About myself About my work Links Licensing and usage policy Learning game dev

Yo, I'm Steph!

I'm over 30 years old, I grew up in the 90s playing video games and wanting to create some.
And after working as a corpo slave for 10 years, I was fed up enough that I finally found the determination to put in the work needed to produce my own games!

Childhood

Oh boy there's a lot of dark stuff in that part of my life, but fortunately things like video games, Pokemon, and Dragon Ball Z existed to save it :D
I grew up in a ghetto ass part of a large city, I was the "mature for your age" smart but weird loner kid who had good grades without trying and constanly tried to be in a hidden place where nobody would bother me so I could just play my Gameboy in peace~

Teenagehood

That's when I started messing with video games on a more technical level. I messed with the Warcraft 3 editor and I played around with RPG Maker a lot. And I mean A LOT! Aside from allowing me to create a lot of cringy ass childish slop, it gave me some knowledge that was really helpful when I entered university for computer science classes later.
My grades in middle and high school kept going down, but I didn't really care, I just did the absolute bare minimum to graduate. Then the next year I was top of my class in computer science major at college :3
In that part of my life I didn't play much console games after the Gamecube. I spent a lot of all-nighters playing Melee with my best friend, but what really consumed my life back then was World of Warcraft. I played it from Burning Crusade until DragonFlight.

Adulthood

Freshly graduated from a bachelor, I start working in offices as a developer, discovering what the adult working life is like. And it's a disaster! It's all about doing what the client wants (and it doesn't want you to make cool games), with negative budgets, stressful deadlines, and hypocrit coworkers you don't like and who lie to your face every day without shame or hesitation!

It was impossible for me to find a balance between work, mental health, and life goals. I survived on "I'm managing" mode for 10 years, doing the bare minimum to not get in troubles, and feeding destructive vicious circle habits. Then I turn 35, I snap, and I leave. I have 2 years of unemployment money and free time in front of me. I need to make the best use of it that I can to avoid finding myself in another similar situation. I cannot afford to waste another year in my life again.

Thus began my game development journey.

Games and franchises I like

  • Arcade Paradise
  • Arcade Spirits
  • AI the Somnium Files
  • Baldur's Gate 3
  • Beacon Pines
  • Bloodstained Ritual of the Night
  • Brok the Investigator
  • Bugs Bunny and Taz Time Busters
  • Cities Skylines
  • Coffee Talk
  • Crash Bandicoot, Crash Team Racing, Crash Bash
  • DanganRonpa
  • Dave the Diver
  • Divinity Original Sin 2
  • DynoPunk
  • Endless Monday: Dreams and Deadlines
  • EverHood
  • F-Zero GX
  • Final Fantasy XIV (Hrothgal heal main :3 PLD GNB WHM SCH AST SGE MNK DNC SMN. I used to play on Aether Faerie)
  • Freedom Planet
  • Golden Sun
  • Hades
  • Hamtaro Rainbow Rescue :3
  • Happy's Humble Burger Farm
  • Heroes of the Storm
  • I'm on Observation Duty
  • JazzPunk
  • Judgment
  • Katana Zero
  • Kid Chameleon
  • Little Kitty Big City
  • ManEater
  • Mario 64 and Mario Sunshine
  • MegaQuarium
  • MeowJiro
  • Metal Gear Solid
  • Metroid Fusion, Prime, and Dread
  • MineCraft
  • NecroBasrista
  • Night in the Woods
  • OneShot
  • Paranormasight
  • Pokemon gens 2, 3, 7, 8, and 9
  • Potionomics
  • PowerWash Simulator
  • RiftBreaker
  • Shantae
  • Skyrim
  • Sludge Life
  • Sonic 2 and Sonic Adventure 2
  • Spyro the Dragon
  • Stardew Valley
  • Stonks 9800
  • Street Fighter 6
  • Subnautica
  • Super Smash Bros
  • Terraria
  • The Red Strings Club
  • Titan Chaser
  • Touhou (I recently became obsessed with it, I could not see how much genius is in this game design before. I would totally like to make a Touhou fan game in the future!)
  • Tyrion Cuthbert Attorney of the Arcane
  • Undertale
  • VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action (Yo devs please, when N1RV Ann-A dropping? :c I've been faithfully waiting for so long and I still am and I still shall.)
  • X-Morph Defense
  • Yakuza 0
  • Yu-Gi-Oh Forbidden Memories
  • Zelda Majora's Mask, Breath of the Wild, and Tears of the Kingdom

Anime, shows, and mangas I like

  • A place further than the universe
  • Cromartie High School
  • Do It Yourself!!
  • Dragon Ball Z
  • Fullmetal Alchemist
  • Grand Blue Dreaming
  • Hajime no Ippo
  • Jellyfish can't swim in the night
  • New Game!
  • Non Non Biyori
  • OddTaxi
  • One Piece
  • Oshi no Ko
  • Ruri Dragon
  • Ruri Rocks
  • Space Brothers
  • The masterful cat is depressed again today
  • The Simpsons
  • South Park
  • Yotsuba
  • Yuru Camp
  • Yu-Gi-Oh!

I don't care what your modern XYZ delta link pendulum synchro ass whatever monster can do, these are still the best cards~

Kairos Phanos I usually do the art and programming myself.
I even learned to make 3D models and animations just to make games!
Godot Game Engine I make games using the Godot game engine!
HTMAG Special thanks to Chris Zukowski with How To Market A Game for making content giving marketing advice!
I use free for use sound effects from Pixabay,
and free for use textures from ambient CG.
I also use Tepid Monkey's free fonts in my games.
Some sound tracks were found on Free Music Archive.
Hosted by Neocities This website is hosted by Neocities! :D
Steam My Steam page, check out my games and wishlist the ones you're interested in!
Itch.io My Itch.io page, you can check my stuff here as well!
Indie DB I'm new to Indie DB, I'm not sure how to make use of this platform yet.
Tumblr I will use Tumblr for personal things, gifs and goofs that might happens during development, things like that~
Bluesky I will also post similar personal things on Bluesky.
X I will be less active on X, this will be more for marketing purposes than personal things.
Twitch I have a Twitch, mostly for watching, I've streamed art in the past, maybe I will stream dev work sometimes.
Youtube I have a Youtube, also mostly for watching, but I'll upload trailers and stuff to promote my work when I have some.

Intellectual property, assets, characters, and universe usage policy

All assets, original characters, worldbuilding elements, lore, stories, names, artwork, logos, branding, and designs in my games and projects are my own creation, unless stated otherwise in the credits.
I currently operate as an independent creator without a registered company or trademark, but I retain ownership of my creative work.

Fan-made and non-commercial projects inspired by my stuff are generally welcome, I don't mind if you want to make something that shows appreciation to what I create or just express your creativity :)
You are welcome to create fan art, fan fiction, fan animations, fan games, mods, or community projects as long as they are non-commercial, distributed for free privately within fan communities, and clearly marked as unofficial fan creations.

However, for commercial use, redistribution, exploitation, or inclusion in monetized products of my work, please contact me first. You may not sell projects using my work in commercial games, films, merchandise, NFTs, or other products and projects involving my work without permission.
I will support small independant developers, artists, and creators. But large-scale commercial use by companies or organizations is not allowed without an explicit licensing agreement.
You can contact me at

You can find the source code of my projects on Github TODO ADD LINK. I do upload the source code of my games, with the entire Godot projects. This is for educational purpose, I want to encourage people to learn game dev and related things by seeing how things are made.

Licensing and usage policy

In the uploaded project can be found a Licensing directory that contains the guidelines and details for each project. The source code I upload is non-commercial, see LICENSE.txt for details in the project files. Characters, art, and world are not free to reuse commercially. See the CREDITS.md in the project files for details about asset credits.

What you are allowed to do

  • View, study, and learn from the code
  • Modify it for personal projects
  • Share modified versions of it privately within communities dedicated to the game itself and with people interested in it

What you are not allowed to do

  • Reupload builds of this game on platforms such as Steam or Itch
  • Publicly redistribute this source code or modified versions without permission
  • Redistribute, sell, or publish builds of this game
  • Use this code or any part of it in commercial products
  • Sell, sublicense, or redistribute it or its assets for profit
  • Impersonate me or pretend the work or assets are your own
  • Use it as part of a paid service, game, or product without permission

Why is the source code public?

As a kid who grew up wanting to create video games, I have played many games that made me wonder how they were made. So I just thought it was overall a nice thing to do, that's all! I have tried a bunch of game engines, and the Godot Game Engine has made creating video games of many genres way more accessible than any other engine I have tried in the past. I share the code of my projects for educational purposes, satisfy people's curiosity, and to help other developers learn and develop their own projects. Feel free to explore how things are built! I want to encourage people who think creating games is too difficult for them by showing them it is not that hard, and that if I can do it, anyone can. And this is also an important lesson about humility and confidence I want to convey by showing my code! To all of you thinking you cannot do something because it is out of your competence: if you knew how every product/service you use in your daily life is made/handled/managed behind the scenes, you would be much more confident in yourself :) Ask yourself everytime you receive a service or product, if you couldn't do it better yourself. You should be surprised how often you realize you can! Many people have no idea what they are doing, and maybe I'm no different :3 If I can make games with code like that, then so can you! Please express your creativity and go make some beautiful things to share with the world!

Doesn't giving away the code basically make the game free? Why would I need to buy the game on Steam or Itch then?

Yes you can run the game entirely for free from the engine if you download both the code and the engine. I believe the people who would go as far as doing that are people who would not buy the game to begin with, or would look for a way to pirate or torrent it. And I'm counting on people's good will to support me and buy the game if they really like it and want to show appreciation c:

Code FAQ

If you ask one of the following questions about my code, chances are that in 90% of cases this is the answer

Why did you not make a component for this?

I worked as an object-oriented programmer for 15 years. This is all my teachers, managers, and clients ever cared about. The Godot engine favors composition as a design pattern, but I am simply not used to it yet. So it is not natural in my mind to think about making components for some things, I am still growing and learning to use the engine to its best potential.

Why didn't you use the engine feature to do this?

Similar answer to the one above, I probably just didn't know this engine feature existed at the time I made it.

Why didn't you refactor this code?

The feature was not initially planned or is a result of a change in scope or plans during development. So when I implemented it I judged it was not necessary, and more time/effort than it's worth to refactor/cleanup that code at the time for the given scope/schedule.

Why is there leftover code/comment here that does not match/does not have a purpose?

I forgor :c

Why is this part so messy and unoptimized?

うわー　めんどくせえー！！

Learning game development

Choosing an engine

If you want to learn game development, you will need to pick a game engine at some point. That's what I advise you to do your research on first. There is probably a type or genre of game you want to be making, and some engines are specialized for certain genres.
For example, it's easier to make JRPGs with RPG Maker, and Visual Novels with Ren'Py. I have used RPG Maker a lot when I was in high school, and it actually gave me some knowledge in advance for when I started computer science classes in college.

I suggest you watch a few tutorials to learn the basics of the game engines you want to try and make very simple games like Pong with them. Yes game engines plural, please I encourage you to try multiple because once you find the engine that works best for you, things will be soooooo much smoother. It is worth the investment to research and try different engines until you find one you want to work with.

Once you picked an engine, you will probably need to get familiar with the programming language it uses, if any. Some engines will abstact the programming aspect to a degree, and it is possible you find engines that do not require you to do any big programming.
Chances are however that you will need to get familiar with the basics of programming. Do not sweat about it, it really is not the hardest part of it and should not be the criteria to decide which engine you want to use. You will learn to make basic statements, conditionals, loops, functions, maybe classes. And that will be enough to not get in the way of your creativity.

For the Godot engine

If you want to learn the godot game engine from zero and learn things in detail with explanations, here is a complete tutorial that will teach you everything you need to know to get started with solid bases:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLG2yVpLDT8
Yeah it's a very long video, but that's because it pretty much teaches you everything very well :)
And once you're done learning with that, even if there is still something you don'y understand, you should understand enough to be able to look up the specific things you need help with autonomously.

Blender

Aight, time to get serious! You wanna try doing 3d models but never used Blender before? Here is the tutorial I learned how to use it with:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqvNNQQPPS8
It's another long one, but it worked better than most other tutorials for me thanks to how it really starts guiding from absolutely zero, explaining basic controls to manipulate objects on top of going straight to the interesting points that matter for what we want to do: making games! It even covers animations and texturing in a beginner-friendly way, this is huge!
Once you're familiar with blender, here are two channels I like from which I learned a lot of tips:
Thomas Potter
Blender Vitals

Art

So this is where things get complicated. So far we've talked about how to use new software, but it can be difficult to learn a new skill altogether. Best thing I can do here is tell you how I personally learned to draw. I learned to draw a while ago by starting with simple things. I tried drawing Pokemons first. Some of them are easy enough to draw that you will progressively learn how to shape things naturally by trying to draw more and more complex shapes. Try drawing Electrode first. Then try giving it different facial expressions. Then try drawing Jigglypuff. Then try giving it different postures and poses that convey different emotions. Then try adding shadows to it. Then try drawing Pikachu. Then try giving it some sparks. Then try combining everything you learned to make a Pikachu with sparks, facial expression, posture, and shadows that match all of that! Etc.
Then at some point you will want to get better and you will try to experiment by adding shades, varying the hues, adjusting the lighting. And you will pick up knowledge and experience on the way!

It is nice to find a drawing program that works for you, and there are a multitude for you to try out there. You do not need to get any paid program, you can learn and practice with free software. But my personal choices are Aseprite for pixel art, and Paint Tool Sai for general art. They are both very easy to learn and can do a lot with minimal learning! If you want to learn how to use an art software, I recommend searching for youtubers or streamers that use it and watching what they do, and try to do similar things. That's how I learned personally, by watching and trying to copy the technique of people streaming their art.

Music and sound effects

I ain't gonna lie, I don't know how to do that yet, I use free assets :c

Free assets!

Look there is no shame in using free assets if you can't make your own or don't have the budget to commission someone.
Stay humble, know where your current limits are, aim to surpass them, but do not remain trapped because of them.
Kenney - all kind of graphical assets
Ambient CG - textures
Pixabay - sound effects
Pixabay - other assets
Free Music Archive - music

Things don't need to be perfect to be good!

Okay hear me out I'm begging you, you need to understand and keep in mind through the whole process of creating something: it does not need to be perfect. Games, art, and everything else, can be good without being fancy or complex. Look at Minecraft, it's all just cubes! And it is a good game! It is in fact pretty much the best game of an entire generation! It's super fun! And look at Undertale, most of the backgrounds are just solid black, there is no background! And it looks good and plays good regardless! And look at Touhou games, the only thing you gotta do is dodge bullets! And you have no idea how much game design and world building there is in it! You get my point? You don't need to know how to use a software perfectly, you will learn things like shortcuts and features naturally as you practice with it over time! The way you make use of the tools and assets you are provided is what will help carry your creativity more than your experience with a given skill or software. Please go create some cool things, you are capable. If you knew how incompetent and unskilled people are on average at their daily job and activities, you would feel much more confident in yourself. The average person has no idea what they are doing, they are only pretending they do. You have so much more untapped potential than you realize.

Do things you like!

This is extremely important: you must find joy in what you do. Not the other way around. Joy does not find you. You have to find joy. If you do something, it should either be because you are obligated out of responsibility (work or chore), or because you decided to do it from your own free will (volition or fun). If you are going to do something from your own volition without any obligation, then it should be something you enjoy doing and find pleasure in doing, or that gives you fulfillment in some way. Learn a new skill for the purpose of using it for something you like. Make games you like, make art you like.

Remember why you do things

If you strugle finding the motivation to do something, or if you feel like giving up, try and remember why you are trying to do it. If you cannot find an answer, then maybe you should not be doing it and your energy will be better invested somewhere else. You alone can know why you do things. Above everything else, you must have a reason why you do things, and not lose sight of that reason. Even if that reason is trying to discover such a reason. The only difference between achieving something and not achieving it, is simply whether you are doing or not what must be done to achieve it.