Idea for a birthday gift for my mom once I've gotten my VCR fixed: Record the entirety of my Y Plan Countdown tape to DVD so she can use it for her home workouts again.

My current fixation is a complete refactoring of my website's templating engine to lay the groundwork for more complex features, most notably conditional branching. Maybe I'm starting to veer into overengineering, but it's also kind of satisfying to see it all come together.

Tbh, Discord profile widgets related to showcasing games are kinda pointless for me because none of the games I play are actually in their database. Wake me up once they've got some Master System titles in there, at least.

I just got around to printing them out today! One of them will need some minor adjustments for subsequent batches, but other than that, I'm very happy with the results.

Popfan@gensakudan.com · last mo.

That said, today I made some templates I plan on printing out in the future to use for game-related concepts. Yes, they're all branded, and yes, I know of a shop where I can get these printed for like 9 cents per page.

I feel like a good example of why console generations as a concept fall flat is because I end up needing to spend a lot of time counting up just to determine which particular "generation" a given console belongs to.

It's kinda impressive just how many singers/bands/etc. that were ubiquitous in the 80s are still actively making music to this day, even if they have become completely irrelevant (judging by their lack of a place in the charts).

The VCR I ordered arrived today! Unfortunately it seems to have been damaged in transit. The tapes play back fine, but completely without sound, except for one. The seller suspects that the audio head fell out of alignment, so I'm gonna call up my trusted repair shop again.

I wanted to try out what it's like writing in a genkō yōshi, so I made a sample line or two on some scrap paper. Funny enough, the 8mm grids are a lot nicer to write in than the 10mm ones. Also tried out a new brush pen I bought myself today. I'll definitely need some practice with it, though.

Oh, I'm also planning on getting my hands on a VCR! Last weekend I went down into the basement and grabbed all the VHS tapes we still had in storage there. They're currently in my bookshelf, and I can't wait to have a way to play them back again.

That said, today I made some templates I plan on printing out in the future to use for game-related concepts. Yes, they're all branded, and yes, I know of a shop where I can get these printed for like 9 cents per page.

On my end, at least, I suppose I am finally getting some more breathing room. It's been helping me get my bearings so I can work on a self-care routine. Creative projects will likely be on hold for at least another week or two while I get *that* set up.

Kinda wish I had happier news to talk about, but it's been nothing but disappointment these days...

Make that another thing killed by AI. Holy shit, this stings, and I wish it were an out-of-season April Fool's joke... I found the project really educational to follow along with, so it's sad to see it end with only one game out of five fully decompiled.

ReC98@rec98.nmlgc.net · last mo.

ReC98 will end after the next delivery. I don't have it in me to compete with vibecoders, especially when y'all cheer them on for instantly delivering what you've wanted all along. And if you aren't cheering yet, you soon will; they're only getting better and more numerous.

Recent news about Sony planning on going digital-only by 2028 makes me think that that kind of trend is another thing I could potentially write a blog post about sometime. I just don't know if it'd have anything to add other than "enshittification bad, everything sucks, retvrn to retro gaming"...

Thinking about how Peri Fractic has the potential to be the next Tommy Tallarico (in the "resurrects a dead brand and then runs it into the ground again" way).

God, I just had the wildest idea: If I had a VCR and some blank tapes, I could use that to record gameplay in a period-accurate authentic way. Granted, I'd probably still need a capture card to get those recordings digitzed onto my PC, and I'm pretty sure my Dazzle is already on its last legs...

Snail Maze

SEGA City@segacity.bsky.social · 2mo ago

What game was built-in to your SEGA Master System?

All the spam emails I'm getting from scammers pretending to be specifically Amazon are pretty funny when you consider that I've purchased something through Amazon all of *once* over the past 2+ years...

These speedrun world record bots are weird. They're all like "BRAND NEW RUN RECORD VERIFIED!!!"... and the run itself has been up on the leaderboards for like the past two years now.

After half a year, I finally finished this book during a flight back home... and I gotta admit I'm a little disappointed. To start with, the writing is extremely sloppy. Missing commas, semicolons used in place of proper colons, names of brands and people getting misspelled all the time... (1/6)

Popfan@gensakudan.com · 9mo ago

Couldn't resist, so I got my own copy, which finally arrived in the mail yesterday! I haven't gotten around to opening it up yet, but I'm excited to give it a read as soon as I can.

Kinda wish I found more images/videos documenting how games were developed back in the day. I genuinely wonder how they did it without the conveniences that homebrew devs have today.

COMPILE development staff (1989). In the second picture is Katsuji Suenaga (planning, map design on Golvellius: Valley of Doom for SEGA Master System) and Koji Mizuta programmer on Ghostbusters for SEGA Genesis and designer/programmer of Gun-Nac for the NES. Via: MSX・FAN 1989-09.

N E E D

KΛMΛ 🌸🕹️🏳️‍⚧️@tamarakama.bsky.social · 2mo ago

@mjfouldes.bsky.social I thought of you when I saw this mat because it's SEGA Master System themed.. 😅💜 Sega Door Mat Entrance Doormat Non-slip Washable Carpet a.aliexpress.com/_mKaedJ5

Advertise your Bluesky account with a Simpsons GIF. Me with all my weird fixations and obsessions that almost nobody else shares:

Marge Simpson: I Just Think They're Neat!

Alt: Marge Simpson holding a potato. The subtitles read "I just think they're neat!"

static.klipy.com

Kelly M@kello-ren.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Advertise your BlueSky account with a Simpsons GIF.

Feel like the 90s (and, to some extent, the late (?) 80s) were full of just slapping gratuitous Japanese writing everywhere for the aesthetic. Wonder if Blade Runner is to thank for that...

Old UK Catalogues@oldukcatalogues.bsky.social · 2mo ago

1993: Video Games and Arcade from SEGA (+Cool Spot)

1993

I made a website to search and download games from the Game Maker 4 Games CD: gm4gamescd.quadolorgames.com I uploaded the CD to the Internet Archive a few years ago to help preserve it, but browsing it and trying to play some of the games was a hassle, so I decided to fix that. (1/4) #GameMaker

There's something kinda magical about talking to someone through emails as opposed to instant messaging.

Been getting quite a bit into Master System Light Phaser games lately. It's something I don't have much practice with, so I've been playing a lot of Marksman Shooting/Trap Shooting/Safari Hunt to develop a feel for it.

Browsing Japanese auction sites and stumbling upon stuff is my form of doom scrolling. I wouldn't know what to do with those so I hardly buy anything, but just getting to see those is great. Here, a box of Shinobi carts for the Master System / Mark III.