@jyushimatsu here in my case it's less laziness and more IRL stress of a really, really, shit job. I already have plans where if something happens to my job I'm going to just finally start learning C# and art and whatnot in between jobs.

>im not even sure what clout they're expecting?

I'd argue what happened with Notch during his e-celeb phase where he made one hit and faded out and some other other has-beens of the past is what they want, because if you have one project to your name people will take you seriously in online arguments and similar.

I agree on the fantasy part, IMO to nerds being a gamedev is like how everyone in high school wanted to be a sportsball athlete or WWE star or some shit and then when that falls through they ended up at the desk job or working behind the counter at a Bally Fitness location (real, saw it once).

Many burnouts I knew online were like this, they wanted to make a game but either didn't have a drive to do it, or got caught up in some autism like "I need to write an engine from scratch for something that could be done in Game Maker/Multimedia Fusion" and burning out as a result.

IMO, wanting to do gamedev isn't for everyone. It's like how being an online artist clearly isn't for everyone.