WEEK of 2023/03/20: SPRINGTIME

the wip title for this post was "basically springtime" but those of you who noticed.... we missed a blog post or two!! Apologies for that, things have just been a bit hectic for past few weeks!!! Blogs have been written in the weeks.... just haven't gotten to posting or anything like that.... I need to super streamline the blog posting process.... Right now there's a lotta manual busywork I gotta do whenever a blog gets posted... so making it so that I can just post everyones blogs...dats da dream... anyways... here's all the blogs you fools!!!

I keep the lights on

by Kawa

I support a Minneapolis-based indie record label, called Doomtree Records. Primarily, this means that if there's a Dessa show where I am, I move heaven and earth to go - but I also toss a few bucks to its Patreon every month. This means that I have a shirt with the phrase "I keep the lights on at Doomtree Records" on it.

I tell y'all this because it feels like my role at Funkin' is also about keeping the lights on. There's a weirdly large amount of just...stuff, that goes into running a business, into treating your collaborators right. A lot of bureaucracy as I alluded to with last week's BDG video, but also just...getting in touch with people, individually. Checking they're okay, supporting them, clearing the pathway for them to get the nonsense out of the way and do more of what they're best at and love.

Like electricity and Internet access, utilities that you don't necessarily think about until they're gone - I want to enable the rest of the crew, on a person by person level. And sometimes that means hounding someone to fill out a form - and sometimes that means having a heart to heart about how we show up for each other and support each other's badass art.

funkin in toronto

by ninja_muffin

this week PhantomArcade is visiting me in Toronto! After me making the trip to Philly a few times now, it's his turn to hop on plane so that we can physically co-work together and beat each other when we slack. This week was a smidge on the chill side as we get ourselves settled and I show him around the city a bit, but there's always damn good progress that gets made when we are together. I can't say what exactly we worked on... secret features!!! But I can say that it reminds me that Funkin' is one of my fav games visually and I feel blessed to work on it!! I love adding in all the crazy animated ideas that dave comes up with, and makes the game feel especially closer to a polished state.

and u know i hooked dave up wit da tims on the daily !!!!

Eric's Squashing Bugs!

by Eric

My current project is doing playthroughs of the whole game and trying to locate bugs. This is sadly really easy to do right now, Story Mode is practically held together with twine and duct tape right now.

I've succeeded in cleaning up a bunch of stuff but I'm dreading the prospect of touching Week 6, I think it legitimately hasn't been looked at in over a year and the dialogs are probably super fucked up.

I swear I'll work on inputs again soon(tm) I want a wide range of people to playtest it before it goes into the final game.

the redacted post

by ninja_muffin

a lil handful of the work I've done this week is lil secret teehee for secret features teehee. But I will still run down what I've been up to a bit

first few days of the week was to fix up somethin REDACTED related for one of our contractors. It was easy quick work so it was nice lil W for the beginning of the week heheh.

Then through the rest of the week was slowly poking around some of the code that Eric wrote related to REDACTED. He codes in a different way than me, and in general it's the classic thing of code being easier to write than it is to read. But anyways, I was parsing all the code into my brain to get to working on it and adding small lil (but essential) feature to it. I'm almost done that aspect, just need to finish up REDACTED part of it!

Since it's in my brain, once I end up doing more feature work on it, should be a bit easier for me to add and change things how I please, as well as have better understanding of how Eric codes heheh

funkin in san fran

by ninja_muffin

just as we get ourselves settled in toronto... me, dave, and kawa are heading over to san fran for GDC.... the punk days are over when me and dave would rebel against GDC and despise anyone who would even think of going.... those days are long gone.... life is different now.... BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUT I will say I'm at least lookin forward to it. All that talk about working with dave and how enriching it can be will apply to kawa too!!! it's a good excuse to go over and meet kawa!!! and as we find ourselves getting more legit™️ with our work, we are finding more and more people in the industry who go to these sorts of events. and as I personally become less and less of an anti-social basement dweller and finding myself becoming at least somewhat of a more normal human... I think I appreciate talking to people more :3 I think the magic that you get from talking to like minded people ONLINE can be even more powerful when it is transferred to REAL LIFE!!! So I am very optimistic about my first time going... even our damn lawyers are going!!! lol!!!

gdc plans we keepin a bit lowkey, nothin to big and dazzling but if ur at the event and happen to see me and/or dave say hi!!!!

Phantom Says: It's Fucking Cold in Canada!

by Phantom Arcade

Hello all u guys, been a minute, huh?

This week, I'm writing this update from Ninjamuffin's couch here in Canada! The time finally came to return the favor of Cam visiting, which meant for me to roll on up to Toronto and jam out some work. Though it's mostly been a week of settling in, we've been off to a good start of diving into what needs to be done.

It's pretty odd being outside the US for the first time ever, but it's been super nice already. The vibe is like if Philly was less harsh, essentially. Somehow, everything feels a bit relaxed on these streets. Maybe it's all the weed smoked out in the open? Who knows, but as we walk around with the CN Tower always partially in view in someway like the fucking Erdtree, it's a fun way to turn even more work into more of an adventure.

I suppose to sum up what the week's worth of work has entailed, it's been a matter of oversight on various aspects, even IRL. Being able to work with Cam and instruct what I need in-person is always much easier than over the internet. I guess right now for art, I'm mostly handling... how to say it.... hmmm... well, special art this week. And probably a few more weeks beyond his, lol. I just can't bring myself to reveal any secrets!

That being said, one thing in Toronto is there's quite a few retro game shops, and they all seem to carry cheap second hand Nintendo Power issues. It's been pretty exciting to read the upcoming game previews for games I remember beating, as well as seeing the layouts using special art from the production teams. Reading those makes me want to draw even MORE! I really hope eventually we have a nice huge stockpile of art that if we ever get a cool magazine feature, or make our own, that we can have a really sick display of art that excites fans.

Honestly, even seeing famous pieces of art kinda re-contextualized into the pop-art way the magazine organizes the pages gives art I've seen a billion times a fresh spin that feels so juicy. It's hard to describe, but it's a very fun and good feeling to see it. Being steeped in that kind of graphic design, while also being in the graffiti heavy Toronto definitely is exactly a big part of what I want FNF to feel like.

Basically, it's good to be here in Toronto; Tim Hortons for breakfast every day, wouldn't have it any other way.

Til next time, cock, balls, penis.... and cum! -PhantomArcade

closing thots for the wek!!

by ninja_muffin

as me and dave are doing last minute prep for a lil flight... i am doing last minute to finish this blog!!! I really do hope we are able to get these blogs out on a more consistent basis!!! we were on a streak for a while, but then things started piling up and I never fixed em woops!!! I will try to get em sorted!!! things like whenever I post a blog, I'd have to format a lotta things, and redo some dates, etc. etc.

SONGS OF THE WEEK (MULTIPLE!!!):

https://youtu.be/H7HmzwI67ec https://youtu.be/dTVebUPyQqg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TeMpnr3F8k