The weather has been chaotic in California (and many other parts of the US), so I feel very blessed that we were able to join a few families of friends for a quick snow trip near Bear Valley, CA. A storm right before the trip brought beautiful snow to the slope, and my 6yo finally took his first snowboarding lesson (we all skipped snow trip last year) while I stole away for some nice and quiet time to ski down a few. Less than a week after we came home a huge storm hit, creating all sorts of havoc and even a few ski resorts had to be shut down due to snow-in.
Other than that, it is a leap year so this February we have an extra day to enjoy! Hope everyone is feeling extra productive! ;)
Here are the things that kept me busy this past month, aside from the day-to-day ‘job’ related stuff…
Creating and hacking stuffs
Game Dev
Made some progress with Game#2, reworked the gameplay design and even the story. Getting back to making a playtest version now… As you can see below, this is a very different type of game than my 1st one, and man, trying to create a different genre is proven challenging for me. Yet, I am trying to enjoy the grind :)
Feel free to play my game#1 Qin (early access release)! Available on Google Play store (Android phones and Chromebooks), Itch.io & gd.games (web)
Drawing
Weekly project drawing (comics) - here is a taste of the comics I’ve done this month - full 3-panel versions are on most of my social feeds, Artstation, and of course, my (paid) Patreon page.
Study drawings (#inktober52 ) - the cat & mouse one is in red since I didn’t finish it… the time went to packing and preparing for the snow trip! ha!
#FanArt (always fun to do!) - pretty much the two main series I’ve been reading this month :)
Writing
Book#2 project -“100 Drawings of Tang Dynasty Poems” (唐詩一百畫) - continuing with editing - getting some friends to help review and provide valuable feedback!
The pre-released drafts of this book will continue to be published/shared with my Patreon members every week!
The Web
The usual shoutouts for Heta Studio:
Started a new POD partner, merch listed on a brand new etsy store
This month I took some time aside to check through a few interesting tools: Tails, Tailscale, Teleport, Stytch, WireGuard - catching up on how devops trend is making things way more interesting and more secure!
Consuming Stuffs
Reading - reading Game of Thrones Book 3 "A Storm of Swords"; Amulet B1-B9! (Book 9 was finally released in early Feb, after more than 5 years.)
Gaming - continuing Trine 4: The Nightmare Prince also a bit of Minecraft Dungeons with my 6yo.
TV/Movies - Black Mirror S6; Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio; Beef (omg, so good!); Maestro; Arrested Development (binge worthy fun!); House of the Dragon S1.e10; Now You See Me 2 (meh, but it's done);
Podcast: I’ve been listening to a lot of Smartless episodes - I’m a big fan of Jason Bateman since Ozark, and found this podcast way before its recent sale to SiriusXM for $100M!
That’s it for this issue of my newsletter! If you really finished reading the above, I thank you, and wish that my sharing would either entertain you, or inspire you (if you’ve been thinking about your own creative projects).