For the past two years, Timothy Eden has lived by a commitment. Every day, he would draw and publish a comic about Slay the Spire<\/em>, and keep it up until the sequel came out. As of March 5, Slay the Spire 2<\/em> is now out in early access.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The artistic endeavor began as so many things do: with a breakup. Eden, who streams on YouTube and Twitch as the content creator PixelPenguin, was going through it \u2014 with his health, with his career, with his relationship.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was all kind of in crisis mode, and I thought, I need something to anchor myself<\/em>,\u201d Eden told Polygon over a video call this month. \u201cOne of my home base feelings for me is video games, and I hadn’t started a new video game in a long time. And I thought, OK, well, I’ll just, I don’t know, buy myself a video game. <\/em>Slay the Spire looks good<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n Released in 2019, Slay the Spire<\/em> has since become totemic in the indie game world. Developer Mega Crit deftly fused deck-building turn-based combat with roguelike mechanics and fantasy flair for a game that has appealed to players of pretty much all tastes. Some friends had recommended it to Eden, even the typically non-gamer ones, and it had an \u201coverwhelmingly positive\u201d rating on Steam based on tens of thousands of reviews. (One of his rules: \u201cAnything that says overwhelmingly positive on Steam, I’m going to like it.\u201d) So he gave it a shot.<\/p>\n Ironically, Eden was not a fan of the game\u2019s art style (“[it] has that idle mobile RPG feel when you look at it for the first time”), but became enamored by the atmosphere and the characters, and started drawing them every day. He was inspired by content creator Ursa Ryan, who primarily makes content for the Civilization series. In anticipation of Civilization 7<\/em>\u2019s February 2025 release, Ryan pulled a similar stunt, drawing one comic every day until the game was finally out.<\/p>\n Eden posted his first comic to Reddit on June 24, 2024, under the title \u201cDay #1 of drawing badly until StS2 comes out.\u201d (Your mileage may vary on the \u201cbadly\u201d part. I, for one, think they\u2019re quite charming.) At first, he thought the stunt would be a small internet curio, enjoyed by \u201c10, 20 people.\u201d Then it blew up. His posts on Reddit regularly garnered thousands of upvotes. He was even featured on the front page of Reddit.<\/p>\n \u201cIt became a bigger part of my life than I thought it would,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Eden admitted there were moments where he thought about throwing in the towel. Around the 100-day mark, he hit the first wall when he realized it wasn\u2019t possible to get hundreds of comic ideas out of a single Slay the Spire<\/em> run. But the toughest moment, he said, came when Mega Crit announced that Slay the Spire 2<\/em>, initially planned for a 2025 release, would be delayed into 2026. The way games are developed these days, that could\u2019ve meant hundreds more drawings. (Eden was clear to note, though, that he supports developers taking all the time they need to polish games, rather than rush them out unfinished.)<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a commitment,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was an important commitment for me. One of these things that was going on in my life was my relationship collapsing with my partner. And it was about a mismatch between our understandings of what commitment meant. And so this whole thing was also a way [\u2026] to show myself that I could expect people who commit to something to hold themselves to a commitment because I could do it.\u201d He thought: if he was going to commit to something meaningful, he should<\/em> be able to do it to the end. \u201cEven on the days that it feels tiring or exhausting or you have no ideas or no inspiration, it shouldn’t feel like work. It should feel like checking in with your commitment.\u201d<\/p>\n Mega Crit released Slay the Spire 2<\/em> in early access via Steam on March 5 \u2014 and instantly became one of the most-played and best-received games of the year. Players praised how the sequel took all of the aspects that made the first game such a standout and improved upon them, though some, including Eden, noted that it felt more like an expansion than a proper sequel.<\/p>\n Eden isn\u2019t going to continue drawing or start drawing comics for another game because how do you just follow up a project like that? But \u201cthe journey had meant too much to me for it to just stay in the forgotten archives of the internet,\u201d he said. He had to make something.<\/p>\n \u201cThe community event of the daily drawings was only kept material because of the fact that they were being visited and engaged with every day. That the substance of their existence was that,\u201d Eden said. \u201cAnd once it was over, I personally, even if no one bought it, I needed to turn it into something that had substance and that could stay with me.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s why, even if the servers of Reddit get shut off or transformed into AI or whatever, you\u2019ll always be able to see Eden\u2019s art. Drawing Badly Until StS2 Comes Out (Vol 1.: 1-300)<\/em> is a printed collection of his comics, and will be followed by a second volume covering the remaining comics. Ryan, his inspiration for the endeavor, wrote the foreword.<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe five years from now, someone’s going to be bored at home and see the thing on their coffee table and flip through it and go, \u2018I remember these times in my life where it was the silly penguin posting memes,\u2019” Eden said. \u201cAnd sometimes it was emotional, and sometimes it was funny, and it was something that tied a lot of people together in a meaningful routine.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/static0.polygonimages.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/b2igfw3suh8d1.png?q=70&fit=crop&w=800&dpr=1\")
\n <\/picture>Image: PixelPenguin<\/small><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n