Category: Miscellaneous

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2022 Was a Rebound Year

It’s good to look forward to what’s coming next, set goals and get excited for the future. I am not even being sarcastic, despite not being a proponent of actual resolutions. But first, let me take a moment to reflect on the year that has passed. 2022 was the year when the world tried spinning back up in earnest, and in large parts failed to do so. This applies to me personally, as well as in general. As the pandemic lessened its grip, there was a lot of jumping the gun to get “back to normal”.

We are not there. At least, I hope 2022 is not representative of the new normal. It doesn’t feel like it. More transitional, like a rebound year, if you ask me.

Losses

I lost 3 old friends over the span of a quarter in 2022. We weren’t all that close anymore, but we used to be, and their passing hit me harder than expected. These guys were all around my own age and died of natural causes. Cherish your friends, even those you don’t see very often. Send them a note.

I changed jobs 3 times in 2022, which is at least twice too many. Even as a longtime contract worker, it’s too much stress to go through. It doesn’t help that I was fooled by a consulting company. Their lure was to build a gaming industry arm of the business, but it was a ploy to get a business plan made. Within a week after I delivered, they decided it was too expensive after all, canceled the project, and let me go.

Those events required a hard rebound, mentally. I am not looking for pity, however. We all have bad situations happen, but how we react to them determine whether they can be turned into a win.

Wins

One of the biggest wins of the year for me, was that it only took a week to land a new job after the fiasco with the consulting company. At the time of writing, I’m working as producer on Age of Empires 4, shepherding the Xbox port of the game. It’s a great gig, and an honor to be associated with such a respected franchise. That said, I would really like to make this my last contract gig. Being employed a maximum of 18 months at a time is not ideal.

Another big win was launching Above the Fold out of Early Access on Steam after almost 4 years in development. It happened with less fanfare than planned, in large part due to coinciding with the events previously mentioned, but it felt great to officially finish the game and “set it free”. There is an update in the works, but no launch date on that.

Completing a project always leaves a gap, followed by increasing experimentation and eventually, new projects come out of it. This renewal is well underway already and will continue to set the tone for the first part of the new year. In fact, I’ve already started working out prototypes for a new game.

So, as I look forward to the year ahead, I look for building out fresh ideas and inspiring relationships; a welcome challenge. I want 2023 to be a year of strength and creation.

Want to join me?

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Impressing 12-Year Old Me

Any time I do something big or important, I think of myself as 12 years old, and I ask what the younger me would think of what I am doing now. If the kid would be impressed, it was the right decision.

The reason I do this, is because I still carry many of the same dreams and am fascinated by the same things my younger self was into. And at 12, I still had a bit of the innocent naïveté of a child, without the awkwardness of being a teenager but with a well developed sense for right and wrong. I suspect others probably can relate to this as well.

So, it’s really a technique to try and stay true to my core, not be afraid of lofty dreams, and to keep seeking adventure. I think returning to that kid also acts as a way to avoid getting too jaded or caught up in life’s endless list of complications.

At 12, I was really into gaming. Especially roleplaying games and video games. I was also into organizing stuff back then, taking charge. Fast forward 35 years, and I am a producer in the gaming industry. Kid-me, from a decidedly blue collar family in tiny Denmark, would have his little mind blown. That’s a clear win, and the most direct tie back to my childhood. Most of the time, it’s much more subtle.

A common one I use, is “would kid-me trust this person?” It’s a pretty good bullshit-meter, because my default position was always not to trust adult strangers. And in continuation of my thoughts on donating work to other people’s projects, I absolutely use this technique as a measure, before making any sort of commitment. If kid-me disapproves, it’s an automatic pass.

In essence it helps me to be less constricted by outside expectations, and instead focus inward on what matters to Rasmus.

It doesn’t work for everything, of course. Specifically, it doesn’t work for things kids just don’t care about. Like choosing an accountant or cleaning your room. Kid-me never approves of those things, so I make sure to get him a small reward whenever it gets done anyway. Which current me is thankful for.

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Taking back my content

Many moons ago, mine was an active website. I’d publish new content regularly, talking about whatever I was doing or thinking about. I started doing this before it became widely known as blogging. Back then, it was just us nerds doing it. My first content management system was Notepad and a shareware FTP client, and I proudly wrote my html 4 with CSS styling – zero tables, baby! It was considered borderline reckless at the time.

Along the way, tools were upgraded and it became easier to focus on the content itself. Things were humming along – but then I just sort of stopped posting. What happened?

Social media came along, and eventually all my content ended up there. Spread out on every platform under the sun – because I’m curious and want to try everything. Though my initial plan was to use social as a way to amplify my content – the old hub and spoke approach – I started slipping.

I lost focus and ended up convincing myself that posting content to my own site was pointless. “No one is going to read it”, I told myself. “Skip the post and just do a thread on Twitter? Saves me some effort, and no one has to leave their social media app.” Seems like an easy win, right?

So, I have decided to go back to hosting my own content, reviving my personal site as the main platform – and all the other channels once again become more like spokes in a wheel, pointing back to the center. Like the original plan.

Of course, this move was partially inspired by the recent developments on Twitter, which reminded me that I have no control over all the content I have shared there, over the course of more than a decade and a half. That’s a lot of content.

Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t suddenly turned into a social media hater. Social media is great for silly memes and networking, it really is. Direct conversation with peers, idols and opponents alike can lead to all sorts of opportunity. Like any tool, it comes down to using it right, and I was being lazy.

So, welcome (back) to my personal site and the renewed commitment to taking control of my content. If you want to stay up to date, there’s an email box nearby – and of course, you can find me on Instagram, Twitter and Mastodon, too. I hope to see you around.

Header image: created using Midjourney and combining a few prompts around the theme of taking back content and archival.