Let me start off by saying that the header image isn’t a render of mine (perhaps obviously). It’s a screenshot from Spirit City: Lofi Sessions, which has helped my focus immensely. I’m pretty happy with the avatar customization since I feel like that one really kinda captures “me”. Consider this a review, so that should mean I won’t get in trouble for using the screenshot, right? Sure.
Anyway, I finished a scene, but that’s not really the biggest of news. I was going to get a lot more work done but something completely derailed my mental stability. If you’ve been keeping up on my personal life updates, you probably have some idea of what it is (and yes, it’s related to why this update is so late)…
Morgana went to the cancer specialists at the hospital last week to see how likely it was that she had cancer, or was susceptible to it. After some very deep questions about family history and other stuff, the doctor basically said it would be an absolute miracle if Morgana didn’t have the genetic mutations that would result in a very high cancer risk. They took three vials of blood for testing, but as it stands right now it’s looking like she may be wanting to look into both a double mastectomy and getting her ovaries removed because her risk of cancer is just disastrously high.
Now of course there’s a very slim chance Morgana’s DNA managed to avoid this stuff, we’ll find out for sure when the results come back. But as it stands right now things aren’t looking great. This isn’t to say she has cancer right now, of course; but knowing it’s practically an inevitability isn’t much consolation.
We’ve both taken this pretty hard. It consumed most of my thoughts, as well as her’s, and our focus has been doing what we can to distract ourselves from what could be a painful road ahead. We went out to different places, spent time together (binging all of the Sandman and Dead Boy Detectives series). There was a “halfway to Halloween” event at a mall somewhat nearby so we went to that (and I got a lot of books to draw inspiration for future Mythos stuff from, as well as a Clue movie poster!). She’s still worried, but she knows I’m going to be by her side through all of this, no matter the outcome.
Since I had today off, and Morgana still had to work, I fired up Spirit City to buckle down and get some work on Mythos done. Now, more than ever, I really want to get this completed. Once this first game is done I can get it up on Steam and hopefully it’ll get enough attention to help me out financially. If Morgana really does have to go through with these surgeries, that will be a pretty big burden on our bank account between the medical costs and her having to miss time off work for recovery.
I know this update was kind of a bummer, but I always want to be transparent with you all. I hope you’re all doing well, and thank you for bearing with me while I struggle to get this game released.
A side note that just occurred to me; I’ve seen a lot of talk in various places about how it seems like devs are always talking about hardships that delay their games. Part of that is why I’m so hesitant to say just what’s been on my mind: I don’t want to be perceived as making up excuses for slow work. However, looking at it from this side, I think there’s one of two factors at play, here:
- Devs don’t have any more hardships than anybody else; they’re just more visible and it’s more obvious when it happens. Think about how many times you’ll come home from work or some social gathering, look at some chores you have to do around the house, and just mentally can’t deal with it just then. Now imagine that, but you’re also making a game all by yourself.
- Devs are actually just cursed and we have more hardships than most people because some ancient eldritch god has a burning hatred for indie games.
Regardless, you Mythies have always shown compassion and patience (usually) when it comes to my hiccups, so I hope you can bear with me at least long enough to see me complete my first game. My plan is still as always; continue making Mythos games and stories until I die. Hopefully future installments will come more easily.
Keep the legends alive!
– Nine