haven't been writing much here lately.

a few times i've started writing general "game design theory" posts and given up. they either seemed quite obvious or. well. we're all pretty sick of people making claims about what games really are or ought to be which are really just thin attempts to justify their personal preferences. i wanted to avoid doing that. just really tired of any time someone's writing about one kind of play they have to point out why other kinds of play are stupid and bad. so i would try to only say things i was absolutely certain i could fully justify, trying to always be precise about the category of things i was talking about and to acknowledge the outside of that category as also worthwhile, to make it clear that i know perfectly well that any design principle can be fruitfully broken. it's a lot of work to write like that. it takes a lot of words. and the more words there are the more likely it is someone will just skim over and pick one thing out of context to argue about in bad faith. can't be bothered with that right now.

it's easier when i'm releasing games because then i can just write about those and the context is completely clear. maybe i'll start writing about my new roguelike. i've become wary of drawing attention to things i'm making if i'm uncertain when they'll be released - i felt like i hurt helix a bit by showing it at a bunch of events and then putting it on hold to do 868-hack; it got attention too early and then when it came to release i'd already used that up and had a hard time selling it. but i think it would be good for me to write what i'm thinking about it. just don't take it as "NEW GAME ANNOUNCED COMING SOON". i've already been pretty bad at estimating how long things would take me and now i'm travelling i just have no idea. it'll be done when it's done nbd.

also been thinking a lot about dancing.
it is something i have no natural inclination towards. more than that; it is completely alien to me. i had no appreciation for it, no intuition, no understanding of why people would do it. when i ended up in situations where dancing occurred i would just be baffled why otherwise rational people were doing this pointless activity. when i saw a dance performance i would appreciate that things like fast complex steps or throwing someone in the air were technically impressive but i felt no emotional response.
but i am interested in alien things. one doesn't have to go to another planet to study something so incomprehensible as to seem utterly meaningless. so over the last couple of years i have been learning to dance. defying my nature. abomination.
and along the way i have also found that since it is a kind of play there is a lot in common with games for me to think about, especially about non-competitive goalless social play. i tried to write about this a couple of times but it seemed probably all so obvious for normal people. perhaps there is something my outsider perspective is useful for but i am not sure yet.
the one thing i do however really want to communicate regarding this is:
if there is a thing that other people care about that you think is pointless and stupid
stop thinking that and instead think "that might take me a year of hard work to acquire the most basic appreciation for"

ok
no actually go back and read those two lines again because there probably is a thing and you're still dismissing it

ok so here's a blog post. done.