iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 27/05/2026

oh good! I thought it would be nice if the extension shipped with a theme + font so if someone was coming from the online try.yarnspinner into VSCode it could look the same. So I just made something up :)

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 20/05/2026

Norco was so good! I replayed it recently and got curious what the devs were up to... Turns out they've been posting quite a bit on Patreon about their next game (3D, "an industrial sprawl wetland investigation game", working title "Sulfur Coast"): www.patreon.com/c/geographyo...

patreon.com

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 31/03/2026

After 10 years of offering first-class, complete (we thought) dialogue solutions, we learned we had been missing the most important narrative design tool of all time: Tarot. We're sorry. We're listening, we're learning. And today, we've taken the first step: adding Tarot to Yarn Spinner 💚

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 21/03/2026

She is! This is what a handful of weirdos in the Marathon subreddit have been implying is sexy. To which all the commenters reply, "she's our MUM, dude!"

A screenshot from the game Marathon (2026) shows the giant bioengineered silkworm character Nona, who is a large soft-looking white caterpillar with shiny wings and little beady red eyes. Her large head is kinda cutesy, but her mouth is two jagged plates of "teeth" which must gnash together.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 21/08/2025

Went to work without bringing the pups today, so husband has of course bought them a roast chicken and is at home trying to by their love / unseat me as dog favourite ☹️

A man’s hand is holding a few chunks of shredded chicken breast. Approaching with eyes full of hope and licking their lips are two tiny chihuahuas, one black and one cream.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 19/08/2025

One can only hope that future elections will see a thriving, growing crossbench such that the Greens can put forward a government and the old major parties get lost to obscurity. Good riddance to them both, I say.

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 15/08/2025

Our local Screen Museum’s call for contributions was the perfect excuse to get retro + realise a silly idea we’d had for a VN with live stills. This celebration of ‘90s game hint hotlines is boasts a colourful mix of Tassie actors being goofy, and extensive lore of a fictional game company 👾🕹️⚔️

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 10/08/2025

Today, he has just been stepped down from his second-last medication, and it looks like a full recovery. It looks again like we have many more happy anniversaries ahead. ❤️ @hey.paris

The same two people are older, this time wearing rainbow accessories and are in front of a projector on a stage, presenting a science show called “West Coast Space”.

The same two people are tanned this time, smiling widely in front of the space shuttle Endeavour as it hangs in a museum.

The same man and woman are rugged up, holding steaming hot drinks in camping mugs, as they sit by a fire under string lights outdoors at night.

The same two people are taking a selfie in front of a branded sponsor wall at a tech event. They are wearing lanyards and pulling kinda funny faces.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 10/08/2025

3 years ago today, I was off touring schools for National Science Week. He was at home, getting a sickness which would soon leave him with life-threatening issues for years to come, and make me face the possibility of life without my best friend.

The same two people are young again, smiling as they take a selfie on the street in birthday party hats.

The same man and woman are sitting on each other in an armchair, this time wearing Christmas hats and jewellery.

The same man and woman are dressed up as if to go to dinner, but they are wearing notable hints of green - a Swift parrot pin, malachite earrings, a west coast Wilds beanie, and a small “The Greens” pin.

The same man and woman are standing either side of a real estate sign which is plastered in a large “Sold” sign. They are grinning madly and gesturing to it.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 10/08/2025

9 years ago today, I had spent the day playing board games with a boy I’d met less than two weeks before and had rapidly befriended. I kissed him for the first time and we started dating. 5 years ago today, we spent the day in escape rooms, then got married, surrounded by our closest friends. …

A man and woman are young, thin, smiling. They are dressed up for some daytime event, and taking a photo under a tree as they leave their rural Australian hotel.

The same man and woman are slightly older, slightly chubbier, dressed even more fancy. This is their wedding day. Standing at the altar, they are snuggling into each other and laughing at something out of frame.

The same man and woman are in what looks like a small art gallery aboard a cruise ship. They are dressed in Original Series-era Star Trek uniforms, including the woman wearing a retro wig, earrings and makeup. They are snuggling and happy again.

The same two people are outdoors in a rugged scrublands, surrounded by glassy rivers and rocky low mountains in the distance. They are smiling even though in serious outdoor gear and visibly suffering very poor weather.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 07/08/2025

@theotherprc.bsky.social you know, I've come upon your website in passing before and I honest-to-god assumed it was a whole data visualisation design _studio_. Shocked to have a quick stalk this morning and find you're just one person. What a bloody awesome job you have!

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 06/08/2025

Only fractionally less legitimate than these major party #taspol / #politas clowns.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 06/08/2025

at this point any Tasmanian who can rustle up 13 mates might as well report to gov house, see if Barb’ll let you form government

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 04/08/2025

Saw a cool bottle of body wash. Was inspired to remake my website again, finally realising the monospace idea I’d had brewing for ages 💙

A snippet of a personal webpage is shown where elements of the style of the body wash have been incorporated - white body with black monospace text, lines divide sections, and a header picture of the site’s owner has been edited to greyscale on a flat background. Text reads “Mars Buttfield-Addison is a computer scientist and science communicator based in lutruwita slash Tasmania. Specialist in software development for scientific and high-performance applications. Day job in space instrumentation, side hustles in game tools and iOS apps, hobbies in signal processing and open source, proper polyglot programmer. Can definitely make your code run faster. Apathetic about modern web design. Overly enthusiastic about most everything else.” The main divergence from the bottle’s design is a thin border around the page where a colourful background image shows through, here featuring marbled inks in water of mixed shades of blue.

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Dr Paris Buttfield-Addison 🔜 MIGW26 @hey.paris · 31/07/2025

thrilled to have had a microgame commissioned by ACMI for the Game Worlds exhibition! @secretlab.games & @yarnspinner.dev, with lots of help from @themartianlife.com & other amazing folks are making “Hint Line ‘93”, a game about answering phones at a game hint line! www.acmi.net.au/about/media/...

acmi.net.au

ACMI’S Next Level Exhibition, Game Worlds, Coming September 2025

The epic realms of videogames are the focus of Game Worlds, a major new playable exhibition premiering 18 September 2025 to 8 February 2026 at Australia’s national museum of screen culture, ACMI.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 04/06/2025

Kristie Johnston is kicking butt with this speech. Great to see.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 02/06/2025

The idea that you can cancel a mission with an instrument already in space is absurd. You can only cancel people monitoring it, or receiving its data. This is akin to spending billions of dollars to build a telescope, just to then “cancel” people looking through it. www.nasa.gov/wp-content/u...

nasa.gov

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 21/05/2025

I call Ruby a “Pocket Wolf” not just because she is small, but because she is a voracious shirt invader. When she was scared of strange places as a baby, I’d put her in my hoodie pouch for comfort. To this day, anyone visiting the Yarn Spinner office runs the risk of her climbing into their shirt.

A teeny tiny baby chihuahua is tucked into the torso pocket pouch but of a warm-looking hoodie. Just her head is showing, and she looks as if she is falling asleep.

A man in a fluffy hoodie pulls a silly face as he takes a selfie in which the same chihuahua - now a proud-looking adult - similarly snoozes while half-tucked into his shirt, this time at the neck. Her head is out of the neck hole of the shirt, resting on his upper chest slash shoulder. Again, she looks comfortable and sleepy.

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 16/05/2025

🎉 YARN SPINNER 3 IS OUT NOW 🎉 for Unity, Godot, VSCode + try.yarnspinner.dev Including: - Storylets, enums, simple "run this bit only once" syntax - Better variables, easier-to-customise views - Bugfixes + QoL improvements galore - All-new docs + guides Check it out at yarnspinner.dev/v3 💚

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 14/05/2025

The CFP is open for our 15th (!!) /dev/world Apple Developers Conference coming up this September in Naarm/Melbourne. Whether you’re a dev, a designer, an admin, or something else, we’d love to hear from you. Come share your expertise with the loveliest crowd in the world! 📲 devworld.au/index.php

devworld.au

/dev/world/2025

/dev/world/2025 is Australia's longest running conference for macOS and iOS developers and designers.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 13/05/2025

Sitting at my desk, reading papers, working on my thesis, minding my own business, being watched by little office busybodies 👀

A cluttered office is shown from the point of view of a person sitting at a desk in front of multiple laptops. One shows a text editor, but the content is not visible. Their desk also has a lamp, mug, e-ink tablet, and colourful desk pad. Their office has a bookshelf full of mixed reference books spanning fonts of science fiction to digital signal processing and the astronomical almanac, and is topped my Lego model rockets and spacecraft. There are plants around the room and a large, comfy armchair. On the armchair is a dog bed, in which a tiny black chihuahua is curled up and looking quizzically at the camera. Atop the chair, an even smaller cream chihuahua looks to camera guiltily, as if she were about to jump down onto her sister before she was busted by the camera-wielding human.

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 08/05/2025

📣 In Yarn Spinner v3, we've also made significant changes to the API to simplify common flows. Including: • custom dialogue views • non-view components that know about the status of lines being presented • variable changed events • re-using line assets across multiple lines + many, many more!

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 07/05/2025

In Yarn Spinner v3, we've also added a bunch of features that improve variables, making them more powerful and - in the Unity API especially - more native and nice to use. • Runtime-computed "smart" variables • Enum types • Code generation to expose C#-side properties for each of your variables 🧵👇

Tile shows a feature for Yarn Spinner V 3: Variable Storage Code Generation. The image notes that this feature is out now in Unity and more information can be found at yarn spinner dot dev slash V 3. The main content of the tile is an annotated code example that reads "In the past, variables declared in Yarn like so..."
A code line then reads "declare variable player name as string".
"... would become accessible in C sharp by calling the variable storage's Try Get Value function and handling the cases where the returned value had no value or the wrong type. Now, the storage will have properties for your variables!"
A code block then shows how by getting the Variable Storage component in-engine, it now has an accessor for the player name variable that can be accessed like any normal object property. Here, it is being used to make a greeting string composed of "Hi" plus variable storage dot player name.

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 07/05/2025

In Yarn Spinner v3, we've added a bunch of features that can simplify the structure of even the most complex narratives in Yarn. Including: • Run this content only once • Run this content then jump back to where we were • Dynamically select from some set of possible lines or nodes to run 🧵👇

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 06/05/2025

It’s my birthday tomorrow and I have TWO meetings scheduled to argue with university peers/leaders about AI. But tonight I got a glass of cider, early access Revenge of the Savage Planet co-op with the husband, a quick game of the new Citizen Sleeper solo-TTRPG before bed, and snuggly lap friends ❤️

Two tiny chihuahuas sit on a colourful rug. The larger one is black-and-tan with brown eyes and tall ears, looking shyly at the camera. The smaller one is cream and white with green eyes and slightly longer fur, looking confused at the camera.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 06/05/2025

(this is a joke about Strauss and Corbin for the precisely three people who will find that funny - one of which is the husband in question @hey.paris)

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 06/05/2025

How I (Comp. Eng./quantitative) view my husband's (Informatics/qualitative) research methods versus how he views mine

2D artwork shows a suit-and-tie-wearing man relaxed and asleep at his desk with a sleep mask on his face. A caption in large friendly letters over the image says "Vibe Coding".

A shot from the TV show Severance shows Helly looking exhausted at her desk as the stares at inscrutable numbers moving around on a computer screen.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 28/04/2025

I have access to the Yarn Spinner account and Procreate Pocket on my phone. I cannot be stopped.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 09/04/2025

We’ve had this beautiful baby for six months now and she is one today and a perfect angel ❤️

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 07/04/2025

All the stuff about using it to teach critical thinking rather than regurgitation? Unfounded. The impacts on the environment, plagiarism, teaching quality? Ignored. And yet noone is yelling. I truly cannot understand why they can’t see this is signing a death warrant for the sector.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 07/04/2025

And yet, watching once again as the university sector embraces wholeheartedly—and uncritically—a set of technologies whose primary impacts are to devalue original and expert information… in an age where people are already wondering what a degree can give you that YouTube/microcredentials can’t…

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 07/04/2025

So many times in recent years I have felt like everyone around me is on another planet. When during the Black Summer fires the news said “stay indoors” but they didn’t. When COVID stayed but precautions didn’t. When climate change is ignored, social issues go unaddressed. AI shouldn’t surprise me.

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Dr Paris Buttfield-Addison 🔜 MIGW26 @hey.paris · 03/04/2025

Once again our local federal senator is streaming! Show @nickmckim.bsky.social some support? #auspol www.twitch.tv/nickmckimgam...

twitch.tv

NickMcKimGaming - Twitch

Nick McKim Gaming

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 31/03/2025

This problem is true for a lot of normal-sized houses, it’s just that there’s enough air in it to start with that a family can seal themselves in at night and they won’t poison themselves by morning. My husband, two chihuahuas and I, in our 30m2 home? Lucky if we make an hour before alarms go off.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 31/03/2025

I mean, it’s air; it works like air does. You can open everything to let in a breeze, force air in/out with a huge HVAC system, or install some sort of carbon-scrubbing solution like a space station. The first option is really the only practical one 😆 Still, anything that lets in air lets in cold.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 24/03/2025

The thing they never talk about in tiny homes: they don't contain enough air or get enough airflow for them to turnover CO2 unless you have them fully open all the time - even at night, in the middle of winter. So if you're thinking you're going to live in New York state in a tiny home, think again.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 18/03/2025

I mean, fair’s fair; you did take my profile picture too 😆

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 17/03/2025

Procreate Pocket sketch of my just-woken-up husband doing his best “look how ugly I am” face/pose because he wouldn’t let me take a photo 🩷

Simple flat-coloured line drawing of a soft-looking man in a black t-shirt, track pants, round glasses and old man slippers. He is hunched over with his arms forward, accentuating his little pooch belly. At the same time, he is grimacing terribly and tucking his chin in to form many neck rolls. His curly dark hair is unkempt in full mad scientist slash bed hair mode. A heart has been drawn beside the man by the artist.

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Dr Paris Buttfield-Addison 🔜 MIGW26 @hey.paris · 17/03/2025

get along to the fantastic @yarnspinner.dev talk from @mcjones.bsky.social today at #GDC25! schedule.gdconf.com/session/inde... #gdc2025 #gdc @officialgdc.bsky.social #gamedev

Tile advertising GDC talks at 9:30 Monday and 2:30 Thursday from the Yarn Spinner team, at GDC

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 01/03/2025

Kinda funny how often this happens. People switch to Yarn Spinner saying they made a game with some other tool and it was a nightmare to localise/port/edit/finish. Maybe we should change our tagline to “Yarn Spinner: we’ll be here for your second game” 💁‍♀️

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 26/02/2025

In the many years before I was old/married enough to get the snip, these were a lifesaver. Spent my teen years on and off pills and injections that made me want to kill myself. Insidious side effects more often noticed by the people around me than myself. Non-hormonal IUD? Solved overnight 🎉

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Yarn Spinner @ MIGW @yarnspinner.dev · 21/02/2025

Run by fellow Tassie studio @twoandahalfstudios.com, The Storyteller’s Festival is a celebration of narrative games that we love 💚 Huge discounts on Yarn Spinner faves including: - Venba 🥘 - Dredge 🚢 - Frog Detective 🔍 - Outcore 💾 - Scarlet Deer Inn 🪡 + more! store.steampowered.com/curator/4239...

store.steampowered.com

The Storyteller's Festival 2025

A celebration of the art of storytelling, featuring a wide range of visual novels and narrative games that showcase the best in interactive fiction.

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Mars Buttfield-Addison @themartianlife.com · 21/02/2025

Let us know if you need a hand with it! 💚

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