I have declared a hiatus from streaming, because of burnout, I guess. I guess that's what it is. I've come to realize I like being on stream, I like chatting with friends and fans, and playing games, and having that audience...
But streaming? I hate streaming. There are a lot of reasons for this and most of it boils down to technology. My capture card is a cheap thing I picked up on Amazon a few years back and the game audio ends up cutting out. My laptop, which is a few years old and supposedly a decent one, can't handle running OBS and PNGTuber+ at the same time. Or OBS and most of my Steam titles at the same time. Or OBS and a browser window at the same time. (As an aside, my partner Char has an older and frankly more decrepit laptop--it takes forever to start up and runs like shit for a solid day after a Windows update--and it can handle running things a lot better.)
And then because I'm stressed out enough about tech issues, I end up hating doing my 'fun' redeems, because I have to focus on them while still stressing about issues. But everyone wants the fun redeems and brings up the fun redeems constantly and I feel like I'm in a SAY THE LINE BART situation. I end up being upset because a lot of the games I play have great soundtracks and I can't share them with my audience. It sucks!
And I know that it doesn't matter if it's scuff. That what matters is that everyone is having fun, that my friends and viewers want to be there. But like. It matters to me. I'm not having fun because of the scuff. I don't want to be there because I feel like I'm putting out a shoddy experience. I feel frustrated because I have very little room for growth because I can't add new features or have a better model or anything else. It's like when you're playing a game and just getting utterly trounced. You get told that winning isn't everything and you should just have fun. But at a certain point, it isn't fun if you never win! And that's where I'm at right now, I need a damn win.
And despite all that, I feel guilty for not streaming! Because I do have the half to two thirds of a dozen or so people who show up to my streams, and because that's been one of my methods of socializing with people since I've otherwise been in recluse mode. And missing out on getting $70ish bucks twice a year sucks too. And I am scared that the longer I stay away from streaming, the less likely I am to go back.
I don't really have a conclusion to this post.