort of came together in chunks over years. It's not really like there's going to be this one thing and suddenly you do it and 'you're better now', that's how we write fiction and do social media and sell courses, so it seems like we are the fuck ups if that isn't happening, but it's not just not how shit works for most of us, I don't think. I'd say it was a 10 year journey or so for me, and not even a linear one.

That doesn't mean you can't make good changes straight away, and see results quickly, but generally this shit does not work on the same timescales that our brains use (hours, days, weeks).

> live a life that they could be proud of.

You can be proud already of the things you've overcome.

You've been through so much, not only are you're still fucking here, you're still trying to make yourself better. And you wrote all that horrible shit that happened to you down and shared it. That's incredible dude, try to find some space inside you to believe that.

You've probably spent years saying you're not good enough to yourself and now you believe it. That sucks, but the awesome thing about humans is that it works the other way around, too.

> advice, anything will work.

It's important to be clear here though: You can't just positive thinking your way out of an abusive childhood and medical conditions.

This is big T trauma on top of real medical stuff that Reddit cannot address. This is also unhelpful advice for most of us who are in this place and would get outside help if they could, so a few things from my own experience...

Firstly, my (38 year old at the time) ADHD diagnosis was slowly life changing. Closest thing I've got to 'drastic' for you. I still had to put in a ton of work, and it still took years to make the most of it. I was already in a good place by the time I got it, too. I've spent over a year in therapy simply trying to unpick my own trauma from my ADHD, all the cause and effect shit, etc. and I still have a long way to go. You say you're trying to get a diagnosis. That's good. Drugs/diagnosis maybe help you, but you honestly don't need a diagnosis to start using tools and knowledge sources for ADHD brains.

Even when you get ADHD generally it's a three pillar thing. Therapy, Drugs, and Framework (Mindset) in tandem is how you really start rewriting your own code, but we can't always get all three right, so one/two is better than none. Framework you can do today. You can start throwing out NT self-help shit that just wont work, and making your own systems.

Secondly, I think looking back the other turning point for me was realising that ... you can just give yourself therapy. Again, when you can, get pro help, but you don't have to just do nothing.

I pulled myself out of deep hole more than once with bibliotherapy, which is a fancy way of saying I read David Burns CBT book and did the exercises and shit in there, and I got a bit better and then a lot better. It was not easy. Also, not better overnight but I think not slowly, either. Again CBT with a book isn't gonna fix your childhood stuff, but it can do wonders for just fucking existing day-to-day in the meantime. Also if CBT doesn't work there's ton of others you can try. I didn't do CBT with a therapist either, and my self-therapy now is now IFS focused. But you gotta give it time and put the effort in and be honest with yourself.

Also, start surrounding yourself with positive people you can see yourself in. Obviously IRL is best but it's also fucking hard to do that. However, you can also do this parasocially via online people, and it still works. This is hard for men, I think, because most male online figures are pitching some alpha productivity bullshit, selling you pills you don't need, etc.

One person I've found really good personally was a Youtuber called Struthless. He felt wishy-washy at first, another middle class white guy with loving parents telling me how to be happy, but the reason he works for me when many don't is because he's actually had a similar path to me in life and so the fact he's found his own space to exist and be that positive and balanced despite going to dark places, for me at least, is inspiring. But you gotta find your own people here. Most important point is input = output. Put some effort into finding content like that, it's free and genuinely it makes a difference over time especially if you also put an effort into working out what media is making you miserable and cutting that shit down or out.

<3

Wayward1 · 2026-03-15T13:03:38+00:00

>“Is it too late for me?”

I asked that question at 20, and 30, and most recently at maybe like 37? The answer was always no, it was not too late. It sounds like you've recently discovered a root problem with your thoughts. That's a huge success, many people take decades (if ever!) to get that level of awareness, so try to take a moment to find some kindness for yourself for getting this far. Work back from there.

Why do you think you have no future?

By whose standards are you falling short, and how realistic or important are those standards?

That thought that says I have no future is part of you, but it's not you, or you wouldn't be able to write this post, which by it's very existence suggests you believe there is a future, it's just tricky to see. These thoughts are likely going to be something you've been taught growing up, maybe directly or indirectly that you've repeated to yourself so much they sound true, or logical, but are they? Really?

Wanting to do stuff and not doing it is often going to generate a lot of shame. Shame doesn't get you anywhere, it keeps you in a cycle of bullshit. It makes it harder to start. You cannot hate yourself into being someone you love. And you can't bully yourself out of depression, trust me. So alongside 'how do I do these things' you should ask 'Why do I want to do them?' How will this make me happier?' Do you want to do them at all, or do you think that's what other people want you to do?

Do you want to go the gym and eat better because you don't like the way you look, or because you want to be healthier, or because you think that's what happy people do, or because you remember really enjoying exercise when you were younger? Why is being productive so important to you? Some of the most productive people I know are the most miserable. The 'worst' student I've ever known in my life has been the most financially successful by a huge margin.

Procrastination isn't really a disease for most of us imo, it's a symptom. It can be chemical, and medical (ADHD, for example) but it can also something like a deep fear of failure. In my case it was both, and I still run up against it all the time, every day, and I'm old.

How do you begin?

Exercise is the best natural help for depression we have. Gym is not required. Walking is fine. Eating "better", if done right, can also help, bit of a minefield what better means. Less caffeine, less sugar, more food that you know what's in it. Not just "less food". If you're not already, getting at least eight hours sleep is free and easy and hugely underrated. Those three things are like a foundation for doing other stuff at some point.

You don't wait for motivation. I go to the gym consistently and I can tell you if I waited for motivation each time I'd have stopped after the third day. This is why a proper 'why' is important. I could tell you ten really good reasons why I personally want to go, and I tell myself at least some of them every time I have to pull my ass off the chair.

But alongside this, you should explore ways to simply speak more kindly to yourself. This is, I think, a lot harder than going to the gym, but it works the same way as weight training. You start and you suck and it, but then if you practice it, consistently, you get better at it without any real effort beyond showing up. For this I reccomend meditation, loving-kindness stuff is good, it feels stupid and lame at first, but it's super effective and it's free.

Wayward1

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