{"id":1684,"date":"2026-06-15T17:24:35","date_gmt":"2026-06-15T16:24:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/?p=1684"},"modified":"2026-06-15T23:30:00","modified_gmt":"2026-06-15T22:30:00","slug":"handmade-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/?p=1684","title":{"rendered":"handmade games"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-15-16.55.10-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"722\" src=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-15-16.55.10-1024x722.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1692\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1.418280063773632;width:323px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-15-16.55.10-1024x722.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-15-16.55.10-300x212.jpg 300w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-15-16.55.10-768x542.jpg 768w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-15-16.55.10-1536x1083.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-15-16.55.10-2048x1444.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">*<em>i once released games under the studio handle &#8216;handmade games&#8217;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left wp-block-paragraph\">the &#8216;handmade games&#8217; philosophy extends to every aspect of new game+:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>i must make the sound effects from recordings, synthesisers (and where i must use snippets of sounds i cannot get myself, i must heavily disguise them, not simply reuse the generously-given work of others on places like <a href=\"https:\/\/freesound.org\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"freesound.org\">freesound.org<\/a>).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>i must make all the songs with single-take recordings of live instruments and heavy, old synthesisers and a million wires and mics going everywhere, a million effects and guitar pedals on everything, two amplifiers recorded on either side of the room for &#8216;width&#8217; (not only on guitar). <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>i must storyboard the intro by hand on paper and work on it for over a year.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>i must draw all the maps and character designs on paper.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>everything must be animated by hand, not programmatically, even wind effects.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>i must code every part of the codebase (except one complicated shader) myself, reuse nothing, even if there is much better code available for free or cheap. unity has a great particle system? roll my own. <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>i must use none of the built-in unity helpful systems or effects or even basic sprite handling and instead write my own engine within that engine.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>i must build all my tools (even my own pixel art software).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>i must never use ai, even for search (well except once&#8230; to help fix a tricky rendering bug. it did help but also i had to do a lot of work checking the code and i&#8217;m not sure what would have taken longer. it&#8217;s my nature.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pxl2023.exe-Screenshot-2024.10.23-12.00.00.90.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pxl2023.exe-Screenshot-2024.10.23-12.00.00.90-1024x576.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1687\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1.7777291978903382;width:656px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pxl2023.exe-Screenshot-2024.10.23-12.00.00.90-1024x576.png 1024w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pxl2023.exe-Screenshot-2024.10.23-12.00.00.90-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pxl2023.exe-Screenshot-2024.10.23-12.00.00.90-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pxl2023.exe-Screenshot-2024.10.23-12.00.00.90-1536x864.png 1536w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/pxl2023.exe-Screenshot-2024.10.23-12.00.00.90.png 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">this is not all to say &#8216;look how much work i&#8217;ve done&#8217;, rather to illustrate the pathological amount of control-freakery that has made this project take 14 years and change. it&#8217;s something i&#8217;m advising <em>against<\/em>, to be clear. there must be a good balance somewhere. i just clearly don&#8217;t know what it looks like. then again, maybe this is part of what makes my games my games. and maybe it&#8217;s needed more than even now in a world with so much automation? i don&#8217;t know, really. ask me after about 16-17 when it&#8217;s done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">anyway, i&#8217;ve got a good flow at the moment. it&#8217;s taken many years to get a good balance alongside life and music career and some health issues which have made things slower than i&#8217;d like. but i with the aid of my new business manager and my putting my music on &#8216;quiet mode&#8217; for a bit (i have a couple of albums to release soon but then backlog is not really increasing rn&#8230;), things are feeling achievable and not only that there&#8217;s a new passion and excitement there that&#8217;s reminding me of the old days. maybe it&#8217;s the similar doomy feeling of &#8216;this has to work or else i am literally broke&#8217; that gets me in gear and perhaps i even relish that challenge. again, this is not a mode i suggest operating in because it also comes with a huge amount of anxiety that only builds the more years that pass and the lower the reserves get.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SS110-1-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"536\" src=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SS110-1-1024x536.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1691\" srcset=\"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SS110-1-1024x536.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SS110-1-300x157.jpg 300w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SS110-1-768x402.jpg 768w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SS110-1-1536x804.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SS110-1-2048x1072.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">as i hit half a century this sunday it&#8217;s got me philosophising about how i spent my last decade and a half, almost a third of it i guess? i don&#8217;t regret it. i just don&#8217;t encourage or recommend it! perhaps there is a balance to be found there, after all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">but i do still love pretty much anything handmade. so i think including as much of it as can be considered practical is always a good way to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right wp-block-paragraph\">*<em>like the 1995 Amiga game Keith&#8217;s Quest (apologies for stealing the logo, Terry Gilliam<\/em>!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>*i once released games under the studio handle &#8216;handmade games&#8217; the &#8216;handmade games&#8217; philosophy extends to every aspect of new game+: this is not all to say &#8216;look how much work i&#8217;ve done&#8217;, rather to illustrate the pathological amount of control-freakery that has made this project take 14 years and change. it&#8217;s something i&#8217;m advising [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[81,156,193,9,206],"class_list":["post-1684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-games","tag-music","tag-new-game-plus","tag-new-game-2","tag-superflat-games","tag-things-that-take-ages"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1684"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1684\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1706,"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1684\/revisions\/1706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/superflatgames.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}