Hey y’all! I realize I haven’t posted in a while, so this will be a very quick little post to get you all updated on what I’ve been working on this past month. In other words, I’m still alive!
The good news is that The Girl with the Guitar is moving along and development is steadily progressing. The bad news is that I’ve mostly been working on cleaning up code, making changes to existing levels, and generally fixing random things up, so there’s not much new content to show nor talk about. I’ve made some new cutscenes, but I won’t include them here – I can’t spoil the entire game, after all!
In other news, I also spent a few days working on a little side project, completely for fun. I wanted to do something more exploratory in the graphics department, so I created a fun little psychedelic Star Fox-inspired minigame which uses some wacky shader magic. I’m currently thinking of ways I can expand upon the idea and make it into a more complete product (it’s pretty much just a tech demo right now), so for now I’m holding onto it – if I end up touching it up later, I’ll publish it on itch.io!
This brings me to another point: I’ve been working on The Girl with the Guitar for a bit over a year by now, and I’ve started allowing myself more free time to experiment with different side projects. That’s not to say that I’m slowing down on development – if anything, it’s been steadier than ever! I find that, when I allow myself to work on smaller, shorter projects (like the psychedelic shader game), I then get more inspiration to dive into my larger projects with new tools and experiences under my belt. Plus, why rush to finish The Girl with the Guitar when there are so many other great games for you to play in the meantime?
I’ll finish by talking about some of those very games which I’ve played this past month. I began the year with A Space for the Unbound, a game which absolutely knocked my socks off from a narrative perspective. Every once in a while I come across an experience which reminds me why I play games in the first place, and A Space for the Unbound falls squarely into this category, telling a touching story nestled comfortably within a wonderfully rendered Surabaya in the ’90s. To all those who are interested in narrative adventure games, A Space for the Unbound needs to go at the top of your wishlist.
Aside from A Space for the Unbound, I’ve also been playing the fantastic Strawberry Jam Celeste mod and the classic Jet Set Radio. I also had a great time watching this year’s Awesome Games Done Quick marathon, especially the segment where a trained dog (!!) played Gyromite for the NES. It’s always a joy to contribute to the fundraisers at these marathons, and this one may have been the best one yet, with so many incredible and entertaining runs. Hats off to the GDQ team!
So… yeah! That’s about it for this quick little update; I’ll try and do another deep-dive devlog-type post as soon as I’ve got enough content to discuss, whether it’s regarding The Girl with the Guitar or something else. Thanks for stopping by!