Doodle 🎨Artist 🖥️Game Dev

I liked how the controls were implemented, it all felt very fluid and intuitive. Also that cityscape looks beautiful!
I think you might have some flipped normals on the wall between the bed and bathroom, I ended up nocliping through those and at first almost thought I was supposed to because I tried going through the mirror and it sort of worked.

2025-11-08 20:46:36 GMT

I don't know when exactly it happened, but at some point I started thinking of #gamedev as more than a hobby, yet still less than a job strangely. Rather, and I'm gonna overshare a bit here, but nowadays I try to see it as a process toward one day cementing a legacy of sorts.
Call it a mid-life crisis (it's not), but in a way that rings true a bit. I'm in my early thirties and have success in many ways, but not many that are truly fulfilling like being in a career that brings that sort of thing, or having a family, etc.
I've never much cared for climbing the corporate ladder though, and only fate can decide if family thing happens. So when it comes to life fulfillment stuff, I find myself leaning into my creative hobbies -- as that's something I've always gravitated toward.
My dream is to make a game people truly and deeply care about, to the same degree I love the games from my childhood. That's a tall order, but sometimes the point of dreams is to have something to shoot for.

2025-11-03 18:54:37 GMT

Critter Drifters is OUT! You can play it! On Windows or Linux or Steamdeck! Right now!!
Or you know...whenever you want to. I'm just glad I can finally let people play the whole thing.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3755680/Critter_Drifters/
#godot #gamedev #indiedev #steam #CritterDrifters

2025-06-14 23:21:49 GMT

- reply

Reminder mostly to myself but also to anybody it speaks to:
Your #gamedev project (or anything) doesn't have to be finished ASAP. Every little bit you add, no matter how small, pushes you closer to creating a full experience.
This means it's okay to have lulls in progress from time to time, in fact it's probably a good thing because it gives you an opportunity to recharge your creativity and refine aspects that might be a bit lacklustre.
Powering through might get you somewhere faster, but slowing down the pace will help make sure where you end up is something you'll be more proud of.

2025-06-13 19:42:23 GMT

Feeling a bit of mental friction again with the game project, this time with the story/character/dialogue kind of stuff. The block is that I need a "reason" to progress through the races and worlds, but a lot of the way to sell that in the game is to make animations, music, dialogue, etc.
Basically...I need to inject some more charm into the game. It has some, sure, but it's still very empty feeling. Stuff like actual characters to interact with (outside of karts) and short cutscenes is what it really needs right now, but I'm less confident in those areas currently so I'm somewhat afraid to start working on it.

2025-05-15 15:05:35 GMT

- reply

Yeah if you're good you can get on that without the bridge :P
Glad you're enjoying it!

2025-05-11 17:50:34 GMT

Little reminder that my game, Robo Rolo, is releasing on Steam in a handful of days! It's a short little adventure game heavily inspired by Marble Blast and 3D platformers in general, and the movement is super fun!
...in my biased opinion, at least
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3563270/Robo_Rolo/
#gamedev #godot #indiedev
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/114/490/457/577/587/213/original/3b58b33ee5f1056d.mp4

2025-04-27 01:00:01 GMT

- reply

One thing that has helped me learn new skills in the past (including Blender) has been to do self-imposed challenges. Like "make something new every day for 30 days", which I did a while back to learn how to model.
Thinking about something I could do similarly for character modeling and rigging, though a daily one of those would be a lot. Weekly maybe, though that doesn't tickle the motivational part of my brain too much.
Even better would be a fully fleshed-out game idea that I'm excited about, which I'm not quite there yet and want to do something smaller in scope anyway.

2025-04-26 23:14:11 GMT

Every time I feel like I've learned something new in Blender, I mess something up so horribly somehow and realize I still know so little. It really is one of those things that you just have to keep fiddling with for a long time to actually develop an understanding for how things should work -- as opposed to trial and error until it does.
For me right now that is what rigging and animation is like. I can put in bones, make a rig, have it affect geometry, make an animation...but making a modification to accomplish something very specific (like a bone that only moves a character's mouth), and suddenly it's like everything is a foreign language again.
I got it to work btw...but I somehow broke all the animations I'd made in the process. I would kill to have a way to just download all the knowledge required to use Blender into my brain, Matrix style.

2025-04-24 13:55:37 GMT

- reply

What I'm hearing from this is your next project will be a mascot 3D platformer

2025-04-24 05:17:44 GMT

- reply

I love SMS, mainly for how well it made the world feel so connected. When people say it's bad I think it mostly boils down to the jank, but it's still a fantastic game.

2025-04-23 00:23:18 GMT

- reply

Making a game is already like 4 or 5 skills combined too

2025-04-22 21:06:43 GMT

It's kinda funny how actually getting close to releasing a game on Steam has led me to have some insights / observations I've had following other #gamedev creators out there.
For me it's mostly just the novelty of releasing a game that I care about, so I'm not really concerned about my number of wishlists or anything (I'm not even breaking 100 yet). But I could see how if you've spent >2 years working on a game, or worse -- having invested a real chunk of money into a project, you might be watching that wishlist number pretty closely coming up to launch day. Apparently 7000 or so is the threshold people say it takes to get trending.
So yeah...that side of things is just interesting to me. I could definitely see how partnering with a publisher is an attractive option for indies out there, considering how much effort has to go into marketing and just getting eyeballs on the thing you made.

2025-04-15 15:26:39 GMT

- reply

As someone using it for the first time...it's also a lot to take in lol

2025-04-07 19:40:41 GMT

- reply

Another one I use a lot is this, when I want an exported variable with a setter that runs into issues with things not being ready yet
@export some_variable :
set(value):
if not is_node_ready():
await ready
...

2025-04-03 15:12:02 GMT

- reply

I don't know enough to say how they would be connected, but global trade and manufacturing is complicated, and I wouldn't be surprised if there's still a more indirect connection. I just get frustrated when people don't try to understand the greater picture and just want to assign blame to whichever target is closest to their view.
Then when a person tries to explain or make known that nuance, they get labeled as a defender or corporate shill or whatever. It's just one of those online discourse patterns that I'm so tired of.
* However, I will say that Nintendo should make it known why they have raised their prices. It would go a long way if they mentioned some reason, which I would imagine the tariffs to be the primary one.

2025-04-03 14:59:21 GMT

The Nintendo Switch 2 game price debacle seems to be a classic case of assigning blame to the obvious target (Nintendo), when the reality is more complicated and almost certainly tied to the ongoing trump tariff situation.
Nintendo could take the hit and be fine, sure. But if I'm going to be mad about the price of video games, I'm going to place most of the blame on the fascist authoritarian messing up global society, not a company that just makes them.

2025-04-03 14:17:08 GMT

- reply

I've been waiting to have more to show off first in terms of levels. Not really making this to make money anyway, mostly just some structure to learn blender really well and get a feel for releasing a game in general. Once I make a trailer I'll do a bit more of marketing stuff though.

2025-03-10 18:58:08 GMT

My game is now on Steam! It's not yet very close to release, but you can wishlist it and stuff...which feels weird to say but is also very neat!
Now to fret over things like the name, how it's presented, etc. Very productive use of my time.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3563270/Robo_Rolo

2025-01-24 20:27:13 GMT

Finishing a silly sketch I made a week or so ago
#ArcticPolygon
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/113/885/210/384/576/993/original/cff17d69d473c485.png

2025-01-05 16:09:42 GMT

Had a fun idea for level transitions in the simple puzzle platformer game I'm making in #godot for the games challenge thing I mentioned.
#gamedev #indiedev
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/113/776/614/817/025/040/original/20f08f99b51ac999.mp4

2024-11-18 22:45:38 GMT

Turn-based battling but instead of physical attacks, you hurl insults and other types of sentences at your opponents. Compliments to have a chance to charm or calm them. Taunts to direct their attention elsewhere.
Base stats like charisma increase your effectiveness or hit chance. Other stats like observation increase your power since you can create more targeted (and hard-hitting) insults.
Instead of health points, characters lose in battle when their emotional instability gets too high.
#gamedev #indiedev

2024-11-11 16:28:56 GMT

I often hear #indiedev game designers talk about "dream games" as if everyone has one. I genuinely don't, or at least I don't feel passionately about any one idea in particular. It's really confusing, because I like the idea of making one, and believe I have the ability, but I lack that hyper-focused "I need this to exist" feeling you hear so much about.
I get a similar feeling with making art. When I have a comic idea that excites me, the sketches flow freely and I can pump it out. But when I don't, the empty canvas scares me and whatever I do draw just feels meh.

2024-11-05 02:52:37 GMT

Alright, for better or for worse, I built a demo for my latest #godot #indiedev project. It's a 2D puzzle platformer built around shifting colors, both yourself and the world around you. It's more of an experiment than anything else, so don't expect expertly crafted puzzles (I myself just found an exploit after exporting it to web for the first time).
Also, kinda sad, the fancy CRT shader had an odd graphical glitch when exported for web and I just don't want to figure out how to fix that, so I disabled it :(
Anyway, I present to you, "Statyc":
https://doodledonut.itch.io/statyc

2024-10-31 19:26:24 GMT

Demonstrating how I can use the gizmos I've been making for my #godot #indiedev game to make bigger things relatively easily. In this case, there are three "receiver" gizmos each connected to a color controller for red, green, and blue (also a gizmo, just an invisible one). And then a "spinner" gizmo that just spins when enabled, and a laser which interacts with the receivers.
Sure, I could write code to do this all in one object, turning off layers in sequence, but this really gets the gears turning and opens up the possibility for the player to actually interact with things to essentially change the programming.
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/113/403/663/895/008/106/original/da80664badc56d8c.mp4

2024-10-28 01:29:33 GMT

Lots of random progress on the #godot #indiedev project. I'm leaning away from the metroidvania aspects, for now, and going to focus on making levels with lots of random gizmos that interact with each other to create puzzles and light platforming aspects. As well as "avoid the enemy" sections (or use to your advantage) as shown here.
Right now I'm resisting the urge to design levels and am instead just focusing on creating those gizmo interactions.
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/113/382/451/887/686/689/original/6839be6e2ebc5cad.mp4

2024-10-25 00:03:31 GMT

Having food but nothing to watch.
Truly a fate worse than death.

2024-10-23 18:01:30 GMT

Still working on my #indiedev #godot project. Though recently I've kind of come to a mental crossroads -- do I want to make a puzzle platformer, or a metroidvania?
The crux here is that the main mechanic -- changing RGB colors off and on (and thus affecting what walls are solid), feels like it could be "too much" for the metroidvania-like persistent world.
At the same time...having a persistent, explorable world would be cool, but also a lot more work, and I'm not looking to give myself more work. So...I'm leaning toward the simpler, puzzle platformer to be honest. The goal here isn't "make the coolest game ever", it's more like "finish making a game".
My brain still wants to find a middle ground though, partially because I finally got persistence of objects working with level changes, and in a fairly easy to extend way.
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/113/358/022/389/116/628/original/ee8a8ce6019f2c45.png

2024-10-22 22:49:41 GMT

Listening to video essays / podcasts are for drawing to.
Listening to music is for programming to.

2024-10-22 21:53:24 GMT

- reply

Damn you've been at Godot for a while, and I assume gamedev in general much further back than 2017 of course. I kinda wish I kept making games from when I started in like...2007 (old school game maker). Only in the last couple years that I've gotten back into it. Much easier when you know how to actually program lol.

2024-10-21 00:31:12 GMT

Just sweeped a Mario Party game with 5 stars with everyone else at 0, AMA

2024-10-19 01:10:01 GMT

- reply

Yeah we're on the same page with that. It's frustrating to me watching her try to play to moderates, but I respect the strategy. We need ranked choice voting nationally.

2024-10-19 01:07:30 GMT

- reply

It's not out of the question. Whatever happens between November and January is not going to be normal.

2024-10-19 00:34:00 GMT

I cant wait for election season to be over, so I can stop withholding all the opinions I want to express about how stupid it is Trump is running.
And the thing is, it's gotten so stupid that stating it simply makes you seem partisan (at least to people not paying attention). And yet, every time I watch some random soundbite of Trump talking (this time reacting to being called "exhausted" in recent days) I just can't help it.
It's been years that this has been the case, but that man is so inconceivably dense and an awful human being. I wasn't very politically aware during Bush's term, so there's that, but at least he seemed like a normal politician. I can't believe we've had to deal with him for almost a decade now. I will have so much schadenfreude if he even receives some semblance of punishment for his criminality.

2024-09-26 18:19:29 GMT

Question to all the #indiedev #gamedev folks out there: How the heck do you stay committed to a project?
I've started literal dozens of projects in the last year and finished virtually zero of them. Gamedev is hard for a reason, but for me it primarily feels difficult simply because I don't have the discipline to follow through.
By some magic circumstance, I got into running this year and have been trying to take some of that success and apply it to gamedev, with little (but still some) success. It all boils down to discipline, which is why I think running helps, but other things that help somewhat are jotting down notes and organizing ideas, pomodoro, choosing project ideas that are smaller in scope, game jams, etc.

2024-09-23 17:05:29 GMT

Playing around with mechanic ideas for a card-based deck builder. I'm aiming for something simple that I can complete in a reasonable time, and one idea I had was combining cards / elements to build your deck into something else. This is showing the bare bones of the card combination
#godot #indiedev
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/113/187/953/913/047/019/original/4ec7522ab6025949.mp4

2024-08-11 03:13:33 GMT

Reworked the save/spawnpoint system behind the scenes and also felt like the game needed some entities, so I made this lil' guy. Debating if I want to add the ability to attack enemies, but for now they're friendly.
#godot #gamedev #indiedev
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/941/204/131/887/242/original/aa35beb3705170cb.mp4

2024-08-06 22:47:01 GMT

Making lots of choices for my latest #godot #indiedev project lately. I really want the world to be somewhat persistable, as opposed to separate levels that always behave the same way. But it's also tough to do that, since a big part of this game will be turning off walls and shifting colors.
So I added a save system (the first thing in the gif you see). When you hit those, all colors get turned back on and the game is saved, meaning if you die you go back to whichever door you last came through.
The second thing I added is a way to manipulate objects. In this case, a little "counter" that increments or decrements depending on where you're standing. In this case, the counter is hooked up to a laser and controls the angle, but the puzzling possibilities are limitless!
#godot #gamedev
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/917/493/458/549/707/original/f496936c0bd03134.mp4

2024-08-03 16:04:21 GMT

Demonstrating some gizmos - switches, lasers, and receivers. Since the laser is green, it only collides with green objects (as well as white, which collides with everything).
#godot #indiedev #gamedev
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/898/936/297/085/768/original/f8ce805619505fa9.mp4

2024-07-30 20:39:24 GMT

I've been having fun making various gizmos and game mechanics for my latest project, which will be a puzzle platformer of sorts with a theme of colors and shifting between them in various ways.
This gif is just a bit of fun, but the idea is that lasers will only hit surfaces of their color (except white, which all will hit) -- including the player. When the player's color is white, all platforms are solid, which is nice, but it also means all laser colors will kill them. Balance!
#godot #indiedev #gamedev
https://equestria.social/system/media_attachments/files/112/877/355/806/237/653/original/3affe9bc00ec2d54.mp4