a blog? in the year of our lord?

yep. i was lost in thought at work a couple days ago, and thought it’d be nice to have a place to write them down.

i’ve never been a fan of social media growing up, and because of that i’ve mostly kept things to myself. i’m still not a fan, but i want to try and change that a little, except with something more personal.

who?

i’m Nicole, known online as NaokoAF (capitalization important), or most commonly just Nao (pronounced “now”). i’m 22 at the time of writing, and have been obsessed with computers since i was a little kid. i remember telling my teachers i wanted to be a game developer when i grew up.

i taught myself programming, starting with blender’s visual scripting (back when it had a game engine), moved onto construct 2 (a 2d game engine with visual scripting), eventually evolving into modding minecraft servers with java, and then making unity games with C#.

i’ve spent the last few years making dozens upon dozens of unity games that never saw the light of day (which i hope to document some day). the first real public project i published was hasty controls, a control enhancement mod for haste (which you should totally try).

i’ve also dipped my toes in other (somewhat adjacent) areas:

• music production: i’ve played around in ableton live and made a few songs, many of which don’t sound great, but a few that stand out as okayish. it’s definitely something i’d like to try again.
• 3d modelling: this one’s a little obvious since it comes with game development. it’s something i struggle greatly with but i know enough to get by.
• graphic design: i may not be good at it, but i’ve always tried. growing up i made youtube banners and profile pictures for me and my friends. nowadays i still dabble in it, since most projects require at least a little bit of design.
• arduino (hardware modding): a few years ago i repaired/modded an old guitar hero controller using a raspberry pi pico, and i’ve recently added an audio jack to my headphones. there are many more projects i’d to try once i have the time (and money).

why not twitter?

i know, i know, but i have a good reason. while i think twitter/bluesky can work really well as a public diary of sorts, they also feel a lot different.

for one, i’m a yapper. its hard for me to consolidate my thoughts into just a few words, and having a whole page to myself is just… freeing.

and for two, its a matter of audience. tweeting is like talking a little too loud at a restaurant. yes, you’re sitting on a table with just your friends, but anyone around you can choose to listen in. meanwhile, a blog is like inviting your friends over. you’re all in a private space, and there’s no expectations from any of you (i hope any of that made sense).

what to expect

i plan to mainly write about programming, game development/design, and tech in general. the things i’m mostly qualified to talk about.

if that sounds a little scary to you, don’t worry too much. my goal with these articles is to try and make these topics approachable to people who haven’t dedicated their whole lives to this one specific niche (normal people).

i’m highly inspired by sebastian lague’s coding adventures series. if you haven’t heard of it, he documents all kinds of experiments he’s been working on, without focusing too much on the code itself. its extremely entertaining, and i’d love to capture even 1% of that in written form.

thanks for reading!

i’m not really sure how to end this thing. at first i didn’t know what to write, and then it turned into hundreds and hundreds of words without me noticing. this may be a complete mess, and likely horrible to read, so if you made it this far i am very grateful.

if for whatever reason you want to read more of these, you can add the rss feed to your favorite aggregator, or just come back here when you feel like it. idk i’m not your mom.