4 months of writing, 1 month for the rest of my life
Today marks four months since I created this blog and made my first post.
It all began with the merging of two ideas I had, brewed by the strong catalyst of Murkdice's axis of abstraction - the one blogpost that started it all and I will never not praise.
Since then, 120 days passed. My four month pregnant wife is now my nine month pregnant behemoth. My nameless sexless baby is now a person, already full of energy and kicks and opinions from beyond the meat veil.
My old apartment is now my old apartment, and my old refurbishment is now my new home.
My old job is still the same, but I somehow found myself promoted in between all this.
That is to say, life happened. A lot of life, even.
And during traffic, baths, washing dishes, taking the subway or the good old writing instead of sleeping, I did some stuff.
I wrote four different games, two adventures, one add-on, participated in three jams and, last but not least, wrote 55 blogposts, including this one.
A handful never got published, but they live the eternal slumber of the draft notes, while some were quite concise.
Most of them became what was released earlier this week as cramOS; the seed that birthed it all, really: a weird, specific game about playing Robots in a planet that is not Earth that expanded on Into the Odd. A love letter to one of my biggest inspirations, to my favorite genre of stories, and also, to my own self.
Which feels egocentric to say, but it is the truth. For I have tried to write many things before, from screenplays, to books, to fanfic even - which I suppose has been written, lost in the depths of the internet.
But finally finding the thing that existed in me and be able to pull it out allwhile the entire world changed around me was like, "how can I make this deeply transformative and insane moment of my life even weirder and equal parts more challenging and more fun?"
Fun because as my TTRPG availability diminished - together with my group's - writing became my Solo Play. Something I could obsess over and spend creative juices that needed relocation.
But also challenging, as life punished me for the greediness of fighting for my happiness.
My wife usually says TTRPGs are my sanity valve. That without them, I start to lose it, slowly. She is right, of course.
Some people comment on the amount of stuff I made in this brief window. Believe me: this is within anyone's reach. You just have to actually put words down somewhere and be brave enough to not look like a fool.
Fool because some of your words will be bad - most, even - and no one will tell you so. But mostly a fool because anyone writing four different TTRPGs in four months certainly didn't test them all.
I do 100% believe I wrote good shit, don't get me wrong. Prima Nomina gameplay loop is entrancing to play. IRON on IRON on IRON probably delivers a swordfighting mechanic that has never being made before. Odd Kids is absolutely unique - believe me, I looked for something like it. And cramOS has a great survival mechanic (this one I actually playtested!).
But I know I am not the next Guy. Heck, I know I am not even the best writer in my house. This is and always will be just a fun weird art project. Sometimes the mind gets lost in validation, or more precisely, recognition. You will always want your new thing to be read, and commented. Some unknown person saying "this is made for me".
Is my Appendix N Jam Entry a winner? I doubt it. But it got a much more positive feedback than I would have ever hoped, even as I thought it was ugly in the end. Will my onepageRPG Jam entry change the world? Not anyone but mine. Will my Minimalist Jam blow up into something real? Ok, this one I really do believe is special, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.
What does the future hold, though? Well, I know what I will hold; my daughter in my arms for one, an immense number of used diapers as well. Or I could say I will hold the weight of the world, my world, a middle management Atlas.
But that would be a lie, because I am lucky enough to share the load with the love of my life and plenty of friends ready to hold the globe aloft.
Will I write an average of almost a post every two days? God, I hope not. Nor will I write more TTRPGs (but mostly because I think I found my tune on writing adventures).
Will my writing get better? Don't get your hopes up.
Will it get worse? The bar is already low and sleep deprivation won't make any miracles.
Will I write for the rest of my life? I don't think I ever didn't.