(Posted 2025-12-31)

Here’s a bunch of sites and other resources that I found cool last year!

I’ll try to summarize my thoughts up top, but don’t expect the links to all be annotated

(Also, I don’t like having to maintain a links page, so expect a new one next year)

Games/GameDev

Noticed myself studying smaller games a lot this year, hoping to incorporate the tricks they use to finish my own game faster (via knowing where I can cut scope and such).

  1. Hyper Chess
    1. Literally just existing gameplay with an RTS element. Low price point makes the experiment probably worth it for some, and if it were suddenly me doing it, I could probably use asset packs for the pieces and just re-texture them to have better cohesion than whatever I buy.
  2. Vampire Survivors-likes
    1. Studied the concepts a lot (though I didn’t actually play any… Whoops!)
  3. Wordatro
    1. Similarly to Hyper Chess, this is piggybacking off of existing gameplay (balatro in this case) in a way that requires minimal assets and core system experimentation, but allows for a VERY fresh idea.
  4. Janken Game Acchi Muite Hoi!
    1. Helped me realize there’s a lot of play space even within a system as simple as rock paper scissors.
  5. The Yume Nikki Online Project
    1. Fun to be reminded of (met a dev from the team at PAX west this year). Collective Unconcoius is sorta like Club Penguin, but if you were in another person’s lucid dream.
  6. Marvel Rivals
    1. Scratches my casual shooter itch that’s been going since Overwatch.
  7. Pokemon TCG Pocket
    1. Got me back into trading card games, which feeds into the design stuff from above (since they have a lot of play variety)
  8. DELTARUNE Chapters 3 & 4
    1. (My fav additions from the major conbtributors that I’m acquainted with below)
    2. Taxi’s bullet patterns were NUTTY. The end boss of chapter 3 SCARES me. Still have yet to get the shadow Crystal for that chapter. TAXI IF YOU READ THIS YOUR POWER IS TERRIFYING.
    3. Enjl’s tower section was nutty to see programmed in GameMaker!! ENJL IF YOU READ THIS I FEAR YOUR POWER TOO
    4. Lex Rosetti did SUCH a good job arranging themes for Chapter 4! She basically made those medieval arrangements of pop songs for Toby’s music. LEX YOUR POWER TO IS AMAZING BUT ALSO FEAR-INDUCING.
    5. Ryan is technically not a dev for Deltarune, but since he’s a fangamer high up and does a great job helping shield the team’s privacy I must pay the same fear as the others. RYAN YOU ARE AN AMAZING DEFENSIVE WALL.
    6. Oh right the game… Overall? SO GODDAMN GOOD. Love how they’re starting to lean into the more creepypasta section of Toby’s influences!
  9. Date ‘em Ups was good study material for my current project, since that’s also a more mechanics oriented dating sim

Tabletop RPGs

I played some OSE this year. Love the guys who I played with. Unsure when I’ll re-join that campaign, but I did notice I have a preference for fairly low level games (since I usually like to switch characters a lot)

  1. Castle Grief
  2. Japanese TRPG art
    1. Athenopolis.net
  3. Dragon Quest art (particularly 3 and 4)
  4. Rise up Comus
  5. The Bear Re-Skinner – OSE Statblock Generator
  6. Goblin Punch
  7. BREAK!!
  8. r/SwordWorld

Web Design

Hoping to incorporate that trend of “mascot character vibing somewhere on the site” that I’ve noticed on some neocites sites

I’ve also seen sites that mimic operating systems, and occasionally ones that prevent you from entering at certain times (i.e one that was built to mimic a bar that closes during certain hours). That’d certainly be fun to combine with the above.

    1. Daiko is p rad. I’ve chatted with them a few times online, and I really love their website’s vibe!
    1. Fizzea’s vending machine links page is a super cute metaphor
  5. Od’s Tower
    1. Has a really cute thing where developers and supporters are represented with in-style characters, complete with vieweable inventory to show personality!
  6. 32-Bit Cafe
    1. Decent amount of web dev resources there!
  7. Enjl
    1. Love the tiny friends’ portraits and CSS animations!

Music

Lots of vocaloid. Finally starting to ‘get’ music outside of a soundtrack context.

  1. Flavor Folley - Spoken For
  2. atena - Odochina
  3. Fex - Subways of your Mind
  4. My Hair is Bad - Ghosts
  5. Jamie Paige - Radiant Revival
  6. TAK - 孤独サイコ (Psycho Mode)
  7. AKASAKI (I think I listened to all his singles this year)
  8. Pinyo - Heart Donut
  9. Salica - 落花のあとに Fallen Flowers
  10. SEGUE-4 - 通俗奇跡のふる夜に -A Night of Common Miracles-
  11. Shu - Aimai Funk
  12. Machi - yakeninatteru!
  13. 雨良 Amala - ダイダイダイダイダイキライ

Shows

Anime

  1. New Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt
  2. The Apothecary Diaries
    1. Blew my goddamn mind. Felt very in style of those chinese parables my grandparents tried to get me to read. The type where you outwit your problem into beating up a bigger problem (though, admittedly I didn’t pay insane amounts of attention back those…)
  3. DanDaDan
    1. SUPER fun! Crass in a unique way. A big selling point for me was the not-so-subtle rom com underneath
  4. Frieren
    1. Honestly was just good for me. Felt like a VERY well crafted vanilla sundae, but I didn’t find anything in it until they started discussing the magic system in depth.
  5. My Hero Academia Season 8
    1. ended about as well as I hoped. Not stellar, but they managed to stick the landing enough for me.
  6. My Hero Academia: Vigilantes
    1. was such a happy surprise for me! Love that spinoff so much dear god.

Toksatsu

  1. Kamen Rider Gavv ended just ok, but had some interesting thoughts and potential, at least. Liked the starting metaphor of snacks as enjoying the life in front of you, rather than sustaining yourself with apathy
  2. No 1 Sentai Gozyugers nearly made the list, but the removal of actress Maya Imamori made me decide to not finish watching. Being mixed ethnicity, made me want to support her more than the rest of the show (though Kinjiro’s actors also did a great job, so I feel kinda bad).

Manga and Books

  1. Tsutomu Nihei - Tower Dungeon
  2. Michael Moorcock - Elric, Stealer of Souls
  3. Kobashiko - CMYK: Sameda Kazuou wa Chuunibyou ga Naosenai
  4. Ryou Matoba - Genkai Dokushin Joshi (26) Gohan
  5. Mao Nagata - Darashinai desu, Hotta-sensei!
  6. Authors: Kyuu Takahata & Yuuji Kaba - Now That We Draw
  7. Yukinobu Tatsu - Dandadan
  8. Guchimoto Mado - Every Adventure Needs a Weapon! The Blacksmith Life of Rudy the Obsessed
  9. Jinushi - Smoking Behind the Supermarket with You
  10. Hyūganatsu - The Apothecary Diaries
  11. Kenichi Sonoda - Gunsmith Cats
  12. Takibi Amambori - Too Many Losing Heroines!

Artwork

  1. Dong Chang
  2. AlbaWorks
  3. Japanese TRPG art
  4. Grey Wizard of BREAK!! RPG
  5. Old TSR Artists
    1. Larry Elmore
    2. Clyde Caldwell
  6. Arne Niklas Jansson
  7. とよそら
  8. 湯村 退院
  9. Lineshark
  10. Archapxl
  11. Saane
  12. zac 3amsoda
  13. Kinu Nishimura
  14. 1041uuu
  15. PicoPico256
  16. skipmore

Tagged Info