Blog

"I find your lack of balance disturbing..."

Date: 20-03-2026

Note to self, don't try making long posts during a very busy day... Anyhow I'm back with some more info on Shadow Wizard Money Grains (SWMG from here on out).

So what is SWMG? Simply put imagine stardew valley or harvest moon on copious amounts of sugar and caffeine. It is a far more arcade-like experience rather than something slower with the player having to harvest a certain number of crops each "round" to achieve a quote, doing so earns them currency to exchange for upgrades. The goal is that either the game scales to the point of it breaking, or the player scales to the point of the game breaking. Either way, the game must break! I'd be lying if I wasn't somewhat inspired by games like Risk of Rain in this regard, in which the player in encouraged to become so disgustingly overpowered that balance goes out the window after a certain point until either they quit or get one-shot out of nowhere.

Currently the player has an environment they can walk around, npcs that are not yet interactable and are able to initiate the "harvesting" phase of the game. The groundwork exists for growing plants but just requires full implementation which is a relief. I will look to have this part done come the end of the week so I can focus on breaking other things!

"Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit, if it ain't my old friend from Goodsprings!"

Date: 18-03-2026

Now that this section is cleared up, hello and welcome to the first blog post! What is it about? Simply put, Shadow Wizard Money Grains!

Given I've been quiet on the subject I'll give a brief summary, as per my time in college for game design I've been working on a personal project this year that I hope to submit! The goal of this project was to push myself through severe limitation to create an engaging and fun experience. To achieve this I opted to make the entire game in Pico8, a fantasy console created by Joseph White of Lexaloffle.