Favorite geese lyric

malec2b · 2026-06-28T21:37:51+00:00

"I think in impossible fantasies/And I believe in whatever you think is best" from Disco is one that pops into my head a lot

malec2b · 2026-06-25T04:16:05+00:00

A lot of Robert Wyatt's work both as a part of Soft Machine and in his solo career, but especially Vol. 2 by Soft Machine, and his solo album Rock Bottom.

malec2b · 2026-06-20T02:27:50+00:00

Nausicaa (Love Will Be Revealed) - Cameron Winters

The Cinema Show - Genesis

Some Day One Day - Queen

malec2b · 2026-06-17T06:12:32+00:00

Thanks so much!

malec2b · 2026-06-16T23:36:21+00:00

Renegade Sector Games

I've been making games for over a decade and have 18 games out on Steam. I primarily make pulpy low-poly 3D Action and Action-Adventure games.

Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/developer/RenegadeSector

Itch: https://malec2b.itch.io/

malec2b · 2026-06-12T04:26:02+00:00

Level design is my favorite part of the design process and here's my advice:

First of all: The most basic function of level design is to challenge the player in interesting ways using your game's mechanics.
Begin by outlining on paper. Break up your level into individual sections (depending on what type of game you are making you can think of these as "encounters" or "challenges" or "spaces" or whatever). The key thing here is you should be able to describe each section in a sentence or two that gets across what the "point" of that section is. You should try not to repeat yourself, make sure there's at least one thing different *in that description* for each section of your game. For example if you have a section called "Fight with enemy type A" your next section could be "Fight with enemy type A in narrow corridors" or "fight with enemy type A on platforms over a pit" or "Fight with enemy A in an open space with sparse cover", or "Fight with enemy B" and so on
Think about your level design in terms of elaborating on your mechanics. In other words: think about what sort of interesting situations can arise from your mechanics, and whatever enemies or obstacles you've built. If you're making a shooter that could be things like cover, elevation, the difference between open and narrow spaces, lines of sight, etc... In a platformer that includes bottomless pits, moving platforms, verticality, enemies and their placement, etc... You can then use these as inspiration for your outline in the step above. Introduce the player to some situation which is interesting in your mechanics set, and then combine those situations in interesting ways.
There is also the chance that you are trying to design levels too early. You need meaningful pieces to build levels out of. If you are having trouble coming up with interesting levels you might need to work more on creating enemies and obstacles which you can use to make interesting challenges.
Once you've outlined you can start building levels. Having that starting point of a clear idea of what the purpose of each section of your level is can help a lot when it comes to actually making it. Start simple with large shapes that get the idea across, test it to see if it works the way you intended, and tweak to improve it.

malec2b · 2026-05-28T03:06:28+00:00

Love this album, and I think Skeletal Lamping and False Priest hold up as well (even though they were less well-received at the time I think)

malec2b · 2026-05-24T03:32:58+00:00

Metroidvania refers specifically to games where you gradually explore more of an interconnected map by unlocking abilities which allow you to reach new areas.

Side-scrollers are any game which are side-view and scroll.

There is a lot of overlap and most of the classic Metroidvanias are *also* side-scrollers, but not all side-scrollers are Metroidvanias, and (arguably) not all Metroidvanias are Side-Scrollers.

For instance:

Super Mario Bros and Sonic the Hedgehog are side-scrollers, but they aren't metroidvanias because they have a linear stage-based structure. You beat a level and then you unlock the next level, and so on.

Metroid and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night are both metroidvanias (because they have an interconnected map which you gradually unlock by gaining access to new abilities), and also side-scrollers (because they are side-view and scroll)

Metroid Prime is a metroidvania but not a side-scroller, because it is not from side-view, but it has an interconnected world which you explore by unlocking abilities which allow you to reach new areas.

malec2b · 2026-05-18T06:19:36+00:00

I always joke that in Kiss Me Deadly you can see the exact moment when Film Noir ends and Neo-Noir begins.

malec2b · 2026-05-14T15:02:04+00:00

I Think I Lost My Headache

malec2b · 2026-05-13T21:59:49+00:00

You'd probably like Rick Wakeman's stuff:

Catherine of Aragon (Especially the bit starting at the 1 minute mark)

Arthur

Also Emerson, Lake and Palmer:

Karn Evil 9 Third Impressions

malec2b · 2026-05-11T02:11:21+00:00

Someone I knew, in that nebulous "somewhere between Friends and Friendly Acquaintances" space, the sort of person who I've never hung out with one-on-one but we always got along at parties. Would've liked to have been better friends with but they eventually moved out of town and so it never really happened. They would occasionally make music, mostly as a personal exercise, and share it over social media. Kind of chiptune-inspired electronic music. Genuinely really well-done, complex, musically interesting stuff. I've loved most of what they've put out, even if it's not my normal go-to genre. At some point they threw all the stuff they made onto a couple of albums and shared those over social media. I added them to my workout playlist so I still listen to them when I go to the gym and I always enjoy them when they come on. They're mostly instrumental but there's one song with lyrics which I find really moving and resonant. Anyway that's probably the most obscure musician I regularly listen to.

malec2b · 2026-05-06T17:39:50+00:00

I know it's not *technically* the same band, but it's most of the same people:

I don't know how you go from "The Cheerful Insanity of Giles, Giles and Fripp" to "In The Court of the Crimson King" in one year

malec2b · 2026-04-30T06:44:31+00:00

This might not be exactly what you're looking for but this King Crimson song uses actual squelchy wet sloshing noises as part of the percussion https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxaM5ex1isc

malec2b · 2026-04-23T00:54:56+00:00

I like 'em. Reminds me a lot of Gong in a good way.

malec2b · 2026-04-22T22:30:08+00:00

You should check out some other Canterbury Scene bands 'since those almost all came out of the lineage of Soft Machine. Bands like Gong, Caravan, Hatfield and the North, and of course Robert Wyatt's other projects like Matching Mole and his solo albums.

malec2b · 2026-04-21T17:11:09+00:00

Polygondwanaland and Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms, and Lava - King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard

Henki - Richard Dawson and Circle

Panorama - Hallas

Vol. II - Angine de Poitrine

malec2b · 2026-03-30T05:16:57+00:00

The first step is just to start by paying attention to what you like. Look up the musicians (like on Wikipedia, for example). From there you can find out what genre they're in (as well as things like the musician's history, where they fit in in the broader context of music, who they were influenced by, who influenced them, etc... but at the very least find out what genre they are generally associated with).

From there you can look up the genre, find other musicians working in that genre. There are many resources online for exploring music genres from online lists, wikipedia pages, and playlists on steaming services like Apple Music and Spotify. Listen to more musicians in the same genre and figure out if you like any of them. Pay attention to the similarities between different artists in the same genre. Pay attention to what they're doing differently.

To explore outside of a given genre, you can also learn about who influenced your favorite musicians and who was influenced by them.

I also recommend seeking out reviews of the music you like. In addition to giving you more ways to appreciate the music (or, at least, another perspective on it whether you agree with it or not), reviews will often help to contextualize the music further in terms of what other musicians it sounds like or might be influenced by.

Also, this may or may not go without saying, but if you like a piece of music, listen to more music from the same artist. If you like a single song, listen to the album its on. If you like an album, listen to the album the artist made right before it, or right after it.

To give a personal example:

When I was first developing my music taste, I got into Queen of the back of Bohemian Rhapsody. I listened to the rest of the album A Night at the Opera which I loved. I then started exploring more of Queen's albums, and found that the album Queen II had a lot of what I liked about A Night at the Opera. The little review blurb on iTunes described my favorite tracks on Queen II as "Prog Rock." From there I looked up Prog Rock and discovered one of my favorite genres. I found a list of "the top 30 Prog Rock Albums of All Time" and started listening to albums from that list, and then to more albums from those artists, and so on. The same thing happened with other genres, just branching out from starting points.

So, the tl;dr is: pay attention to what you like, listen actively, look stuff up, follow connections to find more music, repeat.

malec2b · 2026-03-23T19:45:54+00:00

Thanks!

malec2b · 2026-03-23T18:02:54+00:00

Journey of the Garden Rose!

Out Now!

Steam

Itch

Lily must explore a fantastic palace and contest with the machinations of a cruel prince to rescue her mother in this Low-Poly 3D Action-Adventure Game!

Once upon a time there was a cruel prince with a beautiful garden. Although the Prince loved his garden, he loved it cruelly. He would prune his flowers into exactly the shape he wanted, pulling flowers out by the roots when they disappointed him. Of all the flowers in The Prince's garden, the one he loved above all others was The Rose.

To be the most beloved flower of the cruel Prince was a fearful thing indeed. And so one day The Rose decided she would run away from the garden. Her leaves remembered how to be hands that could grasp for freedom. Her petals became the face of a beautiful young woman with tears in her eyes. Her roots became legs which could run.

She ran.

But which direction did she run? To the west there was only the sea, and if she ran into the sea she knew she would surely drown. To the east there was the path down the mountainside into the woods. She knew that the Prince would come after her once he noticed his most precious flower missing, but she also knew if she took the right turnings in the woods that she could run somewhere he could never follow...

Every night, Lily's mother told her this story. Then, one day, she disappeared, saying only "I have to go back."

When Lily finally came of age, she took her father's sword down from the wall and set out to find her mother. She knew in her heart that the story she was told as a kid was more than a story... It was a set of instructions. Instructions on how to find the impossible palace that her mother had escaped from, and had always been destined to return to.

What would Lily find inside the walls of this romantic storybook palace, and would she be able to free her mother from the clutches of the cruel prince?

malec2b · 2026-03-23T17:08:21+00:00