Blags

SGDK is an amazing framework for building Sega Genesis games. Among its features is the tool rescomp, which compiles resources like images and audio for use inside your game. The rescomp tool offers a path for extension. I’m currently using a rescomp extension to import my collision map from a csv file in ldtk’s super simple export. This guide should allow you to more easily write extensions for your specialized resources as well.

The world is impressively messy right now. I must admit that I’ve mostly turned inward. My focus over the last few months has been on a project that I don’t really want to talk about until I have something to show. Hopefully the first small piece will be ready to present soon. I’ve enjoyed over a year of taking the bus to work now. The difference between busing and driving is incredible.

I won’t be using generative AI on this website. I won’t be using generative AI on my phone. I won’t be using generative AI on my personal computer. I’ve been trying to collect my thoughts on generative AI for months. I can’t seem to write something that I’m completely happy with. So I’m going to post this as-is. All opinions are a work in progress. For the rest of this article assume AI means generative AI.

So I played the demo of the new game from the Persona team, Metaphor ReFantazio. Most of it anyway. I won’t be buying it. Normally I wouldn’t want to post a negative review of anything, but I think my reasons behind that decision are interesting and say something about my identity. So here we are. I’m about 7 hours in. Many of my favorite games are not much longer than that.

This past weekend we went to Matsuricon. We had an excellent time! We got to see ProZD review Ohio foods in person! The AMV competition entrants were great. The dealers hall had a lot to offer. I’m old now. I’ve felt this for a while. My joints hurt in the morning. I’ve got a handful of mild chronic illnesses to manage. I struggle with staying up late. But my girlfriend and I still had a place at Matsuricon.

At the start of this year, I decided to take up the “No Buy Year Challenge” that got popular on YouTube around New Years. More specifically I went for the “Low Buy” variant. If you’re not familiar, the challenge is to go a whole year without buying anything, outside of a few predetermined exceptions like food and toiletries. I found out about the idea from this video by Grace Nevitt, but there are a ton of other videos out there.

I just closed all 228 of my open mobile tabs. I went through each and every one first, putting the ones worth saving in appropriate places in my notes, TODO lists, to read lists, and wish lists. My open tabs had become a sort of an awkward unstructured TODO list of their own. I had tabs open for things I wanted to buy, articles I wanted to read, websites people had shown me on Discord, articles that bloggers had referenced.

In this case the main message - “nothing changes if nothing changes” - a call to actively engage in your own life - is something I needed to hear. It is an excellent shorthand phrase for a theme I’ve seen before but often forget. “People have to save themselves. One person saving another is impossible.” -Meme Oshino, Bakemonogatari While the “nothing changes” version of the message is excellent branding and shorthand for the concept, It undersells the problem.

Spoilers probably. You have been warned. I originally wrote the following at the beginning of October 2023. It is now the end of November. I’ve been hesitant to post it because, pretty much immediately after writing it, I finally spent some time in the underground after spending 20+ hours solely on the surface. If you’ve played the game, you’ll know that means I unlocked an ability that I probably should have unlocked much earlier, which means some of my observations are a little… off.

I took a break from blogging this summer. It was somewhat intentional as I had nothing to write. The format I had here was boring me and I couldn’t figure out what else to write. Still, I feel better when I’m writing. So not writing at all has probably done more harm than good. My departure from the blog started out as an experiment with morning pages - a meditative practice where you write from stream of consciousness for 3 pages each morning.