2025 Year in Review (not by numbers)

January 2, 2026

Hi there! It’s once again that time of the year. Every year I take stock of what I accomplished, go through my numbers, chart what I did and how well it did, and try to draw some conclusions. Here’s last year’s, for reference.

I have too much stuff for one post going on nowadays, and also I’m very tired, so I’m splitting this up into three posts: this one has a general overview, the next will get into numbers (aiming for next week/weekend, but don’t quote me on that) and the last one will have my called shots for 2026.

Crowdfund(s) #

There was only one, but it’s been most of my year, so y’know.

I guess I had a kickstarter or something, huh #

Celestial Bodies kickstarted in March, with great success. It got $51,873 with 713 backers, which is far more than I hoped. I’ve been absolutely gobsmacked by the response for months now, thanks for showing up!

Most of this year has been characterized by jamming on what’s left to write, puncutated by working on other things to not absolutely burn out on doing it. The biggest rewrite is done, so a lot of what’s left prior to editing is cleanup and insertion into the manuscript.

Releases #

I released a lot of things! Some as a distraction (see “bad year for a lot of things” and “working on other things” above), some because I just had a really good idea I couldn’t let go, some because it was the next logical move, and some swerves.

VOID_SHIFT #

I made a card game! Yeah, I’m as surprised as you are. Sometimes a form factor, a game concept, and an idea just align perfectly at the right time. It probably wasn’t a good idea, but it did come out great. The digital version came out first and works better than I would have expected, but in my mind the “real” version is the physical: 36 cards, 5 dice, and instructions in a cassette case.

I’ll talk about how it went financially/etc in the next post but I’m reasonably encouraged given it was indeed a terrible idea.

Death Has Come to This Town #

I always release something for Minimalist Jam, and this year was no exception. It’s something between a BOB thing biting at Pathologic and a long scream of frustration. I had a lot of fun writing it so that it reads like it was oddly translated. It needs tuning up to really pop but based on the playtest I did (thanks to the other two people who humored me!), the bones are mostly good.

I had half of an idea of doing a dual itchfund between this and NULL_SPACE in Zine Month but decided that didn’t really make sense with everything else I’m doing this year. Maybe one year I’ll do a double-header itchfund, but not this year. (Itchfunding has very few upsides but the ability to have two independent things contribute to the same funding bar is definitely one of them.)

HARDFACE #

Another supplement for HARDCASE! Or any semi-grounded sci-fi thing, probably, because it’s mostly a list of NPCs. It was a lot of fun to write, and good practice for doing more setting-oriented work.

Softback APOCALYPSE FRAMEs #

I have softback APOCALYPSE FRAME copies now! I didn’t just want to do perf-bound because I don’t think it’s very good for play at a table, so it took me finding a company that would do square-back binding at high pagecounts for cheap to commit to getting some. I really like how it turned out, I’d use a book like this at the table in a heartbeat.

Notable Events #

NULL_SPACE prelaunch is up! #

I’m cheating a little because this comes out next year, but I did all the work for it this year and it’s my roundup so deal. Smash that notify me button so I can email you when it comes out. I know it’s not a “real” prelaunch page but a. I’ve committed to this bit and b. everything’s fake until it isn’t.

Designed in the DMV Free RPG Day Zine #

I contributed a game to and laid out the Designed in the DMV Free RPG Day zine! We gave 20 copies each to 4 stores. The goal was to get our name out there and I think it was a rousing success. (We had Designed in the DMV folks at one store’s event but I wasn’t able to make it, unfortunately.) I’d love to do it again this year - ideally with a little more runway, time-wise, and if we can get more stores on board that’d be fantastic.

I have a store now #

It’s here! This was a logical next step once I got enough physicals to put up on one. Doing physicals through itch is fine but I can’t do things like set shipping dynamically or combine orders gracefully.

Having a store of my own also gives me way more options re: things like itchfunding physicals (because I can do things like run shipping through my store so I don’t have to bake it into the reward pricing and have two tiers).

Eventually I do want to try an on-store crowdfund, but that’s a later project.

I started a forum #

This was the year I finally started a forum after talking about it for quite awhile! I initially wanted to make one on Discourse, but it was expensive and I didn’t really have the scratch, so I’d postponed it. At the same time, Nova (Dinoberry Press) and Charlotte (co-author of Celestial Bodies, Dreamware Press, Big Hog Games, other shit in general) were also thinking about this, so we all joined forces! (This ended up being a better idea because it was way cheaper.) Since then, Paper Cult Club has been going strong. The worry for anything like this is that nobody’s going to show up, and nearly a year in, it’s not like wildly active but it’s chugging along.

Cons and fairs and events #

Gameface #

I tabled at GameFace Con last March, mid-crowdfund! First non-extremely-local con I’d been to. It was great! Met a lot of folks from the scene that I’d never met before, which was lovely, and sold quite a bit. Will definitely go again this year if I can (it’s a bit later in the year so I don’t know what else is competing, May is tougher).

Indie Tabletop Day @ Pure Panic #

A bunch of Designed in the DMV folks (including myself) organized a mini-convention to celebrate Designed in the DMV’s anniversary! It was a one-day event at Pure Panic Comics and Games, who were extremely accomodating in letting us do our thing and kind of do whatever. We had vendors, we had games running, and we even had a panel (which I was on!) I don’t think everything went 100% perfect but it was fun and I think we learned a lot about how to throw the next thing.

Indie & Local Tabletop Games Fair 2025 #

We did a repeat of the People’s Book Games Fair at People’s Book in Takoma Park as well! Also a good time, also worthwhile, if a bit smaller than last year’s. (I met a potential county councillor, which was fun.)

Game Kastle Goblin Market #

I helped with the booth at the goblin market! This ended up mostly being an excuse to hang out with other Designed in the DMV folks, but I did sell a few things too. It was a pretty good time.

Posts/Articles #

I’ve been writing a bunch of stuff that isn’t strictly game content this year! A good mix of general posts and devlogs. (I do still miss cohost dearly, but that’s the way it goes.)

Devlogs #

• Staring into the (Liminal) Void, 2 years in: At the beginning of the year, I’d been poking at the game that was then called Liminal Void (though even then, I was thinking about changing the name). I laid down some ideas, most of which I stuck to, some of which I didn’t.
• Devlog Has Come to This Town: Death Has Come to This Town would have probably been a game I just dumped out there, were it not for the fact that I was invited to playtest it a day after it released. I went into the game, the playtest results (for better and worse), and where I want to go from there.
• VOID_SHIFT, part 1 and 2: I decided, in the runup to the physical release, to dive into my thought process in creating it, from beginning to end.
• Celestial Bodies updates 2 and 3. I get into why this is taking forever to get to manuscript: it turns out completely redoing certain sections of the game in a way that’s way more verbose takes awhile.

General #

• Combat Without Combat: The first glimpse at NULL_SPACE in its new form, but also generally a post about how you’d apply 1 HP Dragon-esque ideas to core resolution, combat and otherwise.
• Conflict as Motivation and Resolution: A broader restating and combining of several points about combat.
• Appendix N, in which I get into a lot of my influences, generally.
• The Hole at the Center of the Mech, in which I explain one reason why you would omit social rules in a game.
• Religion is too good for clerics, in which I hate on the D&D cleric conceptually.
• Valiant Horizon, Magic, Nature, and the Elements, in which I get into some of the more subtle aspects of my Valiant Horizon worldbuilding.

So how did it go this year? #

This has been a bad year in a lot of ways (politically, economically, personally) but as far as games on my end, things are doing great! Of particular non-commercial note, I’ve been trying to join and build communities both online and locally. I’m hoping that’s a trend that continues next year.

Next time, numbers!

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