Games
My games! Wow, I made more than I remembered going into making this website. Neat!
Main Games
Birdsong
Written for a dear friend. This one still means a lot to me.
Practice Run
I still love the premise of this game, and writing it was a delight. Play as a shy nerd who's trying to practice going on a date with her crush, thanks to the help of her helpful(?) microcat companion. I needed a premise that would let me practice RenPy before committing to a larger project... and I also was on a kick of putting "Run" in the title of my games.
Fun fact: this game's thumbnail has been in the itch.io thumbnail for years now.
Schoolyard Disease
A Rhythm Doctor level that I'm super proud of. The amount of work I put into making "custom characters" work when there was no support for them still boggles my mind, but it was so worth it. You'll need to down the free Rhythm Doctor level editor to play it, but this is one of my favorite things I've ever done. Being able to try to touch on emotions through rhythm gameplay is a delight. I think it really came out well.
But no, really, the work on this was bonkers. Since there was no way to import custom characters into a Rhythm Doctor level when I was working on this, what I instead did was manually figure out when changes to the level "state" (such as the characters being revealed from silhouette, the characters starting to glow, and the gradual degradation of the angel on the right) needed to occur, then used Python to combine base images to generate a full image for every necessary state for the level, then wrote a Python script to "manually" generate the level data to update the background image on the appropriate beats (which was, at minimum, every 1/4th of a beat, so the characters could nod their heads), then manually inject that level data into the main data.
Hopefully the Rhythm Doctor level editor now includes custom characters. That would have made it easier.
Turf Tiger RPG Demo
An experiment in RPGMaker XP. I had a lot of fun with this one. There's something about taking RPG Mechanics and using them for something other than traditional RPG battles that I love. I actually put in the work to plan out other characters, alternative classes for Charthur and Jasmaby, and the basics of the plot... but ultimately, it felt like too much programming work to do alone. Alas.
New Employee Orientation
This was really fun to make. Too bad this plot never went anywhere.
This one was available on the Floraverse website with a background song, but it seems to have been deleted, which is strange. No idea why. You can still find it if you poke around in the games directory, song included.
Quell is Trapped
I was super happy with this!! The sequel to New Employee Orientation, but with more of a focus on humor. I thought it was so cool to make a game that combined Bitsy and Twine, with a shared state between them. You navigate through the Twine, occasionally playing a persistant Bitsy game to represent navigating a network and using that to take control of physical bots in the world. I was really eager to share it.
Then I was told I couldn't share it until someone had made a song to go with it, and that song was never made. I brought up that I was still waiting a few times, but it never went anywhere. It hurt a lot.
At least now I have a place to share it.
Smaller Games
Run Aground
A little Bitsy game about Seren, my D&D character, going through some rough times. Made for Bitsy Game Jam #84: Petrichor. Put some personal feelings into it. Finally started figuring out who Seren is, just in time for the last session of the campaign.
...oh my god, I put "Run" in the name again. It wasn't even intentional this time!!
Quill's Run
Battle your inner demons with the help of your harshest critic. The rules are unclear, and mistakes lead to inescapable punishment. It's art, it doesn't have to be fun. (Disclaimer: I still think it's kinda fun.)
The unique "falling only" mechanic has everything to do with evoking a sense of constantly stumbling in life, and nothing to do with realizing I wasn't ready to implement "jumping" in Pico-8 just yet. It's ludonarrative concordance!!
Milk's Run
My first attempt at Pico-8. An infinite runner where you control multiple characters, each with their own jumping mechanics, all using one button. Crude, but I'm still kinda pleased with it.
[HAPPY]BIRTHDAY
Wishing someone a happy birthday in Bitsy.
Backstage Birthday
Wishing someone else a happy birthday in Bitsy.
Hellsider Round-Up
My first ever Floraverse Twine! My first ever game, really. Simple, but I enjoy writing it a lot. I still have an idea for the sequel... I'll have to find a place for the ideas somewhere else.
Kra'arnauk's Log
Made for a D&D game. A basically linear narrative, but I had fun writing it.
Kar'arnauk's Battle Simulator
Made for a D&D game, after a particularly... tricky battle.
eevee's run
Wishing a third someone else a happy birthday in Twine.
I think the concept is kinda fun: you have a limited amount of time to prepare a birthday and you have to figure out how to fit everything into what little time you have. I think the lack of graphics really hurts it, though. Could've used some visuals. Alas.
Charthur/Jasmaby Twine Trilogy
A trilogy of stories written about Charthur and Jasmaby. These never got shared anywhere, which is too bad, because I had fun writing them. I wrote so many stories that were forever kept in the vault for one reason or another. I'm sharing these now, as I'm pretty sure every reason to hold them back has long, long since become moot.
Experimental Stuff
Undertale: A Diary
Putting this here instead of Main Games only because the premise is cool but also wonky. I'm still pleased beyond measure with the concept, but I know it stumped most people who played it. The basic premise is... let me put this in spoilers, I guess.
Basic mechanics
A Choose-Your-Own-Adventure game where you can cheat by remembering page numbers, but also the book is aware when you cheat. And it remembers what you did on previous runs (readthroughs?). And you have to figure out what the puzzle is before you start trying to solve it.
Pain Prototype
A collection of dreams. A stepping stone to future Bitsy projects, which is appropriate, considering I felt like a stepping stone while making this.
Based on real dreams.
Idol Hands
What do you do when you feel empty when no one seems to care when every thought is wrong when you don't know how to make things anymore?
Expect angst. If this one is frustrating to play, just remember it could be worse.
Never
WOW. I don't remember this one at all. When did I make this?? What was I going through??
How do you forget making something like this??
There is a happy ending, but even I almost gave up before finding it. How fitting.
Static Puzzle
Escape the worst roommate before you die get bored and tired.
Based on a true story. Kinda.