MazeStalker

A while ago I destroyed the source file of my trailer. I'm currently rebuilding what I had shot by shot with a lot more experience under my belt! #indiegame #gamedev #indiedev #solodev

Here is the column I wrote on the theme "What I Would have liked to Know About Germany Earlier," along with the additional reflections I provided at Zeit Magazin's request. -A society governed by regulations, yet lacking individual moral judgement, is more dangerous than one with none at all. -A society that values obedience without questioning authority is destined to become corrupt. -A society that admits to error but refuses to reflect on its origins possesses a mind as stubborn and dull as granite. -Here, at a deserted street, people stop dutifully at a red light. Not a car in sight. This, I once thought, is the mark of a highly evolved society. -At the heart of bureaucracy lies a collective endorsement of power's legitimacy, and therefore, individuals surrender their moral judgement–or perhaps never developed one. They abandon challenge. They relinquish dispute. -When conversation becomes avoidance, when topics must not be mentioned, we are already living under the quiet logic of authoritarianism. -When the majority believe they live in a free society, it is often a sign that the society is not free. Freedom is not a gift; it must be wrestled from the hands of banality and the quiet complicity with power. -When people sense that power is beyond challenge, they redirect their energy into trivial disputes. And those trivialities, collectively, are enough to erode a society's very foundations of justice. -When public events of great consequence–such as the Nord Stream Pipeline bombing–are met with silence from both government and media, the silence itself becomes more terrifying than any atomic bomb. -Facts are acknowledged partially, forgotten deliberately, or swallowed by collective silence. And so we repeat catastrophe–against and again, in cycles. -When the media becomes a servant of public opinion, or avoids conflict to maintain favour with existing powers, it becomes an accomplice to authority. What we call lies are not always distortions of fact.

-Political leaders make decisions steeped in fallacy & failure. This reflects the broader political condition of a society in which most people have surrendered their awareness & even their basic agency–allowing such leaders to enact their mistakes on their behalf -When a society uses linguistic difference or cultural misunderstanding as excuses for exclusion, it has crossed into a more insidious form of racism. This is not a political opinion–it is an attitude, a stain in blood, passed down like genes -Bureaucracy is not merely sluggish. It is a cultural scorn. It rejects the possibility of dialogue. It insists that ignorance, codified into policy, no matter how wrong & inhumane it is, remains the best resistance against social mobility, against moral motion. In such a society, hope is not misplaced. It is extinguished -In the surrounding atmosphere, one sees not culture, but self-congratulation; not art, but insularity & collective reverence for power. What is missing is sincerity–honesty of emotion & of intention. In such an environment, art that grapples with true human feeling or moral reckoning is nearly impossible to produce. -A place that routinely discards self-awareness & erases individual agency is one that lives under iron walls of authoritarianism -I have no family, no fatherland, never known what it is to belong. I belong only to myself. In the best of circumstances, that self should belong to everyone. I still do not know what art is. I only hope that what I make might touch its edges while it seems unrelated to anything. & in truth, in the best of circumstances it is unrelated to me, for the "I" already melts into everything -Those things found in galleries, museums, & collectors' living room–are they art? Who has declared them so? On what basis? Why do I always feel suspicion in their presence? -Works that evade reality, that shy away from argument, from controversy, from debate–be they text, painting, or performance–are worthless.

-I understand now: people crave power and tyranny as they crave sunshine and rain, for the burden of self-awareness feels like pain. at times, even like catastrophe. -Under most circumstances, society selects the most selfish, least idealistic among us to take on the work we call "art" because that choice makes everyone feel safe. Additional reflections -In Berlin, I encounter the ever-present Schweinshaxe and Schnitzel, and I can hardly believe that such a highly developed, industrialised country offers such a monotonous selection of ingredients. Even more baffling is the sudden proliferation of Chinese restaurants–most of them noodle-based, and operating at a culinary level that any Chinese person could easily achieve at home. The variety of food and cooking methods is so limited here that people form all over the world feel compelled to open restaurants: Vietnamese, Thai, Turkish–you name it. -But the truly horrifying part? The sheer number of Chinese restaurants. I can only assume they believe that no matter what ends up on the plate, German customers will come running. In front of some of these establishments, there are even long queues–yet the food they serve bears little resemblance to anything recognisably Chinese. My favourite food in Germany is the bread and sausage–you simply can't find ones with such distinctive character anywhere else. -I'm puzzled by why so many people would willingly cram themselves into a small bar just to have a long conversation. Since I don't speak the language, I can only imagine that the young people coming to Berlin would talk about clubbing. This sort of thing was all the rage in the U.S. back in the '70s and '80s. -The Germans might be the only people who are truly the furthest from a sense of humour. This could be the result of their deep reverence for rationality. Just look at Berlin Airport or the advertisements for Mercedes-Benz cars–you start to feel that their lack of humour has become a kind of immense humour in itself

Ai Weiwei was invited to contribute short reflections on “What I would have liked to know about Germany earlier" for an upcoming issue of Zeit Magazin. His submission was first shortened and edited, then immediately cancelled after a review by the Executive Editor. Ai shared his reflections anyway:

The cool thing about working on the trailer is it always makes me work on parts of the game I had almost forgotten! #gamedev #indiegame #mazestalker #indiedev #zelda #solodev

YouTube video by Nintendo of America The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales – Nintendo Direct: Partner Showcase 7.31.2025

www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-zy...

This is what I fight for every day. I'll make it a success too, you'll see! YOU'LL ALL SEE!!!

Man I forgot how much i ADORE this art style...

At first this was hard to deal with. Then I stopped talking to people. But THEN you start to realize. All the pressure to be a busy bee is a complete illusion. Your work matters as much a month later as it does today, when it comes out is entirely irrelevant, unlike your personal wellbeing.

Post bugs they say... people like bugs they say... #gamedev #indiegame #mazestalker

I'm having such a hard time with Tiktok.
This medium really truly pisses me off.

Every advice out there insists that your trailer has to be about gameplay gameplay gameplay. I think I got that. What I want to accomplish when introducing my game to a stranger is that I will make you FEEL things. I'm sorry, but that's why I'm doing this. #gamedev #indiegame

I fing there's a lot more to learn from flawed games like this one!

It's hard to defend the game, but it has its moments.

This still has a few new bugs, but at least it's starting to feel right. Working on this has been an sbolute nightmare, trapped between my character controller that was written by an amateur and the unity physics system. #unity3d #indiegames #gamedev #indiedev

So of course I need to adjust the size of the sollider, but that can only be done by diving deeeeeeep into the character controller system. Sometimes that's how it goes. I don't want to have too many player actions, but the ones I do have must be perfect!

For context: When playtesting I concluded making the collider of the main character smaller solves a lot of issues. But.. When pushing that pushed the model into the block.

I'm rewriting the pushing from scratch. The final implementation will be very complicated and it's gotten me stuck for a month ( sometimes in a #CFS phase complex problems tend to take a while ). Why all this you wonder? Well a little detail was irking me! #gamedev #indiegame

I would do it!

In UX we sometimes make things last longer so essentially you "appreciate" them more! I have never suggested 2 weeks before, but maybe there's a case!

The decentralization of payment services is such a critical step for humanity. Noone actually needs these dinosaur businesses 2025, so if you wonder why your credit card company gets to dictate how you spend the evening, maybe it's time to get off your butt and look into alternatives.

Just doing some light trailer work as I gather the strength to jump back into production! #gamedev #mazestalker #indiegame #animation

Yes there is.

Can't stop me!

"Enraged, the boy's mother plans to kill the ass." I mean to be fair, I'm wondering how my latin career in school would have looked like if this had come across our desks!

I think it's quite commendable how outspoken you are about these issues. This would be a larger debate, but if you didn't get anyone angry in the last 30 days I'd question whether you were truly alive.

I don't think that AI is the problem. It's right in there, in the article: "not by design, by demand".

While all I see is bugs and problems when I watch people, the feedback has been extremly positive. I can tell this is something people want. What made it truly special was seeing kids interact with the game and witnessing how tried and true game formulas even from 20 years ago still got it today.

Two events down. The primary reason I stepped out into the public was that after 4 years and a lot of talk, there does come a point where you have to verify if you are pursuing something worthwhile. #gamedev #mazestalker #indiegame #solodev

I've been a bit inactive due to another round of Covid, in the meantime I'm just preparing little things for another event. I think I'll get back into the groove after that. #gamedev #indiegame #mazestalker

This is the one!

My girlfriend got a #luigi keychain, I told her to put it on her bag with her other cute stuff. She looked at me like I'm a madman and explained Luigi can't go with the cute stuff, Luigi is a MAN! It turns out that Toad IS allowed on her bag though...