Gorogoa is a multifaceted allegory presented in the form of a puzzle game. Upon reflection, it's one of the most personal games I've ever played. Because of this, I'm gonna get a bit more personal than usual.
I'll be honest, I'm not at a good place in my life these days. Every time I wake up, I dread what is to come as I think about what I've failed at. My dream in life is to become an independent game developer and make at least 2 video games can truly be proud of. If I cannot make 2 games, then at the very least I wanna make 1. I intend to follow this dream in my spare time until I truly have the stability to fully pursue it. Yet, it seems like the stability I need is becoming an endless pursuit in and of itself. I know how to get to my ultimate goal, but my brain will simply not let me finish anything. In order to articulate myself effectively, I need to write, yet thanks to my brain, writing is quite literally like self harm.
My brain is a giant mountain of Polaroid photos and each Polaroid picture has individual thoughts and ideas and sometimes single words. Everything is sort of extremely interconnected and related to each other in some way, but there is no order to anything. Surrounding this mountain of Polaroid photos are several megaphones and loudspeakers that all have different perspectives on anything that I think. Whenever I put together a sentence or articulate myself, I have to climb up and go through this mountain of Polaroid photos and put them together in the correct order. And it takes a long time to do this because it’s a giant disorganized mass, and I have to do that for every single thing that I think or write.
This isn’t helped by the loudspeakers, because they are always going off about everything at the same time. One of these speakers is talking about what I’m trying to say, another one is screaming about what I have written down, another is talking about all the damn Polaroid photos, another one comes up with a joke, another one is always criticizing every single thing that I write. And that’s one of the loudest ones, actually, because I can never see what I’m doing because of it. I automatically think of counterarguments to everything I write before I've even written anything. The combination of all of this makes it as though I have some sort of writing dysphoria or dysmorphia, for want of a better term. This term may or may not exist, but it is the only way I can think about it.
I've spent the better part of a year--potentially even 5 years depending on how you look at it-- writing pages and pages of scripts. No matter what, I seem to be unable to finish them. The first 4 reviews I've published on Backloggd (after the Extinction one) were written before I published them. They are the first drafts for a series I originally called Reverys. I have 8 of these drafts, and the ones on backloggd are the earliest ones. They are the ones I am least proud of for the most part, but I'm going back through them and finishing them one by one. I am stuck on the Bound By Flame one.
I intend to make a living by learning about games, until I am able to make a living by making games. I have tonnes of learning differences and challenges, so I hope that by making videos, I can also demonstrate a different, more kinesthetic manner of learning to those who do not learn well in traditional academic settings. I know that isn't a dream, it can be a reality, but the gelatinous disability that I call my brain keeps me grounded. I'm constantly chasing a lighthouse, but the lighthouse becomes the sun, and the sun consumes the sky until it is covered by the clouds of my mind. I have things to offer the world, I have things to prove to myself, nothing is ever good enough. I write random shite on Backloggd that almost nobody sees, and even less people care about. It's not as though I've ever looked for attention, I just wanna be satisfied with what I make. People tell me that I'm a writer sometimes, but don't want to be one and I never wanted to be. I just spend so much fucking time writing because I'm trying to make something I'm proud of, but I cannot even do the bare minimum task. Even the smallest things become monumental tasks that spiral outta control before I even realise it. I'm not a writer, I'm just trapped in my fucking head.
I remember when I was on the verge of failing school again, Jason Roberts was developing his game, and he was among the many indie devs whose journey pushed me to keep moving forward. I knew he was a software engineer who left his job to make something he could be proud of. I knew he had the ability to draw and code. I knew he was gonna release his game and it was gonna be something good. I was walking up the stairs in the cold the day before Gorogoa released, reading about Jason Roberts and his journey to releasing his game. I pre-downloaded the game on my phone, and the next evening, I played through it in my bed until after the middle of the night. It was fantastic, albeit a little short. Playing through it further cemented my dreams of making games. I miss those days of inspiration, if I'm honest. Those days seem to be getting farther and farther away. I don't know what to do about it. I don't know what to do.
I look at what I've written and I hate what I see, and then I look in the mirror and I hate what I see. But then I look up at the sky and the sun is out again. I wish people could see what I see because then it wouldn't seem like an unattainable dream. I will keep following the sun. I must get to Gorogoa.
I'll be honest, I'm not at a good place in my life these days. Every time I wake up, I dread what is to come as I think about what I've failed at. My dream in life is to become an independent game developer and make at least 2 video games can truly be proud of. If I cannot make 2 games, then at the very least I wanna make 1. I intend to follow this dream in my spare time until I truly have the stability to fully pursue it. Yet, it seems like the stability I need is becoming an endless pursuit in and of itself. I know how to get to my ultimate goal, but my brain will simply not let me finish anything. In order to articulate myself effectively, I need to write, yet thanks to my brain, writing is quite literally like self harm.
My brain is a giant mountain of Polaroid photos and each Polaroid picture has individual thoughts and ideas and sometimes single words. Everything is sort of extremely interconnected and related to each other in some way, but there is no order to anything. Surrounding this mountain of Polaroid photos are several megaphones and loudspeakers that all have different perspectives on anything that I think. Whenever I put together a sentence or articulate myself, I have to climb up and go through this mountain of Polaroid photos and put them together in the correct order. And it takes a long time to do this because it’s a giant disorganized mass, and I have to do that for every single thing that I think or write.
This isn’t helped by the loudspeakers, because they are always going off about everything at the same time. One of these speakers is talking about what I’m trying to say, another one is screaming about what I have written down, another is talking about all the damn Polaroid photos, another one comes up with a joke, another one is always criticizing every single thing that I write. And that’s one of the loudest ones, actually, because I can never see what I’m doing because of it. I automatically think of counterarguments to everything I write before I've even written anything. The combination of all of this makes it as though I have some sort of writing dysphoria or dysmorphia, for want of a better term. This term may or may not exist, but it is the only way I can think about it.
I've spent the better part of a year--potentially even 5 years depending on how you look at it-- writing pages and pages of scripts. No matter what, I seem to be unable to finish them. The first 4 reviews I've published on Backloggd (after the Extinction one) were written before I published them. They are the first drafts for a series I originally called Reverys. I have 8 of these drafts, and the ones on backloggd are the earliest ones. They are the ones I am least proud of for the most part, but I'm going back through them and finishing them one by one. I am stuck on the Bound By Flame one.
I intend to make a living by learning about games, until I am able to make a living by making games. I have tonnes of learning differences and challenges, so I hope that by making videos, I can also demonstrate a different, more kinesthetic manner of learning to those who do not learn well in traditional academic settings. I know that isn't a dream, it can be a reality, but the gelatinous disability that I call my brain keeps me grounded. I'm constantly chasing a lighthouse, but the lighthouse becomes the sun, and the sun consumes the sky until it is covered by the clouds of my mind. I have things to offer the world, I have things to prove to myself, nothing is ever good enough. I write random shite on Backloggd that almost nobody sees, and even less people care about. It's not as though I've ever looked for attention, I just wanna be satisfied with what I make. People tell me that I'm a writer sometimes, but don't want to be one and I never wanted to be. I just spend so much fucking time writing because I'm trying to make something I'm proud of, but I cannot even do the bare minimum task. Even the smallest things become monumental tasks that spiral outta control before I even realise it. I'm not a writer, I'm just trapped in my fucking head.
I remember when I was on the verge of failing school again, Jason Roberts was developing his game, and he was among the many indie devs whose journey pushed me to keep moving forward. I knew he was a software engineer who left his job to make something he could be proud of. I knew he had the ability to draw and code. I knew he was gonna release his game and it was gonna be something good. I was walking up the stairs in the cold the day before Gorogoa released, reading about Jason Roberts and his journey to releasing his game. I pre-downloaded the game on my phone, and the next evening, I played through it in my bed until after the middle of the night. It was fantastic, albeit a little short. Playing through it further cemented my dreams of making games. I miss those days of inspiration, if I'm honest. Those days seem to be getting farther and farther away. I don't know what to do about it. I don't know what to do.
I look at what I've written and I hate what I see, and then I look in the mirror and I hate what I see. But then I look up at the sky and the sun is out again. I wish people could see what I see because then it wouldn't seem like an unattainable dream. I will keep following the sun. I must get to Gorogoa.