Two blog posts in one month? That's unheard of. Anyway, this is just me wrapping 2025 up, talking about some things that happened this year and such. And I decided to highlight games I liked this year in a segment I called the PEER AWARDS. I hope you like reading, because this shit is at least 3k words.

Digital Art, since I'm a Digital Artist

This year was great for me in terms of art. I've improved THREE whole areas: colors, composition, and backgrounds. I still rely heavily on my inspirations and references (I want to be able to draw cool shit from imagination), but i'm getting better! I wish to practice drawing environment that is not nature, too; but that’s for 2026 me to figure out.

I was always insecure of how my art is kind of... meaningless? Because I just draw characters on white backgrounds wearing cute outfits. But now it feels like I can tell stories through my illustrations. It's great. That said, I do try to remind myself that all art I make is good, even if it doesn’t have a cool story to tell. Sometimes I don’t have the energy for a full scene, so I draw my blorbo in a maid outfit. It’s fine and helps me focus on enjoying the process and drawing what I like.

I still haven't fixed my productivitypilled mindset, but at least my art got better, so I freak out about my art being bad less.

I kind of Finally got into game development

I wouldn’t say that I’ve “always dreamed of making my own video game”, but admittedly it is something that has been on my mind! Gaming is a big hobby of mine, and video games are my favorite medium of art. I don’t know if it’s because I’m neurodivergent or stupid or whatever, but I have a hard time “consuming” art that’s only visual or only audial. I prefer video games because they combine visuals and audio and add a kinesthetic experience on top. They feel truly engaging as a result, entertaining me not just through their presentation, but also through motoric challenges they pose to my tiny fingers.

Additionally, I struggle to tell my own stories. I’m a digital artist, but I don’t like making sequential art (comics) because they take too long to draw. I can’t write for shit, if I put any dialogue in my art, it suddenly becomes 20% worse. And don’t get me started on fics, I suck at writing those. In time, I realized that I have to try video games as a storytelling medium: I’m good at drawing, so I’d make good visuals. I’m bad at writing, but it might be passable in tandem with everything else. Also, whenever I’d imagine my OCs in my head, it would almost always be in the format of a video game. The choice was obvious. I had to finally try gamedev.

I understood that making games is hard; that it takes time, effort, and knowledge – and so I never had innocent hopes of making my “dream game”. And this is also why I never seriously tried gamedev until just recently, which is honestly unfortunate – if I had that hope of making Hollow Knight 2 as a 14-year-old, then I would have more experience by now. Instead, I had to learn most things from scratch.

I tried Godot for the first time in 2024 and learning it was a satisfying experience. I got to see things happening on my screen because I typed some funny letters and numbers. Also, learning the basics wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be – some things in Godot are specifically streamlined for game development, and I also kind of like coding! I wouldn’t say I’m good at it, but it’s not something I actively struggle with, and seeing the result of my work was always cool.

Here is a mockup of how I imagined TFC to look like.

My 2024 Godot project was titled “The Fabled Cassette” and it was supposed to be a short platformer about two OCs that are very meta. I never ended up finishing it, but I put down the building blocks. I just had zero experience with level design but wanted to make this game in two weeks (?), so I didn’t end up making any levels. I also got intimidated by the amount of assets I had to draw. I understand what I could have done differently now and I plan to go back to making a platformer once I graduate university (since I will be able to dedicate a lot of time to working on it).

But enough about 2024, because 2025 was the year I made two finished, albeit short games!

I still think the title screen is cute.

The first one is a Renpy project, called “I don’t want to be lonely on this Valentine’s Day!!” or IDWTBLOTVD for short. I had a sudden idea of making an unserious “dating” sim about my characters for Valentine’s Day, so I made it.

It’s not anything extraordinary, and making this game did not require any (complicated) coding, but it’s a finished game! It has art and a story! There is FINALLY an easily accessible gateway to learning more about my characters! I am so glad it exists.

It was also my first attempt to make a game under a tight time limit – approximately 10 days to make the whole thing. And I finished development with time to spare! I think that if I set goals and plan things in advance, I am actually pretty good at getting things done. That is the one strength I possess and something I want to use to my advantage going forward.

The second game is a Godot project, called “Last Vacation Day” or LVD for short. This time I wanted to focus on applying my rudimentary Godot knowledge in practice. It was also my first foray into making a pixel art project.

Once again, I wanted to release LVD on a specific date – my birthday. I first started tinkering with it in June, but got interrupted by Artfight and only returned to development in August. So ultimately, I spent around two to three weeks on this game.

It is very simple on the outside; it doesn’t have gameplay outside of walking and pressing Z to interact with objects. But if you’ve ever made a game, you know that setting everything up takes time: the character movement, all the collisions, level transitions, events, menus, so on and so forth. It’s all a very satisfying process! I was able to refine my basic gamedev knowledge while also making a sweet little adventure about Scare and Rage. I think I did great.

I also started to dabble in PICO-8, but I haven’t made anything concrete in it yet. I want to make a fishing game, I think.

I have a LOT to learn if I want to make my “dream platformer”. I would have to learn how to code enemies and bosses, how to give funky properties to tiles, how to make good levels in general… But I’ll figure it all out in time, I’m sure. I should set feasible goals and make more prototypes, then I’ll be good, surely… I know things can go wrong and that overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer, but I think nothing’s insurmountable for me if I learn everything bit by bit, just like I learned digital art.

In the meantime, I’m slowly working on an indirect sequel to IDWTBLOTVD. It will also be a novel made in RenPy, but I plan to make it better in every way. I don’t know when it will be done, so no release date or anything.

Plurality and ME?

I’ve been thinking about this for a year now, and I’ve come to terms with the fact that I’m likely plural.

My plurality is not caused by a dissociative disorder, at least I don’t think it is – since I don’t experience what’s described as dissociation. However, it does feel like there are multiple instances of me in my head, working like a hivemind, trying to act like “Peer”.

I first started wondering if I may be plural because I experience something akin to emotional amnesia. My mood can change suddenly and rapidly, and after intense shifts I feel like a brand-new person. The same things cause different reactions from me on different days, I assign character traits to some of my thoughts (if that wording even makes sense to you all), and I feel like there is one part of me that’s social and put-together and the others are there to act insane.

The incident that convinced me that I can call myself plural happened (approximately) in September. It was as if a long-forgotten part of me from a decade ago suddenly came back. She can be mean and hysterical, but she is just scared. She is an instance of me, and I want to take care of her. If I had to compare her to a fictional character, she would be Lace (Silksong) or Jessica (BatteryNote).

I don’t know if my parts have names or preferred pronouns. I don’t even know if they like the avatars I made for them. I have no idea how many of them are there, and they certainly share memories. The thing that differs is the emotions everyone feels. So, I think my experience is closer to medianity.

Let me preemptively answer some questions:

• You can continue to call me Peer.
• You can continue treating me like you always did.
• If you notice me contradicting myself, changing moods and preferences rapidly, or suddenly doomposting, please be nice. Do not accuse me of lying, changing my interests too often, or being a hypocrite. I do not control this shit.

The PEER AWARDS!!!

I play less and less video games every year because of how busy I get with other stuff, but the games I play are always a highlight for me. They bring something new to my life, inspire me, and always change my view on life a little. I like video games, damn it. I want them in my blood stream. Let me highlight FOUR games that I played and enjoyed this year! I call this the PEER AWARDS because my rankings are based on how much I liked the games and nothing else.

Honorable mention: Rain World Watcher

Did you know that it is NOT normal?

Rain World is one of my favorite games of all time, and I don’t mention that enough, I think. I played it for the first time in 2018, but it was too hard for me at the time, so I came back to complete it two years later. My long-term memory is shit, so I don’t remember how it felt to play RW for the first time, and that makes me upset. I dreamed of being able to re-experience those moments.

I’d say that Watcher did a good job of fulfilling that dream, since this campaign is nothing like Vanilla or Downpour – it has a completely new map and quest, so playing it on release without any spoilers had me confused but curious about the new world I was about to explore. I had fun chatting about it with my friends, too, and they helped me understand what the main quest of Watcher is because I got unlucky and didn’t meet Spinning Top in the first SIX (!) hours of gameplay. On one hand, I felt bummed out that I “wasted” so much time, but on the other, I got to explore nine regions, and I had a ton of fun doing that. I never realized how much I like exploration in video games until Watcher because I rarely play games blind.

Exploring the regions was undoubtedly the best part of the DLC, but the story was also cool! It’s brand new and expands on the world in a way I didn’t expect. In the end, even if it has flaws (I didn’t talk about them because fuck the haters), I like the Watcher DLC. It adds an absolutely massive new campaign that I’m sure I will have fun replaying a few years in the future.

No. 3: Friendship Test

This is the out of context screenshot I will show you, yes.

I already wrote a 10k words blog post about this game but let me explain why it’s good again and without any spoilers.

There is no media that’s explicitly about lovelessness or aplatonicism, and there isn’t that much media that’s explicitly aromantic either. This is why Friendship Test was so important to me – it depicts my experiences as a low empathy, romance repulsed, loveless aromantic and aplatonic person in an authentic and respectful way.

The protagonist is allowed to express their distaste for romance and friendship, allowed to be aloof without being judged for it by their close ones. They’re also shown feeling depressed, growing up in a society that doesn’t accommodate for those like them; it’s said that they feel like a villain, like they’re inherently evil for not caring about others in the right way. It’s all soooo specific to what it’s like to realize that you are loveless, aplatonic, and neurodivergent, to the point where it felt like some parts of the game were pulled straight from my brain.

This is why this game is so good – it’s fucking one of a kind. Even if you are not loveless or aromantic or aplatonic, you should play it! You will get to experience a bittersweet story about cute cartoon robots. Trust. You might even realize that you are loveless or aplatonic, or other flavor of a-spec! I thought I had everything figured out, but I still came out as aplatonic (after identifying as demiplatonic since 2023) after playing Friendship Test.

No. 2: Hollow Knight Silksong

This game has ambiguous slavic bugs.

I mean, yeah, obviously. This game is hella good. I played it for two weeks straight until I got all achievements after 100 hours of gameplay – this alone should tell you how obsessed I was with Silksong.

I don’t even know where to start? I guess I’m a big fan of how this game is a major improvement from Hollow Knight: all the enemies have better AI, forcing you to learn their attack and evasion patterns; the areas feel more distinct and colorful, and each one has a clear place in the world; and, of course, the bossfights are way more interesting. This game is just HK, but better in every way. It feels like the middle ground between Hollow Knight and Nine Sols to me. The protagonist is also a woman, and the game is surprisingly full of #feminism moments.

I despise the community’s initial reaction to this game’s difficulty. All the whiny gamers came out to complain about “bad game design” during the first month of release, and it was so annoying to listen to. I didn’t want to upset anyone, but every time I heard someone complain about double damage or about how every enemy is “basically a boss”, I just wanted to defend Team Cherry’s wonderful daughter. Like, excuse me? Maybe you have to learn how to deal with these things? Games aren’t always easy. You kinda have to deal with the difficulty and teach yourself how to play the game on its terms. That said, I still think that Silksong could have used a difficulty/accessibility setting, all modern games should have them.

I’m sorry for being a Team Cherry apologist, but yeah, I like this game and didn’t like most of the criticism directed towards it. My favorite characters are Lace, Karmelita, Second Sentinel, and Twelfth Architect, by the way. Karmelita is my favorite boss too, if you even care. That fight is gorgeous and truly requires you to lock in, stay calm, and learn when to punish the boss, which is an aspect of bossfights I like the most, since I’m the patient type of gamer. My friend (hi Bug) tells me I should play Dark Souls, and I wish I could… I’ll buy it after I buy a new laptop.

No. 1: Myths are 100% True

More OOC screenshots for you.

Silksong is good, but Myths are 100% True is better. I’ve been patiently awaiting its release since last year, and it’s finally here, and it’s so good. The main story is only like 5-6 hours, but I have 30 hours in this game because I've been replaying it a lot. I already explained why I like the gameplay and presentation in my Steam review, and there is a short video essay that explains why MA100T is awesome more eloquently than I ever could, so I want to talk about something else in this paragraph.

This game is one of my main inspirations to continue game development because it’s so charming and personal to its director. It convinced me that it’s okay for me to like weird stuff and to reference it in my work, and that I don’t have to make my game 100% serious and depressing either. The optimism of the funny myths game is contagious, and now I hope that, someday in the future, the ideas I have for games will come to fruition; that even though they are currently underdeveloped, they will, in time, grow into something I’m satisfied with. It might take me a decade, or even more, but that’s fine. Life doesn’t end after your twenties; I plan to create for as long as possible.

It's also another reminder that I shouldn't be gravely afraid of failure. If I do something wrong, I can learn from it; and if it's not my fault, then well #FML I guess, but it's not the end of the world. Unfortunately I probably have an untreated anxiety disorder, so I'm constantly jumping at shadows and afraid of failing. More specifically, I'm afraid of what others might think of me, both university professors, friends, and internet strangers... I have to stop caring eventually. It's just a bunny.

Myths are 100% True helped me feel more confident in saying that I’m plural. One (two) of the characters, Whol Wheet (and his shadow), can be interpreted as a system, and I was silently freaking out as I read the dialogue after his (their) bossfight. The main protagonist asked if he should treat Wheet and Maslina as separate people or not, and that read like a very positive moment to me, a plurality win some may say. I was streaming the game to my friends, and the only thing that came out of my mouth was a stupid joke: “Plurality, or selfcest? You decide”. I later found out that I’m not alone in my interpretation and stopped feeling stupid.

Like I explained a few paragraphs back, I experience something akin to medianity. I often feel like I’m not fully in control of my actions, and that “someone else is in the front seat of the car with me in the back seat”. It truly feels like something is following me, usually silently, but that something can become visible from a certain angle – like a shadow. And I feel like my parts are at odds with each other as they react differently to the same things and have different opinions on some topics, so Hlev and Peka are a bit relatable too, as a plural metaphor. I also have a capitalist inside me, the one who always whines about not getting enough commissions and begs people to follow her on Boosty (please please please it’s only 100 rub a month and you get some bonus stuff in return please please pleas

My favorite character is Kaygano, you could probably tell from how many times I drew her. Her bossfight was also the one that made me realize that a difficulty spike was coming. I really like how the game gets harder and harder from that point onwards, and how every Super Myth felt daunting to me at first (especially Mezel, that was scary). Of course, once I replayed their fights and did them all hitless, they felt manageable – I just like how overwhelmed I was the first time I fought the bosses! I think it’s cool when Game makes you feel Things and when it’s not afraid of giving you a challenge. I like challenges in video games, you can probably tell.

Going forward

Do I have any resolutions for 2026? Nah, I don’t really do those. I will just set myself up for disappointment when I inevitably change plans.

I know that the first half of this year will be difficult as it will be my last semester in university. I am bracing myself for all the mental breakdowns I will experience from February to July. Hopefully though my graduation goes smoothly and the second half of 2026 is merciful.

I hope that I can continue honing my artistic skills, like I do every year. And that I can do more game development. That’s about it. Thank you for reading, and here’s to more stupid shit in 2026.