Hey everybody,
Welcome to the first official entry in my monthly series of newsletters. Here’s what I’ve been working on this month:
(Bazooka Panic is a roguelike platformer game I made as part of SuperTry’s 2020 Year of Games that I’m slowly expanding out into something bigger.)
I put my nose to the grindstone this month to crank out some levels for Bazooka Panic. October was all about designing mechanics and sharpening the aesthetic of Bazooka Panic but I wanted to give my patrons something they could actually play for November.
BP’s aesthetic improvements ended up taking up the majority of my time as I had to break everything about the current camera and view systems and then rebuild them again in order to get the game in a playable state. I did however get to make some small but significant improvements in performance, gameplay (backflip sparks!), and enemy behaviors.
I’m really happy with what ended up being released this month. My hope is that the hand crafted levels teach and reinforce some skills for the procedurally generated portions of the game. Every month I work on it, Bazooka Panic gets closer to my vision.
SuperTry Patrons who donate $5 or more can take the latest version of Bazooka Panic out for a spin and get access to a bunch of other cool secret games.
(Haque is a turn based, grid based, roguelike that SuperTry released in 2017.)
Haque turned 5 years old this month! To commemorate the occasion I made a little video guide detailing how to approach Haque’s infamously tricky first boss, The Skeletitan. I also get into some behind-the-scenes trivia and remember how much I love playing this game.
Haque is available for download on itch.io and Steam.
Pretend Friends artwork by Bryan Shepherd.
(I co-host Pretend Friends, an actual play tabletop RPG podcast and I act as Host for the Space Kings adventure. I also edit the show!)
This month I published the first three episodes of a new season of Pretend Friends, a Space Kings tabletop podcast with my friends Hadley St. Clair, Bryan Shepherd, and Brian Townsend.
In Episode 0 we come up with characters and develop the world of RAT CITY a bit.
Episode 1 sees our heroes investigating a strange occurrence that’s tearing RAT CITY apart.
And Episode 2 includes a face-off with a strange foe and the appearance of a mysterious group of interlopers.
I’ve known Hadley, Bryan, and Brian for a really long time! We all went to the same high school and we’ve been playing Space Kings together for almost a decade. It was really fun to finally get to show off our chemistry and for me to get to show folks how funny my friends are.
Pretend Friends is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, basically whatever your favorite podcast catcher is, we’re there. We’re gonna try to do two episodes a month until the story’s done!
The Space Kings rulebook is available as a downloadable PDF at SpaceKings.space and as a hardcover, full color book at Book.SpaceKings.space.
Goosebuds artwork by Brock Gallagher.
(I co-host this podcast about Goosebumps books with my friends Chad Quandt and Paul Ritchey. I edit this one too!)
In Goosebuds Episode 138, Chad assumed the role of our illustrious Book Master for It Came from the Internet!, another whopper in the Give Yourself Goosebumps series of gamebooks. Paul and I died many times from virus and amnesia related adversities but I couldn’t help but sympathize with R.L. Stein’s frustration for technology (circa 1999 technology anyway) that came seething through the pages.
In Goosebuds Episode 139, we read The Mummy Walks, another entry in Goosebumps Series 2000 that plays fast and loose with what qualifies as a horror novel. No actual mummies were harmed or even encountered in the making of this episode.
We also recorded a Camp Goosebuds where we talked a little bit about recent AAA video game design trends and our guiding stars as creators. This was one of those episodes where I kind of forgot we were recording and just had a spirited conversation with my brilliant and creative friends.
Goosebuds is also available on multiple podcast catchers if this is your first time hearing about it!
Back in 2020, Joe Kenneally and I made a video game every month for the whole year. Hot Soul Laser Beam was released in November of 2020 and I made it based on thematic suggestions from our patrons.
Looking back, I still really love the idea of a music video/shmup hybrid. I remember stressing myself out during the development of this game and I think that stress kinda seeps through the mechanics. You’re basically on a conveyor belt trying to do the best you can against hordes of technological antagonists but one way or another the game eventually just ends in some moody blue tones.
Anyway, you can play Hot Soul Laser Beam for free in your browser if you want. Have fun!
Houdi continued to be an excellent cat this month.
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Thanks for reading and thanks for subscribing to this newsletter if you did.
So far this is an interesting way for me to sort of monitor my output from month to month. I find too often things tend to languish on the trash heap on the internet and go overlooked. Hopefully you found something interesting in here to brighten your day a bit. Or some neat trash!
Thanks for your support and attention, I’ll see ya next month.
Bye!
KC + S∴T
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