Blog: New Site and New Name
23 March 2024
Tagged as: #website, #chatter
The Site
Having an official website for my game dev projects has always been an aspiration of mine, and when I got into Neocities last year, I realized I finally had the skillset to do it.
I've also gotten tired of using social media as a creator. Game dev is a hobby, not my job, so I've always been somewhat sporadic with it. Trying to keep up with regularly posting across multiple platforms ends up being an uncomfortable balancing act between a mostly dead account and posting every month, "I promise I'm going to get things done this time! I'll have updates soon!"
I decided maintaining my own website would feel more lively even without updates, give me a better sense of control, and allow me to centralize my updates.
To balance the "going a long time without updates" and "having nothing to update" issues, in addition to the site's blog, which can be followed through the RSS feed, I'm including a Status Cafe widget, which can be subsribed to with Atom. Status Cafe offers an easy, low-pressure way to fire off quick thoughts, without the statistics and hashtags of social media to bog it down. I plan to use the blog for the big updates where I actually have a lot to say, and the Status Cafe as a brief "hi! I'm doing game dev right now!" alert. Feel free to follow either, or just check back on the website when you feel like it. If you're looking for a free feed reader, I personally use Inoreader, but there's plenty of options out there.
Major updates, as well as the games themselves, will, as always, be posted on my itch.io.
The Name
I first named my game dev accounts Pumpkin Snake Games, after my childhood pet corn snake, Kabocha. I've loved the name, but I've always felt like it's confined me to a very specific aesthetic that doesn't match how I want to represent myself online. When I decided I wanted to make a website, I had to contend with this. My partner helped me brainstorm some new logos and color schemes, but ultimately I decided I wanted a new name entirely.
I decided on Lavender Mocha: my go-to coffee order. It's a fun twist on an old classic – much like my game dev philosophy – and its aesthetic associations, rich browns and pastel purples, feel much more like me. It's also the thing I treat myself to when I want to buckle down and get things done, or celebrate an accomplishment, two feelings that are central to my relationship with game development.
I'm really excited to start this next chapter of game dev, and I welcome you along for the ride!