pixel art frogs, game dev, and annouceme ...

pixel art frogs, game dev, and annoucements!

Jun 01, 2023

Dear Creative Pals,

Look at my pixel art froggy character designs!

image

[Image Description: A pixel art graphic of four frog characters in a row on a green grass and flower background. From left to right is the last character design to the first design. Each design has green skin, red eyes with black pupils, a smiling face with a pink tongue sticking out, and blue, yellow, and orange spots. The last design is wearing a yellow shirt and white pants. End ID]

Before I continue, happy pride month! I'm going to work on a pixel art animation today that's gonna include rainbow colors, because why not! Usually, I only post private blogs, but it's the first day of pride and I need to work on a better posting schedule.

Alright, into game dev:

Since I hadn't touched pixel art in weeks, even before I wasn't able to use my laptop, I felt a little rusty trying to design this character. Thankfully, I was able to get Aseprite, on my parent's computer and I finally convinced the Council of my Thots to sit my butt down and work on my game, Strawberry's Flowers.

Also, my laptop wasn’t broken! I just broke the charger itself when I dropped it and my laptop. I told myself I wouldn’t move on to another game until this one is done, so I’m really pushing myself to finish this game.

I’m back on my laptop now and I’ve been working on the player feedback I received. I never scoped for more than two characters, but I still decided to make this frog character after some player feedback. I recorded my art process as I was figuring things out and it started out real rough, but I got a design that I could live with for now.

Not sure if I want to keep the frogs since I’m trying to keep my scope super small. If anything, I'll add the frogs in if I expand the game. Either way, the frogs were a good jumpstart back to pixel art.

image

[Image Description: A pixel art graphic of a frog and cow characters on a green grass and flower background. The frog on the left is wearing a yellow shirt and white pants, it has green skin, red eyes with black pupils, a smiling face with a pink tongue sticking out, and blue, yellow, and orange spots. The cow on the right has brown fur with light white spots, and a heart-shaped birthmark on her forehead She is wearing a blue dress, has a pink nose, and small yellow horns at the top of her head. End ID]

What’s next for Strawberry's Flowers game development?

I’m at the bug fixing (lol, like that ever stopped) and polishing stage. I did consider drawing Mama Cow, but I think I need to end the game where it's at. Like I said early on, this game was mainly for me to get back into making and FINISHING my own games, learning top-down pixel art, and trying new game mechanics and systems.

The following blog post will include a game test to play on the members/subscribers-only, password-protected game page link to playtest the game one last time before I publish it, which I'm going to try and do by next week.

More Updates

That one game I put on the shelf

Since it's pride month, I want to return to making games with intentional queer narratives. When I first started making games, I designed two characters: Leafette and Ovate. Here's the link to the blog posts I wrote about them, and their game was basically a visual novel type of game about "awkward leaf lesbians and trying to find the right words." Or something like that.

Since I have more knowledge and skills in making games, and I have a game engine that I've familiarized myself with, I think I can confidently restart that game. No definite answers, but something to consider!

Videos and YouTube

I'll be working on a video update next, and even though my laptop is usable again, it’s still janky to edit anything past 20 seconds on it. But using my parent's computer worked pretty well, so I might edit videos on there and make my games/art on my laptop until I upgrade.

Discord server in the works

I've been working on building a Discord server! I've noticed that in various parts of my life, I'll hyper-focus and go 100% on something in a burst of energy, so naturally, I've overcomplicated my own server. It will be a public-ish server (or people would have to follow this Buy Me A Coffe page first, haven't decided...) with special channels for my members/subscribers, and I think I want to open it sometime this month. More on that when as I continue to grow and gather myself.

I do chat more on Twitter, and I'm the most active on my Instagram page, so you can also find me in those places!

Thank you for being here and reading about my projects and game updates, I truly appreciate it.

with creativity and passion,

Bloomz

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