Wow, me… you usually write a year-in-review at the end of each year. This is a month overdue!

Anyway, development progress for my indie game “True King” has gone well in 2019. It’s now in a playable state, where you can almost play it from start to finish.

… wait. That’s exactly what I said 12 months ago…

I had actually written a drat of this blog post a few weeks ago, but held off a bit: due to spurts of depression and my natural cynicism, the draft was a real downer. Every year or so, some artist or developer I follow online apologizes for months of quiet, blaming depression as if it was a common cold. In some ways, that’s the most appropriate comparison. But I’ve been trying to stop myself from putting internal or external hate on this blog: there’s too much of that already on the Internet.

But that’s not to say we don’t have things to talk about. Let’s try again… everyone has tried to summarize the previous decade, so I’ll discuss that a little, as well as where “Dust Scratch Games” is at.

I think the biggest change in the past decade is how commercialism on the Internet grew. Sure, we had e-commerce (Amazon, Ebay), but most services were still free, from Google to Youtube to Facebook. Artists and fans would upload their art, video and fiction for free, happy for feedback and a little fame. But big tech companies finally started to cash in their free services, making good on their promise for investors to use decades of collected user data, primarily for ads. Yes, I remember a time when I could watch a YouTube video without a mandatory 15 second ad at the beginning. Naturally, indie artists wanted a cut, and now, “social-media influencer” is a legitimate career.

In game development, digital game downloads have become mainstream enough for some large titles to require it, opposed to a disc or cartridge. One final upcoming generation of consoles has confirmed physical discs, but what follows will most certainly be digital only, and more likely, subscription-based with cloud-computing. A lot of my favorite software now requires an expensive monthly subscription, and my Windows 10 OS requires monthly feature updates, with inevitably breaks my machine every time without my permission. Slowly, I (and other users I see online) are being pushed to Linux and other free solutions, which have become more stable and robust compared to what I was used to in 2010.

If you released an indie-game in 2010, you would struggle a little to get on Steam or other curated digital stores, but would get free press, and almost certainly a couple thousand sales. In hindsight, I was lucky to experience a bit of that when I released my first game in 2015. Today, indie games seem as common as YouTube videos, and Steam has given up maintaining a gate to stop anyone. Following up on a previous paragraph, everyone charges for what they make, regardless of quality, compared to a decade earlier where free Flash games were easy to come by. But on the plus side, the general quality of indie games have improved across the board: “indie games” in 2020 are much better than “indie games” from 2010.

That increase in quality content has made it clear: despite my University degree, I don’t hold a candle to what most other developers are making (perhaps I did in 2015, but certainly not in 2020). It’s clear that I will never be allowed to properly step into the game industry. Perhaps it was a fool’s errand: industry people big and small have confirmed that “who you know” is far more important than experience or education, and not only is it like that today, but it was like that for at least a decade, possible two. Like most artists, I have to accept my passion as a hobby and nothing more, and be creative in finding opportunities to use those skills in a real job. And in a “gig-economy,” I suspect the unemployment rate isn’t indicating how many people are unable to make enough money to pay rent… the over-abundance of entertainment content (archived and new), increasing lack in jobs, increasing living costs, and dangerous weather patterns will be the biggest issues in the decade to come.

Finally, I’m impressed with how far 3D animation has come. In film, 2D animation was declared dead in 2020, and it only barely survives thanks to independent artists and angel-investors. But 3D animation isn’t as cold as I remember. Thanks to Genndy Tartakovsky (“Hotel Transylvania”) and the success of “Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse,” Hollywood companies are embracing the use of old tried-and-true techniques in 3D. Big 2020 movies include “Scoob!,” “Trolls – World Tour” and “SpongeBob SquarePants – Sponge on the Run”: I shouldn’t be excited for any of these movies, but their animation looks spectacular! Even as a die-hard 2D fan, I’m starting to miss the classic method less and less… this hasn’t spilled over into video games yet, but if it does, it could render my years of hard work and research obsolete very soon.

So that’s my thoughts on the world in 2020. What about me and “Dust Scratch Games”?

Animated GIF of “True King” (as of 2019-12)

I HAVE made genuine progress on “True King.” Above is an animated GIF as proof. I’m slightly farther along too, having just finished the “final boss” tactics maps at the Castle. I just have to add NPC dialogue, cutscenes, different unit types, new art assets, generating generations, music, sound effects… right. Even though the game is “playable” after 4+ years of development, I have no idea how much of the game is actually “done.” I feel like it could take me just 1 more year to finish, or 10 more…

More importantly, 2019 was the first time I started publicly showing off the game, both locally and at small conventions. It’s nice to think like I’m back into the game again, but I still have trouble dedicating the amount of time needed to properly get the thing out of development hell. After this much time, I really don’t want to give up either… if I can’t finish this game, I probably can’t finish anything. Even so, “True King” isn’t a great showcase of “3D Cel Animation,” so trying to finish it is entirely a selfish endeavor rather than a self-determined noble one.

2019 was a big year for me in other ways. I visited Japan for the first time, a mecca for animation (there are several museums and galleries there dedicated to the art, science and culture of it). I’m preparing for my first trip to GDC in 2020 (conveniently, the GLAS Animation Festival is also in the same week). I tried out Instagram for the first time, primarily to publish my free webcomic “Indie’d,” which finished its “first series” with over 140 strips. I’ve tried out Blender 2.8 and its new tools for 2D animation, finishing enough of a short film to be satisfied for a while.

… that’s a lot of stuff to do. Despite dedicating some time every week on game development, what little time I have outside my full-time job is spread too thin. On the bright side, I’m happy enough with those side projects to take time off on them, at least for a few months. Instead of 6 hours a week on “True King,” I feel prepared to start dedicating 12 hours… will that be enough to finish the game in 2020?

… probably not. Even so, 2020 should be an interesting year. I’ll probably start posting on this blog even less often, and might even not bother applying tags to blog posts for them to be found. No one is reading this anyway.