Today the Steam release for MyGF went live. I got some choice words about this whole process, and I’d also like to open up about impostor’s syndrome, anxiety, and my relationship with Itchio.

The reason why I’m being so open is because… I’ve always been. Even back when I posted Apple Pie, I wrote a HUGE devlog exposing my heart out. When MyGF hit milestones, I talked about how the story was inspired by my own fears and anxieties. ‘Overcomp’ is literally a game I made to work through my impostor syndrome.

In every game I’ve released, I’ve opened up to you. This devlog will be no different.

THE QUEST FOR STEAM

Earlier this year, thanks to your help, I was able to save up $100 for Steam’s app fee, required for games to be published on the store. I went straight to work researching what I needed to do, tips from other devs, set up the store, aaaaaaand….

An error popped up, leaving me unable to post a trailer. Without the trailer, the game is not accepted by Steam. I sent several support requests to Steam, waited, waited, waited….. and nothing. Next thing I know, months have passed, and I’m extremely busy with university, patients, and family issues.

By the next time I was able to sit down and think, I made several versions of the trailer - I know the current one is far from impressive, but I tried my best with the limited resources I have - and it still didn’t let me upload the damn thing! Suddenly, earlier this month, the bug suddenly… disappeared, and let me upload it without any issue. Why???? Howw????

Nobody knows. Steam sure hasn’t replied to my support requests yet.

But Steam’s glitches aren’t the only reason why this release took so long to come out.

Impostor Syndrome is a bitch

Last year, I learned that the feelings I have about my projects have a name - Impostor Syndrome. My constant negative self-talk, my fear of being ‘exposed’ for something I couldn’t name, my difficulty accepting compliments and praise, and my reluctance to revisit my work…

At first, I thought it wasn’t me, until I read about a type of IS that perfectly summarizes how I feel: I’m putting on a mask of a ‘skilled’ or ‘talented’ developer or writer, but in truth, I’m a sham. I’m not good at anything related to game dev, and the people who think otherwise are either lying to me, or don’t realize I’m wearing a mask. One day, someone will see beyond the mask and expose me, and everything will be over.

So when MyGF started to get hundreds of downloads at day, the initial high of being happy and proud turned into anxiety, paranoia, despair, and finally, hate. I hated myself, MyGF, the characters, everything. I wanted to delete it all so the thoughts would stop.

I wanted to erase ‘Meiri’. I have to hold myself back to not make self-depreciating remarks when I talk about my games. I have probably dozens of scrapped posts where I joke about how much I or my projects suck.

I don’t believe in myself at all. Not even a little bit as much as the people who donated to me to help accomplish the Steam release.

Social media notifications scare me

They’ve always have. When I’m not doing particularly well and I get a message anywhere, be it Twitter, Instagram, or Discord, I immediately assume I’ve done something wrong. I do a little ritual where I repeat to myself ‘it’s something bad it’s something bad it’s something bad’, so that I don’t get startled or surprised.

Now ask me how many times that has actually happened to me. 90% of the time, it’s someone being nice or a friend reaching out. There are some bad apples, but those are are so few and far between it’s not even worth mentioning.

The anxiety is even higher when it’s a notification here on itchio - as I wrote above, my ‘type’ of impostor syndrome is the one where I believe I’m a sham, have no talent or skill, and so, I’m tricking everyone. I have nightmares where someone posts the ‘truth’ and everyone changes their mind about my projects. Where my games get bombed with negative reviews and my connections with the dev community shatters, for they too realized who I really am - a worthless girl with no talent to speak of.

The possibility of that happening is.. close to zero. Nilch. Nada. But it still scares me enough that there are days where I feel like asking a friend to read a new comment for me so I can prepare myself for the ‘obvious rejection’. I don’t know how to explain how debilitating, annoying, and hurtful this think of thinking is for me.

And yet, I can’t stop.

To sum it up, it wasn’t only technical issues that made me delay this release for half a year. I don’t believe in myself enough. ‘What? But the game’s out now!’ - it took a shitton of courage and therapy to get it there now. I could’ve still kept delaying it, but I didn’t. It’s out now.

It’s done. I did my best.

I’m still struggling with impostor syndrome, and every 3 or so months I have to talk myself out of deleting everything I’ve ever made and running off into the wild woods never to be seen again. It sucks! I wish this wasn’t the case and I could love my games as much as some of you guys do!! I wish I could see them the way you do, for real.

But I need to do plenty of work on myself to get there. I’ve been in therapy for 10 years and counting. This is going to take a long, long time to sort out.

I hope you’ll stick around to see me become a confident developer. I want to get positive and negative comments and reviews and be able to accept them with a smile or a roll of my eyes (I’m looking at you, users who complain that my visual NOVEL has too much text! What are you even doing here???), I want to celebrate the milestones and be bummed when things don’t work out - and in the end, still believe in myself.

Thank you for reading. This was very theraputic for me to write.

• Meiri

(The art on this post was gifted to me by good friends Nevi and Marie, who are always there for me when I’m down. I wanted to appreciate their support by highlighting their awesome work.)