iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Small break from writing and working on the strategy game as I avoid burning out haha. After working with C# for more than a decade, started learning Rust a bit ago, porting a smaller personal Unity game. Gonna take a long while to get used to 😂 Nothing “works” yet, but it compiles 👍 #gamedev #rust

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

I pushed out Nonfinito a couple years ago, and I’ve been wanting to rewrite it and fix everything beginner me did wrong. So, anyways, as usual, it’s a WIP, but you’re welcome to 💩 on it haha #writing #writers #scifi #story

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 24/07/2026

Went from mid-to-low teens to several hundred fps after I stopped checking weather and tile ownership every frame 💀. On the Earth map, it became a big problem due to the thousands of tiles. It affected others, but not nearly as much. #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

Couple new bugs, most of em are pretty easy to solve, like an extra line of code in a function for the UnitController and such. The unit stacking bug was fixed before and it seems like I opened it up again lol. Oops. #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

Actual build testing :) Need to fix some UI issues, and tons of balance tuning, but it seems to do pretty good. My MacBook Air has zero issues (other than UI), and I suspect my Windows laptop will be the same. Phew 😮‍💨 😅 #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

Every leader now has their own image done very simply 😅. Diplomacy is still getting adjustments, but it’s a far cry from what it was (a single list box for everything and everyone, essentially). #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

Back to tinkering. The main HUD got a slight shakeup by moving most of the buttons from the hud bar to the top left with the diplomacy flags and such. The hud bar was way too cluttered with everything in there. #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

Found an image of how the game ui looked ~3 years ago, versus today. The old UI was UGUI(?) and the new UI is mostly UI Toolkit with some UGUI #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

Here’s what the city ui looks like. Liked it enough that I copy-pasted that shit in several more areas lol. I’ll need to work on the icons or find a better asset pack or something; they’re mismatching and sometimes just ugly lol. #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

Testing out some UI changes when all the sudden, I lost the fucking game lol. Well, defeat definitely works. #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 04/07/2026

Hmm, here’s my idea for the city UI. Much faster to quickly sketch it up in Affinity than to move things around in UI Builder. Instead of one box with tabs, we have several so you don’t have to search to find something…? 🤔🤷🏻‍♂️😭 #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

Maybe Imperia Provenientia is a bit to say, but I’m pulling ideas out of my ass to find something that might work. Artwork is a work in progress; it’s a first pass at an idea. *sigh* 😅 #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

Computer nations’ decision trees need some tuning around diplomacy. Right now, they declare war as soon as they see ya lol. Oops. Insurgencies seem to be at a sweet spot, so that’s a bonus. #gamedev #gamedevelopment #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

The state of things so far isn’t terrible haha. The city panel is still, idk, not there yet. Thinking about how to do it without looking like I am taking too much inspo from somewhere else. More of a polishing issue 🤷🏻‍♂️ Outside the UI, it’s starting to feel great. #gamedev #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

I think the new game ui is a bit better. Took me longer than I’d have liked because I fought with the UI Builder a little lol. Also fixed several handfuls of gameplay bugs, so, woo! Still a few UI bugs to work out, I think. #gamedev #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

More UI work 💀. Still not good, I’ll probably split the nation details from the map settings and place them in separate columns? Not sure, but this ain’t it. I’ll have to drag things around and see what works. #gamedev #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

A couple hours and I have something a little prettier. Took inspiration from the folks who make some beautiful wire work when doing circuits. I’m tired of UI work 😓😂 but most of it is UI 😭 probably not the best or most efficient way, but it’s what worked #gamedev #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

I’m laughing at myself a bit. Should’ve opened up the research panel more often as I expanded the techs because… it needs a bit of work 💀👀. Went through all the units and such and gave them some basic costs and whatnot that are easy to move up and down. #gamedev #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Play-testing the strategic resources. Seem to work fine, just need to finish a few things up there. Rebels also seem to be working mostly fine lol. Bunch of cost balance tweaks need to be made. Long way to go still haha #gamedev #unity

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Slowly getting units, research, and the combat effectiveness matrix fleshed out. Units are all in but still need stats, research is pretty bare, CE has a long way to go lol. It’s a process 😑. #gamedev #unity #strategy #4x

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

Reworking some UIs and such. Before it was a dark background with a list of buttons with minor highlights. Now I’ve got a (buggy) world procgen’d every open with a slow camera pan. Moving from a dark palette to a warm, bronze-y one, also. Name is a WIP lol 😂 #gamedev #unity #strategygame

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

5 years of work, and I’ve finally edged out something that resembles a Civilization-like strategy game. UI is still a huge WIP, but the underlying mechanics are in place, I think… (I moved the project from GH a while ago). Artwork from Asset Store (tiles, units) #gamedev #strategy #games #unity

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Been a bit since we posted, and I’m going with some vibes with “contracted”. Strangely, it’s one area I haven’t marked up yet for editing. We’re in a fantasy world that’s post-industrial era, so we have things like magic-powered computers. 🤷🏻‍♂️ #fantasy #writing #wip #wipsnips

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 01/01/2026

It’s all vibes haha. I try not to use the word ‘begin’ a whole bunch. Some context, a demon was using her body to violently reorganize and redecorate the town’s road, and eventually she snapped 🤷🏻‍♂️ we’ll come back and flesh it out better later #writing #writers #fantasy #wip #wipsnips

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 26/11/2025

We’re rolling with vibes here, the crowd impeded the civilian’s ability to get in the building 🤷🏻‍♂️ Aint posted in a hot minute, so here’s some of my latest WIP. This is like 300 years before the events of Centaurus (in the same location) #writing #writers #scifi #wip #wipsnips

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

Combat is a puzzle of threat management (the white swirls currently indicate amount of threat). Actions increase threat, except for some spells and items that reduce or transfer it; getting hit also reduces it. #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

In the process of fixing some bugs in battles/combat. Solved the biggest ones, now I’m wondering why all characters are throwing a hit anim when only one character is actually being hit lol 🤷🏻‍♂️ probably an easy fix lol #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 18/11/2025

I hadn’t realized it’d been a whole week since posting last lol. Oops. Most systems are working well, and I’ve been working to hook up the small stuff like defeat menus & doing UI tweaks. Still gotta build a dungeon, the story, etc. #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 11/11/2025

Tackling small interface bugs this morning. Today, we face a bug in which the button at index 2 does not respond at index 2, it acts as index 0. It knows its index 2. *sigh* 🤔 Every other slider and button around it works fine *flips table* #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

*sigh* I figured it out. The battle manager was deleting it because I had moved it to a new game object, but didn’t remove the disabled copy on the game controller, so it was being deleted. Fixed. Next problem is Actions not firing off as expected in the save menu. #gamedev #rpg #programming

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

New day, new issues. Today’s issue is examining how and why my game controller is killing itself when I load into a new game. It’s a new behavior, and I don’t quite like it. Screenshot for funsies, old commented code yet to be deleted. #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 09/11/2025

So, look, perhaps a bit more planning would’ve prevented me needing TWO game controllers, but it is more exciting to see how we can string this together in a working manner this way. 🤷🏻‍♂️🥲 #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 07/11/2025

Other than some visual or audio things, combat, saving, dialog, and all menus work except loading into a saved game. Also working on some music, the story, and the dungeon layout. A long way to go, but the foundation has been put down. #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 06/11/2025

Making sure systems are working properly. They both are, and are not 😂. The enemy selection indicator needs a bit of a refactor haha, plus I forgot to hook up the mana bars fully 😅 #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 04/11/2025

More screens come to life. Revamping the save functions to accommodate for some quirks. After this, I get to start working on story and all that fun stuff. Then, eventually learn everything is broken when I test it on another system 😂 #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

Audio settings and controller style/layout setting are all set up. I might fix the layout of the screen at some point, but for now, it works 🤷🏻‍♂️. Maybe also might add ability to use K&M later, but maybe not 🤷🏻‍♂️🤷🏻‍♂️ #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign #rpg

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 01/11/2025

The settings, saving, and loading screens are all that’s needed for me to shift focus to fleshing out the story, building the dungeon, etc. The important systems are pretty much there. I think. 😂🫡 #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 31/10/2025

Graham is being an asshole and popping off twice. It’s prooobably being subbed twice to the action, and figuring out why is the fun part of my morning 😑. Once I’ve figured this guy out, I can move to something more interesting 😂 #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 30/10/2025

We step ever closer to having the UI complete(ish). Setting up the spell character filter tabs, then to the options screen, then a main menu. The UI has probably been the most code intensive portion of the whole project 💀😑 #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 29/10/2025

In the process of refactoring the Dialog Controller. It’s a massive monster with a bunch of repeated code. Moving things to its own area of responsibility makes it a bit easier to deal with lol. A few bugs needing to be fixed, but almost there. #gamedev #csharp #unity #gamedevelopment #gamedesign

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 26/10/2025

Fixed it 😑 The “OnPlayerAttack” function was being called before the healTarget was being set. Dunno how that ended up happening that way, but it did. (Also, like, there’s better ways to do this than how I am, I’m just being lazy)

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 26/10/2025

There’s a big over here somewhere, and I’m spending enough time trying to hunt it down that I might refactor the whole damn thing. Alllllllso, we’re going to ignore the # of lines 👀 we ain’t talking about that at the moment 😶‍🌫️ #gamedev #programming #csharp #rpg #unity

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 24/10/2025

Decided to take a break from coding for a moment and work on making the UI pretty. Ended up coding anyways. Went from that Final Fantasy blue to a dark grey base color, and changed the layout of almost every UI screen. Much pretty. #gamedev #csharp #unity #rpg #gamedevelopment

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 22/10/2025

Only a few systems-related things to double check or implement, then it’s onto building an actual game 💀 #gamedev #csharp #programming #unity #gamedevelopment

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 19/10/2025

Fixed a ton of UI and other bugs, still have a couple big ones left. I’m so close to have this thing in a satisfying state, then I can beautify it and expand further. #gamedev #csharp #programming #unity #gamedevelopment

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 14/10/2025

Aint posted for a while, but I’ve been slapping away at a jrpg-like game. Only major big ticket item left to code up is the spellcasting, then it’ll be a playable prototype. From there, I can add story and all that other fun stuff and rework the UI #gamedev #csharp #unity #rpg #gamedevelopment

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 20/09/2025

It needs a bunch of love (a whole bunch lol), but here’s the skeleton. Also, instead of ‘obvious’, I went with ‘made clear’. Possible trigger warning as well for death #writing #writers #fantasy #shortstory #wip #wipsnips

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Michael Vanderpool @anothermichael.bsky.social · 11/09/2025

I can’t wait til I get to the point where I can start writing the dragon in. Soon. 😉 #writing #writers #fantasy #shortstory #wip #wipsnips

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