Yo! You may have been wondering what I've been doing lately. First, a little backstory. The last game I uploaded to itch was LUFTMEOWSERS in March of this year. This game was part of the Firepit discord's game-a-week program, which also ended in March. The program was organized and hosted by me, my good friend dogs, and Firepit moderator gleeson! We created a bundle from the participant's favourite projects, which you can check out for free right here, along with resources to run your very own remote game-a-week if you so desire. I wish itch had implemented blogs back then, as I would've loved to have announced what we were up to - alas, better late then never.

Since then, I've been busy with all kinds of things. A shortlist includes catching covid, finally getting medication for ADHD and working on two whole TCGs! TCG work could manifest more publicly in the future, as I'm on the cusp of prototyping a Whole New Card Game, though mostly as a personal creative exercise. Otherwise, I thankfully made a full recovery from covid, and ADHD medication has basically changed my life! For the first time ever, I have the capacity to make changes in my life in ways that I simply couldn't before getting treatment for ADHD.

While I've been working on my physical and mental health for some time, medication has made the whole process eminently more achievable. One of these improvements has been finally addressing and working at chronic pain in my hands that I've suffered with for years. As that gets better, it'll only get easier for me to engage with things that I love, including making games. Obviously, working through these challenges isn't going to be quick or easy, but I finally feel like I have the tools to address this stuff and it's very heartening. This brings me to brings me to the present...!

"Finishing" Work

After game-a-week, I spent a lot of time trying to "finish" a number of games. Finish, in the case, means a handful of specific features I'd like to see in my games, which will come from working more consistently on singular projects. This is mostly simple things - like ensuring a game has a beginning/ending (where applicable), or simply including audio and good feedback. I failed at this a couple times earlier in the year, but obviously, treatment for ADHD has changed things. Right now, I'm primarily working on Hot Hasty Desert Dash, which I uploaded a demo for earlier this year (though it's currently private). I'm aiming to have Hot Hasty out by mid-January next year!

Still, it'll be a very small game despite the ~3 months of time to work on it. While I am doing better, I'm nowhere near as efficient or focused of a worker as I'd like. 3 months probably seems like a lot of time, especially relative to other devs who publicly post updates. I feel I'm very much still learning and I'm always afraid of over-promising, especially due to the various unpredictable health problems that can hold me up. Given this context, it might seem silly to try to announce a small, free project at all. But a due date helps keep me accountable, and teaches me things I'll need to learn if I'm to turn games into a career.

I've been posting progress on my twitter, which is a good place to follow me if you want more regular updates on my work. I've also made a cohost page, which I feel is worth mentioning given the current state of affairs on twitter. At the moment I'm still figuring out cohost, so I likely won't be sharing the same things there as I do on twitter.

Everything Else

Despite my newfound capacity, I still very much have ADHD. While Hot Hasty is my main goal at the moment, I am inevitably and constantly toying with new ideas. Going forward, this is likely just Part Of The Process for me, and that's ok. With that said, here's a bunch of prototypes from the last little while.

WIP - Dandelion Game. An art test and practice for a "shooter" idea.

WIP - Drift Game. Finally made a car with good drifting! I've been trying for aaaages.

WIP - Weird Fish Game. An earlier, failed vehicle controller that can fly. Definitely will explore this further.

And at least a couple other shenanagins.

That's all

Hey, thanks for checking out this blog! I've been wanting to do updates like this for a while but not had a great outlet for them. No promises on their regularity, but I do look forward to making more updates like this in the future. Have a nice weekend!