Hiya!
I'd been wondering whether to do another one of these for the past few weeks. It seems like I've left it for last minute, so I'll get right to it.
I've previously called this year "my flop era", as a joke. It's really a misnomer (as many of my friends kept reminding me), because I believe I did accomplish a lot! Just not in the same way as last year.
The Finished Games Things
This year I worked on 8 "things" (more on that wording later). That's way less than last year, and that's good! While I specifically didn't set out any resolutions on making less games, I did tell myself I'd relax a bit more.
Now, it was one of my New Year resolutions to translate and re-release my two binksi games in English. While I did eventually give up on submitting Sprout: Restoration to the Spring Thing 2023, I did get the prequel swiftly translated to English. I believe the only difference it has compared to the OG Spanish version, is one extra line at the very end of the game. The game was part of the Queer Games Bundle, although I have to say that it didn't get as much attention as I was hoping it'd garner. However, it was part of the Shortlist of the Queer Games Festival. So I feel at least a bit vindicated.
Not a game.
As part of the work I put for Sprout: Restoration, I put together the code from several past games, and I spruced it up (see what I did?). Then I released it for people to use. This year I felt it was my time to "give back" to the community, and while I can't code enough to make cool tools, I could at least do this. The template was picked up by a couple of websites and it was honestly flattering that people thought it was worthy of mention. I believe it was used in at least two games (not by me): morning drive to gifu and Return of the Costa Concordia. So that's cool.
I started playing Minecraft for the first time at the end of March. It was my safe place. I became absolutely obsessed. Then I had an idea, so I posted it on Mastodon on Apr 06, 2023, 23:59.
What if I made a game like BREA🌱HE but evil
The idea garnered some interest and I had people messaging me privately to learn more. It got released for the O2A2 VN Jam ~ Queer Edition ~. I actually wrote my thought on the development of the game as a Foreword, so I'd recommend you read it if you want to hear my thoughts on the game.
However, I must say: I tagged the game as "adult" due to the theme of the game (not because it's actually NSFW) and you'd be surprised to know how many people want Minecraft NSFW games. As of the time of writing this, the game received just shy of 1000 visits from NSFW/adult games with the tag "Minecraft". It is my most played game to date, and it'll probably be. However, I'm pretty sure most people never finish it once they realise it's not the experience they were looking for LOL
In May I hit a block. I had already been feeling some burnout during April as I had done DOWNFALL as a tiny "break" from working on Sprout: Restoration and I was getting tired of it. It was time for Rayuela de Arena and I felt like I needed to place well as I got 1st place last year. I got an idea for a game called "The Longest Way Back Home". However, I felt very demotivated and like I wasn't doing the concept justice, as somehow I struggled for time. Life just got in the way.
And I did something for the first time (during my gamedev stint, I mean): I decided I wouldn't push through it and that I'd put it on hold instead. It felt liberating. However, once Ruber heard I was about to drop out of the jam, he asked me to help him out with their game. And so I did. I feel bad I wasn't able to contribute more than I did (Ruber crunched), but the game looked impressive.
I just realised I made this a couple of weeks after the game above got released LOL
My brain was mush, and I didn't want to make anything big. It was taunting, honestly. I had no motivation to make anything serious. Dropping "The Longest Way Back Home" had affected me quite substantially, so I decided that some silly and short fangame could be a way good way to pass time during a day where I had no work to do (please don't tell my employer LOL).
Again, another low effort game. I wrote a Foreword. You should read it.
Wonderful shitpost game. It took me 5 minutes to contribute to it with a snippet I made for "Chin Up PRINCESS or the Crown Slips" (seriously, read the foreword linked in the game above).
I'm forever grateful I was able to be a part of this. Did I mention it won an award?
KentuckyFriedDreams came to me with the idea for a game. I had been wanting to get him to actively develop more often, so with his idea and some left over ideas I had for an unfinished game that I wanted to do the the 7drl challenge (that never took off) we made this game.
I'm honestly super proud of what we did together. It's a binksi, with sokoban mechanics! I coded that myself (by seriously copying internal bipsi code)! It was fun and rewarding!
The Unfinished Games
Oh boy. I did lean into the "I won't force myself to make a game if I don't feel like it even if this jam sounds cool" and "I will not crunch". I won't delve into the details, but here's at least the list of games that I started and are yet to be finished.
- Airtime Media: A binksi roguelike originally planned for the 7drl challenge
- The Longest Way Back Home
- Chin Up PRINCESS or the Crown Slips
- Untitled binksi game about the places we call home
- PRINCESS INTERNET BAGUETTe
- Untitled Godot game that I'm still working on with a bunch of cool people
The Other Cool Stuff
First of all, I am a published game developer! I got paid for gamedev stuff!:
I helped ran two game jams! Not only we had the "regular" O2A2 2023 - Visual Novel Jam, but we also had the O2A2 VN Jam ~ Queer Edition ~! That's 258 (TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY EIGHT) games that I enabled people to make. I did help friends to make one of them too! It was INTRUDER by FUTURE RUINS and ghost.
I also started a newsletter that hasn't yet gotten off the ground LOL
There was also a very short Museum Arc this year:
- I was part of the My Famicase Exhibition 2023. Something I made was in an exhibition in Tokyo? Honestly, I never thought I could say that. It was really really cool. Here's my famicase, btw.
- Solsticio was part of an exhibition in Barcelona. Although I wasn't able to go in person, I got sent a few pictures.
- Not really a museum, but BREA🌱HE was also one of the games that La Madriguera took to the IndieDevDay. And people played it???
- BREA🌱HE was also part of the online event/showcase "BENGALA!" organised by La Madriguera.
Which leads me to the last point:
As I mentioned above, this year I felt I had to give back to the community So back in April I organised a workshop/crash-course (which is more of a live-recorded videotutorial) on bitsy likes. You can watch it here, although I must say it's in Spanish! I prepared a lot for it and I was really nervous, but people seemed to like it! I'm happy that now it's a resource that people can use, as it doesn't seem like there's much stuff about tiny game tools/engines in Spanish.
The workshop was well received so I actually got asked to give another talk as part of BENGALA!. We managed to match schedules and I was able to give my talk live from the XYZ Reviews' studio. It was a wonderful day and I had so much fun that I stayed for too long after the event wrapped up that I almost missed my plane back home LOL It was incredible to be a part of such a cool thing. It is something that will stay with me until I die and I am forever grateful that I was given the chance to be a part of it.
New Year's Resolutions(?)
This 2023 I finally sat back and actually went back to playing videogames, as opposed to spending all my free time making them. It's been great: I discovered Minecraft, I finished the Great Ace Attorney and I literally completed the pokédex in Pokémon Violet a few hours ago! This is the first time I complete a pokédex in a Pokémon game ever!
In 2024, I want to:
- Play more games.
- Finish some unfinished games (I won't say which because I don't want to impose myself to finish specific ones LOL).
- Do more community stuff with La Madriguera.
- Make longer games and prove that I can make other things that aren't bitsy-likes.
- Just have a good time. If I've learnt anything from the death of my brother-in-law earlier this year is that life is too short.
And that's it. Happy New Year!
With love,
PRINCESS
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