Spring 2026 Updates
Hey Z Space travelers! I wanted to update people who may have been absent from the stream on what's been happening and where Game Z is going in the near future. The TL;DR? I beat a crazy Zelda rando with CrowdControl, and I was challenged to a Pokémon FRLG Nuzlocke run, so that's coming soon. Also expect coding and Dark Souls at some point.
Retro Goodness
Last month, I played through Soul Blazer and Secret of Mana on-stream, and both were pretty great RPGs that didn't overstay their welcome. They definitely show their age in core design, but still important pieces of game history that help show the evolution of the Action RPG.
Random-sanity
For the three year affiliateversary, I completed a pretty nutso Ship of Harkinian randomizer, which included one-hit kills, ocarina notes, no wallet, shuffled entrances, shuffled bosses, grass-sanity, tree-sanity, pot-sanity, and SIXTY NINE TRIFORCE PIECES! I played with CrowdControl, and it was a pretty fun three days! The community's participation contributed to at least a dozen of the 94 deaths it took me to finish the run! Big shout-out to those who were able to show up!
Any future randomizers will omit the entrance shuffling. Getting turned around slowed me down quite a bit and it gets frustrating to go in circles looking for that one specific entrance you found already, but forgot about 20 minutes ago. Still, it was a great run and I am already considering ways to spice up the next one.
FRLG Nuzlocke
While hanging on @torabii's channel, I mentioned I hadn't played through a Nuzlocke run before. So, he quadruple god-dog dared me to do one! Specifically, FireRed or LeafGreen. I'll probably be playing FireRed, since I bought and played through LeafGreen back when it was brand new.
The date's undecided, but I'll try to give people a few days' notice. I'll need time to research the rules and brainstorm a starting strategy before I begin.
Reclaiming Darkness
It's been nearly a year since I've touched Dark Souls II. I still have some DLC to finish before I can move on to another Soulslike. Dark Souls III and Sekiro are in the pipeline next, so if you have a preference, please let me know!
Code Learning
My eye has been on HTMX lately, as have a few other tools. I'd like to devote a few streams exclusively to learning or trying out new tools to see if any interest me enough to dive deeper. This sort of content hasn't been on the stream in a while, but I've been neglecting my tech interests, and it'd be cool to find other people trying out simpler or lighter-weight solutions to their problems.
I was impressed with how easily I put together the screensaver with LÖVE2D last year, so I want to get more serious with learning it. We'll start with primitives and work our way up to something like a cutscene or textbox. Maybe an idea will tickle our fancy and we'll run with it.
More Stream Features Incoming
Lastly, there are some ideas I've cooked up for the stream, but I want to finish them before I'm fully ready to share. Let's just say the interactivity for the stream will be going up! These things take time to make, so Please Understand.
That's it for Spring 2026! See you guys on stream, and stay Game Z!