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by chrisallenlane 1303 days ago
I've been doing retro (Pico-8) indie game dev for about 2 years now, and I've been having a lot of fun with it. It's great because:

- It exposes me to entirely new classes of problems (pathfinding, graphics math, ai, etc), which are much more interesting than the daily CRUD nonsense.

- It forces me to branch out into adjacent interests and areas, like pixel-art, music composition, storytelling, etc.

- It provides a medium for self-expression.

- There's a well-trodden path for monetization (Steam, etc) if you're interested in that.

- It's fun to share with others! Nobody gives a shit about the Unix-y projects I typically work on, but people have actually been interested to hear about my game :)

This has really reinvigorated me. I do recommend checking it out if it sounds interesting to you at all.

Pico-8: https://www.lexaloffle.com/pico-8.php