I want to talk about my current dilemma with this game.

Many times in the past I vowed to never make games for money. The reasons are many, but it comes down to focusing on the right motivation for making games to me. I make games to express myself. They are my artistic outlet, and that’s why I enjoy it. I could, of course express myself AND make money. But I believe it could corrupt my mindset. Another reason is free games don’t have to worry about using copyrighted stuff (and most of all, I love using commercial music). And the last reason is I want as many people as possible to have access to my game, and putting a price on it could be an obstacle.

But that exact last reason is making me rethink those vows. I recently had professional experiences that made me realize people are more likely to attend to an event to which they paid in comparison to a free event (and sadly I learned that out of frustration and disappointment). Thinking about it, it’s clear that people put more value and perceive more quality in something they have to pay for than in things that are free (and there is research to back that claim). So I wondered: is it the same for games? Wouldn’t people be more likely to play a game they find on Steam (because it looks more professional and it’s not free) than a game that’s free lying around some indie game website?

This idea made me want to make THERAPIST: Mind Manager a commercial game. Not to make money, but to reach more people. Make it look more “valuable” to the community. And that has been the plan all along. To release it on Steam once it’s finished for a very small price.

But two things made me rethink that.
First, I’m having a really hard time composing my own music. Not so much for the lack of musical talent, but for the inability to deal with music composing software.
Second, I heard someone on Discord saying this “Steam makes your game more visible” thing is a myth. And indeed it must be. From my experience, what gives visibility to a game is not really the platform, but the articles, reviews and LPs.
And all of that made me remember my vows.

But still, somehow, after deciding to make my game commercial, changing it back to free, giving up on making my own music and using commercial ones feel like I’m downgrading my game, or settling for less than I could aspire. It changed my perception of quality of my own game, and that's not a good feeling.

I'm mostly just rambling, but any thoughts to help me solve this conflict are welcome.