Dev Blog 2: This isn't working out.

I really just don't think people are capable of caring about me anymore. Not as an artist. Also in some ways as a person but we all have that. It has been 37 years and I'm just gonna write JORDAN's origin story now. No fun stuff. People won't even deign to hear what I think a good manga would be or a fun game. So here is just who I am:

I was not well loved as a kid. A Mother who drank and drugged but had infinite love. A Father who thought he was faggy and weird (it was the 90's, sorry). The first thing he was taught is to just fucking get over it. Done.

I spent most of school learning to survive bullying and try to change myself for the sake of said bullies. So, yeah, Art was a thing I wanted to do: Comics, Games, Cartoons, Books.

Every step was "You aren't good enough." "You don't have anything to say, you just play Video Games". So in my 20's OF COURSE I let the anger drive me to try my best, go to college and find himself.

Every college teacher found Jordan very annoying. As the narrator and Jordan I can tell you it's a mix of him being annoying and some of the professors kind of sucking at teaching. So learning how to do what he wanted became another purity test. Are you SMART enough? Do you even have anything to say at all? Why should I read this?

For your brief relief: I had friends and good times. Drinks and smokes and social spaces. I was not miserable 24/7. That made it all the worse when a room would clear when I stopped being my friends clown and started asking if they wanted to hear about my game idea or manga concept. Not the place. So I work on it in college or alone to make sure it's good enough when I find the right place.

So, we are in the 30's Life is Hell as I work at GameStop, a lonely manager with all my peers gone onto better or worse.

Not the Place.

So we are in my mid 30's. Life is Good as I work at a really nice retro retail establishment, a lonely manager with all my peers too busy to take a phone call because I talk too much.

Not the Place.

So I am HERE. I have skipped a lot of details but the TL;DR is this: I made sure every step of the way to try and make comrades who share my interests and if they didn't want any part of my projects, neither did my peers in college, online, or anywhere an artist might collaborate.

Again, Not the Time. Not The Place

So, doing it when I lose my job and have free time in between being a doting full time father?

Not the Time, go be with your kid.

So years of: I'm busy, It's not good enough, do it yourself, that kind of thing is not what we pay you for, You're a good friend and this is a great...thing I'm just too busy, you should make it on your own, I have my own stuff going on, I'm just not really interested, have you tried a Podcast?

This isn't working out for me anymore. I knew this round it would be out of spite. That I would have to do this alone in a crowd of people who love me so very much. They want to see me happy and successful. I'm so lucky to be in a place where every one of my family members and friends tells me how nice I am. How much they appreciate my attitude, my hard work and my stalwart friendship.

NOT. THE. PLACE.

This is just what it's like to be untalented. I have a little confidence and know I can carry a conversation. My words, ephemeral and temporary are about all people are willing to invest in since the art of listening and tuning out looks functionally the same. HOWEVER:

Got a sec to read my review fellow gamer and established reviewer? Another time, sure.

Wanna hear my game idea? Yeah, you can look at your phone, I guess.

Want to collab? Oh, yeah, of course, it wouldn't be fair to you.

Want to see my solo work? Yeah, I get it, don't waste your time with a sketch.

It's in the fact no tweet I ever made hit. No character idea ever worthy of collaboration. No solo work that didn't go into the void and slide off the eyeballs and ears of people I know personally and people who I want to work with alike. I'm not being a sad-sack I can't read this any other way than "We don't like it or want to hear it". No one to blame but me for being in the wrong place and the wrong time again.

Now I'm almost 40. My own family is too busy to care other than liking the photos of my kid. The only thing that keeps my old engine going is that all this makes me HATE and because of the very nasty way my parents raised me, I use that as fuel. My art came from needing to deal with 90's bullying. I'm used to just making something no one will regard at all... even my own family.

I'm making things sure, but I am basically birthing them directly into the graveyard. My "Cool voice, you should voice act bro" and "pretty words" are for me and the A.I google uses to generate SEO for this dead website. Oh and the nice people in On-Together who listened to my idea despite knowing me less than a day.

I'm going to lash together my game of sorrow and personal grievance. I'm going to watch it float out to sea and sigh as it joins a mosaic of itch games that have 31 plays, uploaded 13 years ago. I'm then going to not be surprised when my lifelong friends and collogues say, "Oh, I didn't know you made games, when I get the time, I'll check it out!"