Fawpaw

I discovered the game Aquaria by pure chance in January 2011, a year and a half ago. It has changed the direction of my life, at least for the time being. I started making Labyrinth Mod in February, shortly after I finished the game. I was in love with Aquaria and didn't want the game to end, but you can only play it over so many times… There were several very fine Aquaria mods available on the Bit Blot Forums, and after playing them, I began to think making a mod might be interesting. I particularly wanted to give Naija (the protagonist of Aquaria) one more lovely adventure before the grief of the original game's second ending.

As a total newbie, I learned as much as I could by poring over the modding threads on the forum and perusing the Aquaria wiki, but eventually I had to gather my courage and ask for help. You might think that doesn't sound like such a big deal, but as a somewhat shy woman in my 60s, having to ask really dumb newbie questions of 20 and 30 something guys, well, it was hard… Fortunately, said guys were most helpful, and gradually the mod started coming together.

In fact, for over a year it has been an obsession… I don't think I've ever had so much fun creating something. I'm a landscape and abstract painter and natural science illustrator, accustomed to the enjoyable process of creating imaginary images or depicting natural subjects in a realistic way. But drawing an entity for Labyrinth mod, putting it in the game, watching it come alive and move around, and seeing it interact with other creatures in the game world, is the most pleasurable thing I've ever done with my artwork. And landscaping the game maps, especially using parallax, has become an equally enthralling pleasure. All this in addition to the fun of crafting puzzles and challenges for the player. I feel quite lucky to have discovered modding just as I'm reaching retirement age - a most fortunate conjunction of desired activity and the (guilt-free) time in which to pursue it. Who knows what will be next...

I finished the mod in March, and released it on Bit Blot Forum. Hopefully, it will soon be up here as well. Stay tuned!