Justice01 on 23/11/2024 at 02:28
Favorite movie quote (Tombstone): "Wyatt, there's no such thing as a normal life... there's just, LIFE.."
Fen, very sorry for your troubles and many thanks for making an awesome and reliable tool such as AngelLoader. Also, love the voice acting!
Estel Randir on 23/11/2024 at 04:42
Fen, I wish you success in moving forward. Understanding your own limitations is very key to finding your own niche in the world. On the other side, so is hope combined with a will to move forward and any limitations be damned. The modern culture wants to put everyone who is struggles with any form of disability into an identity box and tell them to embrace it as some kind of freedom. Well, it's a prison. It is a way to control you without actually trying to help you. Find whatever your good at and keep on doing it until you become the best at it you can. There are so many inspiring people with physical, mental, emotional obstacles that instead of laying down, they literally spit in the face of the odds. Imagine if Van Gogh had simply said, "I recognize that I am bipolar / manic depressive and that is all I will ever be - my 'identity'". Instead he channeled it into the amazing artistic legacy he left for us all to admire today. Or Terry Fox (I grew up watching the Terry Fox story), an athlete who lost one leg to cancer. But with the aide of a prosthetic leg, he ran cross country across Canada. He inspired millions. You are valuable. You just have to find a way to accept that.
dovahkinia on 23/11/2024 at 16:02
Hey Fen, if you read this, know that many people, including me, understand you on multiple levels. I'm an awkward person myself, a "weird kid" people used to call me. I just get by these days, "masking" to somehow fit into society. Was hard to learn to accept myself and not to pay attention to looks people sometimes give me.
Your videos brought me so much joy, your commentary was great (but yeah, a lot of things you said in them were sad, it was clear you deal with loneliness a lot) and your editing was fun. I will never forget them and I will never forget that you made me "addicted" to fan missions. You are a good dude and I'm sure the future will suprise you in a positive way someday.
chk772 on 23/11/2024 at 19:39
Quote Posted by fortuni
He first announced his impeding retirement from making let’s plays 5 months ago in his community page (
https://www.youtube.com/@FenPhoenix/community)
He’s tired of playing missions just to entertain others, it sad to read some of his reasons for his retirement from YouTube but he’s entertained many people for such a long time, so thank you Fen for your incredible contribution to this community, but it’s not a complete farewell as he’ll still be developing Angelloader.
TBH, I always wondered what the point of commented Let's Plays is.
But, sure, whatever floats people's boat.
Mortis on 24/11/2024 at 13:12
Hey Fen, been watching your videos for a long time. My first "Lets Play" was the Thief series playthrough by Khad which I stumbled upon via the SomethingAwful forums but luckily the Youtube algorithm wasnt crap in those days and it led me to your videos and I was hooked. Due to various factors, I do not have the ability to experience all the awesome Fan Missions this community has put out over the decades but, I did get to enjoy your playthroughs of them instead.
As someone who is an introvert most of the time but can occasionally summon up the energy to be the Life of the Party (hehehhe) once in a while, I dont really like overly chatty people but somehow I immensely enjoyed the babble in your videos because it felt familiar, like those times spent with friends in college, just talking bullshit and hanging out.
Anyways, thanks a ton for all the years of videos and I wish you the best of luck for the future. I really hope that you find a way to be more comfortable in your own skin and dont underestimate the impact a positive mental state can have over physical afflictions.
Hope to see you around the forums
Erin on 25/11/2024 at 21:40
Quote Posted by FenPhoenix
I perhaps should have made a video announcement, but I thought maybe the post would show up on peoples' feeds and be discoverable enough maybe. I myself bookmark straight to the youtube subscriptions page and don't see the home page at all, so I don't see community posts there, but maybe they show up on the home page, or not, I dunno.
Anyway, yeah. It's a long and complicated thing. I think the very premise of my channel - Thief played in the style of old-school raocow - probably never made much sense in the first place. There was always this awkward tension between the stream-of-consciousness standup comedy act and the playing of the game. People have often thanked me for the "walkthrough" to help them finish a mission. I would think my videos make pretty poor walkthroughs what with me jumpcutting all over, but who knows.
When I started taking regular hiatuses, the reason I would come back was always because I'd gone stir crazy and wanted to say something to someone. After a few videos it would start to become forced again (I'd run dry on my well of things to say I'd built up) and I'd drop off again, or people would start to point out my videos were "rushed" or whatnot, which was accurate enough really.
I started let's playing in 2011. At that time I was living in my mom's basement after previously spending a year living "on my own" (in a house with several other roommates). Let's playing was something I was excited to try back then. My idol was raocow, who'd been playing Super Mario World romhacks with a nonstop stream-of-consciousness commentary style and lots of quick cuts. I loved that commentary style, so I ripped it right off for my own videos. I really enjoyed doing it up till around late 2012/early 2013. Early-mid 2013 was a pretty bad time for me. Several things happened both physical and emotional and I've never really recovered from it.
As to the adult in a kid-sized box thing. As some of you know, I have Aspergers (or whatever they call it now), diagnosed at age 15, which apparently is pretty late. Before then, I had no clue, so I would just go around saying weird awkward things with no self-doubt whatsoever. When I was first diagnosed, I focused a lot on it, but after a while I realized that ignoring it and pretending it wasn't there made things go more smoothly. For many, many years that's what I did: Ignore it and pretend I was neurotypical. Not because of shame, but because I didn't want it affecting me. During my teen years I also developed severe anxiety which at first I simply attributed to being a teenager (this must just be that teen akwardness I've heard about, right?) but it never went away. These two things caused me to feel like a "stupid incapable kid". I couldn't answer the phone like an adult, because I dreaded having to talk on the phone. I couldn't get a job like an adult. Vocal and facial tics don't exactly make you feel respectable either. The only job I ever had, my mom hooked up for me. And then sitting in my mom's basement at age 25 and doing crappy youtube videos for free... and always just moving wherever my mom moved and staying in the basement of whatever house she had, and doing stupid-ass videos instead of being a capable adult. And then just continuing to do the exact same thing for 13 more years... blabbing like a goofy idiot over poorly edited jumpcuts is kids stuff. It's what you do when you're in your mom's basement with no job, and you're young enough to think your life is infinite and be okay with wasting it.
I've been depressed for a long time now. The events of early 2013, particularly on my physical health, put my dreams perpetually out of reach. I
do know what I want to do with my life, but it ain't let's playing (or programming either), and I also know I'm not able to do it and have lost all hope of being able to do it. You ever have something you just burningly need to do, and if you don't, you'll go crazy? And the calculus of it doesn't matter? Well, it's like that. My state has been very bleak in recent years, and I basically get by on distractions. Programming is one of them, kinda, but I also find it enjoyable in a low-key way. If a fairy waved a magic wand and healed my body and I could use my voice musically (or practically at all, these days) again, I would probably still program in the evenings or whatnot to unwind. That's why I'm okay with continuing AngelLoader development.
But in any case, I'm running on distractions and often enough I go to sleep thinking to myself "could I please not wake up this time?"
Most online personalities are fake af, so there's my dose of realness, for whatever it's worth. I dunno what's going to happen with me, but I do know I can't keep doing let's plays. I have to find some way to move forward, even though I can't see it.
Hi Fen,
I can totally understand where you're coming from. I will always love your videos but want you to be happy no matter what. I find your videos super relaxing and you'll never know how many times they got me through a tough time.
I feel that no matter how old we are, we can all still make and enjoy Lets Plays. I'm 34 and still love to watch them. I even tried to make my own but I think I actually lack the social skills and determination/motivation to keep doing them. I am probably not neurotypical either in some way and cant seem to get started in any case. I think you were far more actually capable than you think you might be.
Sometimes getting a diagnosis can be more harmful than good. In elementary school I could NOT grasp math and I don't even remember math class. I had to get a tutor to help because I was so behind. I know that if I was diagnosed with (and probably have to some degree) ADHD or Autism my life would definitely look a lot different. (I eventually grew out of it and can do math but I still hate it). I think everyone has something good to offer the world no matter what their diagnosis. I also struggled with awkward stuff when I was really young like ordering food at a fast food place, and especially if I had to use the debit card. I'm much better now but I'll always have a tinge of awkward lol!
I think if you did ever come back, just remember there is no need to force yourself to talk and be funny etc. I would enjoy your videos even if you didn't say much at all! And I think as I said before, you really are capable, and I think anyone at any age can make and watch Youtube videos as long as they enjoy it. But I would hate for you to not enjoy it because you believed that making them made you a kid, or the pressure to entertain was too much. Sometimes we put constrictions on ourselves thinking something has to be a certain way in order for it to be good. I'm still trying to learn my own advice haha.
Anyway, don't want to make this too long, but thank you Fen for your contributions here and on YouTube. I will always hold your videos in high regard and respect whatever you'd like to do in the future. I don't talk much on this forum but I just thought I would say this :)
