No problem. To answer your first question, from the remarks in the one-star ratings, there were other better games that deserved to be on the Popular tab... namely theirs (or their favorites, idk). 😅 You're right when you say "weird and far-fetched", because I wasn't expecting to get those remarks either. But Itch is weird like that, and I've learned to roll with the punches since. You gotta grow a thick skin when pushing out games.
To answer your second question, I don't reply to posts often. I tend to comment on other games which I've played and rate them, but only when time permits. If there's something I do more often than other things, it's posting new visual novel game assets... but even then it's not that often overall. I'm offline a lot of the time.