Well howdy again, y'all! It's Heather here. Apologies for not having posted anything in the forums for a little while there, life's been a rollercoaster lately... so it's the usual, heh
I posted about the current project I've started that I'm attempting to put all my artistic attention into in the "lets make video games! (69 days from 4/20)" thread.
Though, I felt I wrote so much compared to the others in there that I sorta overtook the whole vibe; so now there's this thread about this project in specific, as I'm interested in how people take to it.
(((( If you're not into long/personal posts, just *start scrolling until you see images** )))))
I have a fairly explicit and tethered history to a very niche subsect of RPGMaker... enthusiasts(?) ((We all talk shit on every iteration of the engine, but I think a lot of us actually secretly like the pain it brings us.))
A handful of my curerent friends and myself started getting into the first few steps of proper independent game development through 2014's LISA The Painful -- to the point by which I was the first person to ever announce a fangame for the series. (That's a reupload, by the way, the original copies of a lot of the stuff I made for it are looooooong lost.) I was a teenager then, one caught in quite a handful of nasty ruts.
There's a lot of history I could get into, some good most of it isn't. But needless to say, I've stuck by attempting to become a proper developer since around 2016, and have been making pixelart since 2011.
A few games sequentially inspired me to get more and more into the possibility of making games as a means of not starving to death under a horrible nation and economic systems that values profit and control over human dignity.
The Scott Pilgrim beat-'em-up got me into wanting to make pixelart --> later on Hotline Miami (not linking to that one, because I feel like I know all of you have it installed already) would make me think "well, if two guys can make a full game, I'm sure I and my bestfriend could as well" ------> then LISA The First (at the time just 'Lisa') made my puberty-stricken mind say "Woah, wait a minute... video games can be about REAL SHIT?!!!", got hyped for it's RPG sequel in an autistic energy drink fueled lapse all along delving into trying to find the game engine that works for Me!
So why is it I can go on and on about my personal history in trying to make games? Should I instead just be working on one or however many of my ideas now instead of typing this out?
After all, in my own experiences, talking and hyping people up for something so soon after it's inception can often feel like a kiss of death. And I've already got a handful of hefty corpses that had potential in the eyes of particular indiviuals I still actively hold a lot of respect for. Most of the reasons any of my previous projects (both of them RPGs) got canned were because of situations outside of my control in life. Graduations, being a caretaker, having a ton of mental issues with no means of therapy or recovery (I even still lack a proper living situation to fully feel at ease with anything.) My life boiled until it frothed and drowned out my aspirations for quite a few years.
Though, instead of falling into a pit of constant despair over my past failures, I actually look on them with some amount of honor.
I've been told by more than one person that the amount of work I put into the second iteration of my attempt at a LISA fangame on my own was inspiring enough for them to keep on working on their RPG project.
So even though I had lost it and a few other half-hearted attempts at making games to my own internal struggles and external factors... once I got over enough of my issues, I decided to get right back into the swing of it.
And that's what SADISTIKA is(!) Years, and years, and years of personal development and self-understanding mixing in with some of my darker interests.
During my hiatus from trying to make my own games, I started trying to figure out why I even play and like video games (a term I'm not even that big on anymore, I think "interactive experience" works better for a lot of 'em)
which lead to me following another trend of trying to make video essays on them. This... went nowhere, compared to my development attempts which at least had plenty more results and more I could talk on intricately lol
I actually managed to snag someone I look up to for an interview regarding a game that had inspired my handdrawn artwork for many years, none other than Destructoid's Jonathan Holmes, in which I wanted to hear his unique angles (what with him being a writer on games and a licensed mental health worker) about his opinions and feelings on the very first POSTAL entry.
As with a lot of the personal changes I've mentioned so far, I actually stopped working on that video essay for a number of factors; I became a volunteer QA tester for POSTAL 4 (which comes with even more baggage, if you can believe it),
I didn't feel it at the time but my understanding of why I liked POSTAL 1 so much started to shift, and ultimately I felt there was more that could be done with games like it and Hatred (which I got a t-shirt from the devs of for making them a drawing, although when I moved out from Alabama the first laundromat I used fucked the shirt up with heat, ugh...) Ultimately I decided "fuck it, I'll just make POSTAL 1 but actually have it be about something." And so here we all are!
(notice the error I made on the initial draft? I corrected it on a separate sheet after I started digitizing this one, heh )
It's still incredibly early, but what can I say? I'mma sucker for showing off my goods.
I even got a drawing tablet just to work on this game, something I never could have afforded back in the deep south (a close friend did lend me one, but for whatever reason it wouldn't work with most of my Pcs.)
Most of the assets in the game use what I call a stencil as their base, meaning I draw out the basic shape(s) and details on paper beforehand and then digitally trace back over them.
This next image is a more complete iteration of the level I took a screenshot in on the first game dev thread I interacted with on here(!!!)
Eh, screw it, here's the current full background for the first map you're dropped into in the game!
Even though this level's art alone has gotten praise in the few private circles I run in, I still feel it's too sparse... and yet, I also don't want to clutter up the screen with too much all at once for the introduction level.
Decisions, decisions.
And with my job and how my homelife currently goes (plus internal struggles and growth), I don't get to work on this project nearly as much as I'd like to.
While my rent may not be "all that much" in some peoples' eyes, there's still groceries and other things that chew into my flimsy cash pile. I'm lucky the bank doesn't close my account, I'm usually broke because literally everything is getting more and more expensive. And I CAN SAY IT FIRSTHAND, since I work in a store and all. I don't even like cars, but they're such a huge part of modern living here in the states; I don't own one, so I have to hitch rides out to work. I was lucky to grab that new drawing tablet in a sale and had to get an emergency used eBay desktop after my last one died (just a heads up, I've got shit luck with technology, ahahahaha!) ((which has made me better able to salvage projects from one harddrive to another in more recent years, rather than teenage me losing everything all at once and having to do a ton all over from scratch... again!
Actually, the nigh... er, morning I'm making this thread I pulled an all-nighter out of nowhere just to see if I could get a bit more done on the main menu screen of all things.
It's 4 AM, I've got a ride reluctantly taking me into work around 6 (when they leave the house), and I don't even clock in till 9. And it's gonna be a seven-hour shift for me today.
I've just been so pissed that I haven't been able to make any fluent progress on Sadistika that I decided "to hell with my health, I'll just down a quarter of an edible and some coffee and fucking GET IT WORKED ON!!!
Do I regret it? Only physically. I know my shift is gonna suck ass. And the stress of possibly not being able to make it into work these next few days is really doing a number on my head.
That's why I'm here, though. This place is, as it says on the tin, quite comfortable. Which I don't usually seek out personal comfort, I'm very tolerant of almost never having any of my needs or desires met. You get used to it, ya know.
I mean we shouldn't, but... Uh... anyhow.
My process of working on this particular project is much different to my past attempts with the RPGs (which if I had the means to stay home and work on while possessing a steady enough income, I'd like to someday come back around to).
I wrote out a lot of stuff to make a progressively sensible plot stringing level-to-level together in my phone's memo program while waiting hours ahead of time to clock in at the oooool' "shit factory", so some details (like the crashed truck in one of the images I posted) will tie into how events unfold in the story. There might also be more than one type of cutscene, taking advantage of how RPGMaker handles differing assets and all (The version I'm in is MZ, by the way, but I started with XP/VX Ace like a lot of other LISAheads.) The scripts more and more people are putting out for most versions of the engine are actually getting incredibly impressive. So yes, it is a possibility to make something like this in such a limited engine. Actually, I learned that POSTAL 1 (not Redux, the OG) itself is almost entirely grid&line-based, so that made me realize that isometric can be done in something as rudimentary as RPGMaker (truly the beat up Toyato pickup truck of personal 'at home use' game engines) Plus, I sometimes like working within limitations. While on the flipside, I also wish I never had to deal with any limitations in my life. I wanna be a floating bodyless mass somewhere private out in space.
... Alrighty, I think it's time I bounced out of here and got a shower to wake my stupid ass up s'more before the sun comes up and I have to leave.
I hope any of y'all who looked into this giant ass thread in any capacity (whether you skimmed it, read it all, or just looked at the art) are doing good today and from now on.
I like this forum site, it reminds me of the first one I ever used back in 2013, same color scheme too ironically enough. I dig the purples on black look, it really strikes me a certain way.
I'm looking forward to updating you guys in specific on this project as I get more involved with it, if God doesn't smite me before then or I somehow become unable to work on anything related to my art.
Strangely enough, I don't even like calling myself an "artist" since art doesn't actually exist. ... But that's a longass thread for another time, lol!
Take it easy, peeps - Heat (my usual nickname)
I posted about the current project I've started that I'm attempting to put all my artistic attention into in the "lets make video games! (69 days from 4/20)" thread.
Though, I felt I wrote so much compared to the others in there that I sorta overtook the whole vibe; so now there's this thread about this project in specific, as I'm interested in how people take to it.
(((( If you're not into long/personal posts, just *start scrolling until you see images** )))))
I have a fairly explicit and tethered history to a very niche subsect of RPGMaker... enthusiasts(?) ((We all talk shit on every iteration of the engine, but I think a lot of us actually secretly like the pain it brings us.))
A handful of my curerent friends and myself started getting into the first few steps of proper independent game development through 2014's LISA The Painful -- to the point by which I was the first person to ever announce a fangame for the series. (That's a reupload, by the way, the original copies of a lot of the stuff I made for it are looooooong lost.) I was a teenager then, one caught in quite a handful of nasty ruts.
There's a lot of history I could get into, some good most of it isn't. But needless to say, I've stuck by attempting to become a proper developer since around 2016, and have been making pixelart since 2011.
A few games sequentially inspired me to get more and more into the possibility of making games as a means of not starving to death under a horrible nation and economic systems that values profit and control over human dignity.
The Scott Pilgrim beat-'em-up got me into wanting to make pixelart --> later on Hotline Miami (not linking to that one, because I feel like I know all of you have it installed already) would make me think "well, if two guys can make a full game, I'm sure I and my bestfriend could as well" ------> then LISA The First (at the time just 'Lisa') made my puberty-stricken mind say "Woah, wait a minute... video games can be about REAL SHIT?!!!", got hyped for it's RPG sequel in an autistic energy drink fueled lapse all along delving into trying to find the game engine that works for Me!
So why is it I can go on and on about my personal history in trying to make games? Should I instead just be working on one or however many of my ideas now instead of typing this out?
After all, in my own experiences, talking and hyping people up for something so soon after it's inception can often feel like a kiss of death. And I've already got a handful of hefty corpses that had potential in the eyes of particular indiviuals I still actively hold a lot of respect for. Most of the reasons any of my previous projects (both of them RPGs) got canned were because of situations outside of my control in life. Graduations, being a caretaker, having a ton of mental issues with no means of therapy or recovery (I even still lack a proper living situation to fully feel at ease with anything.) My life boiled until it frothed and drowned out my aspirations for quite a few years.
Though, instead of falling into a pit of constant despair over my past failures, I actually look on them with some amount of honor.
I've been told by more than one person that the amount of work I put into the second iteration of my attempt at a LISA fangame on my own was inspiring enough for them to keep on working on their RPG project.
So even though I had lost it and a few other half-hearted attempts at making games to my own internal struggles and external factors... once I got over enough of my issues, I decided to get right back into the swing of it.
And that's what SADISTIKA is(!) Years, and years, and years of personal development and self-understanding mixing in with some of my darker interests.
During my hiatus from trying to make my own games, I started trying to figure out why I even play and like video games (a term I'm not even that big on anymore, I think "interactive experience" works better for a lot of 'em)
which lead to me following another trend of trying to make video essays on them. This... went nowhere, compared to my development attempts which at least had plenty more results and more I could talk on intricately lol
I actually managed to snag someone I look up to for an interview regarding a game that had inspired my handdrawn artwork for many years, none other than Destructoid's Jonathan Holmes, in which I wanted to hear his unique angles (what with him being a writer on games and a licensed mental health worker) about his opinions and feelings on the very first POSTAL entry.
As with a lot of the personal changes I've mentioned so far, I actually stopped working on that video essay for a number of factors; I became a volunteer QA tester for POSTAL 4 (which comes with even more baggage, if you can believe it),
I didn't feel it at the time but my understanding of why I liked POSTAL 1 so much started to shift, and ultimately I felt there was more that could be done with games like it and Hatred (which I got a t-shirt from the devs of for making them a drawing, although when I moved out from Alabama the first laundromat I used fucked the shirt up with heat, ugh...) Ultimately I decided "fuck it, I'll just make POSTAL 1 but actually have it be about something." And so here we all are!
(notice the error I made on the initial draft? I corrected it on a separate sheet after I started digitizing this one, heh )
It's still incredibly early, but what can I say? I'mma sucker for showing off my goods.
I even got a drawing tablet just to work on this game, something I never could have afforded back in the deep south (a close friend did lend me one, but for whatever reason it wouldn't work with most of my Pcs.)
Most of the assets in the game use what I call a stencil as their base, meaning I draw out the basic shape(s) and details on paper beforehand and then digitally trace back over them.
This next image is a more complete iteration of the level I took a screenshot in on the first game dev thread I interacted with on here(!!!)
Eh, screw it, here's the current full background for the first map you're dropped into in the game!
Even though this level's art alone has gotten praise in the few private circles I run in, I still feel it's too sparse... and yet, I also don't want to clutter up the screen with too much all at once for the introduction level.
Decisions, decisions.
And with my job and how my homelife currently goes (plus internal struggles and growth), I don't get to work on this project nearly as much as I'd like to.
While my rent may not be "all that much" in some peoples' eyes, there's still groceries and other things that chew into my flimsy cash pile. I'm lucky the bank doesn't close my account, I'm usually broke because literally everything is getting more and more expensive. And I CAN SAY IT FIRSTHAND, since I work in a store and all. I don't even like cars, but they're such a huge part of modern living here in the states; I don't own one, so I have to hitch rides out to work. I was lucky to grab that new drawing tablet in a sale and had to get an emergency used eBay desktop after my last one died (just a heads up, I've got shit luck with technology, ahahahaha!) ((which has made me better able to salvage projects from one harddrive to another in more recent years, rather than teenage me losing everything all at once and having to do a ton all over from scratch... again!
Actually, the nigh... er, morning I'm making this thread I pulled an all-nighter out of nowhere just to see if I could get a bit more done on the main menu screen of all things.
It's 4 AM, I've got a ride reluctantly taking me into work around 6 (when they leave the house), and I don't even clock in till 9. And it's gonna be a seven-hour shift for me today.
I've just been so pissed that I haven't been able to make any fluent progress on Sadistika that I decided "to hell with my health, I'll just down a quarter of an edible and some coffee and fucking GET IT WORKED ON!!!
Do I regret it? Only physically. I know my shift is gonna suck ass. And the stress of possibly not being able to make it into work these next few days is really doing a number on my head.
That's why I'm here, though. This place is, as it says on the tin, quite comfortable. Which I don't usually seek out personal comfort, I'm very tolerant of almost never having any of my needs or desires met. You get used to it, ya know.
I mean we shouldn't, but... Uh... anyhow.
My process of working on this particular project is much different to my past attempts with the RPGs (which if I had the means to stay home and work on while possessing a steady enough income, I'd like to someday come back around to).
I wrote out a lot of stuff to make a progressively sensible plot stringing level-to-level together in my phone's memo program while waiting hours ahead of time to clock in at the oooool' "shit factory", so some details (like the crashed truck in one of the images I posted) will tie into how events unfold in the story. There might also be more than one type of cutscene, taking advantage of how RPGMaker handles differing assets and all (The version I'm in is MZ, by the way, but I started with XP/VX Ace like a lot of other LISAheads.) The scripts more and more people are putting out for most versions of the engine are actually getting incredibly impressive. So yes, it is a possibility to make something like this in such a limited engine. Actually, I learned that POSTAL 1 (not Redux, the OG) itself is almost entirely grid&line-based, so that made me realize that isometric can be done in something as rudimentary as RPGMaker (truly the beat up Toyato pickup truck of personal 'at home use' game engines) Plus, I sometimes like working within limitations. While on the flipside, I also wish I never had to deal with any limitations in my life. I wanna be a floating bodyless mass somewhere private out in space.
... Alrighty, I think it's time I bounced out of here and got a shower to wake my stupid ass up s'more before the sun comes up and I have to leave.
I hope any of y'all who looked into this giant ass thread in any capacity (whether you skimmed it, read it all, or just looked at the art) are doing good today and from now on.
I like this forum site, it reminds me of the first one I ever used back in 2013, same color scheme too ironically enough. I dig the purples on black look, it really strikes me a certain way.
I'm looking forward to updating you guys in specific on this project as I get more involved with it, if God doesn't smite me before then or I somehow become unable to work on anything related to my art.
Strangely enough, I don't even like calling myself an "artist" since art doesn't actually exist. ... But that's a longass thread for another time, lol!
Take it easy, peeps - Heat (my usual nickname)