Archive

Howdy! I write to you from the couch on a sunny Saturday morning. I come bearing some fun recently released projects.

Slither — Cute Snake

First up is Slither! It’s like the old game Snake but with hand-drawn graphics. It’s free and you can play it in your browser or on iOS. (I’m still waiting for my Google Developer account to be approved to get it in the Google Play Store. Soon! 🤞)

They’re everywhere! It’s up to you to stop them in DESTROY ALL GOBLINS.

The little game I’ve been working on for the last month is done! Destroy All Goblins is a free game for personal computers, and you can download it right now! You can play it with a keyboard or a controller. (And if you’re on MacOS, you gotta jump through some hoops in System Preferences to open it since it’s not a specially signed program, I’m so sorry!)

Or watch the trailer if playing games isn’t your thing:

As I look forward to the year ahead, I’d like to approach it with a fierce focus on and determination to finish my projects. I’m pleased with what I got done in 2022, and I’d like to keep that momentum.

My primary focus is going to be making games because I’m enamored with the art form and love how it combines visuals, audio, design, and player interaction.

Here’s what I’m setting out to accomplish in the new year:

1. Release at least 6 small freeware games
2. Be competent and confident with the game engine I’ve chosen
3. Release at least 1 of those games on widely on places like Steam, GOG, etc. to get experience with that process
4. Share my process and projects via my blog and newsletter

I write to while sipping on peppermint tea, and I hope that you are well. Happy winter, may the light last longer. Let’s get right to it. I’ve got a bunch of projects to share, and I promise I won’t let them pile up again.

Projectbook

I’ve kept a private list of project ideas I’d like to build for years, usually just for learning some new programming language or technology. These ideas aren’t so simple as to be boring but not so complex as needing an entire board of directors and no fewer than six investment rounds from the richest people in the Bay Area. As I was adding ideas to the list, I thought… I should just make this public! I present to you, Projectbook! It’s a free, online book collecting 100+ ideas for projects to build when learning programming and lacking inspiration. I learn my best when working on projects, especially ones that have a pretty limited scope. So I wrote out what each project could do, added some wireframe designs, and put this gosh dang thing together. I finished Projectbook back in October and people seemed to find it useful, so that was rewarding. If you or someone you know is interested in learning programming and wants ideas for what to make that aren’t just weird exercises, maybe it’d be helpful. Check Projectbook out!

Lonely Paddle