Random Artwork

I draw knights and fnaf characters :) feel free to give me any tips and criticisms https://beastinthecave.itch.io/ https://www.youtube.com/@BeastInTheCave

[beastinthecave]

Did I say 'render' yesterday? I meant render these moving PNGs.

Behold, Charge every time he hits his head too hard.

If I had to make this again I would make sidestep more squishy. One day I'll get around to syncing the animation to the music...

[beastinthecave]

WIP drawing of Ortega from fallen hero...

Got the basic tones in, now I gotta render it -_-

[beastinthecave]

Made a stickman animation in godot to mess around :)

[beastinthecave]

I'm nearly done with this artwork.

[beastinthecave]

Had to compress image due to the gaussian noise I added for texture :(

Anyway, I made shading darker and gave them their old eyes back. I think they look creepier this way.

[beastinthecave]

Couldn't resist tweaking the painting a bit more....

I think I like the two bigger eyes more than the smaller one, so prob gonna undo that.

[beastinthecave]

Decided to work on more fanart ^-^

I don't quite like the eyes, so I'll probably change them tomorrow. Also might give them some clothes.

[beastinthecave]

Added some softer lighting details to make the painting read better from a distance. The portraits will fairly small on screen so it seemed prudent.

In unrelated news, just watched TADC finale and damn. It hit me right in the feelings. Like every single character made me tear up at least once that episode.

[beastinthecave]

I decided to commit to the 'darkest dungeon' art style for the merc portrait.

I especially like how this version makes them look like a body bag come to life. It works well with their new lore.

[beastinthecave]

Am playing around with different styles for the portraits in my IF. Still not happy with either one, but they'll make for good placeholders.

The uniform of the Orpheus mercenaries is partially inspired by Greek funerary masks.

They're meant to be an army that has ventured into the deepest depths of Hades, only to return to the surface in a diminished form. Alive only in the biological sense.

[beastinthecave]

I started writing for Forgotten Heroes again ^-^

Pinball was slightly redesigned to appear more threatening. To be honest he's one of my favorite characters since his arc of wanting to become a 'real' superhero mirrors the MC's goals prior to the insurrection.

Basically, his story gives me a chance to write two different outcomes for two very similar characters.

[beastinthecave]

Learning animation so that I can make a short 'Drink Your Villain Juice' fan film.

Going to have to rework this part because, as it so kindly has been pointed out by people, Paradigm looks like they're either taking a dump, or giving birth >-<

For the artstyle I chose lego because the tentacle rig is giving me grief already, and I don't want to deal with even more bones.

The art style is inspired by old lego games, spider-man unlimited (the series), and the batman beyond shorts by conorsvfx on youtube.

[beastinthecave]

This morning I was reminded that 'The Green Goblin's Last Stand' existed.

I would be surprised if someone else hasn't used that one frame as a reference for their own sidestep oc art before.

[beastinthecave]

RELEASED A NEW GAME ^-^

Wayward Travels by BeastInTheCave

Travel through empty worlds in this post-isekai adventure.

Finally published the short IF game I was making.

A while ago I promised to release the scrapped outlines for my IFs in interactive form so more of these experimental works will be coming out soon.

I hope they'll fill the void as I continue to slowly chip away at my larger projects.

[beastinthecave]

Made this for the "no dialogue jam." Ended up missing the deadline since work has been taking a lot of my energy.

Learned a ton about godot's UI though, so there's that.

Maybe I'll release this post-isekai game alongside fabled, the huckleberry cyoa and the bird knight dungeon crawler walking sim in some kind of bundle.

Hate selling my trash so it's prob gonna be pay whatever you want.

[beastinthecave]

I'm back. And it did not even take me multiple months to find work. Hurray.

It turns out that a full-time job is not the key to happiness. I never would have guessed.

Anyways, anyhow, anywho, let me bitch about AI again because if I see another 'author' talk about AI 'assistance' I will bite somebody.

The separation between 'plot' and 'prose', like chocolate chip cookies, is merely an illusion of the mind. Prose in a novel mostly exists to convey the plot, and important plot beats in turn spotlight good prose.

Plot and prose should constantly be bouncing off each other. Outsourcing one to AI *always* results in writing that rubs me the wrong way.

In my experience, there's something demiurgic about creating art. I like to approach writing and drawing and making games like trimming an ungrateful hedge that refuses to return the love I pour into it.

You start out with this heap of ideas. They branch and intertwine with one another, growing on their own like little weeds. My job is to turn this wild bush into a shape that is almost recognizable.

So, anything that exists in my tiny, single-plant garden without my knowledge exists without my permission. Anything that lives in my garden without me knowing *why* it is there is a possible pest, poised to ruin everything I have tirelessly worked on.

I hate the thoughtlessness, the lack of drive, and foremost the overwhelming lack of confidence that comes with using generative AI for anything. I hate looking at Artificially generated cocks. I hate to see that shit clog my feed. I hate to see it all over the interactive fiction tag on itch.

I can only pray to myself that I remember to-

Oh, right, I'm making game. Game just a glorified digital pop-up picture book. Other games releasing soon too. Might release together as big collection. Or maybe I'll keep them locked away in the vault.

[beastinthecave]

I just remembered that I'm still alive ^-^

My to-do list has also has only grown bigger and bigger. Mostly because I can't bring myself to deal with the tedium that accompanies the final stretch of any project. Guess this is karma...

I think part of the issue is that instead of actually unwinding when I'm burned out, I instead move onto a new 'temporary' project, which is really stupid. To compound my ever lasting misery real life keeps fucking me in the ass as though I were the average ao3 writer.

At this point, a roadmap on my games would probably look somewhat like this:

Weird short lizard hidden object game (It shouldn't take more than a day to develop)

Fabled (the game is basically finished. I just can't bring myself to look at it anymore)

The Huckleberry's dungeon crawler that has been in the works for a while now

The walking sim game with a bird knight as the main character (the 'look' for the main character is older than this tumblr account lol)

-Sorcerer's Eulogy (I have a semi playable outline. I just haven't gotten around to it)

Abhumans: Forgotten Heroes (Also got a playable outline for this one.)

Abhumans: Double Life part 2 (I have a new outline. It ain't playable though)

I'm genuinely beginning to wonder whether doing this whole game making thing is making my brain work worse. Like, I physically can't think of anything else. When I play a game I'm looking at which design principles I can steal for my own games. Whenever I'm reading I'm always paying attention to the word choice and sentence structure to figure out how I can improve my own writing on technical level, rather than paying attention to how they service the actual story.

At the start it was fun, it felt as if I was getting more out of the media I'm smoking. But now it feels more like studying than enjoyment.

Worst of all, I keep making new projects because I actually want to finish something, but that just results in more unfinished crap. >-<

This is all to say that I'm most likely going to disappear again for few weeks/months. Gotta focus on studying and actually making money for a change. That way I can continue to pretend to be a real functioning human being. How embarrassing smh.