This is gonna be a hard one for me to write out but also an important one. I'd love to say that I've been silent because I've been working on something big or that I've been crazy busy with my work in commission paintings but, unfortunately, neither is the case. I hesitate to write this and put it out there for all to read but at the same time it should be destigmatized to talk about... a while back I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder and recently I've been dealing with the worst bout of absolutely debilitating depression I've had in years. Nothing caused it, no event triggered it, my life has been pretty much the same before and during it (after hasn't happened yet if I'm being honest, I'm still in it) but I'm doing my best to sit up and do this post through it right now.

This has been a struggle for longer than it should have been and harder than it needed to be because I happen to live in one of the absolute worst states to find any help with it (Oklahoma is 38th in mental health and 49th in healthcare after all). My kids, and especially my wife, have been exceptionally understanding through it all and just amazing at being there for me but there's only so much they can do for me. I've had tons of troubles finding a decent psychiatrist to help me work through it and get me on the right meds or whatever it is I need in my case and just as much trouble dealing with insurance.

It's been a struggle beyond words to actually DO anything, even things I normally love doing or absolutely need to do. I've barely done anything but lay around doom-scrolling YouTube shorts or TikTok videos and marathoning shows that used to perk me up. What few commission projects I've bothered to secure during this time have been pushed back again and again, and I can barely bring myself to sit at my computer. I've played only a handful of hours of videogames in the past couple of months (a record low for me) and generally have to force myself to spend any time with my family (though I put it on a good face for them).

All that said: the struggle may be real but so is my determination to get to the other side of it. I'll keep trying with Doctors in my area, keep working on myself, keep leaning on my loved ones, and I'm confident that as long as I don't give up then I'll make it past this like I have many times before. This may be the worst so far but it certainly isn't the first and likely won't be the last. What's also real is my passion for gaming and desire to make my own games. I will be back to this and continuing my journey as a game developer. Stay tuned for more (soon I hope!).

I’m gonna be real here because this isn’t really a dev log as much as it is a blog revolving around game dev. I had a really bad couple of weeks since my last post. Depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, and imposter syndrome ran rampant (all concerning game dev in this case btw). I felt like I was wasting my time trying to do this, no one cares, I’m not capable, and everything I’ve done up to this point has been a lot of pretending on my part that I can do this when it’s really going nowhere. There will absolutely be times you feel like this if you try to do anything important to you, I can tell you that much!

I can’t tell you the right way to handle it, I honestly don’t know for myself how to do that, but I can tell you what helped me this time: let it all out to someone you trust and can be supportive for you, then listen to what they have to say and go to sleep. I poured out all the negative crap my brain has been spewing at me for the past couple of weeks to my wife and she was amazing about pointing out that she understood how I felt but she doesn’t believe any of that. She reminded me how much I’ve learned already, how new to all this I still am, how quickly I’ve taken to this whole thing, and how many successes are already under my belt. When I woke up the next morning I went from feeling like I was ready to give it all up to having an epiphany that pushed me to finish a project that same day and gave me renewed energy for it.

What does all this have to do with Brackey’s Game Jam? That was the project I was working on when I hit such a low point. I was afraid I was going to fail another jam and thought it was a sign that I’m absolutely not cut out for this line of work. As you can probably tell from link above: I was wrong about failing! It’s not ultimately the way I wanted it to be but it is a complete experience and that’s what counts here. I wanted there to be a lot of randomness to several elements of the game but I’ve never worked with adding RNG to games before and there just wasn’t enough time to both learn and finish. Give the game a try though! I think it turned out pretty nice!

The theme of the jam was “The Calm Before the Storm” so I had the idea of doing something simple (since a complex idea was what set me back last time) and created a basic “push your luck” type game. A storm is coming and your job is to loot as much abandoned treasure from an evacuated village as you can before it gets here. No timer for the storm or tracker for how much loot is on the island, you can’t even where the loot is until you get close to it, just the weather elements and the empty island. Not knowing anything is important to the push your luck mechanic, it’s meant to make you question everything after all.

At any rate: make sure to check out the game, Storm’s Coffer, linked above if you’re interested and go to the social media links to stay up to date on all things Nerdfactory related! Thanks for the support!

I still love the game I started to build though and think I should keep it going and even expand it into a full game on it’s own right. So much of what I’ve been for this can translate very well into Flux Animus and I genuinely think it’s worth the effort! The theme of the Jam ended up being “out of order” which I spent the majority of the first day trying to figure out what it meant and what to do for it. I landed on the concept of chaos being the opposite of order so the game should have a chaotic sense to the world and I started calling it “Chaos out of Order” (not sure yet that I’ll stick to that name, I’ve started thinking maybe “Anarchic Gates”?).

The idea was an action 2D side-scroller set in a world where rifts in reality have opened the door to alternate realities and monsters from all over the multiverse have poured through. Simple enough so far right? I probably could have handled that much in a week! But then I had to go and get the bright idea to create the rifts and points in the level you would encounter and when you did it would transform the entire level, and you, into alternate reality variations of the original. You start as a cop in a dystopian sci-fi city trying fight off the crazy monsters that suddenly appear, then you end up going through a green portal and turn into a Elven archer in a forest! Or a purple portal to be transported into a Victorian village as a cat-burglar thief, etc. I got a lot of the inspiration for that idea from “The Messenger” (one of my all time favorite games!) and the way they swapped between two time periods throughout each level.

This idea may have made the game unique and more fun/interesting but required me to build multiple different levels and main characters for each level and figure out how to swap them on the fly quickly and seamlessly. I eventually figured it all out but the extra work made it impossible for me to get it done in time. I actually still have a chunk of to do list items and bug fixes that need to be checked off before it’s even at the state I wanted it to be to submit it. I haven’t even started on the music and SFX or the UI for example. Once I have that all done I will still release that much on https://itch.io as a proof of concept, then I’ll work on expanding that into a demo I can put up on Steam before making into a full game available for purchase.

All that said, I did do one thing I think was smart to begin with on this Game Jam: I recognized that I was too new to everything to expect to do it all myself before the end of the week so I acquired a ton of free game assets also available on https://itch.io. There was no way I was gonna be able to do the coding, art, and sound by myself in a week when I’ve barely touched pixel art, haven’t even started on music, and only recently shaken the rust off my coding skills! By the time I make this into a full game I may have added a good bit of my own contributions to those areas but, for a Game Jam, I wasn’t even going to try to do it all by myself when there were resources out there to help with that! Do yourself a favor if you ever go for a Game Jam: either find yourself a team or download all the assets you need. Don’t try to go it alone even if you are a solo developer.

That’s all for now! It was an exciting and exhausting week delving head-first into designing a game after spending just a couple of weeks dipping my toes in the water with Youtube tutorials. Don’t forget to check out the links above and subscribe to all the social media stuff if you wanna stay updated with all things Nerdfactory!

Since my last post the first thing I did that I wanted to talk about was getting my feet wet in the area of pixel art, which it turns out I absolutely love doing! At first I was just playing around with the settings and experimenting with the art style in general. When I got serious about I decided to start things off by using a reference photo and trying to recreate it in a pixel art style using Aseprite (fantastic pixel art program btw!). I went with a pretty formative image for me: Goku turning super-sayin for the first time. I’m 40 years old so I’m old enough to remember when it first aired here in the states. There’s obviously still room for improvement but I’m pretty proud of this first attempt!

Beyond the pixel art aspect of things I’ve been continuing to develop ideas and concept art for Flux Animus. I landed on making 12 “Ranger” (obviously not the word I’ll be using for it) forms at the start so I’ve been focusing my concept drawings on those first. It’ll still be a little bit before those are actually done though (more on why in a moment).

On top of all that: I’ve developed a loose learning plan for myself to learn game design in the Godot engine! The idea is to avoid getting stuck in “tutorial hell” while leaning into the ways I learn best (which mostly via Youtube tutorials lol). I looked through a bunch of these tutorials and picked 4:

Godot 4 Crash Course for Beginners by Chris’ Tutorials

Start Your Game Creation Journey Today by Coco Code

How to Create an RPG in Godot 4 by DevWorm

How to Make a Video Game – Godot Beginner Tutorial by Brackeys

I just finished the last of the four today and I recommend them all! The only thing I would say is probably don’t start with DevWorm’s as he tends to go a little fast so it can be hard to keep up with if you have the basis of a complete beginner like me. After following a couple of videos before his, though, it wasn’t too bad and I learned a lot from that one too.

After my work the last week of following tutorials, it’s time to take part in some Game Jams!!! I’m really excited about this one! If you don’t know: a Game Jam is kind of a low-stakes contest that’s more about fun and learning where you’re given a time limit and theme to make a game in. The theme is announced as the timer begins and all games must have a tie to the theme. You can participate solo or as part of a small team but I’m going solo, at least for the time being. My first Game Jam actually starts in about 6 hours for me. It’s the Godot Jam Round 2 which is obviously pretty new but, then again, so am I! I’m planning on joining several of these Jams, some big and some small, to really get a feel (even if it is more short term) for how to develop a games and get some real experience with it. This one’s going to last a week so I’ll let you all know how it goes in the next post! Be sure to check out the links above and follow me on the other social media platforms to stay up to date on all things Nerdfactory related!

Oh! I’ve also started getting some sketching done of some concept art for characters. I’m not greatest when it comes to drawing but it gets the ideas across and the important part will be the actual sprites, not my concept art, so it’s all good. Regardless, I’ll share the sketches here in a gallery page when I have a good chunk of them finished! I’m also working on putting together my thoughts on the narrative of the game into a rough outline but that’s not quite there yet.

As far as learning Godot goes: it’s complicated but also makes sense at the same time. It’s a bit strange like that. So far I haven’t done anything too major, just poked around the menus and added some free assets I downloaded to test things out. I plan on following a few of the tutorials I found to get familiar with the process before I start on my own idea.

I know this is a bit of a short post this week, but as I said: it’s been a busy one and I am tired! Make sure to follow the social links above for all things Nerdfactory and join the Discord to get involved! I even have a page there where you can give your feedback and ideas!

To be honest it was a bit of an exhausting process, but well worth it! It was extremely helpful in both defining and organizing all my ideas around the foundation of the game. I used a template I got from https://develop.games, which is a site I highly recommend you check out if you’re at all interested in making your own games.

I spent the last few days working on my GDD and researching the right software for me to make this game (pinning that down is part of the GDD too, after all). It really challenged me to take a closer look at what games are inspiring me and what elements of theirs are actually going to be what has an effect on my game. It turned out to be exactly the exercise I needed to really solidify my vision for the game! It did help that a lot of the information I needed for it was already in my notebook but I expanded a lot from those initial ideas. Because of how helpful it was and just how much great new information it contains, I decided to share it with all of you! Please check it out at the bottom of this post (or in the “About” page of this site)!

Along with all that great information is a kinda big reveal: the name of the game! It is, of course, still subject to change but I like it and think I’ll be keeping it as is. Without further ado:

Flux Animus

The name is a reference to the enemies of the game who are a shapeshifting (hence, “in flux”) alien invasion force known as “The Flux” and their mysterious, malicious, power called Animus.

That’s all I have for now! Don’t forget to give the GDD a read if you’re interested and please check out and follow my social media pages linked above if you want to keep up to date with all things Nerdfactory!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qxT-RyrDSmV9Z1OjSofxju-kPZD3I1cqjMA3bgzD3Eo/edit?usp=sharing

7/31/24 My name is Richard Berti and I am beginning a journey I thought some people may be interested in: I’m going to be developing my first video game! I am starting things out with no experience in music, a little bit of education (from forever ago) in programming, and minimal work with 3d modeling (really just cutting things up for my 3d printer, but I wanted to sound a little impressive!). I have, however, had some decent experience with writing fictional stories. If you want to watch as a complete novice fumbles his way through making a lifelong dream of creating his own game come true, this is the place to be!

First, though, a little about me, then onto the game. I’m old. like “I remember when the SNES came out” old. I’ve been an avid gamer since the 80’s and have explored a variety of genres and versions of the industry: tabletop, CCG, board games, miniature wargames, etc. My first love will always be video games though! I’ve been through a lot since that first time I loaded up a game of Zelda with that beautiful gold cartridge, though, and am now sitting in a position where I feel compelled to come back to that age old desire of making something like that. I run my own small business (i.e. it’s really just me!), Nerdfactory Customs (https://linktr.ee/nerdfactorycustoms), where I do commission paintwork of board game and display miniatures and decided to build on that into making video games.

As far as the game itself goes (I know! “Finally he gets to the point!” Right?!) I have an idea! I know my idea is a little… ambitious, but if it’s not something I want to play than what’s the point? Picture it: Sicily. 19… no, wait. Sorry. The wife’s had a lot of Golden Girls going on in the background. Anyway! The starting thought for the game was “what would it look like if a modern looter-shooter was made in the era of beat-em-ups?” Imagine a 16-bit 2.5d side-scrolling version of Warframe or Destiny! All the trappings of a modern live-service game (without the money-grubbing pay-to-win crap if I have anything to say about it! And with this I do!!) with all the style of TMNT: Turtles in Time. If there’s anything out there like this, I sure haven’t seen it.

So now we have the idea for the gameplay, mechanics, and art style. “What about the setting and story?” you may ask. I struggled with that for a while, trying to come up with a world that has a lore-conscious reason why you can transform into multiple different characters at will and have superpowers and fight bad guys. Finally, I struck on a great idea: what if, instead of a space-psychic kid jumping his brain into living armor (no shade here, I’m a big Tenno at heart!), you were essentially a Power Ranger? One who could transform into any available Ranger form when needed? Defending Earth from an alien invasion? A quasi Super Sentai setting would be perfect for this world!

That’s what I have so far! A looter-shooter in a SNES beat-em-up style with a Power Rangers inspired world setting. I’ve been filling a notebook with ideas and details along those lines since I got the inspiration to do this. The inspiration, I might add, that was sparked by one Thor Hall of Pirate Software (if you’re reading this Thor: thank you!) while watching his videos and streams. I don’t know how much I’ll be updating this blog exactly but I will try to make it often, I just don’t want to post update that don’t add anything to the discussion either. So if you like what you’ve heard so far, want to keep an eye on my developing game, or maybe just wanna follow along on my journey through video game development… keep an eye on this page!