last month, i put up a demographic survey, asking a variety of questions. i received a grand total of 728 responses!! ...well, ok, the first response i filled out as myself to test the form, so it's actually 727 responses!!!!! an incredible turnout. you guys really went above and beyond. thank you ;_: i have this very long post for you as a reward for participating, so i hope it'll be interesting!!

i'm going to assume anyone reading this already knows who i am, what kinds of games i make, and a general idea of how long i've been doing this. as for my methodology, i only posted this link in two places: on my patreon, and then in a blog post here on itch.io. i added a link to that post in the newsfeed section of my website, and i'm not currently on ANY social media apps. considering all that, i feel like i got way more responses than expected!! but it also (handily) illustrates my true purpose in doing this survey in the first place:

i wanted to prove that being on twitter is not a necessary factor to your success as an artist.

i’ve known this intrinsically, and wanted to write a post about it for a long time. but having the data to back it up will hopefully give other artists the confidence to accept it as true! so thank you again to everyone who participated in the survey, because i think this has the potential to help artists who have felt lost and scared due to the rapidly changing environment of late 2022 twitter!! (and if you want to skip ahead to my proof you don't need twitter, please feel free to scroll down to the conclusion section!)

now, onto summarizing the results :)

age groups

i asked: how old are you?

you answered:

1. 18-22 (237 people, 32.6%)
2. 14-17 (207 people, 28.4%)
   
3. 23-29 (160 people, 22%)
4. 30-59 (97 people, 13.3%)
5. 13 and under (26 kiddos, 3.6%)
6. 60+ (1 legendary elder, 0.1%)

for the first 230 responses, there was a mistake in the choices (did anyone else notice…?) the age groups i had written were 18-22, and 22-29. so which 22 year olds chose which group is a total mystery (for those first 230 responses). that's why i don't have an image for this section... 

but my guess was that my audience would skew 22 or younger, and i was right! truly shocked by the one 60+ respondent. good for them.

gender/identity

the questions in this section were all optional, but most everyone answered anyway. thanks!

what pronouns do you use?: this one was multiselect, so there were all sorts of combinations! my guess was that she/her would take the majority, so i'm a little surprised this wasn't the case. very nice to see that they/them was so common.

as for which combos were most frequent: 240 people said he/him only, 165 are she/her only, and 61 were they/them only. she/they was also pretty frequent at 67 (hey those are my pronouns too!), and he/they came in at 54 responses. 25 people use he/she/they, 15 use just he/she, and the rest of the combinations each had 10 or fewer responses.

do you consider yourself to be LGBTQ+?: resounding yes, as expected. (69%... nice.......)

not much to say about this one! there were 3 options and the split was more or less what i thought it'd be, considering the content of my games.

are you perhaps asexual (like me?): 320 people say no, but the rest are questioning or fall somewhere on the spectrum! neat!!

it's nice to see so many aces, considering people think we’re super rare. i didn’t single out other identities because the other questions touch on them anyway, and i wasn't as interested in the specifics of those. i think it’s significant that only 10 people answered that they have never heard of asexuality before! that’s not something you would find surveying a general population, but it does make sense for a majority lgbtq+ audience (only 1 of those 10 respondents said that they are LGBT haha).

did my games or characters have some effect on your identity?

this one was multi-select with writeins! here were the most common answers:

1. no effect, but it was good for me to see the representation (379 people, 52.8%)
2. i felt affirmed by them! (274 people, 38.2%)
3. they helped me figure out my sexuality (114 people, 15.9%)
4. well it turns out i'm polyamorous (82 people, 11.4%)
5. you made me trans omg (47 people, 6.5%)

a lot of the write-in answers elaborated on what they selected. i should've included a simpler "no effect" option in hindsight, but i think i had just assumed people who felt that way would leave the question blank. my bad! 

i've often gotten comments or emails with stories of how my games have helped people to pin down their identity (which is why i wanted to include this question in the survey), but i'm surprised at the number of people who said they're polyamorous now!! though considering the results of the next section, maybe i shouldn't have been surprised at all hehe

the games

what was your first NomnomNami game?: 218 people said lonely wolf treat!

syrup, contract demon, and her tears were my light are the runner ups. 62 people have been around since before syrup, which is kinda incredible! thanks for putting up with me for so long ehe. to the 4 people who said they've never played my games before... thanks for doing my survey! <3

what's your favorite game?: the winner is... TREAT AGAIN! with 161 answers (22.1%).

no graph for this one, since there was a writein option. but the second most common response was "how can i choose?!" at 147 responses (20.2%). starry flowers is in third place with 122 responses (16.8%). i actually expected BAD END THEATER to be higher, but... it’s still new, and although it has the most reach of any of my games, the more hardcore fans (patrons and itch.io followers who have played more than a few titles) are here for my main series it looks like :)

 by the way, KAIMA was one of the standouts from the writeins! spooky soiree and astra's garden got mentioned a lot too. i love all those games, so thanks for loving them too!

what system do you prefer to play my games on? overwhelmingly pc/mac!

i asked this one to get a sense of how much i should focus on mobile ports. i like doing them if i can, but it's quite a bit of extra work to manage. i'm worried about doing it for syrup 2, because a lot of screens will need touch friendly redesigns... ah, um, sorry, this data isn't as interesting as the rest. let's move on!

language/translation

i do a lot of backend work on my games, adding translations in lots of different languages to serve an international audience. it's nice that most respondents said they're fluent in english, but that's also to be expected from a survey that was only written in english. thank you to the 29 people who said they rely on translations but still put in the effort to fill out my survey anyway!! you rock!!!

i'm a little surprised that most people play in english, but glad that the amount of people who are waiting on translations is relatively small. only 3 people said my games aren't in their language at all, which kinda rocks! i hope i can add translations for them in the future.

after this question, i left space for people to write in with translation requests. i’m happy to say some of these were in progress already! russian and spanish came up a lot, but i have dedicated translators for those languages--all of my games have at least one translation for both of those (excluding treat complete, since i decided to handle it later for that project specifically!) but to those asking for japanese starry flowers... i would love that too... i'll try to make it happen one day.

marketing

finally, the section that got me to write this survey in the first place!! in other words, here comes the juicy stuff :)

where did you first find out about my games?:  most people said... right here on itch.io!!

1. itch.io (322 people, 44.2%)
2. youtube (124 people, 17%)
3. google play (106 people, 14.6%)
4. from a friend (62 people, 8.5%)
5. twitter (14 people, 1.9%)
6. steam recommendation (11 people, 1.5%)
7. followed me since before i started making games (9 people, 1.2%)

this one had a lot of writein responses. there were some surprising sources in there, like 4chan and tiktok! a lot of them elaborated on existing answers (like mentioning the specific youtuber they first saw my games through, or a friend getting them to play a specific game). but i wish i included an "i dont remember" option, because that was very common. silly oversight.

notably, the number of people who found me via twitter is pretty close to the amounts who came from steam recommendations, and from my early 20s posting art on tumblr, or possibly even when i was a teen on deviantART! interesting!!  very very interesting fact to consider!!!!!

do you share my games with your friends?: most people said yes, in private chats or discord servers!

this was another multi-select answer. i should've included an option for if you share with people you know in real life... i didn’t even think about it due to my lifestyle (i never go outside!) but the pandemic has forced everyone to be more online regardless. hmm.

a much higher amount than expected said that they do not feel safe sharing my games, i assume due to some kind of social stigma. a friend pointed out that because it was the only “no” option, more people may have chosen it despite not actually feeling unsafe—answering this one wasn’t required (which i thought would’ve been enough of a “no”) but i can see how people might miss that and click it anyway. i wish i had given a better variety of answers for this one! darn. it's a learning experience for next time, at least.

comments and feedback

i received 361 responses in the feedback section (almost exactly half of respondents!!) wow!!!

i included this part in case people wanted to clarify one of their previous answers, or point out any missing options they wish i would've included. but the vagueness of the prompt just meant that most people used the space to say something nice to me... ;_;

i’ve cried a few times reading these, because many were very heartfelt and personal. i didn’t expect this at all--and after a pretty lonely year, it was overwhelming to be hit with so much positive feedback at once (i mean this in a good way! thank you all so much!!)

these were the general trends:

• "i love your games / thanks for making things / keep it up"
• personal anecdotes (the ones that often made me cry a lot)
• "i love this character/pairing so much" (hey, me too!)
• some kind of demand/question (aka when’s the next treat update haha)

a bunch of people also said that they missed seeing me on twitter. thanks ;_; i'm definitely never going back, but luckily, it's only my posts that they really miss. not the website i'm posting on ;)

conclusion

SO. the question.

is being on twitter a necessary factor to your success as an artist?

i would say that the people who responded to this survey aren't just random people, but very dedicated followers who have most likely paid for my games at one point (if not shared them with others who have). again, this was sent to my patrons and itch.io followers, not a general audience clicking links put in front of them by an algorithm. it's everyone who is specifically keeping an eye out for updates from me.

less than 2% of these fans found me through twitter.

this survey isn't a complete picture of every person who has ever bought one of my games, but it doesn't need to be. it represents my core financial support--the people who will show up because my art and stories serve them in some way. whatever i end up making, they will be there to at least give it a shot. that's what it's like to really be a fan of something.

i never leaned into marketing myself on social media to begin with, so maybe that's why being off twitter hasn't impacted me financially at all. people still share my games online. people still get recommendations from the storefronts they're posted on. maybe other artists really do have it a lot worse in terms of discoverability, but if you haven't been nurturing a core audience, then who are you making your art for? just, anyone? i don't know...

artists need communities, not twitter. i think there's always a way to reach people outside of social media spheres... i get that seeing the numbers go up might look very enticing, but you have to examine what percent of those numbers are your actual livelihood, vs a cool stat to make you feel like you're doing well. it took me a long time to be able to make a living off of my art, but it IS possible to get there... so, to any artists who are struggling, i wish you the very best.

thanks everyone!!

i know i've said thanks all through out this, but thank you again to everyone who participated in my little survey. i was moved by your support, and want to give something back…

so i’m starting a NEWSLETTER!!! it's called Letters from Trick! the signup form is HERE! i’m planning to do monthly issues, so anyone can subscribe and get updates on my projects. they’ll be written by trick, which i thought treat fans would enjoy :)

i’m currently preparing one more thing, which i plan to announce in january (real soon!), so stay tuned for that, too. i'll announce on itch.io again when it's ready.

thanks for reading <3