I’ve never been much of a blogger, as a quick look at when I last posted here will attest. But after nearly 15 years of neglect, I figured it was time to update this website and start using it again to share some of my personal little game dev projects. In the last year I discovered Pico-8 (late to the party I know!), and there is something about the 8-bit-like restrictions and how quickly it lets me make something that really scratches that game dev itch for me right now. Quick is relative though. I find while I can get my little game dev projects to a playable state fast, where I really like to spend my time is getting lost in details and seeing how much game I can cram inside Pico-8’s limits. And honestly that is a big part of the charm. For someone who makes game as their 9-5, Pico-8 fits perfectly into a niche I like to call “Couch Game Dev”. A way for me to tinker around with game ideas while I sit on my couch with a crappy laptop and maybe a beer. I can nearly always get SOMETHING done in an hour. Its simple enough for me to pick up again if I leave it for a month when other life stuff happens. Most importantly though it does not feel like work!

Actually, there is probably another post I should about how I think making games for a living has warped the way I view my personal projects. How professional standards and expectations have crept into the games I’ve tried to make in my spare time in ways that were not useful or helpful. But for now I’m just to get this posted and then get back to iterating on “Oh Nobles!” and seeing if I can add a small single-player campaign (you can currently play an early version of over on itch!).