StarTopic Creative Endeavors |ST| Flex your art muscles

[paranoodle]

So, what’s this thread for?​

Sharing the cool things you make! Discussing the cool things you want to make! Be it visual arts, writing, composing, game dev, sculpture, collage, embroidery, other arts and crafts, you name it! Maybe not a cool carrot you grew in your yard, though, unless you carve it into an ocarina or something.

Basically, it’s a catch-all thread for discussing and sharing various creative/artistic undertakings, with a reach broad enough that it can make for a starting point for any sub-group or sub-community to form around an art-related topic.

If any discussion on a specific topic or medium gets big enough, feel free to migrate into your own ST to have more room for it! You can ask to have it linked back in this OP so everyone is still left with that hub feeling, and you can always come back here if things feel too quiet in their own thread.

tl;dr: Post stuff you make, everything’s in one thread so people don’t get discouraged from having 40 different inactive threads to cover all the stuff they could make.

Thread Guidelines​

• You can post works in progress, finished projects, projects you’d like to work on someday, ask for advice, or just generally talk shop. All that kind of stuff!
• Obviously, don’t post anything someone else has made and try to pass it off as your own. If you ever want to post someone else’s work (because it’s relevant to discussion, not just to show it off), make it clear that it’s not yours, and properly source it. (url if applicable, artist + title if not)
• Don’t offer unsolicited critique. If you want advice/critique, say so! If you want to give critique, make sure the person is actually asking for it and not just looking to show off something they’re proud of.
• Remember this is give-and-take - don’t spend all your time showing off while ignoring what everyone else is doing. You don’t have to mechanically comment on everything, but pay at least a little bit of attention to what other people are up to - after all, they’re nice enough to do it for you. On that note, posting works in progress in general is a-ok, but make sure you’re not just taking over the thread with over-frequent updates.
• While some people do art for the hobby, some do it professionally and/or commercially. It’s not taboo to mention this if relevant, but please use your best judgment and avoid coming off as going overboard advertising or spamming the thread. “I drew a cool commission!” is fine. “Everyone come buy my $20 game” is not, no matter how good your game is. If someone has to pay to see the thing you’ve made, that’s right out.

Sibling STs​

• @bellydrum's Share your music thread
• the Famiboards GameDevs ST
• No others yet (that I know of) but I believe in you all, let’s make this thread overflow.

 

[Skittzo]

So I'm trying to make a WRPG in the vein of the old Might and Magic or Wizardry games, though much more heavily inspired by the former. I've been kinda trying to make this game for years now but recently I've had way more luck with it (and with my motivation) so I'd like to show off what I have so far. I'll share a few screenshots and then a few (outdated) videos.


Note: The vast majority of assets in this were not made by me. Most of them come from free asset packs on the unreal marketplace and some come from other free sources like fantasy-faces.com or game-icons.net.

Spoiler: Lots of big screenshots

Like any good Might and Magic game there is a starting town with a stat boosting fountain (or two).

With slums. Stuff goes down there (not that it's implemented yet)

Characters have stats, though not those ones! I used a JRPG template from the unreal marketplace as a basis for this, but I'm using wildly different stats in my game. I just haven't bothered to change the menu to show them yet!

Like any good RPG/adventure you can interact with stuff like statue plaques.

And solve puzzles. I'll be impressed if anyone gets this!

There are shops, though I need to figure out how to arrange the item layout based on the item type. Bah.

There are NPCs and quests of course...

Some helpful...

And some snarky.

There are dungeons of course, almost all of them with cheeky and/or silly puzzles or traps

Betcha can't guess what's behind this door

There's also loot of course!

And a world map-

Currently in progress anyway. The plan is to make a 64x64 grid of tiles. Viewable entirely in first person, for maximum goofiness:

So as I said these videos are a bit outdated (you'll notice the UI looks way uglier) and they also run like poop since my laptop is very RAM starved. But they show off my goofiness and (hopefully) creativity!





Edit: please give me all the criticisms and suggestions you have by the way, I'm very happy to hear any discussion about my project. I'm well aware that using a bunch of free assets makes it look kind of whacky, ideally I'll be able to commission some original assets or something if I ever get close to a place where I might be able to sell this.

But in the meantime only being able to use a premade selection of free assets has been incredibly useful for breeding creativity, one example is the statues... I didn't really know what kind of puzzle to make and just looking through my available assets really helped narrow down a theme.

 

[EtherPenguin]

Great thread idea!

I've had the desire to make a JRPG-style game for a few years now but really got serious about it last year. I wanted to get original with the mechanics and for the game to stand out a bit so I didn't want to just make an RPG Maker game. Here's the prototype I put together last year using Game Maker Studio 2:


I was bad at backing stuff up and I had some troubles with my laptop. I ended up losing most my work, unfortunately. But I've got a new laptop now and I started work again but in Godot this time. After taking a few months to learn Godot, I can't bring myself to ever go back to Game Maker, especially since Godot lets me write code in C# which I've taken classes on in the past so I'm more comfortable with it. I don't have videos of the Godot version right now though.

The biggest roadblock for me is asset creation. I was quick to learn that I hate making pixel art and I always want to put it off. At the same time, I don't want to just buy assets or use creative commons stuff - I'm already going to have to do that with the music.

Mechanically, what I was going for was to have no defense stat, just HP, but still make multi-hit attacks function similar to how they would be in a system with subtractive defensive. So everything has a block rate. If a hit is blocked, then it cancels the rest of the hits in that attack. The hero's stun move inflicts stun on the second hit so if the first hit is blocked, the stun won't happen. I'm not sure it's actually all the fun though and I'm looking at getting rid of the idea in the new version. Also, every time you inflict stun, the enemy gains more resistance to stun once they recover. I want crowd control to be powerful and able to be used on bosses without it being spammed or allowing any sort of stun-lock. Then I wanted the enemies' mana charge to be easily visible so the player can prepare for big attacks.

Also, Kyle Bosman (formerly of Easy Allies) is doing a community Game Jam starting next week that I'm looking forward to. He did one last year, I watched and loved all the creativity that came out of it so I really wanted to participate this year. I think it's easy to get stuck on making a big game for a long stretch of time so this would be a great opportunity to force myself to make something in a small amount of time and actually finish a game. I've been wanting to get into jams for a while now.

 

[Appelsider]

I love to draw, and it is my mission to be able to one day make art thats so good it makes me and others happy!

I don't want to spam my artworks here, but you can easily scroll through them on my side account on twitter where I put them aside for easy viewing!
I mostly stick to video game/anime fanarts.

Art Account!

Fire Emblem Three Houses was in particular the biggest reason I got out of my art slump and I am forever grateful to it! My recent drawing is coincidentally Byleth also. XD

 

[chocolate_supra]

I love to draw, and it is my mission to be able to one day make art thats so good it makes me and others happy!

I don't want to spam my artworks here, but you can easily scroll through them on my side account on twitter where I put them aside for easy viewing!
I mostly stick to video game/anime fanarts.

Art Account!

Fire Emblem Three Houses was in particular the biggest reason I got out of my art slump and I am forever grateful to it! My recent drawing is coincidentally Byleth also. XD

That begs the question, did you draw your avatar???
Also your twitter banner is fantastic, omg

 

[Appelsider]

That begs the question, did you draw your avatar???
Also your twitter banner is fantastic, omg

Yes I did!
And thank you LMAO yeah the Kirby dab has become an essential part of me to express myself now.
I occasionally like to make cursed emojis that that was one of the first ones. XD

Me saying FE3H brought me out of my artslump also meant, I ended up making cursed emojis for of them as well

Spoiler

 

[chocolate_supra]

Yes I did!
And thank you LMAO yeah the Kirby dab has become an essential part of me to express myself now.
I occasionally like to make cursed emojis that that was one of the first ones. XD

Me saying FE3H brought me out of my artslump also meant, I ended up making cursed emojis for of them as well

Spoiler

YES LOL

 

[Skittzo]

Great thread idea!

I've had the desire to make a JRPG-style game for a few years now but really got serious about it last year. I wanted to get original with the mechanics and for the game to stand out a bit so I didn't want to just make an RPG Maker game. Here's the prototype I put together last year using Game Maker Studio 2:


I was bad at backing stuff up and I had some troubles with my laptop. I ended up losing most my work, unfortunately. But I've got a new laptop now and I started work again but in Godot this time. After taking a few months to learn Godot, I can't bring myself to ever go back to Game Maker, especially since Godot lets me write code in C# which I've taken classes on in the past so I'm more comfortable with it. I don't have videos of the Godot version right now though.

The biggest roadblock for me is asset creation. I was quick to learn that I hate making pixel art and I always want to put it off. At the same time, I don't want to just buy assets or use creative commons stuff - I'm already going to have to do that with the music.

Mechanically, what I was going for was to have no defense stat, just HP, but still make multi-hit attacks function similar to how they would be in a system with subtractive defensive. So everything has a block rate. If a hit is blocked, then it cancels the rest of the hits in that attack. The hero's stun move inflicts stun on the second hit so if the first hit is blocked, the stun won't happen. I'm not sure it's actually all the fun though and I'm looking at getting rid of the idea in the new version. Also, every time you inflict stun, the enemy gains more resistance to stun once they recover. I want crowd control to be powerful and able to be used on bosses without it being spammed or allowing any sort of stun-lock. Then I wanted the enemies' mana charge to be easily visible so the player can prepare for big attacks.

Also, Kyle Bosman (formerly of Easy Allies) is doing a community Game Jam starting next week that I'm looking forward to. He did one last year, I watched and loved all the creativity that came out of it so I really wanted to participate this year. I think it's easy to get stuck on making a big game for a long stretch of time so this would be a great opportunity to force myself to make something in a small amount of time and actually finish a game. I've been wanting to get into jams for a while now.

I also lost a ton of work when my laptop died this year. Though that kinda became a bit of a blessing and a curse since a big reboot is kinda what I needed.

But yeah I need to back up my shit, that's a good lesson.

 

[chocolate_supra]

Alright so I dunno if building an engine counts as crafts or sculpture but there was at least painting involved and I was really, really proud of how pretty this dude turned out so:

I guess I could say that the medium for this piece was "oil," but I'd be stealing that joke from a tv show so..

 

[Skittzo]

Alright so I dunno if building an engine counts as crafts or sculpture but there was at least painting involved and I was really, really proud of how pretty this dude turned out so:

I guess I could say that the medium for this piece was "oil," but I'd be stealing that joke from a tv show so..

I give that engine work a 5 star review

 

[paranoodle]

@Skittzo That's really cool! Free assets are definitely one of those things where you might not want to keep them all up to the final build, but they're super useful for prototyping and getting something already going without having to lose hours trying to improvise your own placeholders. I could see how a pass over assets (both 3d and 2d) could really smooth out your good start!

@EtherPenguin It's a shame you lost the originals, that's a solid prototype! Moreso than just backing up, I'd definitely recommend looking into versioning software (I use git for my projects but there's a lot of options), not only does it do the same functions as a back-up, but it improves your life several times over when it comes to debugging.
I hope you have a good time with the jam! I've never done any because I'm not great with time constraints, but they seem like a really good way to just get new ideas down and prototyped without just getting lost in the sauce.

@chocolate_supra I can't say I know anything about engines, but that looks rad so I think it counts. That looks like it would be super hard to do, is it all mostly from scratch? (As in, from the parts, I would assume you didn't cast the metal yourself)

 

[chocolate_supra]

I give that engine work a 5 star review

It actually revved to seven stars, which was one of the things I loved about it

 

[chocolate_supra]

@Skittzo That's really cool! Free assets are definitely one of those things where you might not want to keep them all up to the final build, but they're super useful for prototyping and getting something already going without having to lose hours trying to improvise your own placeholders.

I don't have experience in game development, but as a graphic designer who's mind often gets bogged down in the details of "thing one must be perfect before I move on to thing 2 (at the cost of things 2 and beyond getting done)," I think I can second this bit of encouragement. Also applies to what @EtherPenguin was saying about using Creative Commons stuff. Don't be afraid of using temporary placeholders to keep your momentum up!

@chocolate_supra I can't say I know anything about engines, but that looks rad so I think it counts. That looks like it would be super hard to do, is it all mostly from scratch? (As in, from the parts, I would assume you didn't cast the metal yourself)

Thankyooooouuuu! It wasn't terribly hard because engines in 1972 were remarkably simple. And yes, the engine was rebuilt from scratch. All new internal parts, seals, etc. But because of issues in the transmission and rear end, I actually tore the entire car down to a bare shell and upgraded basically every mechanical bit on it, speaking of getting creative. The engine was just the pretty part. The designer in me couldn't help it.

 

[paranoodle]

On my end, I'm primarily an artist, I do hobby game dev but I haven't gotten to work on my current project in a little while because it's been a little more work than I can handle alongside my job at the moment, but I swear I'll get back to it as soon as I can. Promise. I've also done a lot of arts and crafts (including sewing, embroidery, and leatherwork) over the years but at the moment I'm mostly having fun with crochet as my keep-the-hands-busy activity.

The game I've been working on is a little life sim, there's currently a small prototype demo out here: https://paranoodle.itch.io/elf-game ! It's been a solo endeavor so far, but I might reach out for help creating certain assets later (I'm terrible at sound design lol), once I have enough done to actually justify the expense. It's all in Godot, with GDScript (because I like Python better than C#), and I'm really bad at finding and figuring out plugins so I've been doing almost everything from scratch. Pretty proud of the result so far!

On the art side, I mostly draw original characters (I have... a lot of them) but there's the occasional fanart. Mostly Star Ocean (see: my icon), sometimes Tales or Monster Hunter. I used to do a decent amount of Fire Emblem fanart too but I haven't touched it in a while, I've really dropped off the series.

 

[chocolate_supra]

This. This is darling.

 

[Skittzo]

@Skittzo That's really cool! Free assets are definitely one of those things where you might not want to keep them all up to the final build, but they're super useful for prototyping and getting something already going without having to lose hours trying to improvise your own placeholders. I could see how a pass over assets (both 3d and 2d) could really smooth out your good start!

Pardon my lack of experience with the lingo, but what do you mean by "pass over assets"?

Also for the record I am absolutely not an artist. I wish I had any of my dad's artistic skill but I was not so blessed. My best 3D creation is probably this fella and I'm pretty sure I didn't make the texture.

If I do ever manage to get this game in a state somewhere in the realm of "complete" I'll definitely need to hire an artist or two.

 

[paranoodle]

Thankyooooouuuu! It wasn't terribly hard because engines in 1972 were remarkably simple. And yes, the engine was rebuilt from scratch. All new internal parts, seals, etc. But because of issues in the transmission and rear end, I actually tore the entire car down to a bare shell and upgraded basically every mechanical bit on it, speaking of getting creative. The engine was just the pretty part. The designer in me couldn't help it.

Ohh wow, okay! That sounds like it must've been a huge undertaking. Must've been really satisfying to finish though!

This. This is darling.

Thank you It's probably one of my favorite lines I wrote for the demo

Pardon my lack of experience with the lingo, but what do you mean by "pass over assets"?

Also for the record I am absolutely not an artist. I wish I had any of my dad's artistic skill but I was not so blessed. My best 3D creation is probably this fella and I'm pretty sure I didn't make the texture.

If I do ever manage to get this game in a state somewhere in the realm of "complete" I'll definitely need to hire an artist or two.

Oh, sorry, that's just messy wording on my part. I meant as in like, "do another pass", so basically if/when you're at a point where you're comfortable commissioning assets like you mentioned, I think it'll make the rest of your work shine through even better. I have no idea how to word this actually so I hope this word salad makes any sense at all.

Also I would play a game with that fella, not gonna lie. And honestly 3D is hard, getting anything done counts as an achievement.

 

[chocolate_supra]

this fella

I loves

 

[Skittzo]

Oh, sorry, that's just messy wording on my part. I meant as in like, "do another pass", so basically if/when you're at a point where you're comfortable commissioning assets like you mentioned, I think it'll make the rest of your work shine through even better. I have no idea how to word this actually so I hope this word salad makes any sense at all.

Ah gotcha, yeah that's ideally the plan. Most of the logic is separate from the assets so it should be a relatively straightforward swap if it ever occurs.

Also I would play a game with that fella, not gonna lie. And honestly 3D is hard, getting anything done counts as an achievement.

Thanks! I made a whole series of pun monsters but he was my first and favorite. I liked Tyrannosaurus Specs a lot too but I didn't make the T-rex model.

I also have no idea how to embed from Flickr here from my phone.

 

[chocolate_supra]

pun monsters

What sort of pun is..?

OMG I GET IT

 

[EtherPenguin]

I also lost a ton of work when my laptop died this year. Though that kinda became a bit of a blessing and a curse since a big reboot is kinda what I needed.

But yeah I need to back up my shit, that's a good lesson.

Yea, I mostly felt the same for the actual project. Re-examining my design and starting again in a new engine was like a breath of fresh air. Lessons were definitely learned and I have been meaning to look into versioning software. The bigger problem is that I started a tutorial series for making RPG elements in Game Maker after some comments were asking how I built the prototype last year. I lost my stuff for that as well and now it's been so long since I posted the last video, it's been half a year since I touched GMS, and it was very time-consuming to work on and edit. Comments were very nice and friendly even despite the bad audio. I still get the occasional comment wanting it to be continued and it's just become this whole big thing I've been avoiding.

Anyways, looking forward to see how your Might & Magic project progresses. Nothing wrong with using what assets are available to you. I've been avoiding it and pushing to make my own stuff because there's a stigma with hobbyist jrpgs being so reliant on RPG Maker and having that kind of look. But that's not so much of a problem for you.

I've playing around with Blender and 3D modeling lately. I find myself enjoying making models more than sprites, but I'm not sure if I could make a whole 3D game. I started messing with Unity to see what it's like and get the hang of the terrain tools and importing models and materials. This probably looks like every person's first Unity project but I'm proud of the Dragon Quest slime model I made:

Spoiler: Unity Test

@Appelsider Clicking on your twitter and being greeted with Kirby dabbing got a laugh at me. I liked that WIP Addam from Torna! I hope you finish it (no pressure though lol).

@paranoodle That pixel art is gorgeous! Such an adorable look, and fantastic color choices. I'll have to try your demo when I have some more time later tonight.

 

[Skittzo]

Yea, I mostly felt the same for the actual project. Re-examining my design and starting again in a new engine was like a breath of fresh air. Lessons were definitely learned and I have been meaning to look into versioning software. The bigger problem is that I started a tutorial series for making RPG elements in Game Maker after some comments were asking how I built the prototype last year. I lost my stuff for that as well and now it's been so long since I posted the last video, it's been half a year since I touched GMS, and it was very time-consuming to work on and edit. Comments were very nice and friendly even despite the bad audio. I still get the occasional comment wanting it to be continued and it's just become this whole big thing I've been avoiding.

Anyways, looking forward to see how your Might & Magic project progresses. Nothing wrong with using what assets are available to you. I've been avoiding it and pushing to make my own stuff because there's a stigma with hobbyist jrpgs being so reliant on RPG Maker and having that kind of look. But that's not so much of a problem for you.

I've playing around with Blender and 3D modeling lately. I find myself enjoying making models more than sprites, but I'm not sure if I could make a whole 3D game. I started messing with Unity to see what it's like and get the hang of the terrain tools and importing models and materials. This probably looks like every person's first Unity project but I'm proud of the Dragon Quest slime model I made:

Spoiler: Unity Test

@Appelsider Clicking on your twitter and being greeted with Kirby dabbing got a laugh at me. I liked that WIP Addam from Torna! I hope you finish it (no pressure though lol).

@paranoodle That pixel art is gorgeous! Such an adorable look, and fantastic color choices. I'll have to try your demo when I have some more time later tonight.

Honestly that is a fantastic slime haha

And the hills are super cartoony, I love it. I use blender too, and yeah 3D modeling is super tough. But texturing is even harder in my experience, it took me a hell of a long time to even learn what UVs were.

Over the years I've found that my strengths are in repurposing existing assets to make new and creative things like the Tyrannosaurus Specs and the one I just remembered, the Litigator.

I think the reason a (unexpected) reboot worked for both of us is that we had a better idea of our strengths and weaknesses and could better plan our projects accordingly.

 

[paranoodle]

Rebooting can definitely be a good idea, if you're thoughtful about it. Sometimes you just need to shake things up, and everything you've done previously teaches you a lot: your strengths and weaknesses, how to do some things (or how not to, huhu), how to better organize/plan projects, etc. Sylvan Meadows is something like the... I want to say fourth? fifth? attempt at the same game, and it's finally the one where I feel like I've got things where I want them design-wise (both for visual design and more generally game design). Basically the only things that stayed the whole time was the setting (even if the specifics of how it's used aren't the same), and that it's been pixel art the whole time.

 

[blondkayvon]

There's a lot about this that I really dig - art, UI, customization, etc - but I really want to commend you on your font choices. I feel like I'm pretty particular about fonts and these all are superb choices.

 

[Appelsider]

Speaking of random kirbies, I have another one that I just had to make after Sephiroth got announced for Smash, it was my take on what Kirby should've looked like

Spoiler

 

[Irene]

On my end, I'm primarily an artist, I do hobby game dev but I haven't gotten to work on my current project in a little while because it's been a little more work than I can handle alongside my job at the moment, but I swear I'll get back to it as soon as I can. Promise. I've also done a lot of arts and crafts (including sewing, embroidery, and leatherwork) over the years but at the moment I'm mostly having fun with crochet as my keep-the-hands-busy activity.

The game I've been working on is a little life sim, there's currently a small prototype demo out here: https://paranoodle.itch.io/elf-game ! It's been a solo endeavor so far, but I might reach out for help creating certain assets later (I'm terrible at sound design lol), once I have enough done to actually justify the expense. It's all in Godot, with GDScript (because I like Python better than C#), and I'm really bad at finding and figuring out plugins so I've been doing almost everything from scratch. Pretty proud of the result so far!

On the art side, I mostly draw original characters (I have... a lot of them) but there's the occasional fanart. Mostly Star Ocean (see: my icon), sometimes Tales or Monster Hunter. I used to do a decent amount of Fire Emblem fanart too but I haven't touched it in a while, I've really dropped off the series.

Everything you shared in this post is jaw-dropping, I adore it!

Speaking of random kirbies, I have another one that I just had to make after Sephiroth got announced for Smash, it was my take on what Kirby should've looked like

Spoiler

Adorable! What program did you do this in? It's fairly close to how Kirby actually ended up looking - minus the legs, of course but I like the legs!

 

[Appelsider]

Adorable! What program did you do this in? It's fairly close to how Kirby actually ended up looking - minus the legs, of course but I like the legs!

Hahaha thanks! I just had to make the hair long just like Sephi's, so the only solution was long legs. XD

I draw in Procreate, on the old iPad Pro (2017) model! It's a very nice program with a very simple ui!

 

[paranoodle]

There's a lot about this that I really dig - art, UI, customization, etc - but I really want to commend you on your font choices. I feel like I'm pretty particular about fonts and these all are superb choices.

Thank you! I spent SO long on the fonts, so I'm glad that shows haha. The ones in the character creator are from the PixelOperator family, which is a libre/free set of fonts. The others are from somepx (whose fonts I would really recommend checking out, they do fantastic work), and specifically the dialogue font is a version I modified to have a slightly wider/more airy look because the original looked a little tight for my use.

Everything you shared in this post is jaw-dropping, I adore it!

Thank you!! Really happy to hear it

Speaking of random kirbies, I have another one that I just had to make after Sephiroth got announced for Smash, it was my take on what Kirby should've looked like

Spoiler

It's so fitting and just a tad unsettling, I love it. It instantly reminded me of legschilla, I think he and Sephikirby (Kirbyroth?) would be friends.

 

[Skittzo]

Man, UE4 blueprints are very, very clunky and tedious when you're largely trying to handle data and structures. Took me like two days to figure out how to translate my character stats to the pre-existing UI properly. Structures make things a lot easier at times but also much tougher sometimes.

Anyway I should have a playable demo up within a week or two, encompassing the starting town and two dungeons in the town. Gonna try and see if I can finally implement my equipment system (so that these items actually do something) and start on a rudimentary quest/quest tracker system.

 

[Irene]

Alright, time to stop being shy and post something.

I've been tinkering with a game recently.. (I'm a hobby game dev normally) Unfortunately the project is in a bit of a suspended state because of having lots on my plate atm, so haven't gone much farther beyond making the world, the visual style and some mechanics, and sort of making some concept images.

Lo and behold!

Spoiler: game

 

[chocolate_supra]

Alright, time to stop being shy and post something.

I've been tinkering with a game recently.. (I'm a hobby game dev normally) Unfortunately the project is in a bit of a suspended state because of having lots on my plate atm, so haven't gone much farther beyond making the world, the visual style and some mechanics, and sort of making some concept images.

Lo and behold!

Spoiler: game

I Yeah!ed this, then unYeah!'ed it so I could Yeah! it twice.

 

[curl-6]

My primary creative outlet is my blog, which I've been writing since early 2014, chronicling both my lived experience of autism, and my observations as an advocate who works with other autistics for a living.

Writing is one of my autistic strengths, when I'm doing it it's like my brain is lit up like a Christmas tree, it's so liberating. It is my sincere hope that my work helps increase awareness and acceptance of autistics, and proves helpful and insightful for all readers autistic or not.

Max's shop of horrors

Warning: imagination testing site. Enter at own risk

japanmax89.wordpress.com

 

[paranoodle]

Alright, time to stop being shy and post something.

I've been tinkering with a game recently.. (I'm a hobby game dev normally) Unfortunately the project is in a bit of a suspended state because of having lots on my plate atm, so haven't gone much farther beyond making the world, the visual style and some mechanics, and sort of making some concept images.

Lo and behold!

Spoiler: game

Ohh, I love those flying isles, that looks like a really fun area to navigate! What kind of gameplay are you aiming for, something kinda adventure-ey?

My primary creative outlet is my blog, which I've been writing since early 2014, chronicling both my lived experience of autism, and my observations as an advocate who works with other autistics for a living.

Writing is one of my autistic strengths, when I'm doing it it's like my brain is lit up like a Christmas tree, it's so liberating. It is my sincere hope that my work helps increase awareness and acceptance of autistics, and proves helpful and insightful for all readers autistic or not.

Max's shop of horrors

Warning: imagination testing site. Enter at own risk

japanmax89.wordpress.com

That's really awesome! There's nothing nicer than getting to engage in special interests, and it's rewarding twice over when you get to feel like you're helping other people out with it too. I only got to read a little, but I really liked how vivid your word choice is, you do a really great job of describing how a lot of this stuff feels, so I'm sure a lot of autistic people will get to see themselves in there too <3

 

[Appelsider]

@Appelsider Clicking on your twitter and being greeted with Kirby dabbing got a laugh at me. I liked that WIP Addam from Torna! I hope you finish it (no pressure though lol).

I'm glad the kirby could make people laugh XD

Just wanted to let you know I did finish Addam after all!
It was pretty tough and I got stuck really bad, so I took a detour by drawing other stuff in the mean time. XD

I'm not entirely happy with the end result but I don't like staying stuck on one drawing for too long so I just forced myself to finish it.

Spoiler

 

[Skittzo]

People on discord liked my rat king so I'll share it here too.

As with most things in this game I didn't make the assets but I put them together creatively, in this case had to learn about sockets.

 

[Irene]

Ohh, I love those flying isles, that looks like a really fun area to navigate! What kind of gameplay are you aiming for, something kinda adventure-ey?

<3

I'm currently experimenting with puzzle, stealth and platforming aspects. I don't think I'm haxx enough to code a good combat system, so I try to make engaging gameplay without that.

 

[curl-6]

That's really awesome! There's nothing nicer than getting to engage in special interests, and it's rewarding twice over when you get to feel like you're helping other people out with it too. I only got to read a little, but I really liked how vivid your word choice is, you do a really great job of describing how a lot of this stuff feels, so I'm sure a lot of autistic people will get to see themselves in there too <3

Thank you, really appreciate the kind words.
Few things make me happier than writing, so if I can do that and at the same time maybe help others, (being an advocate I feel is my calling in life) then it's a win/win.

 

[EtherPenguin]

Alright, time to stop being shy and post something.

I've been tinkering with a game recently.. (I'm a hobby game dev normally) Unfortunately the project is in a bit of a suspended state because of having lots on my plate atm, so haven't gone much farther beyond making the world, the visual style and some mechanics, and sort of making some concept images.

Lo and behold!

Spoiler: game

I meant to comment on this earlier. That looks like such an incredibly fun world! I'm a sucker for sky islands, always love to see those. I don't know if you've played it, but the sky world + low poly look made me think of Skies of Arcadia, but more ghibli-esque. I just love the whole vibe you got going here.

 

[Irene]

I meant to comment on this earlier. That looks like such an incredibly fun world! I'm a sucker for sky islands, always love to see those. I don't know if you've played it, but the sky world + low poly look made me think of Skies of Arcadia, but more ghibli-esque. I just love the whole vibe you got going here.

Thank you!
Skies of Arcadia is actually one of the game's 4 big inspirations. The other three being Star Fox Adventures, Wind Waker and Beyond Good & Evil. I'm really going for capturing that era of games.

 

[EtherPenguin]

Kyle Bosman's game jam has started, and I've been prototyping an idea for it. It's five weeks to make a game which is a pretty lengthy jam so I'm wanting to be a little ambitious with it. Where I've been practicing Blender, I want to try making a 3D game. It's possible I'll fail spectacularly but I really want to give it a stab.

Kyle's game jams are a lot more elaborate than most. The idea is that there was a popular YA book series in the 90s and early 2000s but deep into the series, there was a major plot twist that completely turned fans off and caused the publisher to drop the series. During the stream, the chat came up with 8 characters who died throughout the series. For the jam, we have to make a game set after the series ended, that can't undo the unpopular twist but needs to revive a character to revitalize the series. There's more details on the itch io page if you want to know what all it's about: https://itch.io/jam/robot-party-jam-2022

So, I settled on building my game around the character Charlene Chibs. Here's my first attempt at making a 3D character model:


I'm fairly happy with the way it came out. Given the limited time frame, I'll have to work with a good enough approach. Still trying to figure out the basic mechanics. I had the idea of something that felt like a 5th gen era adventure game like Ocarina and Mega Man Legends with some collectathon aspects. I also made a thread in the community section of the jam's itch io page, so I'll probably post any updates over there but wanted to share the start of my project with you all.

 

[Appelsider]

I just received my first own stickers! The quality is so good I love them.

Spoiler: Stickers!

I also had a tshirt made with the ghost on it and that also had a really good quality! It's nice to know for future reference.
And it just feels really nice to see something I made in a tangible form!

 

[Phil32]

Hello all! I'm so glad @Irene pointed me to this thread (thank you, Irene, for that!)! I don't get around to this side of Famiboards too terribly much, so I hadn't seen this thread yet. I'm especially glad to be pointed here because OMIGOSH there's so much awesome and creative stuff in here! You all are blowing my mind!

As for me, I've recently--as in two evenings ago (ha)--made a YouTube channel dedicated to my WIP RPG Maker MV game, Legends of Adrigal. Currently, it's a bunch of songs from the soundtrack posted, some brief overviews of some of the locales/villages/dungeons in the game, and this video: the first 15 minutes of my game. I hope it's enjoyable to watch and perhaps gets at least one person excited about my game!



It's been in sporadic development since 2015 after I finished and published a puzzle game for a college final and portfolio piece. A year ago I only had three hours of gameplay thereabouts. This month, I have over 12 hours, and that's just what I've played as someone who knows the game front to back. I think I'm close to halfway through development, but who knows!

 

[EtherPenguin]

Work on the game jam continues, I'm really pouring everything I have into it. Been fleshing out the environment design for the main area. Asset packs are allowed so I decided to use some free textures to lighten the load. I have two teammates working on the project, an artist and a composer. The character artist showed me some of the portraits they were working on, and I was blown away! I already posted this on itch.io, but I can't resist sharing it here. You can see their amazing art and my okay environment design in the background:


Here's a short video I made of the character running through the empty environment to get a feel for the level layout. I'll continue tweaking it through the jam to add little points of interest and collectables. I had the vague idea of something like bob-bomb battlefield where the level would be leading up a mountain. At the top is a deactivated giant robot and a crashed spaceship.

 

[Irene]

Work on the game jam continues, I'm really pouring everything I have into it. Been fleshing out the environment design for the main area. Asset packs are allowed so I decided to use some free textures to lighten the load. I have two teammates working on the project, an artist and a composer. The character artist showed me some of the portraits they were working on, and I was blown away! I already posted this on itch.io, but I can't resist sharing it here. You can see their amazing art and my okay environment design in the background:


Here's a short video I made of the character running through the empty environment to get a feel for the level layout. I'll continue tweaking it through the jam to add little points of interest and collectables. I had the vague idea of something like bob-bomb battlefield where the level would be leading up a mountain. At the top is a deactivated giant robot and a crashed spaceship.

I have nothing but positive experiences from game jams. They're always fun! Sounds like Kyle's are pretty elaborate, which is cool.

It looks like you all really put lots of effort into this. The character looks cute. I also like the environment, I specifically like the BotW fog, it's a nice touch. Warm colors!

 

[Skittzo]

I promised you all a demo and it's nearly ready, I just need to figure out how many bugs I really need to smooth out at this point. Some weird UI stuff I guess is probably no big deal but I don't want the player to be able to get stuck anywhere at all.

Might just put in an emergency "teleport to start" button instead of worrying about every bug.

Anyway it should be coming soon, I just need to figure out where to upload it. GitHub is probably my best option.

 

[Skittzo]

Hooray, my demo is finally up and available to download!! Itch.io was my best bet for it. Anyway,

Monsters of Mican Demo by Skittzo

A modern whimsical take on old-school RPGs by a solo dev

skittzo.itch.io

Please let me know what you all think! I really need some criticism/comments to help drive me to keep going!

 

[Suswave]

Hey everyone! I've been meaning to post here for a minute.

I'm working on a creature-catcher called Grögol Bonanza. Multimedia / music / code are my main skills – other than shitposting – but I'm not necessarily deeply talented at any one thing.

I started cooking this up as a joke, mostly as an inversion of what some Pokémon fans have decried in more recent games. I ran with some "careful what you wish for" concepts and tried to see how absurd I could make them. So based on that:

There are tons of creatures – called Grögols – in every possible type combination! ~ but they're all the shittiest little pen drawings I can scratch out based on very bad ideas

There's a gym for every type, and you can do them in any order! Maybe even secret ones! ~ but many of them are hidden, or require side quests, or won't open until you make the stinky wizard come out of his dumpster

There's no two-version split! ~ but your save file does more random generation than you think, meaning there are maybe way too many possible versions

There's a huge open world map! ~ but it's kind of minimalist, with flat bright colors and sketchy decoration

Your starters are not overpowered! ~ because you might not even get one, since the professor you're interning for is kind of a dick

The combat isn’t strictly turn-based! ~ because it’s “mini bullet hell” style, and you’re gonna have to practice your dodge dash if you don’t want to get dunked

There’s lots of optional post-game content! ~ because your Grögolpedia isn’t the only thing you’ll be filling out! and where did the Grögols come from, anyway? and why is the Federal Birdeau after you? and why did you put a Grögol in the horse incinerator when you don’t even know what a “horse” is? and what’s the deal with the terrifying Chaös Grögols? and why does it feel like there’s a whole other world beneath your feet? and where is the fourth karaoke bar? and what happens if you change the world? and what if you choose violence? and is a new save slot really just a new save slot? and what the hell is Jerry?! and where is the damn fishing hat?!

My hope is that it will end up being fun to play, funny, and engaging! but even if not, I’m having fun. it’s the perfect amount of chaotically ambitious and not too serious for a project to get me into game design.

Here’s a little reel I put together of planning and progress so far:




let me know your thoughts! I realize it’s all very chaotic and I didn’t really explain anything well, but this forum (and this community in prior forums) gave me the push I needed to finally try and make a game after ~25 years of wanting to. cheers!

 

[chocolate_supra]

Hey everyone! I've been meaning to post here for a minute.

I'm working on a creature-catcher called Grögol Bonanza. Multimedia / music / code are my main skills – other than shitposting – but I'm not necessarily deeply talented at any one thing.

I started cooking this up as a joke, mostly as an inversion of what some Pokémon fans have decried in more recent games. I ran with some "careful what you wish for" concepts and tried to see how absurd I could make them. So based on that:

There are tons of creatures – called Grögols – in every possible type combination! ~ but they're all the shittiest little pen drawings I can scratch out based on very bad ideas

There's a gym for every type, and you can do them in any order! Maybe even secret ones! ~ but many of them are hidden, or require side quests, or won't open until you make the stinky wizard come out of his dumpster

There's no two-version split! ~ but your save file does more random generation than you think, meaning there are maybe way too many possible versions

There's a huge open world map! ~ but it's kind of minimalist, with flat bright colors and sketchy decoration

Your starters are not overpowered! ~ because you might not even get one, since the professor you're interning for is kind of a dick

The combat isn’t strictly turn-based! ~ because it’s “mini bullet hell” style, and you’re gonna have to practice your dodge dash if you don’t want to get dunked

There’s lots of optional post-game content! ~ because your Grögolpedia isn’t the only thing you’ll be filling out! and where did the Grögols come from, anyway? and why is the Federal Birdeau after you? and why did you put a Grögol in the horse incinerator when you don’t even know what a “horse” is? and what’s the deal with the terrifying Chaös Grögols? and why does it feel like there’s a whole other world beneath your feet? and where is the fourth karaoke bar? and what happens if you change the world? and what if you choose violence? and is a new save slot really just a new save slot? and what the hell is Jerry?! and where is the damn fishing hat?!

My hope is that it will end up being fun to play, funny, and engaging! but even if not, I’m having fun. it’s the perfect amount of chaotically ambitious and not too serious for a project to get me into game design.

Here’s a little reel I put together of planning and progress so far:




let me know your thoughts! I realize it’s all very chaotic and I didn’t really explain anything well, but this forum (and this community in prior forums) gave me the push I needed to finally try and make a game after ~25 years of wanting to. cheers!

oh
my
gahd

I can't wait to see that trailer in a Direct, goddamn

 

[Suswave]

Hooray, my demo is finally up and available to download!! Itch.io was my best bet for it. Anyway,

Monsters of Mican Demo by Skittzo

A modern whimsical take on old-school RPGs by a solo dev

skittzo.itch.io

* Hidden text: cannot be quoted. *


Please let me know what you all think! I really need some criticism/comments to help drive me to keep going!

I will absolutely give this a shot when I’m at my laptop again!

 

[Skittzo]

I will absolutely give this a shot when I’m at my laptop again!

Thanks! I can't wait to experience the Grögol one day too.