Yes, in case you're wondering, this newsletter is really late! These past few days were a bit more exhausting than I expected, so I decided to publish it a day later. Thankfully, I have some very cool things to show you!
Not only am I continuing Inktober, but I also worked on a completely unplanned project this weekend that turned out to be a lot of fun.
Without further ado, let's begin!
It took me 3 years to finish this project!
You might know that a few years ago I was really focused on making video games, but one thing you might not know is that one of my last projects was never widely available online.
“Trip Down the Chip Mine” was a game I made for a Secret Santa event on the website for experimental video games Glorious Trainwrecks. We had a pool of participants, and each of us made a game for someone else in December 2023. Quite a while ago!
I managed to release the game on time, but it was slightly unfinished. It was download-only, so you couldn’t play it in your browser or on mobile. It also had no sound and a few bugs.
For context, this was at a time when I was really trying to find a new job and move to another country. Once the event was over, I didn’t have much time to finish the game properly.
Until now! I finally remembered this little project and decided to bring it to the finish line :)
So, what’s the game about?
It’s a completely hand-drawn game where you explore a cave as a miner in a very weird world. But instead of mining precious metals, you’re here to mine old computer chips!
It’s a fully fledged little game, with a story and a great ending that I can’t wait for you to discover 😄
Very big dungeon crawler influence as you can imagine
"Weird" is definitely how I’d describe it: I completely took the brakes off my creativity, without worrying about whether things made perfect sense or what people would think. Playing it again after nearly three years really took me back to that time :)
It might not be for everyone, but I feel like this game is the best version of itself, and I’d really encourage you to give it a try if you have a minute today.
It actually takes about ten minutes to finish, but I promise a lot happens in that time!
You can now play it directly in your browser, and the controls have been adapted for mobile too. So wherever you are, feel free to check it out! I made this purely for fun, and I hope it shows :)
I made a comic this weekend!
This weekend, a 24-hour comic challenge was held in my town and other parts of Poland!
Some of you might remember that I participated in an 8-hour challenge by the same organizers last year. I made a comic back then, not finishing on time, and it was already exhausting!
So when the same organizers announced a 24-hour version, I didn’t go in with very high expectations. I’ve done plenty of gamejams and 24-hour challenges in the past, but honestly, that’s not something I really want to do anymore. Maybe I’m getting older! Or I just value my sleep and health a lot more :)
I wasn’t even planning to make a comic at first. My idea was simply to hang out in good company, do my Inktober sketches for the day, and that's about it.
We arrived, found a table, and once the theme was announced, I started sketching.
Here are some previews for the rest of Inktober :) 🌱
Turns out I was quite productive, because just 40 minutes into the event, I already had all my Inktober sketches planned until the end of the month. Super satisfying, but now I didn’t have much else to do!
Inevitably, I started wondering what I would make if I actually participated in the comic marathon.
The theme was “Depth”, which could mean anything from the deep sea or outer space to perspective, complex characters, or deeper themes...
I started doodling ideas and quickly realized that if I took things too seriously, I probably wouldn’t get anywhere.
I thought back to that old game I’d been revisiting earlier in the week, where I let my imagination take over and made things up as I went, simply because they were fun.
((i'm missing an image for that part so here is the poster of the event))
And something really struck me this week, something I hadn’t quite put into practice before:
As an artist, as someone who draws and (tries to) tells stories, my job is literally to make things up. To imagine something in my head and bring it to life. That’s what artists do, and really, anyone who make things happen!
Of course, you can use tools, structures, and academic rules to make a story more satisfying or a drawing more believable. But in the end, we’re still all making things up.
And that was exactly the mental shift I needed to have fun making a silly little comic.
I settled on an idea: an Alice in Wonderland-type story where a girl gets lost in her family’s basement, going deeper and deeper.
Unlike my usual approach, I only had a vague idea of where the story was going when I started drawing the storyboard. I was literally making things up as I went!
I don’t think it’s necessarily the best way to write a great story, but it’s definitely a great way to have fun!
And because I was only making rough sketches, I didn’t feel any pressure to get the characters right every time. I could just focus on fun expressions and cool camera angles.
You can’t imagine how freeing that felt :)
I'm great at writing dialog as you can see
Six hours into the event, I finally sketched the last page! I had a very absurd story on my hands, in a rather unusual format (I’ll explain in a moment), but I’d had a lot of fun making it.
Of course, these were still pencil sketches on printer paper, nothing particularly clean. For much of the dialogue, I’d only written keywords, or sometimes nothing at all, keeping the rest in my head. It was clearly not finished!
mood
I didn’t have my computer or proper equipment with me, so as it got dark, we decided to head home.
I was already quite happy with what I’d done, and I fully intend to clean everything up and publish it. But as I said, I value my sleep, and I didn’t want to stress too much about it this weekend.
I did, however, finish the first few pages, and I’m excited to show them to you today!
One thing you should know about the format: instead of traditional comic pages divided into panels, I went for a webtoon format, with one very long vertical strip designed to be read on mobile.
I chose this on a whim! But also I thought it would be interesting to show the character going deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole in a vertical format. You’ll see what I mean!
Here’s the introduction to the comic. I’ve tried to stay as close to the original sketches as possible, adding only a few fixes, textures, and colors to make it easier on the eyes.
Please enjoy!
That’s what I have so far! I hope the vertical format looks alright in your email client.
I’ll publish the rest as soon as I can (I don’t want this to drag on too long!), and I’ll definitely let you know when it’s done :)
Thanks for reading about my little comic! Let me know if you have any thoughts on it!
Inktober is still going!
While all of this has been happening, I’m still working on my Inktober project, where my goal is to draw an entire sticker sheet over the course of the month.
I did miss a day or two, but nothing too serious. And now that I have the sketches roughly planned out until the end, I can peacefully continue working on them for the rest of October.
Someone told me this week that my art and colors make them hungry. What do you think it tastes like? 😄
Next week will be the penultimate Inktober update. I’m excited to see the final result with you!
Alright, that's it! Sorry again for sending this newsletter late. I really don't like doing that because it messes up the rest of my schedule. But we ball!
I'll do my best to get back on track and see you again next Tuesday morning, as always.
