iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

#indiedev sure does require a lot of non-game development work. trailers, paper work, store pages, marketing, etc. On the run up to release is when you feel the absence of collaborators the most. anyway here's the first draft for the new Cloudbusters trailer #gamedev #solodev

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

the design school types did us all a favour by calling it "juice", so we know not to take them seriously. Its a perfect metaphor, as just like actual juice, "juice" is for children. Adults drink water, we should aim to make our games cool, clear, and refreshing.

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

cloudbusters demo has been submitted for review. Only missed my deadline by a day. I plan to release is as soon as its approved after that I think I should be able to finish the full game within a month, as its mostly done already. probably gonna be $5

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

got windows installed to test my game and I have never been more glad I switched to linux ~8 years ago. I had to unplug my router to install without making a microsoft account becasue I made the mistake of connecting thinking the installer maybe wanted to update or something.

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

ok, I got all the features I wanted done for the Cloudbusters demo... so, for the next 4 days I'll be polishing, bugfixing, and testing out steam builds. The part I'm looking forward to the least is installing windows... haven't used it for ~8 years, but I've got to test the windows build.

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

what if you could defuse a mine after its already been triggered but you only have five seconds and it costs 3 giga-litres of 3D printer ink? #screenshotsaturday #gamedev #indiegame #puzzle #minesweeper

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I wanted to get the demo for Cloudbusters done on last Sunday, but failed, so I'm going to aim for this sunday now, not for actually releasing the demo, just a freeze in adding new features. Then I'll set another deadline, maybe oct. 1st, by which time I will stop working on it altogether.

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

updated the custom puzzle menu, can now enable/disable items. Also did some more visual polish. #cloudbusters almost finished with the demo, just need to do a bit of work on sound and animation #screenshotsaturday #gamedev #indiegame #ebitengine #puzzle #puzzlegame

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

logically, it doesn't make sense to have dark nighttime clouds over an obviously daytime scene, but aesthetically... i think it works #cloudbusters #gamedev #indiegames #indiedev #puzzle

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

going to aim to have a demo finished for Cloudbusters by the end of the week. also just decided to double the resolution of every sprite in the game to 128x128. I've been wanting to do another pass on the art anyway so I think it will be worth it. Anyway there's not that many sprites.

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

I think I'm going to replace the lore dumps as rewards in Cloudbusters with some kind of scoring system. At first I was going to write all the lore, but I just didn't enjoy doing it so I thought I'd write some and supplement with snippets from public domain books and Wikipedia articles.

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

I'm liking the feel of this chapter select... I want this game to feel a bit like a book, where you can easily flip back and forth from one chapter to another. #gamedev #indiedev #indiegames #puzzle

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

should be working on the demo... instead I added a bunch of different traps to the mid/late game. The idea is the player can often deduce their location, but can either avoid them, or trigger them intentionally, if, for example, they are stuck. #screenshotsaturday #puzzle #indiedev #gamedev

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

added UI scaling so people who own hi-res or small monitors can actually tell whats going on in the UI... still a few edge cases but its already more functional than UI scaling in my desktop environment lol. #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame #puzzle #ui #gui

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

worked on the visuals, added outlines around everything. Makes it "pop". Accidentally recorded this with music playing in the background, that's just how I play strategy games. I ALWAYS mute the game's music, which is why this game will not have any music whatsoever. #screenshotsaturday #gamedev

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

never assume stupidity always assume malice

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

adding a level editor to my game so I can more easily make a tutorial and it has me thinking... I might change the puzzles in the main campaign to be entirely hand made, and only do random generation in endless mode (maybe daily challenges?).

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

too many games these days are coolslop

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

how I figured out my game's system requirements #solodev #indiedev #thinkpad

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

updated my build system to use Steam Linux Runtime 4 (as per Valve's recommendation) and guess what? It doesn't work on my minimum spec testing computer anymore! Good work valve!

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

added a practice mode to #cloudbusters so players can get a better idea of how all the items work/interact with each other. #puzzle #solodev #indiedev #gamedev #indiegames #minesweeper

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

reject modernity (Prey) embrace tradition (System Shock)

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

in my logic puzzler, sometimes instead of hidden mines, there are other traps. This one is called "Shuffler" and it shuffles the position of all the mines in the level when triggered. #cloudbusters #indiegames #indiedev #gamedev #puzzle #screenshotsaturday #solodev

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

made another vid, trying something a little longer... with Blender this time. Like kdenlive, it crashed a few times, but at least the preview actually runs at 60fps... #gamedev #solodev #indiegame #puzzle #blender

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

just going to keep making gameplay montages until I figure out how to not hate using kdenlive. #gamedev #indiedev #indiegames #puzzle #etc #spam

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

I shouldn't be working on a 3rd project right now... but I couldn't help it... I guess its sort of a 4X with combat inspired by tactics games/JRPGs. Although I might replace the 4x part with a city builder idk. #gamedev #turnbasedthursday #rpg #pixelart

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

itch page is up for Cloudbusters! steam page should be up within a week. No demo yet, but I think I should have one ready in a couple weeks. ibex.itch.io/cloudbusters

ibex.itch.io

Cloudbusters by VICTUAL WORLDS

Bust Clouds

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

first attempt at a trailer for Cloudbusters. Will probably make another (longer) one once I've got the UI finalized and proper win/lose effects, but I'm pretty happy with this. #gamedev #indiegames #puzzle #solodev

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

working on a custom mode for cloudbusters. Also spruced up the menu a bit, and added some cool royality free music. #gamedev #indiegames #solodev #puzzle

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

added images to Cloudbuster's in game wiki. steam/itch pages should be up pretty soon, hoping to have a demo in a couple weeks, full game a couple weeks later. #gamedev #indiedev #screenshotsaturday #indiegame #puzzle #minesweeper

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

using photos in games is so much fun, its free style, free sense of place. #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

switched to a bird's eye (...or alien's eye?) view just cause I thought it would look cooler. Big implications on the game's story but fortunately I haven't written much anyway. #gamedev #indiedev #indiegames #puzzle #ebitengine

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

I desperately need to ship one of the games I'm working on soon... both games are at the polish/balance stage of development, which I hate, and I lack the discipline to work on them for more than an hour a day so, I'm starting a new project so I don't waste all my time going on youtube lol.

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

added a lore minigame: guess letters based on their frequency and position in a sentence, correct guesses are revealed when all letters in a given column or row are correct. probably needs more clues... anyone have any ideas? #gamedev #indiedev #puzzles

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

finally got the shader looking good, even if by accident lol. Probably a sign to stop working on it for a while and focus more on game design. #cloudbusters I've also got to figure out how to tell the story... lore dumps as rewards? in game wiki? #puzzle #indiegames #gamedev #ebitengine

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

added "plans" (like scriptable blueprints) to my factory-automation game #sidewayschairs #indiegames #gamedev #factory #automation #ebitengine

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 06/06/2026

refined cursor >> bio-hazardous waste, refined poo >> heart. Waste + heart >> human. Finally, combine human + poo >> battery. Send the battery to a Charger to distribute power (as a particle) to your factory. #screenshotsaturday #gamedev #indiegames #solodev #ebitengine

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 05/06/2026

working on making the clouds more fluffy in my #minesweeper like: #cloudbusters items are shared between all the grids on the page. Thinking of cool ways I might connect the grids together... #indiegame #indiedev #gamedev #ebitengine #puzzle

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

I've been mostly testing my game on the normal difficulty, and I haven't played through the whole thing since releasing the alpha so I decided to try speedrunning on easy mode. Might have made it too easy... #indiedev #gamedev #automation #factory #ebitengine #indiegame

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

experimenting with ways of revealing tiles in my #minesweeper like. This level reveals tiles that don't have a mine in a diagonal direction. I like the checkerboard pattern. #indiegame #indiedev #gamedev #ebitengine #puzzle #solodev

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 23/05/2026

working on the gui. somehow adding hands makes it feel a lot more like you're looking up into the sky... #cloudbusters #gamedev #indiegame #indiedev #solodev #ebitengine #puzzle #minesweeper #screenshotsaturday

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VICTUAL WORLDS @arkanar.bsky.social · 19/05/2026

rewrote my tilemap to render with a shader and its so much faster. more than doubled the fps, plus I can do cool wavy effect, a vignette around the fog of war, and way bigger maps. #gamedev #indiedev #indiegames #ebitengine

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