Devblog #77 (Patreon)

Hey Wizards!

Shady Character One here!

Let's talk about fear. Fear and Steam. It's funny how such trivial things as making a page on Steam can induce so much anxiety and doubt. Because one would think, what's the big deal? It's just a store page. Worst-case scenario, it's the same as not having one, right? Even funnier is that I was once in the position my current friends are in now—advocating for creating a Steam page—while my other friend was in my current position of being way too cautious about moving to a bigger platform. It wasn't about gaming, of course, but the situation was still the same. I was publishing stuff on a bigger platform that I started on almost by accident, without knowing how large and important it was, and they were publishing their works on smaller, cozier platforms, afraid to venture into open waters. Waters that seemed too dangerous and unforgiving to them, but were just the default state of things for me.

I guess we also have the issue of fumbling our initial release on Itch, and me wanting to "do things right" this time. But either way, I've been avoiding and delaying our Steam page creation for a very, very, very long time. So there's that factor too.

There's also the factor of finality with all of Steam's interactions. Their moderation system is very unforgiving to NSFW projects. And a lot of other aspects are set in stone too. So it really feels like you have barely any room for mistakes, and that too made me look for reasons to postpone this important step in any contemporary gamedev's journey.

But even with all the reasons to delay, I slowly but surely moved toward finalizing our Steam page. I think I might've spent an unforgivable amount of time on each of the steps just to buy myself more time to come to terms with the thought that I would need to get it published eventually. Now the page is almost complete (what takes others a couple of days, I proudly stretched into two months), and I just need a few small things and one large thing to finish it. The small things are the banners, backgrounds, and icons that Steam requires and which can buy me maybe another week of delay. And a trailer... This one is a BIG big issue.

The trailer has been one of the major hurdles to overcome since day one. Most articles on setting up a Steam page emphasize how important the trailer is for Steam—how it brings views by itself, but also serves as a symbol of professionalism, granting credibility to your project. And I have no idea how to make one. I know all the components: script, gameplay capture, editing software. But how to put it all together—the mere thought scares me. It also is something I will have to tackle in the upcoming week or two... But for now, a bunch of screenshots is all I have.

Well, I'd better get back to thinking about how daunting all of this is going to be instead of just sitting down and doing something.

I'll probably tell you how it all went next week.

Shady Character One, out!