#23: The project, managed.
“Because the world is so full of death and horror, I try again and again to console my heart and pick the flowers that grow in the midst of hell.”
Project update
On Monday night, I submitted the 3rd of 3 grant applications for I Am This Castle to (hopefully) commence prototype development in July 2025. I only need one grant application to be successful in order to fund the prototype, and I am extremely confident that at least one of them will be successful the 2nd time around. “Why so confident?” you ask? Because in the last grant round, feedback was very positive, and specifically, I placed 2nd in the Digital Games category in the ACT. “If you only came 2nd last time, why so confident this time?” great question, and the obvious answer is that I spent a lot of time refining my proposal.
First, time is a great teacher, and looking back at your own work months later will let you spot things you simply could not have seen at the time because of how involved you were. I found efficiencies in my language that allowed me to be more concise than I had been, which in turn allowed me to add additional important details.
Secondly, context is everything: Transgender people and stories have been actively and deliberately suppressed, erased and sidelined for decades, hundreds, thousands of years, whether by governments, private business, or societies broadly. 9 months ago when I hit ‘submit’ on my grant applications, I thought that the for me to stand up and contribute my own trans story had arrived. Like some other parts of my life, I thought I had waited long enough that maybe now I could shoulder the weight of action. I couldn’t have known just how much more catastrophic the plight for survival would become for my trans brothers, sisters and non-binary siblings worldwide in 2025. Art is a powerful force for positive change, and when we are so much closer to the brink of calamity for all marginalised and ostracised people due to a populist wave currently encircling the globe, we need art. We need stories. We need to see one another’s humanity.
Third, the importance of a diverse team has become so much more important to me in the last 9 months, and I have expanded the team to include additional gender-diverse team members! Hell yeah. These are extremely talented people and I am looking forward to you getting to know them soon.
Fourth, I have spent a chunk of my own money to kick-start the pre-production of the game (the work that is supplementing the grant applications). This includes not just undertaking some incredible animation training, but also commissioning concept art by the sensational Charles Lin. Below are some of the initial thumbnail sketches which he created for me, for two of the characters in the game. Take a look - I’ll drop more of them soon.
These are cute little characters with a whimsical and fantastical nature about them. They have various inspirations about them, such as their role in the game, their temperament and outlook, castles (shock horror), and other buildings.
Concept art for I Am This Castle by Charles Lin.
Concept art for I Am This Castle by Charles Lin.
Technical reflections - Major Production (AIE Advanced Diploma)
I have finished my Advanced Diploma. Hooray! There’s a pile I could write about the capstone project of my team and I, but I simply don’t feel in a space for doing a videogame post-mortem at the moment. You can check it out over here, and trust me when I say that the feedback was glowing all around. The video trailer has one moment that is goofy as all get-out, but other than that, this was a serious game prototype.
Personal update
There is a large personal update coming, for those with an interest in that sort of thing, but I will muse on it separately.
Much love to you all,
Zora
