I got really sick of looking at my last news post so... Here are some of the chilis growing in my garden. I think they're really cute and I'm very proud of them.

Poblano

Hungarian Wax

Jalapeño

Thai Chilis

Cayenne

Trident

Any of y'all into gardening? Show me those mf gardens.

Roadside Boardin'

Play the game here.

On January 26th, GallowJolt and I posted our game, World War Wizards as an entry for Pixel Day 2020. I had started working on it all the way back in January 2019, after being inspired by the Pixel Day entries that year. I knew I wanted to have something for the next one, so I got to work right away. Not long after publishing that, I realized I was still in a "game-making" mood. I had seen that the Phaser Jam was going on, but up until that point I had mostly ignored it. I didn't know anything about Phaser and when I started looking into it I was very afraid of making a complete game entirely in the abstract. But, I figured it would be a good learning experience and might teach me some things that I could use when I get back to working on World War Wizards.

So, I set to work. I had this idea for a game based on a thing I always did as a kid. You play as a 9-year-old, staring out the back window of your family's car on a very long road trip, and you imagine a little skateboarder doing tricks on all the passing scenery. I spent about 2 weeks working on the game, and by the end - I was feeling pretty good about it! But then...

Nobody seemed to get it... Only two people managed to get the kind of scores I was expecting to see, and one of those was my girlfriend, who I had explained the game to in person, so it doesn't really count. Now, let me be clear, it is not anybody's fault but my own that nobody grasped how the game was meant to be played. @HerbieG left me a good review (by which I mean good, constructive feedback), and included this sentence:

"Also: 10 000 points with these controls and all things I mentioned? Really?"

That's when I realized there was a serious issue here. 10,000 points in Roadside Boardin' shouldn't take more than a few minutes to accomplish. 5,000 points, the medal below the hardest medal to get, in my mind, wasn't going to be that hard and I had expected a lot of people to unlock it.

But like I said, that's my fault. I don't know exactly what the issue was - that I didn't explain clearly enough how the game was meant to be played in the description, or maybe because I didn't add any in-game instructions. I'm not sure. But I was feeling pretty bummed. I'm going to leave it up because... well... I like it. I'm still proud of it. I feel bad that I did a bad job of explaining it, but I still like playing it myself, and that's gotta be worth something. Maybe I'll get around to recording myself playing it and post it here so anyone who still wants to try it out could see how I had intended the game to be played.

Closing In

Play the game here.

So I went back to the drawing board. In one day, I conceptualized, prototyped, did the art, and made Closing In from the ground up. This game is much more simple and straight forward, and this time - I included in-game instructions. And, well, it seems to have made a difference. The scoreboards are looking a lot more like I had expected and intended, and I've received a reasonable amount of positive feedback. So, I'm happy. I appreciate everyone who played both games, and especially those of you who left reviews or private messaged me about them. Thank you, Newgrounds.

Happy Pixel Day 2020

I've been waiting for this for a very long time. Two years ago was the first time I had noticed and really gotten into Pixel Day. I made a couple little gifs just messing around, but nothing serious. Last year I didn't make anything but I was really inspired by the work of other people and vowed to make something for 2020. And now -- here we are! This year I'm submitting this game, World War Wizards. It's a game where you play as medieval fantasy characters and you kill Nazis with magic. Back in September I contacted GallowJolt and asked him to join the project with me. He agreed and proceeded to do a fantastic job making much of the art in the game and contribute heavily to the creation process, coming up with a lot of the ideas that are now in the game. We are quite proud of the result, and we hope you'll enjoy it too! Thanks for your time, and once again -

Happy Pixel Day!

I haven't made a post on here in what feels like a pretty long time, and I figured I should briefly update this in case anyone wants to know what I'm up to. First up, I recently moved into a new house (that I am renting, ain't no way my millennial ass is buying a house) in which I've set up an entire room dedicated only to my creative projects. It's got my instruments, my recording equipment, my green screen, my computer and laptops, and everything I need to do the things I love to do. It's a huge step up for me from the set up I had before, and I'm hoping it will help me to be more productive.

In other news, I recently made a Twitch account, and last Sunday after recording the A Couple of Crickets episode featuring mrjoeyprosser I did my first stream on there playing one of my favorite games of all time, Vagante. I haven't worked out an exact schedule yet, but it is something I intend to start doing with some amount of regularity, so if you enjoy watching Twitch streams, keep an eye on me over there! You can find me at https://www.twitch.tv/gagegoodell or there is a link to it in my links section here.

I've also finally decided to get in on the e-begging bandwagon (gotta pay for this new house somehow) and made a Ko-fi. Any donations are very much appreciated, but I certainly don't expect anyone to feel obligated to give me their money.

I have a big to-be-announced project set to come out in January that I've put a lot of time into and I'm really looking forward to releasing. Stay tuned for more news on that.

Big thanks to everyone on here for the continued support, especially Tom Fulp, who I love talking about.

This morning I woke up with a shiny new badge: Police Lieutenant. (I'm a tiny bit disappointed though, I thought Police Captain came after Police Sergeant so I thought I was almost done being a cop, but no. I'm stuck being a cop for a while.)

I also recently hit level 20! It's kinda cool, only a couple thousand people have done it before me, and there aren't many things I can say only a couple thousand people beat me to. I'm also working with a meaningful amount of vote power now, which is neat.

A big part of the reason I've grown my level and rank so much this year is A Couple of Crickets. If you don't know, @ACoupleOfCrickets is a podcast here on NG (and all major streaming platforms), about NG, for NG. I co-host it with @littlbox . It's a great way to keep up with the goings-on of Newgrounds, between site news, hidden gems on the portal, and artist interviews. The Crickets account is only 2 followers away from 100, so it would be real cool of ya to digitally stroll over there and click "Follow".

On the note of followers, I'm not too far from 200 myself! It's not a lot, but it's meaningful to me. Thanks to everyone over the years who decided I made something worth following. Especially a huge thanks to Tom, who followed me earlier this year after discovering A Couple Of Crickets, and who has been a big supporter of the podcast, which means the world to us.

Speaking of years, I've always felt like a newbie to this site, but I'm beginning to realize that, although I haven't been here nearly as long as the greats, I've been using NG for about 8 years now. I couldn't be happier to see the site continuing to grow. Newgrounds is by far the best place on the web, and I'm so grateful to be a part of it.

In other news, I recently downloaded Krita and have been trying to get into digital art. I still have a ton to learn and work on, but it has been really fun so far, and I appreciate everyone who has given me help and support through that, especially @TheDyingSun who inspired me to get Krita in the first place, and who has been giving me helpful tips along the way.

I think that's all, mostly just wanted to not-so-humbly brag about my rank and level, even if it isn't particularly exceptional.

Stay classy, NG.

Edit/Update: I also just got my stuff for participating in the Wick Editor Game Jam a few months back! Got a nice t-shirt, a bunch of stickers, and a lovely handwritten note from @luxapodular and @zrispo , to whom I'd like to apologize for getting a little salty there near the end of the jam. I was frustrated more with my own inability to make a functioning game than I was with anything else, and I definitely should have been more willing to take that blame. In any case, I very much appreciate the shirt and stickers, and the note says "We hope to see you during the next one!" to which I say, you certainly will. Cheers :)

I've had so much going on in the irl over the last week or two that I haven't had much time to work on creative projects, unfortunately. That being said, I figured I'd post a general update regardless so I don't feel like I'm not doing anything productive.

First off, @ACoupleOfCrickets is still going strong. If you haven't checked it out, it's a podcast that @littlbox and I make weekly where we talk about music, movies, art, news, and most importantly, Newgrounds. If you're a NG-lover, be sure to check that out, might find some gems in the portals that you missed each week!

Speaking of podcasts, I'm actually starting a new one! It's (most likely) going to be called "Even More Sound". I've had an album club (like a book club, for albums) with some old friends of mine for over a year now and we've decided to start recording it. If you're something of an audiophile, and want to hear other audiophiles talk about music, you should check it out! Our first episode will be coming out in the next couple of days, and we'll be talking about the new Carly Rae Jepson; Tyler, the Creator; and Flying Lotus albums that came out over the last two weeks. It'll be a good time. I don't know if we'll be posting it on Newgrounds or not, since it doesn't have anything to do with NG. I don't usually get much interaction on these posts, but if anyone wants to weigh in on whether I should post it here or not, I'd really appreciate that.

I'll be participating in the Wick Editor Game Jam here on NG. I haven't yet started my project in any real capacity since I haven't had the time recently, but starting next week I should have a lot more free time that I can dedicate to that. In the mean time, I've tried to be as involved with the Wick community as possible, helping people get their projects started. I'm certainly no expert myself, but I want this jam to be as good as possible and I'd like to think that we can all help raise each other up, that way we can get some awesome submissions for the jam. I'll be updating my progress on my entry here on my page as I go along. Everyone go check out http://wickeditor.com/ , it's awesome!

@FlowDownStream will be coming back soon! We've been having some delays that I haven't spoken about publicly yet, but we're getting there and everything should go back to normal for us before too long. Stay tuned.

Finally, I had a couple hours of free time yesterday. Not enough that I felt like I could get any substantial work done on any main projects, so I animated this gif instead!

That's all for now. Have a great day, everyone!

USING WICK EDITOR TO MAKE GAMES

So Wick Editor is a really neat little browser-based software, very similar to older versions of Flash. Tom made a news post about 12 hours ago (at the time of posting this) announcing that we're going to have a Wick Game Jam, which sounds awesome to me! I decided to take the opportunity to learn my way around the software so that I can hopefully participate. I made this little test game (by no means a completed game) which, if you'd like, you can check out here:

https://www.newgrounds.com/projects/games/1326613/preview

Probably should read the Author Comments before you give it a go.

I said this in the news post too, but if some people want help getting started with Wick, I might be willing to help if I can. Keep in mind, I just learned of the software today, so I'm an absolute noobie too, but I'm hoping that if we can all help each other out then we can get more entries (and better entries!) in the jam! Not to mention that I just think Wick Editor is cool and want to help spread it.

Here's the newspost about the jam too, in case you missed it:

https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1441142

Edit April 26- Animated this in Wick Editor as well!

Edit April 27- One more!

M̴͐a̵͉̫̤̲̦y͚̺̯͉͉̝̔͟ͅb̠̙̻̲̙̙̣ͦ̇̉ͫ͞e̶͒̋̋ͭͣͥ̈ ̱͕̙̣̫̌y̧̬̫͗ͯ̒o̜̬̥͍͙͋̀u͎̮̤ͨ̒ͮ̂͟ ̫̞͔̱͔̉ͬͭ̍͜sͦ̏̊ͨ҉͈͖͚͖̗̳h͎̟̟͙̣̖͋̉̽̔̈́̑ͫ͘o̝͈̳̮͕͓ͥͣȗ̶̻̙̬́l̹̞͍̽͌̾̋͌̽͢d̙̝̦̠̳̉̐̎̓̈́̃ͅ ͎̲̺͌͌̈́ͦͪ̈́̃ͅd̫͕̭̝̜͍͙̎̏̽͊ͤr͙̤ͫͧ̊ͅï̼ͫ́n̳̮ͪk̙͉͈̖̜ͧ̔ ͗ͩ̏ͫ͏͚s̲̦͇͔ǫ̹͕͎̰̩̰͛͊̂ͦm̤̯̫̼̿ͤͦe ̟ͫw̔̍̒̉̿̃ͫ҉̥̮̣̰aͩ͂ͦ̓ͤt͕̙͚̫̳͍̗͛ͪͬe̼̫r̰̠̼̝̥̭͔ͥ̅̏̍ͯ͜.̸͉͍̎ͅ

https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/728555

FlowDownStream Season 2 premieres February 23, 2019. One week from today.

Here is the trailer for the upcoming episode:

We hope to see you there. I'd like to say thank you to the Newgrounds community for all the support we received in the first season, and I really hope you all enjoy the second season even more! We've got a lot of things planned and we're using a new system for developing the episodes that should hopefully bring the series to new heights.

If you're not familiar with the series, you can check it out on our page here on Newgrounds. We are an art collective that formed here on NG; I am very privileged to work with a such a wonderful team of like-minded individuals.

The majority of the music in the show (as well as in the trailer above) is made by Sro (@DoctaBGL) who just happened to drop a great new album last month that you can listen to on bandcamp.

In other news, the podcast @littlbox and I have been doing weekly (A Couple Of Crickets) has had the pleasure of featuring some lovely guests recently, including @DoctaBGL, @PoliWall (briefly including special guests @BarfBart and Dad Wyrick), and most recently @WillSpencer. We include a "Newgrounds Spotlights" section in every episode, in which we give shoutouts to our favourite submissions every week, and then we generally proceed to talk about movies, cartoons, music, and the like. We'll be having @CzySzy on the podcast next week!

That's all for now. Tune in to FlowDownStream on Saturday, February 23rd at 5 PM Eastern Time. See ya there!

Figured I should make a little post welcoming in the new year. 2018 was by far my most active year I've had on Newgrounds since I started coming here in ~2012. I'm pretty proud of my collection of work from last year and I hope to surpass it again this year. A pretty big milestone for me was hitting 100 followers, which I know isn't a lot, but it sure is meaningful for me. FlowDownStream did much better than I ever could have expected, and we're starting Season 2 in February, which I expect to do even better. We've got some wonderful new team members and the first episode is already looking very promising! Most of my creative output for the foreseeable future is going to be FDS-related, but I am currently working on a fun little podcast with @littlbox called "A Couple of Crickets"!

Here's a fun thing that has happened to FlowDownStream recently: I made a frontpage post from the FDS account a few days ago, and within 25 minutes it got its first reaction. Also, for 2 whole days, its only reaction. Sounds like it would be a bit of a bummer, right? But look who the reaction is from:

Tom was also one of the first followers we had on the FDS account, and I can't even begin to describe how amazing that is to me. His support really means more to me than I could ever put to words.

Just a few more things I'd like to say here:
First of all, on January 18th my friend and frequent collaborator Sro (@DoctaBGL) is putting out a new album titled "wot". It's definitely something you're going to want to check out if you like trippy, mind-bending music. He makes most of the music in FlowDownStream and also provided the soundtrack (the only good part, lol) of my first game, Platform Picasso. Definitely worth keeping an eye on. You can follow him on his website, his Twitter, and his Bandcamp.

@littlbox is working on a full feature-length film called "Talentless", which is a massively exciting project. Keep up to date with its production from his website.

And I guess that's all that I really care to write about at the moment. Thanks to everyone here on NG for making this such an awesome community for small artists. Best place on the web, by far. I couldn't be happier to see how well Newgrounds is doing right now, with the flood of new artists and the supporter milestones, not to mention all the great site updates. I can't wait to see it continue growing and improving.

Thanks again.
-GG