Notices by Nathalie Lawhead (alienmelon) (alienmelon@mastodon.social)

this in no way surprises me, and goes as further indication that you need to be super fucking careful around most anyone in the game industry that holds positions of power or influence.
https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/unity-senior-client-partner-rod-stafford-jailed-for-sexual-offences
shit like this is too normal.

Hey!!~ A Butterfly is 50% off on Steam right now.
meaning you can grab it for a whole 49cents: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3439300/A_Butterfly/
half a dollar for a poetic surrealist experience, with good high quality existential despair vibes.

#GameDev #IndieGame #IndieDev

I've been polishing the level bounds today. i wanted to do that trick where you prevent your PCG system's foliage from "growing" on steep edges, and it was so easy to figure out! so i decided to fill those empty spaces with dandelion seeds... omg isn't it perfect? it looks like these fuzzy spores just kind of gathered at the base of cliffs, and stayed there.
#GameDev #GameArt #IndieDev #IndieGameDev #Procgen

another dramatic one...
(lol i've been sick and am slowly getting my head back into gamedev again... no more life-stuff interruptions nuuugh!)

a few screenshots from recently...
i've been slowly populating the landscape with trees, the shapes of which are roughly based on people. it's effective.
both unsettling and kind of beautiful.
#GameDev #GameArt

i’m only part of the orphan grinding death execution squad because times are tough and i need the income. it’s just a job and shouldn’t reflect on me personally.
my own political views are pretty progressive actually.

@HauntedOwlbear thanks, that’s very validating to hear.
every time it happens it becomes more disillusioning. i’ve heard literally every excuse, accusation, or weird lines of reasoning that they start to loop around. i think it’s the type of thing that if you’ve experienced it, then you see through it… solidarity to you too ❤️🩹

they are the very same people that tortured me with their collective platform, & then go on to continue being awful to others. i will reshare it when people mention how i was treated by them because that never got closure. i’m over all the ways i should be polite because it’s never the “right” time...

😌 sharing this one last time before letting it vanish into the social media void ~ forever ~ 😱

https://www.nathalielawhead.com/candybox/making-art-matters

i just published...
"Why making art matters: We no longer have a type of industry where we can chase financial success. We can only sustainably fail."
https://www.nathalielawhead.com/candybox/making-art-matters
about sustainable alternatives to existing in the game industry, and the positive impact of failure.
#GameDev #IndieDev #IndieGameDev #FOSS #Software

i never shared this but i truly believe it… if you grew up in America, and America is the only culture you ever experienced, you are wired for fundamentalism. you grew up hearing that you’re number one, therefore ends justify means. the country has a talent to kill empathy. it’s best expressed in online discourse. /4

it’s no different than these awful takes about “Ukraine refugees are privileged actually” when that conflict started, and then you pit them in your online arguments against other refugees… yet that war is still going on and nothing changed except a new conflict being normalized. 3/4

America always had these problems but there was still a chance that it can turn around. whatever was is gone. it will take more than bickering on social media over what victims are more privileged than others to stop that. online American social justice is almost as guilty at destroying solidarity as the right. 2/4

my grandmother was sent to the camps, and other family caught up in similar political situations. i grew up hearing stories about how things get this bad… i don’t need to be lectured if i’m fear mongering or not.

this is fascism now. 1/4

too much gamedev advice focuses on making a success. success is such a complicated, often random, and subjective thing.
i want more advice on learning from your failures or even openly celebrating failure. destigmatize failure please 🙏🥲

(Bonus Content!) the playable essay “individualism in the dead internet age” now has a print ready zine to go along with it https://alienmelon.itch.io/shovelware
i made these to give away at GDC but hey since they are zines they can easily be printed folded and shared by anyone! (fold instructions included)

say what you will about the writing (which i am proud of) but all assets where made by me…they are original & made for the game. anyone would know that if they follow me.
also it’s not abandoned. 🙃
ugh… shouldn’t have looked at the reviews.
i love itch. it’s so much more supportive on every level.

a page of unicodes all conveniently in one place
⬊ ⬇ ⬋
⟶ https://unicodes.jessetane.com/ ⟵
⬈ ⬆ ⬉
unicodes are the original emoji. bring them back𜴳
look at this snowman ⛇
blank face ⚇
3d square ❑
centipede 𓆨
communism ☭
realize ur power ⎃
╰┈➤see what you could do？！

there’s something really endearing about amateur pixel art. no mater how amateur, it just doesn’t ever look that bad.
hot take: everything is better as pixel art.

i just learned about “riot dogs” (stray dogs that for no knowable reason join in when people protest, and protect protesters from police), reinforcing my view that all dogs are good boys https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riot_dog
(i am not a dog person so this is an unbiased nonpartisan dog assessment)