@AZ0RZER0 - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: In what ways would you say the internet has impacted you? Would you say you see the world differently because of it?

I can say for sure that I couldn't be the person I'm now without it. While dealing with the outside world is always essential, I cannot stress how much I learned with the Internet, whether it was gore, porn, memes or just current events all around the world. While I'm still not one to start a conversation or talk all the time, I'd say the Internet helped me desensitize myself to a lot of topics and being able to talk about them more openly and with less hesitation.

Q: Who is NG for? Do you feel different about the site now compared to when you first joined?

Just like the slogan says, everything here is made by everyone and so, made for everyone. It's a place for animators, gamers, developers, artists, musicians, writers, but also a place to meet new friends, to have a laugh, to have a talk, to share a bit of yourself. I love this site just as much as I loved it when I discovered it 4 years ago. At the time, I only cared about revisiting old classics and playing games. But now, I come here for everyone. I come for the threads, the pranks, the collabs, the jokes, the folks, mostly the Supporter Party as that's the one I use and love the most, and then the projects themselves. There's so much to see besides reviewing the submissions on the Judgement Portal, which was almost the only I did for most of the previous years.

Q: How do you know when you like a piece of art? What are the elements that resonate with you, and why do you think those elements have that effect on you?

I look for something I find entertaining that provokes a certain emotion, but in a technical standpoint, I don't think people should feel stuck with an incredibly strict model of what is acceptable because it's possible to tell a great story with visuals or audio without needing a proper story or character development, or even a great story with simple visuals. Art should provoke and total submission to the norm can kill that aspect.

Q: What advice would you give to people dealing with depression? What music did you listen to, and what movies did you watch? How do you come up with ideas for new projects? What is the theme of your projects, and why do you think that theme is present? How did you become interested in creating animations, and what is your process for making them?

My desire of making my own animations came in the end of 2020 shortly after Hybrid Theory’s 20th anniversary release, as after his passing, I went back to listen to their origins, and when I came across the Xero demo tape, I listened to it non-stop for 2 years straight. Being my favorite band and having bangers even in their earlier stage, I waited with excitement for the HT20. But Fuse was not there, and Stick N Move was different from the tape. Seeing no one was talking about it, and there were almost no AMVs for me to binge, I decided to try to take matters into my own hands and make an animation for it. I never finished it, and I lost my progress in the floods of Flipaclip updates, but it was a Firestarter.

My ideas come from all kinds of sources, making it impossible to point out exactly what leads me there. It justs clicks. It can be a memory, an activity, an emotion, a song, etc... In that sense, I believe the theme of my projects drift around whatever it's on my mind, with the one of the only consistent features being mood. I gave it three types of mood based on these three emotions: happiness, sadness and anger. From that point onwards, every theme can be seen in any mood, from the cutest and innocent to the gruesome and disturbing, from the stupid and nonsensical to the coolest and badass. I say this seeing as between what I'm working, there's brainrot, there's gore and there's characters just hanging out. I prefer to give a fair share of shiningness and darkness instead of focusing on one ang getting bored of it, hence why style of lack of curves gets constantly interrupted by characters with big circular heads. That way i try new things without nuking what I had.

This model I use to make my projects follows the principles of a personal theme for me that I'm now going to discuss: depression. Yeah, I suffered from it during the first 9 months of 2024 and of course, it was hard. It got in the way of my responsibilities and I focused so much on the despair and hate I had for myself instead of standing up and getting my shit together. But after feeding my mind with suicidal fantasies that couldn't be accomplished and locking myself away from everyone, I started to learn from it.

Anger, sadness and happiness all come together to make you a human. You will never learn everything you need from just being happy, as that will make you naive, something I was for a good chunk of my life. Those dark thoughts can teach you great lessons. Regret reinforced me to not get gratification on harming others; loathing to not get too full of myself and to not be dependent, but also to see that I'm still no less than everyone else. I started being more apathetic, avoiding unnecessary troubles and keeping a chill behavior. Don't let those feelings take a tool on you. Use them as reminders of who you are and what your purpose is instead of convincing yourself that they're not there. No tears, isolation, self-punishment, meds, support or therapy will have any effect until you stand for yourself and learn to live a relation of mutualism with your darkness to become a stronger person.

Q: How did you become interested in swimming? What is it like having parents with a swimming pool that you use every time you visit them? Why do you enjoy going for long walks through the city, and what music do you listen to while you walk?

My dad, being a PE teacher, was always supportive of sports and hobbies. Despite not having an interest in sports, I still attended lots of activities out of school, one of the earliest ones being swimming. While everything had strict rules that required constant teamwork and complicated schedules, this one did not have places to go and every time summer came, we always stopped everything we were doing at some point in the day just to enjoy the pool. When playing football or basket felt like chores, swimming was always natural for me, as a moment when I'm not being judged, a moment when I can forget everything for a bit and relax, even more than going to the gym.

As for long walks through the city, it helps me to think and come up with ideas. I like to stay in my room, but too much at once leads to burnout and lack of willingness to do anything. I also think about it as to do with the fact that I lived in the city until I was 6 years old and then moved to the countryside. When I traveled to the capital for college, I felt relieved with the ability to go anywhere I want on foot or public transport while having a much more interesting view to look at. I prefer a city that never sleeps than a small town haunted by a morbid silence. Maybe my preferences will change in the future, who knows? Until then, this is where I feel I belong. To combine with that vibe, I tend to listen to Canadian pop-punk like Avril Lavigne, Green Day, or Sum 41.

Q: Why do you think you prefer watching instead of reading?

Laziness. I like the fact that art can express itself through more aspects than just words, but the main reason is that I'm too lazy to read. I already have so much to read for college, I just can't do it in my free time.

Q: What is the Newgrounds community like?

Awesome. Very charming and supportive without sacrificing the jokes and criticism. Just that nice balance.

Q: How would you describe your experiences with 4chan and Reddit? What are the differences between them, and have you noticed any changes in their cultures over time?

I always despised social media in general for how fake they are, just resorted to show lame dresses, ugly makeup and places of people I don't give a fuck. For these two, they stood out in their pros and cons. Reddit is great for finding specific information on a topic but its upvote system gives the stage to the popular opinion and overshadows the rest. In 4chan, the stage’s open for everyone, all being anon treated equally in terms of access, making it very open for discussion and my favorite of the two. Some people love to brag about acceptance when they’re no different when it comes to other views on Reddit and on 4chan, thinking that just because one board offends them, then everything is this and that, when really you can just disable the NSFW “offensive” stuff and just have a normal talk or even make friends. 

Q: Where do you think your interests stem from, and how would you define your personality? How is personality constructed, and how do interests play a role in shaping it?

Personally, I describe myself as an honest person, quiet, even though much more vocal than just a few years ago, curious and patient. I try to see people for what they really are and help in what I can, but all with its moderation. I’m no one’s slave nor a host for leeches and I’m surely not afraid to put anyone in their place if they get too cocky.

I like to learn about all kinds of stuff. There’s much more beyond the what’s “important” as people want new ideas to the table and that can only come when you extend your knowledge and culture to other horizons besides your familiar ground. But I also don’t want to fill my head with the most basic NPC shit if that means forgetting everything else to become a normie, so I’m always searching for something new, even if it sounds completely random like “Who invented the spoon?”.

Q: How did you come to consider yourself an atheist, and from your perspective, what is religion? Why do people have beliefs? Why did you want to visit all of the sacred capitals last summer?

I had that standard catholic background of going to church on Sundays, having a catechism class and praying when sleeping at my grandparents’ house. It was so outdated, so lifeless, so preppy, so unnecessarily rigorous, and most of all, it was useless for me. What benefits did I get from prayers? Most of the people that tried to reinforce me into with were just a bunch of jealous and gossiped losers. But then I started to find a pattern: all those euphemisms and metaphors were thrown around without any specification or organization on what was honest and what was figurative, making the whole thing easily corruptible and hypocritical. Big balls for a guy to kill millions with the excuse they were all sinners while sparing liars and monsters he knows about has the perfection he makes himself to be. Oh, but you believe or don’t believe and that’s it. But what do I believe if you’re just gonna be vague about it and shape it for your own gain? There’s no point in calling it a religion at that point. So yeah, I felt my resentment and skepticism did not fit with the indifference of agnosticism and I became a full-on atheist.

Different opinions come from different beliefs, some making more use of it than others as it can serve as a source of hope and strength. If they feel it helps them get going, good for them, no one’s going to take that away from you. Having an interest in history and philosophy, religion tends to be a major subject, to which I find it fascinating to a personal but not emotional level. So, I had the idea of visiting the Holy Land, Mecca and Medina, if possible, as visiting the place itself would be much more exciting than just simply studying it from a far. At the time, things looked peaceful, but that’s not the case right now. I’ll have to wait a bit longer, but I really wanted to go there at least once in my life, again, not for religious motives but out of sheer curiosity.

Q: What is the purpose of politics? Why do you personally dislike extreme ideologies? Where do extreme ideologies come from? What defines an ideology? What constitutes good satire? What does a more civilized discussion about politics and the Internet look like?

Personally, I don’t like extreme points from both sides as I feel like they represent two perspectives that are too exaggerated to be put into practice in a good and functional way. These, just like every ideology, come from people and the society they live in, depending on their necessities and interests, with some having completely different focuses despite their closeness to the political spectrum. In this sense they also come to fight any kind of oppression presented, with the extreme being exact opposites. But I’m not someone who pursues one for what they believe as that would be unfair and biased. To fight this favoritism, I look for satire to make fun to criticize both sides of the same coin and promote a clever and balanced discussion of the topics, while also staying away from most political arguments on the Internet as they tend to choose sides based on what the media tells them to, rarely being civilized.

Q: What makes a good video about Internet drama as opposed to a bad one? What elements are necessary for it to be considered edutainment? What do you think about MrBeast and Chris Chan? What have you learned from watching drama videos?

It all comes down to only two factors: accuracy and neutrality regarding the subject at hand. In an online world where misinformation spreads like wildfire, these are essential to understand what's going on. In the case of Internet drama, this goal tends to be much harder to reach, requiring a long and detailed chronology of the events, always following the rule of “innocent till proven guilty”. While there are archive channels capable of reaching this goal without giving their opinions, just like Bowblax’s videos were during the Pokimane drama that brought him into fame, drama creators can give useful points, if it doesn’t corrupt the main information. Regarding how those points come across, it’s up to the creator to decide whether it be through jokes, gaming streams or whatever, including production quality as you don’t need to be high tech to be plausible and slop (commonly used term for spam content). This last one tends to be thrown around a lot as it add nothing to the conversation, to which I disagree because news are always being updated and can change trajectories from day to night, requiring more updates in lesser time and for people whose purpose is gather information, some moments there’s a lot to talk about, others not so much, but we should not ignore details. That way, they can be seen as edutainment as it informing the audience of the situation while functioning as a form of entertainment in the way it's presented.

Being now more specific about MrBeast and Chris Chan, I will say the following. MrBeast did achieved good ends in a lot of his videos, giving a big contribution that a lot of jealous Twitter users disregarded since day one. And it's not his fault that Kris turned out be such a scumbag. There was no way of him knowing it before hand without having to violate Tyson's privacy, which is a right that should be respected. In that part, he acted correctly. Does this justifies how he treated his workers and let pedos involve themselves in the business? No. While he couldn't have full control of everything, there's still so much stuff wrong here for him to be innocent.

Chris Chan is also a perfect example of how things are not black and white. He reached popularity on the Internet at a time where moderation was next to none, allowing for much harsher trolling than what we have now, he was indeed mistreated at a time that, just like nowadays, had lots of misconceptions and much up into interpretation about Asperger Syndrome (it literally stopped being recognized less than 2 decades after it was accepted), and was surrounded by flawed people. But at the same time, he wasn't (and definitely not now) an innocent angel. He could have left at any moment and he wouldn't have received all of this if he just shut the hell up and not said a word about personal information like his house, parents, teachers and so on. He was a victim, sure, but he also victimised and made a fool of himself when it was clear he knew what he had to do.

To be honest, seeing the amount of looney tune-like arguments at the center of online drama, it just reinforces to me the importance of knowing how to argument and understand how the legal world works to scare the ignorance away. MAybe it could have been one of the reasons why I decided to study law.

Q: What is the LGBT community from your perspective? Where do you think your views come from, and why do you think other individuals think differently than you do?

It comes from a bit of tradition of education, as it promotes the most accepted view by even the more conservative ones, and the others from people I met in high school and college, as I was in a private school until 9th grade where there was not much diversity in that sense, at least from the ones I interacted with. After getting out of that bubble, it made a little shock with my reality as one thing is seeing it on tv, interacting in real life is another story. While I appreciate the support given by that community to people with a closer reality, I can see how our elder contemporaries still have outdated views as it all changed from one day to the other in terms of acceptance.

Q: How do you think people are influenced by racial identity? From your perspective, what does it mean to discriminate against someone based on their race?

It’s one of those things you are immediately put into without choice and the only thing you can do is live with it as a part of you, to which society unfortunately doesn’t treat everyone as it should. The past showed us all how using race as a way of judgement is flawed and justified some of the worst acts in the history of mankind and useless conflicts that could have been easily avoided. It's stupid and unreasonable, making enemies when we could have been friends or just normal citizens that share the same world. Everyone counts, not just you.

Q: Where would you say your interest in more sensitive topics stems from, and why are you interested in sharing your thoughts on the topics?

I feel like it’s something that comes when having an open and mature conversation, being a much better way to deal with taboos than simply ignoring them and let people keep their beliefs for themselves, thus allowing for much more ignorant ideologies, despite knowing that not everyone feels comfortable taking about it and can be seen as triggering when you talk about it all the time.

Q: Why do you think you contemplate death in this specific way? Where do your thoughts come from? How do you think other people perceive death, and why do you think they view it that way? What is your experience with how others see the Murdoch school shooting as a suicide? Would you say you see it differently?

Death is a delicate theme as it’s natural and will come to as all, the emotions find it hard to accept that one day even our most beloved ones will turn into a thing to be buried or cremated. Seeing how everyone will be subjected to this fate, it’s also public, having the possibility of being covered by the media. When I say media, I refer myself not only to news and shockumentaries, but also to movies and storylines than center themselves on the exploration of twisted and evil mindsets. Because of personal experience from loss or fear, some find it offensive, believing they don’t have the right to talk about it, to which I disagree. Life is made of good and bad moments, and society mirrors it. So, when it comes to differing fiction from reality, that’s up to the legal guardians and schools to doctrine the morals that should be followed. It’s their responsibility to teach the youth about the fakeness of the image instead of staying silent.

Q: What is it like to be in your second year of studying law? How did you decide to study law?

It’s been alright. It’s hard, not gonna lie. People don’t call it the Medicine in human sciences for nothing. I just decided right at the last hour as I’ve never been someone that had a clear idea of what I wanted to do, but I wasn’t gonna hesitate either. My mom’s a doctor so I thought of studying medicine, but when I saw my grades, it was clear that I would get a better shot at humanities.

We will end up interacting with jurists and lawyers in some way in our lifetimes, but somehow, it still feels a little alien like for most people. When you study it, you start to see notice law's omnipresence and diversity while it teaches you how to develop arguments and build a more confident and trustworthy way with words. To be honest, seeing the amount of looney tune-like arguments at the center of online drama, it just reinforces to me the importance of all these teachings.

Q: Why do you think you love dark and transgressive comedy, like Sam Hyde jokes? What is a Sam Hyde joke, and why do you say you enjoy it in moderation? You mention there's always a 'too soon' moment; why would you say that comedy is subjective?

I find it funny in the sense that jokes can be seen as a form of satire and mockery in all kinds of themes, including taboos that would never be mentioned in a conversation, without being taken too seriously. This definition also includes the type of humor used by comedians such as Sam Hyde who constantly makes sketches that use sensitive terms in order to get a reaction from the audience, like that one time in order to make fun of TED talks, he came up dressed up in a shitty costume and a PowerPoint full of offensive slurs and anime references, to which some found it to be too much they even left the room.

Now in terms of context and situation, that’s another story. Comedy is subjective and not everyone will find you funny and that’s ok. It can feel tiresome joking about the same kind of stuff all the time, so a change of pace is always good for me, hence why I say I enjoy it in moderation. There are moments when we can joke about 9/11, other times it’s better to take things seriously as I imagine people wouldn’t take that type of comedy in the aftermath of the tragedy nor those who had clear contact with the victims, moments which you can say are just “too soon” to joke around. Technically, no one should be private of free speech and it’s funny to piss people off occasionally, it’s mandatory to understand the context and situation where you’re landing yourself in, both for the comedian and for the audience as words can have a whole different meaning without it.

Q: Why do you say you can't get enough of Brain Rot? What is Brain Rot, and what makes it so stupid and over-the-top that you see it as the next step in meme culture, leading previous memes not to extinction but to evolution?

It all started with “21st century humor” in 2021, which was already random, and now, it’s the same thing but on steroids.

For anyone that has even the smallest contact with the Internet, memes are no strange thing. They’ve always been here, and they are here to stay. It starts as an inside joke about an already existing subject, stops when everyone moves on to another thing when it’s popular enough, only to come back when it finds a new way to become popular again. So, when people say memes are dead, I disagree. Just like in nature, “nothing is lost, nothing is created, everything is transformed”, and so as skibidi. It picked things from the past like Minecraft or Gmod and adapted it to this new type of comedy.

Q: How did you come to have a playlist with more than 3,600 songs? Why do you like to listen to a variety of music, and what different genres do you enjoy?

My parents had tons of records, and we would hear from Bob Marley to Massive Attack, Metallica to Guns N’ Roses, Dire Straits to Santana, Sade to The Police and Pink Floyd to Supertramp. With all this diversity, it was a lot to take in. At the time, I told people I was into alternative rock, which meant bands like Linkin Park, Coldplay and Evanescence. Yeah, it wasn’t specific at all. But after watching Mission Impossible II with that Limp Bizkit cover along with Bullet in the Head by RATM, I had dived into all kinds of metal.

Last year, I watched the movie Pi, which soundtrack caught me off guard with all the fast drumming and chaotic mixing. It sounded like nothing I had ever heard up until then. When I searched, I got exposed to the iceberg of drum n’ bass. After encountering this, YouTube recommended me videos with anime characters and tracks categorized as “breakcore” along with a song called “generic incelcore song” that introduced me to epunk. With this, I ended up where I’m today, having a playlist of songs ranging from rock, metal, punk, pop and dnb.

Q: Why do you think sports don't resonate with you, yet you still watch them when your country, Portugal, plays in the Euro or the World Cup?

While I don’t care much about the sports part, I feel like it’s worth watching something that represents the nation in a tournament with much vaster competition. It’s like if I don’t care for it, no one will. It’s one of those moments when you feel like you’re a part of a big union, even if it’s made up of mostly people you don’t even know. What do you call it? Patriotism? Love for the homeland? Idk, but it feels special.

Q: How did you become interested in experimenting with sonoplasty, making your own sound effects and ambiance? You often distort everything and use whatever you have in your room at the moment, whether it be Monster cans, M&Ms, scissors, clothing, or even trying some death metal growls, squeals, and screams to create hellish sounds.

After playing Half-Life, I became fascinated with how distinct their sound effects were. While they confirmed they had just gone to the sound library and chose already existing sounds to put in the game, it gave me the will to record my own audio files instead of just picking the same sound you heard a million times before. And seeing how copyright has changed over the years, now being unable to put the songs I want in a project without fear of legal action, it sounds like an even better option.

As for the sounds themselves, I try producing them with common tools as some of the biggest sound libraries in history were produced at a time when there was no way to transport the recording material outside the studio, thus having to produce it all by themselves alone with their creativity. That way, you can also use it to create an ambience, describe certain characters and so on. With distortion, who can produce even more unique and alien-like noises, being able to use in all kinds of genres, not just horror.

Q: You studied at a conservatory where you played the pipe organ. You stopped 8 years ago. Why? How did you come to play in your college's tuna (a group of students that play traditional music and serenades). How would you describe your experience with playing music? How did you become interested in traditional music, and what is it like being part of a group?

While it was fun to play, it was an instrument I couldn’t replicate at home, so I had to stay there longer to practice. I stayed there from 1st to 5th grade playing pipe organ, having choir and musical education classes, spending at least 6 hours there every day of the week, some having to wait a total of 3 hours to have the next class. As I was too young to have a phone at the time, I would get easily tired, thus having lower grades in some of these classes, only to head home at 9 pm at having to study for school tests. It reached a point when it was unbearable, so I decided to make a “gap year”. After that, I decided to give up entirely.

Now years later, I wanted to have some extracurricular activity in college instead of just studying, so I went to the tuna. I really liked it. Everyone is just chilling in that room playing, joking, smoking, drinking, you name it. As of now, I don’t play anything, I just sing. Learning an instrument takes time, and I still haven’t had time to do it.

I always liked traditional music as I felt like it was something sacred that people didn’t give the proper care it deserved. In Portugal, there was a time where the regulations had to change to add more national music because no one would play it, which is a shame. It has a simple organization, but it feels genuine. “Fado” is that equivalent of people playing a guitar and singing in the streets, giving life to the city, thus never sleeping.

Q: Your favourite food and beverages

I’m the kind of guy to eat whatever comes to the table, and I like both junk food and gourmet food. For beef, my favorite cut is rump steak, chicken legs, pork is belly (bacon), fishes are codfish and salmon and vegetables are mushrooms and broccoli. As for beverages, I’m a sucker for sodas and energy drinks, the best ones being Coke, Dr. Pepper, and Monster.

@VIATHINE - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: How did you become interested in creating art and designing characters?

A. I always liked creating art ever since I was little, particularly cartoon drawings, having been inspired by childhood shows and movies. Realism never enticed me as much as the vibrant and expressive nature of cartoons and I'd constantly try to recapture that magic I saw on the screen in my sketchbook. It wasn't until I played a game called Fire Emblem Awakening that my interests began to veer towards character design, however. In that game, you'd unlock party members throughout the campaign, each with their own unique designs and personality, and I'd always be itching to see what the next one would look like and being very excited upon seeing them; it inspired me to start making my own characters instead of just redrawing existing ones. I wanted to show people my ideas and hopefully someday have others feel that same joy and excitement from seeing what I had to offer as an artist and character designer.

Q: What is your advice for building the habit of creating art?

A. I think first and foremost, you need that passion in you to create art. You absolutely do not want art to feel like a chore, it is something that cannot be forced. You need to ask yourself "am I doing art out of love or some kind of obligation?" because if it's the latter, you likely won't yield favorable results. There is no one-size-fits-all advice I can give to help people get into the habit such as "draw in your sketchbook once a day" because everyone's routine is different but I do think that something we artists all have in common is we love doing what we do and that's enough to fuel our drive to create.

Q: How have Tyson Tan and Tom Fischbach inspired you?

A. Tyson Tan is my art idol, really. I said earlier that games and shows inspired me to do art but Tyson Tan's work is the final nail that got me to lock in if that makes sense, it's what made me go "this is what I want to do for real." He specializes in drawing robotic anthropomorphic characters in a way that perfectly blends organic and mechanical design elements and a lot of his work draws inspiration from Chinese themes and mythology, which really resonated with me since I'm also Chinese. I love cute things but I'm also a big fan of "cool" stuff such as robots and Tyson's work taught me that it's possible to seamlessly merge the two.

Tom Fischbach is another artist whose work played a big role in shaping my work into what it is today; I stumbled across a post of his on Deviantart by pure happenstance titled "Tkturials- Digitigrade Legs Guide," which was an in-depth guide on how to draw digitigrade legs for furry characters. The idea of having a character walk on their digits, mimicking their animal counterparts, was a concept so foreign yet fascinating to me that I wanted to practice drawing it; I browsed more of Tom's art for inspiration and used his style and Tyson's as the basis for developing my own over time.

Q: Can you share the story behind your username: VIATHINE?

A. This is a weird one and actually not the first time I told this story. I was in Shanghai, I had just finished having mushroom soup dinner and was waiting outside the restroom for my friends and had nothing else to do so I started brainstorming names for my OCs. Viathine was one of them. In hindsight these were very goofy so I never ended up using any but for some reason, I didn't want to get rid of Viathine so I reused it as a username. One byproduct is the name now reminds me of mushrooms and I pray that you, the viewer, don't start associating me with mushrooms after having read that.

Q: How did you discover the Newgrounds website? What inspired you to join the community? How do you feel about the site now compared to when you first joined?

A. Newgrounds is a site I was always aware of but knew little about up until recently. Not even I can remember the chain of events that lead me here so I guess you can just chalk it up to fate, hah. I don't regret it though, I've only been here for a month but it's already starting to feel like home. There's this strong sense of community on Newgrounds you can't quite find on other platforms and it's very refreshing.

Q: How would you describe your experiences playing League of Legends?

A. Aptly put, I don't like it. I mostly just play it to socialize with my friends and when they forcibly send skins to my account to guilt me into playing with them. Two good things I did get out of League, however, is the treasure trove of inspiration from its champion and skin designs as well as meeting an amazing and influential artist in a match by pure happenstance. That's the person who convinced me to start putting my work online this year and it was the best advice I ever took.

Q: In your opinion, what makes a video game good?

A. I'm not versed in game design enough to gauge the objective quality of a game. I just think that if you enjoy playing something, it is good to you.

Q: What inspires you to study character designs from video games?

A. I think it has to do with games being an interactive form of media. When I play a game, I myself am put into that world and so I'm more likely to "understand" the characters in it. I mostly look to games for inspiration because they allow me to evaluate their designs from various angles, figuratively and literally, that other media cannot offer.

Q: What makes a good show?

A. Very similar to my previous answer regarding games, animation and storytelling to a lesser degree aren't my forte so I don't think it's my place to judge a show's quality on an objective level. I simply engage with the media that makes me happy and inspires me to push my art in new ways, that's all there is to it. Never let people tell you you're wrong because you enjoy something. Ꮚᵔꈊ’Ꮚෆ

@23i - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: What is it like living in Sweden?

Sweden is a good country, but like all western countries we get increasing wealth inequality which causes both child birth rate declines and increasing difficulty getting into the housing market for first-time buyers. The municipality is not doing too well deciding to spend $500 million on a healthcare system from 1997 which when deployed didn't work and for instance removed words in the diagnostics comments such as "no bleeding" became "bleeding". Now it has been withdrawn from production and will probably not be deployed 2024, if ever. So it feels good paying a lot of tax knowing that it's being spent responsibly.

However, there are good things about it as well. Our air, nature and in general happiness is good. I am about to become a father and I think that's one of the best feelings in the world. I really hope my child can grow up in a good society though, and I will do my best to make sure my child is safe. I am really interested in attachment theory and I've been listening to Psychology in Seattle to get a better idea of what it is and how I can incorporate this into my own parenting. I'm excited nontheless.

- Hardware Story

Something I remember from when I was younger was the release of Battlefield 2. It was an incredibly beautiful creation, and I desperately wanted to play it on our computer that Dad had bought through his work. I decided to purchase the game at the nearest GAME store. When I finally got home, I took the disc out of the game case and placed it in the computer's CD drive. As the installation program started and chugged along, it felt so wonderfully close.

Once the files were in place on the computer, I found the .exe file for Battlefield 2 and launched it. As usual, the program seemed to create a black screen while waiting to load further. However, something happened - the game didn't continue loading but instead closed back to the desktop. It was my first experience of having hardware that was too weak for the software.

Q: Have you had many experiences with hardware issues? What are your thoughts on hardware in general? How do you feel about computers and technology?

I've been interested in technology for as long as I can remember. My first game I played was probably Super Mario Bros 3 on NES while getting my hair cut by my mother because it was the only way I could sit still. My interest continued but my parents, well mostly my father, was sceptical of technology and in particular didn't like that me and my younger brother spend so much time at the computer. We had some allowance though and that was really awesome. Either way, I had a chat with my father about my future and what I wanted to do. He told me that because I like computers so much I shouldn't work in an occupation where I sit at computers all day, because I will not do anything else. I felt like this resonated with me and it made sense. However, it wasn't the best of advice because this made me pursuit less optimal routes for me, and I ended up working in IT anyway after a detour.

Q: Your opinion and experiences of the Internet

As for my internet experience, I started out with the classic modem, connecting through the phone line simultaneously locking the phone line so no one could call in our out. One fond memory I have is playing Need For Speed 3 online with one of my classmates when I was around seven or eight, where we called each other on our father's mobile phones in order to chat. It was incredibly laggy and almost unplayable, but also glorious at the same time.

Q: The story of your username: 23i

My username stemmed from me discovering FL studio when my friend had it installed on his computer and I was at his place. I started producing and boy was I a beginner. At the very least I had played some piano from before so I had an idea of what notes fit together, but the mix was just all over the place. Either way - when I finished the song on his computer, I wanted to upload it somewhere. Since I had used Newgrounds for the majority of the 2000's, it was finally time to become a member so I could spread the music. 23i was really nothing but a random sequence of characters that I thought looked and sounded cool, so that's what it became.

Q: How did you discover the Newgrounds website? What inspired you to join the community? Do you feel differently about the site now compared to when you first joined? In what ways would you say the Newgrounds community has changed over the years, and why?

Alright here we go, haha. Some of these questions really make me think about how it was back when I first discovered Newgrounds as a site. I think it was searching for flash games while also learning how to install and use flash player. It was a hassle but once I got the hang of it I really enjoyed my time here. I remember playing Pico's school a lot and being really impressed with what people could come up with just using Flash 3. For me, the abstraction was a little too big for the time I was allocated by my parents to spend at the computer to actually be able to produce something worthwile.

Q: What would be your advice for creating music?

As for my advice for creating music, basically, do whatever you're comfortable with. Install some DAW and play around with the interface. There are tonnes of tutorials on youtube for instance now, and it should get you going. Or find a friend that has it on his/her computer and bother them until they help you make a song and learn in the process.

Q: What's the story behind you creating music for @Hyptosis's Relic?

Hyptosis Relic is really cool. I was actually approached by Hyptosis himself in DM asking if he could use my song A Figure Approaches. It was an awesome experience and I am still very thankful for Hyptosis DM and it's super cool seeing something I made in a game on the website that really meant so much to me over the years.

Q: Your favourite food and drinks

I love Kung Pao Chicken, but really, meatballs all day.

Q: What is your advice for being happy

For me, being happy is really about having your family close. It doesn't mean close in distance, but just close contact. I also make sure to keep myself active and in shape so I can play with my child(ren?) when they grow up, and in extension, live a happy and long life.

@BroatsShorts - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: You were inspired to become an animator after seeing Nicktoons for the first time in 1992, with your second major influence being Adult Swim during your high school years. Why do you think animation resonates with you? How do you distinguish between good and bad animation?

I suppose animation resonates with me because it's a stylized, colorful and exaggerated version of reality, and can communicate things in a really punchy and simplified way that I find really satisfying. I always had a wild imagination as a kid, and animation can replicate the stuff I imagine in my head. I also have ADHD and I feel like cartoons are a really soothing balm for the ADHD brain.

As for good and bad animation, it's largely a matter of taste. Things can technically be "poorly" drawn and animated but be fantastic. For instance, shows like Life and Times of Tim or Ten Year Old Tom are really deliberately rough looking, but I love the style and the writing and acting are great. Anything with a specific point of view that's executed well on its own terms is something I appreciate. At the end of the day I tend to especially gravitate toward shows with really punchy, poppy, memorable character designs & colors, and humor that is kind of absurd and weird and over-the-top - The Amazing World of Gumball, Invader Zim, and The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack are some of my all-time favorites.

Q: How did you develop your process of starting with a concept, writing the script, then recording a “radio play” of the dialogue, followed by creating an animatic? You move on to designing and painting backgrounds, exporting scenes for animation, compositing in After Effects, and finally editing in Premiere with audio. Have you experimented with different workflows, and how did this particular process come about?

It's just the typical process I've encountered while working in the industry. I've worked on a bunch of shows over the years (Rick and Morty, DuckTales, Final Space. Pickle & Peanut, Future Worm, Randy Cunningham 9th Grade Ninja, Animals [on HBO]) and I'm always really interested in the entire pipeline and observing how everything gets made at each step. A lot of people get locked into their particular bubble (character design, boards, etc.) and don't really venture outside of that specialization, but I always wanted to be able to do everything from start to finish on my own. I haven't really experimented with other processes because this approach really works for me.

Q: How did you develop your series Broats?

Broats was initially just a joke in my head combining Check It Out With Steve Brule and My Little Pony. Steve Brule always mispronounces "boats" as "broats", and to me that word sounded like a goat version of "brony". So after chuckling about that for a minute I realized it could be a funny name for a cartoon, and started working backwards from there. I initially pitched it to Cartoon Network, but the setup was a lot different. They were 3 goat bros living on a farm, and a human kid came from the city to take a job as a goat herder. The goats would follow him around and try to learn how to be cool like humans. They were more exaggeratedly "bro" stereotypes in this version, and the names Chad, Thad and Reggie were intended to sound like frat boy names.

CN passed on it, and a couple years later while walking through a farmer's market at the Americana at Brand (a famous outdoor mall in Glendale, CA) I saw a petting zoo set up with some goats. That was a lightbulb moment where I realized a much funnier premise for a Broats cartoon - the goats run their own petting zoo inside a mall like the Americana. I pitched that version to Nickelodeon and they greenlit a short, which was made around 2013. They also greenlit it for early development, but wound up passing on it. Eventually the rights reverted back to me and I decided to just make it myself, with some of the original voice actors returning for the roles of Chad & June.

Q: What are the defining attributes of a concept that you believe are worth developing into a script? What is your process for scriptwriting, and what would you say is the optimal way to structure a script for an animation pipeline?

For the current Broats shorts it's pretty simple. I usually get a specific, quick gag in my head. Like, with "The Cake Is Lava", my kids were watching tons of "Is It Cake" and "Nailed It!" and they also love "The Floor Is Lava." It was a simple, dumb gag that popped into my head. So if something like that occurs to me, I'll write it down, or make a post it note with the general title of it. I have a whole list of these little titles and descriptions on my phone.

When I need some new scripts I'll pull one of those and then open up a screenwriting app called Beat to flesh it out. As far as how to structure it, Broats is kind of different to trying to write a whole 11 minute script, which would have a different structure. With these it's often more like a comic strip structure, a quick setup and then a punchline. That said, as far as optimizing it for animation, I do consciously write and board stuff in ways that allow me to simplify the animation and minimize poses and movements and locations and such. I do really strive to be economical and do a lot with a little.

Q: What does it mean to be an artist?

Being an artist just means doing anything creative in order to express yourself and communicate a message. I'm pretty open to almost anything being art, if the intention and thought process is there behind it.

Q: Your advice for artists starting out

Don't wait around for someone to give you permission to make what you want. Just start doing it. I'm much happier with Broats now than when I was trying to make it at Nickelodeon (even though I'm not making any money off it now). At Nick I got so many notes and so many limits and so much pushback on my particular take on it, and then they cancelled it. Now I'm free to do exactly what I want with it. I wish I had just done it myself years ago!

If you do your own thing and make what you're inspired to make, it's all practice that'll make you a better artist. It can eventually help you get seen by folks that might be able to help you get work in the industry, as well.

Q: What are some common misconceptions people have about animation?

I think one misconception is that cartoons are somehow a lower form of art, and more base and shallow than other art forms. Even within animation, the stuff that more people feel comfortable recognizing and celebrating the value of are things that are clearly high art, like a Ghibli film, or a very somber and serious independent animated film. I think there is a tangible and high spiritual value in something like a really funny episode of Spongebob, or an incredibly executed joke in The Amazing World of Gumball. That stuff is sublime. It taps into some kind of divine energy. A lot of adults are just too insecure to allow themselves to recognize that.

Q: Why do you think there's this misconception that cartoons are somehow a lesser form of art? What would it take to change that perception?

I think most adults are very insecure. They don't feel secure in their "maturity" and are afraid that if they like cartoons others will judge them or see though them and realize that they're not actually "adults." I think they think they will be judged and ridiculed and ostracized from "grown up" society if they indulge in "childish" interests. I suspect a lot of them had parents that kind of beat any kind of imagination or creativity out of them, as well. In any case, I don't expect that perception to change much. It's their loss!

That said, I was talking to a friend recently and their take was that the generations coming up now are going to continue to appreciate cartoons into adulthood and maybe change that. I hope he's right, but even if he's not, I don't really care what other people think about cartoons. I just feel pity for them that they can't let go of their insecurity and enjoy themselves.

Q: What are some animated series and films that you would recommend, and why?

Ok, I'm going to recommend a show that seemed to get a lot of pushback when it came out. It's a show that I worked on a little bit, as well - freelance BG paint on a few episodes. Pickle and Peanut. I get why people judge it on the surface and assume it's going to be really awful, but it's one of the funniest shows ever made. The pilot is a bit shaky, but give it a few episodes to get the hang of it and you will not be sorry. If anyone has the animatics to this show, do the world a favor and leak them online. They are the funniest animatics I have ever seen in my life. They were almost funnier than the show sometimes because the drawings were so unhinged. Anyway, justice for Pickle and Peanut!

Q: What is bad advice that you think artists get and why do you think that advice is bad?

I don't know. I know a lot of folks have the mindeset of "draw every day as much as possible, fill up notebooks upon notebooks with sketches until you get good." It's not bad advice, but I don't do that myself. Maybe I'd be a better artist if I did! But I like to take time to take lots of breaks and enjoy other aspects of life that might inspire my work in between all the drawing.

Q: Art resources you would recommend

I don't have a great tip for this. My biggest art inspiration and references are just watching lots of cartoons that I like and playing video games. Do that.

Q: How did you get interested in the K-pop group aespa?

So in the Broats universe there's a kpop group called V35P4 that's a parody of the real life group aespa. I got really into kpop during the COVID lockdowns because what else are you going to do (besides also reading all of One Piece)? As a visual artist I was especially drawn in because of the wild visuals and colors and style of the music videos, which are really over the top. There's tons of groups I love, but aespa specifically have a really cool aesthetic to all of their creative output. They have a very iconic poster from their "Savage" era that was really easy to use as a reference that I felt people in the know could easily identify.

Q: What do you like about Xenoblade Chronicles?

If anyone has ever played Monkey Island and run into that pirate in the Scumm Bar with the big button on his lapel that says "Ask Me About Loom," that's me with Xenoblade Chronicles. For many decades Chrono Trigger was my favorite game of all time - I love JRPGs, but that one has some of the best characters, story and music. Then when I got a Switch I caught wind of Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and heard that Tetsuya Takahashi was involved, and that Yasunori Mitsuda had done some of the music. From the minute I turned on that game I was completely hooked - it felt the closest to a '90s SNES JRPG in spirit of anything I had played in decades. Absolutely loved it, and it replaced Chrono Trigger as my fav game and soundtrack. Since then I've played the first Xenoblade and Xenoblade Chronicles 3, as well as all the DLCs, and have a budding collection of art books, soundtracks, and amiibo. I am beyond hyped for Xenoblade Chronicles X Definitive Edition to drop next year.

Q: Why do you think you like One Piece and Pokémon?

I've always loved anime. Even as a little kid I watched stuff like Unico, and when I was older I got hooked on DBZ and Tenchi and everthing else on Toonami and Adult Swim at the time. When I moved to LA I had a friend with a garage studio whose walls were completely covered in One Piece figures. He told me it's the greatest manga/anime ever, you gotta check it out, etc., but of course, like most people I balked at the sheer volume of backlog. I knew that once I started it I would like it, but I put it off for a decade until just before the pandemic hit when I finally began reading the manga. Once the lockdown started it was like, welp, I guess I can really catch up now! It really is the greatest. All those annoying people bothering you about it are right.

Pokemon I mostly love for the character designs. When it first came out on gameboy, I actually didn't like the gameplay (blasphemy, I know). Like I said, I loved Chrono Trigger. I heard it was an RPG like that, and I was disappointed that it was mostly about collecting and battling (battling was my least favorite aspect of JRPGs) and very light on story. But I love the character designs so much I eventually got into the games as well, but they take a backseat to just enjoying the artwork of the creatures.

Q: What is boba tea, and why do you like it?

Boba tea is tea with chewy tapioca pearls in it. It originated in Taiwan in the '80s, but now it's a worldwide phenomenon. I first had it when I visited my brother in college in the early '00s - it was almost nowhere in the US back then, as far as I know. They were calling it "bubble tea." Anyhow, I was a big coffee guy previously, and thought tea was watery and weak tasting, but here in LA there are such great tea places that I actually switched over to milk tea. I'm pretty picky about it. There are only a handful of places that really make a legit good milk tea with high quality tea brewed really strongly, and to be honest, I personally rarely add boba to it. Similarly, I only really like a good, fresh boba made in-house. RIP to Cha Bei-Bei, which used to be the absolute greatest boba & milk tea in LA. Currently Motto and Chapresso are some of the better options in the greater LA area.

In the Nickelodeon days of Broats Chad was super into coffee - a reference to how coffee was allegedly discovered by goat farmers who noticed their goats eating the berries and going bonkers. In the newer Broats shorts I switched the characters over to boba, because it's more fun, more specific, and it's more true to my own taste nowadays. The tea shops around me know me by name because I'm in there all the time.

Q: What has been your experience with skateboarding?

My experience skateboarding has mostly been being really bad at it and not able to do any tricks. I can do a small ollie if I'm standing in one place. But as someone who was a kid in the '90s it is burned into my psyche as being cool, and I still enjoy skating around. When I worked at Disney TVA I would bring my skateboard to work and skate all over the campus. When Pokemon Go! came out that was a really fun combo - skating around the Disney campus & catching Pokemon. Anyway, to me the visual of these goats skating around a fancy mall was really funny, so they skateboard. Recently the new Scott Pilgrim show did a bit of Lucas Lee skating the Americana at Brand mall and I both loved it and was kinda bummed about it because it's so similar to what I wanna do with Broats.

Q: How did you get interested in astrology?

When I was a little kid I had a little hardback children's book about astrology with like, one page spread on each sign & like one or two sentences about them. I'm a leo sun, and it said something corny like leos are leaders, and that's it. But I was always interested in mysterious and mystical kinda stuff, so it remained on my radar. When I got really deep into tarot and astrology was during the 2015 leadup to the 2016 elections, when the world was starting to look really scary and I wanted some sort of thing I could lean on to try to see a little more about where things were heading. I think a lot of other people had a similar experience - when things get scary and overwhelming in the world you reach for something to help you though it. I actually wound up pulling back from it a bit in 2020 because the astrology of that time was just really intense and depressing, and I was just like, ya know what, I'd rather not know! I'm just gonna read One Piece until this is over.

Q: What tarot decks do you own, and what have you learned about yourself through tarot? 

I own a few decks, but I realized quickly that the only one I get really clear results with is the classic Rider-Waite deck. It's just the most clear imagery for me, and some of the newer ones, while beautifully illustrated, kind of water down the message for me personally. I suppose I've learned about myself through tarot, but mostly it's just a good philosophical framework for processing the world in general by breaking it down into archetypes.

Q: How to become a certified Hellenistic astrologer?

There's an astrologer named Chris Brennan who has a podcast called The Astrology Podcast. He has an online course you can take to get certified, so I did that a few years back. He's got a fantastic book on Hellenistic astrology that serves as the textbook for the course.

Q: Favorite food and drinks!

Like I said, I love milk tea. But it's gotta be a very strong black tea, like a ceylon or assam, brewed very strongly. A very minute bit of sweetness, brown sugar or maple syrup, and then something thick like whole milk and or cream so it doesn't get watered down. That's peak milk tea.

Favorite food - I spent some time in Italy as a kid, so a really well made and simple pasta with tomato sauce. I lived in Napoli so it's gotta be that southern Italian style with pretty much nothing in it but olive oil, garlic, tomatoes, salt and basil. Adding anything else is blasphemy.

But I love food in general, especially international cuisine, so living in LA is like paradise cuz it's got everything and you can get it pretty authentic in the right neighborhoods.

Q: How would you describe your experiences of playing and writing music in a band during high school and college? Do you carry that experience with you when creating music for your shorts? What software, instruments, and VSTs do you use in your process? What is your philosophy and overall perspective on what music represents? Finally, what have you learned about yourself through creating music?

My experience playing music in high school & college was pretty much like my experience doing any other creative original works - I felt like very few people cared or noticed or liked it! But there were a handful of fans that really did, and I largely did it for myself because I liked it. When we were doing the Broats shorts at Nick they asked if I wanted a composer, and I said yes cuz I didn't trust my abilities and wanted a pro. It turned out I didn't vibe with the music they were presenting and I wound up writing all the music myself, ultimately, with the composer we hired just helping record it with in their studio.

I'm not that technical, equipment wise, I just use garage band and plug a guitar and bass in, use the distortion presets in there. I lay down some drums with the keyboard. It's really simple and bare bones, but I think it works. Again, I grew up in the '90s so a lot of music back then was just that. I was a huge Weezer fan, and the Broats theme is loosely based on "El Scorcho" by Weezer.

I don't know what my philosophy is on what music represents, I just want it to have a kind of fun, irreverent vibe that matches the tone of the show, and feel a little bit '90s as the show is somewhat a spiritual throwback to old Nicktoons and CN shows.

Through creating music, I have learned nothing, lol. Just to make what I like.

Q: If you were to create an inspirational catchphrase, what would it be?

Goat for it!

@Andrey20 - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: The story of your username: Andrey20

:I used to have another account called Andrey2010, but I lost access to it so I had to create a new account, I didn't bother with a name for my new account and I just removed the number 10 from the name of my previous account, so it turned out Andrey20 :)

Q: How did you discover the NG website? What made you decide to join the community? Do you feel differently about the site now compared to when you first joined?

:To be honest, I have been familiar with NG since 2020, but I did not decide to create an account, then after 3 years I decide to create my first account on NG (and I mentioned it in 1 question) I lost access to it and then abandoned NG for a while, but on March 3 of this year I am creating a new account (by the way, an interesting fact is that my mother's birthday is March 3). And so I came to NG for medals and for good content.

Q: How did you become a medal hunter?

I became a medal hunter when I realized that I was making great progress in this.

Q: What makes a good or a bad medal? How should game developers make medals?

:I believe that what makes a medal good is when it is possible to get it, and I consider bad medals to be those medals for which you need to fulfill very insane requirements, for example, play the game 123456789 hours. I recommend that developers do everything possible to get a medal.

Q: What are your favorite games on NG?

:I really liked the game Abobo's Big Adventure, it is immediately clear that it was made with a soul, I also liked the game Madness: Sierra Nevada (Halloween UPDATE) also a very cool game.

Q: What makes a good game?

:I think the game is good when it has a good plot and good graphics.

Q: Your advice on medal hunting

For novice medal hunters, I recommend going through simple games to achieve great success, it is not necessary to play games 24 by 7, if the game is difficult, postpone it for later, perhaps you can pass it in the future.

Q: What is it like having a cat?

:It's great to have a cat, especially in my case, when my cat walks outside alone and then comes home.

Q: Your favourite food and drinks

:I like black tea, mostly I eat meat, potatoes, salad.

@Porter - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: What do you like about art, and would you say that art is therapeutic? How does it help you, and do you think about art differently than you did before?

I love how there are possibilities in breaking the walls of what was once thought to be impossible and exploring what you can do with the tools that are offered both digital and traditional. It's therapeutic to me because I get joy during the process of making it, and when it's finished, there is always something new to learn from every piece that further advances my skill and could potentially push the boundaries. I think about art and being creative a lot more differently than when I was getting started like night and day.

Q: What advice would you give to people who want to draw but are dissatisfied with their current skill level?

Don't feel let down about not drawing what you want to draw or even feeling unmotivated at some point in life. There are going to be times where you need to take a step back and focus on the things that matter most. When there are times where you feel a sudden spark in making something, write it or doodle it down somewhere to save it for when you're ready to work with it.

Q: What drawing advice has been most helpful to you in developing habits and gaining knowledge?

I can't stress this enough, but, practice. Learn the fundamentals and apply it to simple doodles. Look at art thats good or bad, and think about what makes it good or bad, apply it to your art. Keep doing this and apply a specific style you want to your works to stand out or be a part of an art movement/aesthetic. Practice is key to learning new things, and continuously working with what you're learning is key to building a habit.

Q: How did you get interested in animation?

I got interested in animation since I was a kid watching Disney princess films and reruns of various cartoons all on VHS.

That was all we had until we got cable and full internet access later near my middle school years. When we did get internet access, I had a DSi that had Flipnote Hatena. That was where I really became amazed with every animator on that platform and wanted to be like them grown up. And well, I'm sure 10 year old me would get his pants wet seeing how far I have come.

Q: What is the NG community, and how did you join? How would you describe the culture, and do you have to do something specific to fit in or be called a "Newgrounder"?

A welcoming one for that manner. The community feels like what Flipnote was to me as a kid, a fun and engaging community that welcomes all levels of creatives. I joined at a weird time in 2018 where the great Tumblr migration occurred, which funnily enough, was not the reason why I joined. Eventually, as of recent, this is the only platform I am exclusively posting regularly on. For the last part, I don't wanna determine what makes someone a "Newgrounder" or to fit in, but just be yourself and only make what you're passionate about. There's always an audience that will love what ever it is that you put out and follow you along your journey. A lot of what comes out of this website is from people who are passionate in what they make and only do it because they love doing it.

Q: Can you describe the experience of doing additional animation for Mix 'n' Match?

Fun, easy to work with along with getting feedback from Nine when there came time to work on an episode. I learned a lot of things in each episode and it's great getting the feedback to improve on the next batch of episodes. Hoping to work with him again soon and also potentially work with everyone else here looking for an additional animator for their projects.

Q: What was it like creating backgrounds for Glyde the Dragon?

That was my first experience working with an independent studio and getting to know what it's like having something you contributed to be included in a major piece of media. The backgrounds I made were for the intro video to the indie game of the same name. It felt trippy seeing something I made be in a video game. Wish that there were more I could have made, and maybe some more opportunities for other games/animations would be awesome.

Q: What animation and art inspire you, and why do you like them?

I have so many art pieces and animations that have inspired me over the years, from the Hatena legend BosS to the indie animator Don Hertzfeldt and some animators on this website who are killing it like LiteralHat and ImPage. When it comes to artwork, wish that I had enough room for every single one to mention, but a good few I love are shotty, carmine3, ennuikal, birdblitz, and Wildblur are all that come to mind. Those mentioned or not, I love their art because they're unique from all I have seen be put out as of recent and it gives me inspiration.

Q: Why do you think you don’t get sick very often?

Not eating a lot of crap! I do the best I can to not eat too much while being careful not to eating the same things. Working out too, although I don't work out often, I do my walking and occasional gym visits every so often when time is available. One other thing, two bottles of water and an apple per day keeps the doctors happy!

Q: When did you get interested in glassblowing, and how would you describe your experience?

Right around 2022 and it blew my mind once I found out that there were classes you could take in my area. Enrolled in the classes and it eventually grew with me. Overall my experience has been good, with some good and bad days at the studio, there's always something to learn from every session I partake in. Not the absolute best at it nor have I completely gotten all the shapes down to be perfect, but only with time added in each day I enter the shop, I'll eventually get better with a new understanding of the material and tools to use for the project I want.

Q: How did you get interested in the art aesthetic known as "Metalheart" (also referred to as Depthcore and Trendwhore)? And thank you for allowing me to use your art for the album cover of my royalty-free instrumentals

Not a problem! When I first discovered the internet as a kid, I had kept seeing a lot of it from various websites and short video reels. I was fascinated by the animation and rendered shapes that I wondered how it was done. Now all grown up, I've gotten the time and drive to not only learn 3D modeling, but also replicate what I saw as a kid on the computer.

Q: Do you have any advice on being cool and collaborating?

Super corny but just be yourself. Don't put yourself in a bad group of people who'll take advantage of you. Find something new that you find cool and put some time to get really good at it. As far as collaborations go, I'd find a good number of people that envision your idea(s) and ask around to see if they'd be willing to work with you on a project. Getting rejected is not the end of the journey but a starting point. So keep people on tab, ask friends if they know anyone who'd be down to collaborate with.

Q: What food and drinks do you like?

Just about everything really. I am not a picky eater and will munch on just about anything that's given to me. However, funny fact about me, I really enjoy drinking cranberry juice and it gets people to come up with funny "old people" jokes. The pomegranate or grape variation are awesome and good for your body too, trust.

Q: Games that you enjoy and why?

I enjoy hopping on Terraria and Quake. I have been a die-hard fan of the Portal series and the lore behind it. I love everything about it from the dystopian environment to the gameplay to the characters that make the games shine.

Part 2:

Q: What misconceptions do you see people having about art and animation?

The biggest one that I have noticed is either seeing people feeling bad about using a reference or people getting heated over someone using it during the process. I can see why someone would only trace a reference and not really learn something out of it, but at the same time, some people really need to get angry over other things that are more important. The artist will eventually learn to draw without using a reference, it's all part of their own journey.

Q: What do you enjoy doing when you go outside?

Walking and drawing on my sketchbook with some music playing in the background. It's always a treat when I get the chance to do that once everything from personal to university projects are completed and have nothing to work on. A great way to get out of the little room and think about your surroundings outdoors.

Q: What are some songs you like?

I like just about everything, lately I have been getting back into some deadmau5 tunes and some OSTs from Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross. Classic hip hop and Drum n Bass are also bops to put on while I work on stuff at the studio or in the car. A song I like lately is "Re_Jaded - deadmau5" and an album I listened to lately is "Above - Mad Season".

Q: What’s your opinion on fashion?

An everlasting evolving form of art & design that I could never catch up on nor understand entirely! Only type of fashion I could get myself into would be street wear like baggy jeans/shirts or big sneakers (oh Osiris' when will I ever get you...)

Q: What are some of your favorite dishes?

As mentioned, just about anything, but I do like some buffalo wings and fries. Always my go-to and its enjoyable to eat in any occasion in my opinion. That or spicy chicken sandwiches. Those are the bomb dot com!

@larrynachos - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: How would you say the Internet has impacted your life, and in what ways do you think it has affected you?

1. The internet has affected me in both positive and negative ways. It is a portal to the world's information and entertainment. It did a good job of giving me perspectives outside of my bubble, before algorithms shoehorned us into cliques and restricted the variety of information put in front of us. I feel like it helped me discover what was possible, I probably wouldn't have become a musician or game developer without seeing how accessible it had become. In the past few years though, the amount of time I spend online has decreased significantly. It's no longer about enriching my knowledge and connecting with others, everyone is just trying to use misinformation to distort our perception and provoke conflict, as well as monopolize our attention with cheap brain rot.

Q: What is Newgrounds, and what is the story and context behind you joining? Why did you join?

2. Newgrounds is the last surviving refuge for genuine creativity in the AI age. It's a great place for creatives of any size to be seen and appreciated. I think the sense of community has splintered into somewhat tribalistic cliques in recent years, but overall I like to think we're one big happy family.

My first exposure to Newgrounds was Eddsworld and Final Fantasy Daycare, both of which I was introduced to by my sister. My first newgrounds account @larynachos was created in 2010. I wasn't really a creator back then, I just used it to play games like punk o matic, chaos faction, and territory wars.

I don't remember exactly what inspired me to make this new account. In 2013 I downloaded the trial versions of fl studio and construct 2. The limitations of each software (not being able to re open project files in FL, and having a limited number of events in construct 2) forced me to iterate quickly and keep ideas simple, making songs start to finish in a single session, and keeping games simple, procedural, and repayable. Around this time I also pirated flash and tried making a few animations, but I'm a terrible artist/animator so nothing really came of it.

The first users I befriended on newgrounds were @thatawkwardkid, @etherealwinds, @cyberdevil, @cacola, and @teravex, among others. I'd always struggled with making friends in real life, the interests of those around me never aligned with my own, so making these connections in Newgrounds really helped me feel like I belonged.

Q: What games do you enjoy playing, and why?

3. The answer to this has changed now that I have little free time ^^; I grew up on Nintendo games, we've had every Nintendo console and handheld. I used to love open world games that I could sink dozens of hours into. Minecraft, Ark, 7 days to die, sea of thieves, just to name a few. Nowadays I play games that have shorter round-based gameplay loops. I used to play csgo but that game is too sweaty. I play a lot of dead by daylight with my mom and brother in law. On my phone I play hearthstone battlegrounds and pokemon tcgo (rest in peace the old version). I like games with minigames for that same reason lol. If I had more time, I would play more narrative games like the Yakuza series. I played all of 5 and like half of 7 but I just don't have time anymore.

Q: How did you get interested in making music, and what are some of your favorite games?

4. As a kid, we had a huge electric clavinova piano that you could record and save midi songs on. I don't know how to play piano, but that didn't stop me xD I also got an electric guitar in 2013, which I also have no formal knowledge with but I still like to jam on from time to time.

The second part of the question is a little redundant lol, I answered above. It's hard to pick a favorite, do I pick a game that I play the most, or a game that gives me the most nostalgia, or a game that I had the most memorable moments in? What you should have asked is "how do the games you enjoy influence the games you develop", to which I wouldn't have much of an answer either lol. My games aren't really inspired by anything, when I'm not collaborating with artists my game ideas revolve around the royalty free art assets I can find online x.x I suppose there are a few that could be traced back to old flash games I enjoy. Shoot your goo is inspired by Hanger, bandits and barbarians is inspired by the old stick archer games. Just little things like that I guess.

Q: What advice would you give on developing games?

5. My advice for developing games is to not neglect preproduction. I'm guilty of it for most of my games. I just dive right into development without a clear vision of the entire game's scope, which bites me in the ass when I try to build additional features that are incompatible with my original code and either requires a bunch of hacky fixes or a complete rewrite. Preproduction also prevents scope creep and keeps you from stalling because you're not sure what to implement next. Write out a game design document with all of your ideas, then organize it and structure it in a way that will streamline your development journey.

Q: You've created multiple Madness Combat games. What do you like about Madness Combat?

6. I mostly made madness combat games because my artist friend YuriKadry enjoys the series. Madness Roulette was originally going to be a pico day game with characters from multiple series, not just madness combat. I chose to make madness roulette instead when Yuri and I were thinking of madness day game ideas back in 2021. I like the series for its simple style and modular body composition which makes them easy to animate.

Q: What is Newgrounds culture?

7. Newgrounds has many cultures, but I guess if I had to sum it up, the core values of Newgrounds are creativity and collaboration. "Everything by Everyone"

Q: What do you like about music?

8. I like music because of the way it makes me feel. My dad raised me on rock music, but once I discovered electronic music I was hooked. Every other genre is seemingly defined by it's limitations, but electronic music is all about experimenting and defying expectations.

Q: How do you define color bass?

9. The defining characteristic of color bass is constraining atonal bass sounds to a scale, and layering it with twinkly high end sound candy. It's heavy bass music but it sounds pretty because it's all in key.

Q: What do you like about the VST Pitchmap? 

10. I like pitchmap because it accomplishes exactly what is needed to make color bass. It takes a sound and snaps the frequencies to that of the selected scale. It takes a lot of tweaking to sound right, and of course you need to pair it with other effects, but it's a very powerful tool to turn atonal sounds into something cool.

Q: What makes Castle Crashes are good game?

11. The diarrhea deer

Nah in all seriousness, it's a combination of satisfying art, animation, music, and sound design. It all just meshes together so perfectly. The levels were unique and varied. The progression keeps you playing, but the option to switch characters and do it all over again kept it from getting stagnant. Any game that can tell a story without words is a good game. I played so much castle crashers on the 360 as a kid.

Q: How did you become an audio moderator, and what do you do as an audio mod?

12. I was nominated to be an audio mod a few years ago, presumably for my contributions to the audio portal cleanup thread. As a moderator, my duties are going through user flags to find and remove songs that violate our terms of use, and to review copyright appeals. When I first started as a moderator, going through flags was a regular part of my routine in the morning. I will admit that I don't work as diligently anymore, but I still go through flags when there are too many, and I'm always available for people to ask questions and appeal our decisions.

Q: What advice in life has helped you the most?

13. I'm a very anxious person, I'm always worrying about things and running scenarios in my head and trying to predict every outcome for every situation I may or may not encounter. It constantly leaves me burnt out. And one day when talking to my mom about it, she told me to not worry about things I can't control. I still overthink a lot, but it helped.

@ConorKehelly - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: How would you describe your personality?

Dry. But I like to find the humour in everything. People have said I am pessimistic at times but I think I am an optimist at heart. I just like having a laugh really.

Q: What is animation?

A magic trick that somehow turned into an artistic medium

Q: How would you say having unrestricted Internet access has impacted you, and has it helped with your interest in animation?

Yes. I think without the internet, I would never have got into animatiton and developed such esoteric and niche interests. I think the internet forces you to take in every world view from every type of person imaginable. I used to watch really innapropriate things during the wild west of the internet, but I think exposure to these things gives you more time to compute it. Some people end up just getting an overabundance of information shot into their brains in ttheir 20's when they suddenly start partaking in internet culture and it feels like when a caveman gets thawed out of ice in the future and goes insane due to seeing flying cars. I never saw animation as a childrens medium due to sitting on newgrounds when I was young so I think I understood that animations had the power to deliver a wide range of ideas if the viewer was open to it.

Q: What were some of the Flash animations that inspired you, and why do you think they resonated with you?

David firth is an obvious answer. His influence over animation is really under-rated. The madness-combat series is also mind-blowing. I still don't think an animation has managed to match it's kenetic energy. I remember the brakenwood series also feeling like prestiege at the time, as if flash animation could also be sensitive and thoughtful as well as crude and counter-culture.

Q: Where did you learn to animate and how?

Cracked version of adobe-flash cs6 and I think the only tutorial I ever watched was the OneyNG one hahah, I later went to university and studied animation, but I feel like I learnt more from the internet.

Q: How did you create your animation THE FINAL NAIL IN THE COFFIN? What was the pipeline for the project, and where did the story come from?

It feels very immersive, emotional, and personal. How did you decide on using this texture and making it black and white?

I am only one person so I needed to strip everything back to it's bare essentials in order to finish it. I tried to keep to a boring old script>storyboard>keyframes>cleanup but somewhere along the line I just ended up improving and redoing stuff as I saw fit. I had no monetary backing so I could just take my time and do what I want until I was happy with it. I think the core to a good short is the idea and story. Nothing needs to be animated that does not further the idea. This resulted in a kind of brutalist striped back design. I love the textures of old 1940s found-footage type animations where the film is scratched and blurry, as if found from a dumpster. I thought that style might reflect the ugliness of the characters a bit more.

Q: How long did it take to create your THE FINAL NAIL IN THE COFFIN?

I work a full time job so I justt worked on it most evenings for an hour or two, and over weekends. This was over the span of just over two years. It felt long. Too long at times.

Q: What is your advice on creating an animated short film from start to finish? What do you think are the misconceptions around creating short films?

Just start. Don't get in your head about not having a voiceover or you are not good at drawing. If the idea is good, people will be engaged. Do the voiceover and music yourself. Nobody is stopping you. Don't talk yourself out of it. Stick to an idea and make it even if people won' like it. There is someone else out there who thinks just like you and will connect with it.

Q: How did you come to play the upright double bass throughout your childhood, and how did you receive classical training in orchestras until you were 18?

I just saw the biggest insttrument and decided I wanted to play it. For a long time, I thought my career would be in music so I slowly worked my way up to the highest orchestra I could in my age range, but then as i reached adulthood, I realised I never really enjoyedi it like I enjoyed art. Luckily it has come full circle and my musical knowledge has come in handy when scoring my short films. I can just do the majority of it myself. That saves some resources.

Q: What songs and bands do you like, and which genres do you gravitate towards?

Big fan of really hard electtronic dance music. Happy hardcore. Hardstyle. Dariacore. Breakcore and the likes. I find it easy to listen to really loud noisy music when concenttratting. Probably something to do with the rhythm keeping me on track. I also liike ambient too. People like the haxan cloak, Ian William Craig, Phillip Glass, Burial. They can pull a lot of emotion from the bare minimum.

Q: You love electronic music and enjoy getting granular about sound design. Which DAW and VSTs do you use?

Ableon all the way. My favourite VST's at the moment is cycles by slate & ash. It turns any sample into something giant and vast. I am also a big fan of pigments. It can create almost any sound in the world and is pretty cheap.

Q: What is it like being on Instagram? What do you like about it, and what is the culture like?

It is a means to an end. It takes a long time to build up an audience there but it is easy to chat to other like-minded artists in a really simple format, so it isn't all bad.

Q: What is it like being Irish and currently working in London?

Expensive.

Q: You made a webcomic as a teenager on Facebook called Humans of Microsoft Paint. How did that come about, and how would you describe the experience? What did you learn from it? And has it helped in cultivating your style?

It was a riff on humans of newyork, but with crazy absurdist humour. My brotther and i worked on it when we were only teenagers but we both love just distilling really odd characters into one senttence. I don't think our humour has changed much. We wanted o continue it but facebook's algorithm nuked it and we never got the ball rolling again. i guess the thing to learn there is that nothing on the internet lasts forever.

Q: How do you recognize an animation that you like, and what are the elements that you personally find appealing? Why do you think these elements resonate with you?

I think if an animation feels authentic and from a genuine place then I will pick up on it. it should be based on what you personally like rather than what you think the audience wants to see.

Q: What have you learned about yourself from watching animations, and what are animations that you like and would recommend people check out?

Favourite animation of all time is Cat Soup by Tatsuo Sato. Anything by Maasaki Yuasa is brilliant too. (space dandy especially). Anytthing by Don Herttzfeld and David Firth. They have never missed.

@PachkaNG - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: What is funny?

A: its a haha, a goof, maybe even... a Jape.

Q: What impact would you say the Internet has had on your life? From your perspective, what is the internet really about?

A: Well, without the internet, I'd probably be nonexistent to the wider world or any of you all. Id say the internet is just about sharing. Sharing has gotten us all here and changed us all, for better or worse.

Q: The story of your username: PachkaNG

A: When I created my account, I was EXTREMELLYY into Post punk, especially this russian band named КИНО (Kino). They just so happen to have a song named Pachka Cigaret (A pack of cigarettes) that I absolutely ADORE. I was thinking of usernames and then that song popped into my head and made me think "Wowzah that could work" and the rest is history

Q: How did you get interested in Newgrounds? You made a really good metaphor about the BBs—it's like: "A pub in a small town where everyone knows eachother, and whos patrons will gladly sing shitty AC-DC karaoke with an out-of-towner". How would you describe your experiences and explain the culture of the BBs? What advice would you give on using it, and what do you think is the right approach?

A: Oh Pico's School definetly. I used to adore flash games like it as a kid, so I basically grew up on the site's content. In 2021 however, I really decided to take shit seriously on the site. I was an animator at the time, and hearing all the praises animators gave about newgrounds at the time, I thought "Hey I should join then I'll be famous like Jonbro!!". Obviously I didnt become famous on the multiple accounts I made back then, but it definetly got me hooked. Then I joined the BBS, and I was IN FULLY. The culture of the BBS is really like a small town pub. Everyone knows eachother, we have our own inside jokes, we shit on eachother playfully, etc etc. But like a small town bar, its easy to get shit to hit the fan. General was the biggest example of this, it closing really sent a shockwave throughout the bbs. It really made us more laidback and less chaotic, but still ready to be riled, like a cold war era nuke. As for advice while using it, dont immediately think everyone knows or cares about you. Going back to the small town bar analogy, if you go there everyday, people might start to notice you and care after a week or two, but if you go there like once a week, no one will care until you do some stupid shit. I see this attitude in younger more newer users of the bbs, though this isnt a means of haranguing on them.

They just gotta learn to be more active and interesting to be noticed

Q: Where does your interest in collecting old computers come from? You currently have two battle stations, and you're planning to expand even further. You've even converted your closet into a storage space for your collection, having spent over $500 on it—mostly on processors and PCI components

A: In my school's campus, there is this local shopping complex called Freighthouse Square. It hosts a variety of stores and resturaunts, including an amazing seafood place that I took my current bf on our first date too, but there used to be this store called E-cycle. For context, I have had a life long infatuation with old technology. My parents are Gen X, so I was exposed to all of the stuff the last millenium had to offer and I made me hooked on that shit. So the moment I saw a compaq deskpro rotting away on the shelf at the store, I was sold. It started me on this path and I dont regret it ine bit

Q: How did you become interested in creating art?

A: My brother mostly. Hes an AMAZING artist, so seeing him draw and paint and all that stuff made me want to be like him. Couple that with the fact that I loved little einsteins and you got a recipe for an artist

Q: What do you enjoy most about creating animations?

A: Gee I havent made a finished animation in years. Back then I mostly did them for the sake of it. I loved Richard Williams at the time, so I tried to emulate him as much as I could (to hilariously bad results). The joy came from seeing the finished product and thinking "Holy fuck, It moves"

Q: What are your thoughts on Vinesauce?

A: I love the funni pizza pasta binyot and the Jobell

Q: What’s the story behind your greentext reading?

A: I have the ability of doing a pretty masculine voice. Whenever I did people said "Hey Daisy you should do voice work!". So after hearing those almost everytime I spoke back then, and also watching alot of brendaniel, I came to the conclusion that I should be a Greentext reader. I made a single one and I never wanted to do it again because the genre died

Q: What is the Newgrounds community about?

A: Its about everything by everyone (ayyyy)

Q: Why do you have a Mexican flag in your room?

A: Yo soy mexicano-americano. Mi abuela es de michoacan y ella vino a los Estados Unidos cuando tenío 15 o 14 años para trabajar en los años 60s. Nunca conocí con ella porque esta muerte ._.

Q: Your favorite foods and drinks and why?

A: Easy. Conchas and Sidral Mundet. RAAAAAGH I FUCKING LOVE SIDRAL MUNDET

Q: How would you describe your experiences visiting Ireland, England, Scotland, the Philippines, Mexico, and Canada?

A: Ireland was cool, Phillipenes were cool, Mexico was amazing, Canada was cool, and England and Scotland were the most depressing places Ive ever been to in my entire life

Q: Your advice for being cool

A: Be a cool guyy. Treat everyone equally because we are all brothers as humans, and being divided is what our rulers want for us to be that way they dont get blamed. LOVE EVERYONE, because everyone deserves it, and thatll make you the coolest person ever 

@Jampley-Dev - @Aalasteir (Q) - Index

Q: How did you become interested in literature? Why do you think you enjoy reading? Can you provide examples of your own stories that you’ve written, and what do you like about writing them?

1- I was in high school, I felt the education system had failed me, so I tried to learned some stuff on my own, like how to write and read properly, so I read some books like Frankenstein and Don Quijote. At first, I didn't like them much, but then I actually tried to understand what I was reading and I started to take linking to them. I always wanted to tell my own stories, growing up watching a lot of movies and cartoons, and I found a way to tell stories through literature, which is its own media with its own qualities. I like the creative process of making anything that is on your mind, and express your ideas and feeling.

I don't usually write stories in English, but I have this flash fiction that I think it's good:

Q: Where does your interest in game development come from? What have you learned from your experiences creating games such as Gravity Storm, Lucy's Dream Panic, and Manuee's Adventure?

2- My interest comes from the many games I played as a kid, maybe not much of an unique story ha, ha. My first console was a bootleg console called "Fullstation", that looked exactly like Playstation 1, but it come with a zapper and loaded with 999,999 repeated NES games. I had fun playing Mario and Dog Hunt on my "Fullstation". It took a while until I got my PSP and could play with oficial Hardware. I'm more a retro gamer although I'm not that old.

I remembered that one day I just woke up and asked myself, "is it hard to make videogame? I like games, I wonder if I make one". I don't know I found out about Gamemaker, but I did and started learning, although Gamemaker is quite an easy game engine to learn, it was still hard to learn. After like a year of treating game dev hobby, I found myself with no job and a lot of free time, so I decided to try see if I can make so profit out of it. I participated in several game jams which most of the time were just excuses to make games and get some visibility at the same time. Gravity Storm was the game I felt had the most potential and it actually got pretty popular in Gx.games and Newgrounds, so I decided to make it my main project, and I'm still working on it. Game development gives me a certain creative feeling that writing give me too, although I never focus on the narrative when I make games.

Rather than learning from making games, I have learned more from watching people play my games, and listening to their "feedback". Most of the time, their feedback isn't useful, so many people give their opinion without even playing the game for more than 2 minutes, or even without playing it at all, asking me to add stuff that is already in the game or features that would break the level design, or take me too long to implement to be viable. Don't get me wrong, I have gotten plenty of good feedback, but most of it tends to me poorly thought out or biased, and I usually learn how to improve my game by watching how people play, rather than what they say about the game. Many people want your game to be more like other games they like, instead of a better version of itself. For example, many want my game to be more like Megaman and I understand that Gravity Storm looks like Megaman, but it was never my intention to make a Megaman clone, my inspirations are others, and Megaman fans who actually played my game realized that it plays quite differently from Megaman. What I'm trying to say is that I've learned how irrational people can be, even myself because I've acted similarly in the past, and you should be careful listening to people who talk out of ignorance, and try not to talk out of ignorance yourself.

Q: What recommendations and advice would you give for doing pixel art commissions?

3- I'm not an expert in pixel art commissions, I have done only 5, I'm kind of new to this. But I was a Spanish tutor in the past, and I learned that you have to get paid in advance because there are many irresponsable or simply bad people out there. I have learned to value my time, my work, and keep getting better at it, because quality is important. You need patience because freelance work can take time to pay off because you need to get an audience, which isn't an overnight thing. Also, advertisement is important, advertise your work in as many places as possible.

Q: Why do you think you’ve never played Minecraft? What is it about FPS games that you don’t like?

4- I've never been interested in Minecraft, it's not like I'm not open to try it, I might try it in the future.

I don't usually like FPS games because I feel restricted in the limited view I have of the surroundings, third person games gives me more to work with in that regard. I also don't feel more immersed in first person prospective because normal people don't really move their body like that, it's unnatural. I'm not really looking for immersion, most of the time, I'm looking for cool mechanics and freedom. I don't really view art or videogames as a way to escape from realistic if that makes sense. VR games might be more immersive, but I can't afford them nor I'm interested in putting a screen right in front of my eyes, well, that's probably a whole other topic.

Q: What do you discuss with other game developers?

5- Usually how hard game development is and how to solve each other coding problems and we give feedback to each other's games.

- Two blue, two red, and one yellow

I used to work at a shop and some guy came with a piece of paper. The piece of paper read, "two blue, two red, and one yellow". I was like, "what does that mean?", and he was like, "it means what's written there. Then I handed back the piece of paper and told him to read it himself. When he read it, he look at me puzzled, then got angry and said, "I'm never doing her any favors ever again". Then he stormed out the shop, never to be seen again ha, ha, ha.

Q: Do you have any clues as to what "two blue, two red, and one yellow" was referring to?

6- I'm not sure, maybe they wanted paper, I worked at a office supply shop/pet supply shop, I know, weird. It could have been whatever, or maybe someone was pranking that man.

Q: Your favourite games and why?

7- Hard question... on top of my head:

1. Resident Evil 3, Resident Evil 1 remake: best survival horror games I've played, I love survival horror games.
2. Pokemon Black and White 2: best pokemon games in my opinion.
3. Over Horizon (NES): Best NES shoot'em up on the NES in my opinion, you can shoot left and right, great use the the environment in the level design, more shoot'em ups should do that.
4. Castlevania Harmony of dissonance: Underrated, my favorite Castlevania game, I love Castlevania
5. Kirby and the Amazing Mirror: I love metroidvanias and this is one with co-op, I played alone and with people I love.

Q: Advice for Game Dev

8-Get your priorities right, scoop creep is a big and very common problem. if you make a big project, it will most likely take you years to finish it and you got to be aware of it, you might not be as excited about your game after a month or two. Listen to criticism, ask for help if you need some, don't listen to ignorant opinions, and try to be wise enough to tell them apart from good feedback.

Q: What do you think about Newgrounds? How did you join, and what have you learned about yourself by being a part of it?

9- I love Newgrounds, I gotten many opportunities since I made an account. I like the system it has, it seems to make it easier for new creators to get visibility, I wish It were a more popular place because I think it deserves it, but I guess sometimes it's better when things aren't too popular.

I think I found out about Newgrounds because I was doing research on places where I could publish my game and Newgrounds would pop up a lot. I uploaded Gravity Storm one evening without expecting much, and the day after Gravity Storm was on the front page and I was so happy, some time after that I got 100 dollars from a contest on Newgrounds I didn't know existed, I thought it was a scam, but it was legit, I was surprised and grateful I got it because at the time I needed the money.

I don't think I've learned much about myself; however, I've had a lot of fun and and opportunities, and I think that's awesome.