The more things change, the more they stay the same.
The last seven years have been life-changing for me. Building this website, inviting contributors to write for it, inexplicably being able to create a community around it, none of this is what I expected to be doing in the last years of my 20s and the first of my 30s. I also didn’t expect this to last nearly as long as it did. There were several points I thought about giving up, and the support I’ve received from friends I’ve made through doing this shit in the first place kept me from doing that, straight up. I am here right now because No Escape sort of developed a life of its own.
Something my mom always used to say has been following me around lately, though. “Shit changes every seven years, and if it doesn’t it means something’s wrong.” She had this belief that major stages of your life came in sevens, and if you were still doing the same thing after seven years with no change in your circumstances it wasn’t good for you. I have no idea how much I take stock in that idea but it’s a little weird that after seven years of working from home, of building a website, of comfortably straddling the line between precarious media freelancer and mostly-secure-but-pretty-underpaid Corporate Cog, everything in my life is changing right now.
A month and change ago, I learned that I’d be losing my job. I take some pride in the fact that I lasted at that job for eleven years and made it to a place of such security that the only thing getting my ass was our client deciding not to renew its contract. I got really good at what I did, even though it’s not what I wanted to do with my life. And when I got the opportunity to do something more aligned with my interests, I took it. But unless I find a similar job, that dynamic I enjoyed is running out of runway very quickly. I will be fully unemployed for the first time in 11 years as of August 28, 2026.
So, understandably, that has me looking around at everything in my life and reevaluating it.
Do I want to go back through the call center life, likely starting from scratch as a customer service rep again and having to work my way back into a trainer position? Do I want to try to permalance it, knowing fully that online media in general is shrinking and games media especially is in the direst straits it’s probably ever been in? That if I decide to become a freelance writer full-time I will be stuck in a feast-famine cycle where the latter far outweighs the former more often than not? Do I want to become a PR person? Could I even make the transition to that? Should I become a content creator, streaming myself on Twitch playing video games alone in my apartment all week or posting video essays to an increasingly draconian YouTube platform?
Can I make a living? Or am I fucked?
I don’t mean to be dramatic about any of this. The truth is that I know I have been exceptionally, grossly privileged to be able to do any of the shit I’ve done with No Escape for the past seven years. I’ve run GoFundMes in the past that have been extremely successful even if they didn’t all reach their goals. I’ve asked for help repeatedly in the past when the corporate gig wasn’t enough to pay for rent and bills and I’ve always, fucking miraculously, been able to make shit work. The debts I’ve racked up to the people who inexplicably like me (or at the very least like this website) are already incalculable. I will never be able to repay them as it is, and here I am on the cusp of asking for more help like some kind of greedy and entitled motherfucker. I feel guilt about this. I feel shame. I do not feel good writing this post just like I haven’t felt good writing any of the past “I’m fucked please help me” posts.
I’m also trying to trick myself into not feeling like this situation has me by the short-and-curlies. I’m trying to keep the upsides in mind and be positive about this whole thing. Life changes aren’t bad. I’ll be happier doing something I actually like doing. Thousands of people have visited my bullshit website this year alone. I have a chance to enjoy what I do to make a living for the first time.
So… fuck it. I’m just gonna do every fucking thing.
I have just become an Affiliate on Twitch. That means I can run ads (but have no control over what those ads are) during streams. I’ll be doing a hell of a lot more streams moving forward and for as long as I can. It also means I can have paid subscribers, and I know for a fact that means I’m probably gonna do a subathon stream sometime soon. My goal with Twitch is to do variety content, bouncing back and forth between a bunch of indie games, mainstays I can jump into every day like Trackmania, and bigger stuff like Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII. I’ve also revamped my long-dormant YouTube channel and am beginning the process of monetizing that as well. You can check out the first two episodes of an Ace Combat 7 let’s play I’m producing over there already. Additionally, there’s a new Patreon perk for all tiers $3 and up: you can check out the full stream VODs days or even weeks before anyone sees the let’s plays.
I’m also of course going to be writing here more. And not just here: I am open to any editor who’d like to work with me on a freelance basis, especially with the onslaught of games coming this fall. And if you’ve got a story outside of games journalism that needs covered, I’d also love to give that a shot for you if you’re interested. noescapevg at gmail if you’re one such editor.
I am not going to let No Escape slip through my fingers as some kind of failed or abortive experiment just because shit got a little hard re: the economy (okay that’s underselling it too much). I don’t think my voice is special or that it’s needed in these trying times or that I deserve to have a job in media or whatever, but I would feel shitty about just giving up on this. So rather than setting up a liferaft gofundme or spamming my ko-fi link on Bluesky every 15 minutes, I’m gonna ask you – everyone who reads this, wherever they read it – to consider doing one of three things for me.
And you know I had to do it to em:
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If you’ve made it to the end of this post, thanks for reading. It’s a weird one for me to write, but honestly my life has been weird as hell for almost two whole years at this point. Anyway, I’m gonna go apply for more jobs and try not to lose my lunch lmao. Thanks again for being here.
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