I like to say Hello and welcome you good day that is my name
I use CSP and a Kamvas 16.Name is cray, And if I'm not busy eating crayons
for breakfast I am being yelled at by the skeletons next doorI mostly do drawings both digital and traditional, do Pixelart / animations in Aseprite and a healthy dosis of doom II moddingProject lead of the Bushmills brewery
Please be advised I do not take commissions or Art requests from strangers, acquaintances/friends are free to discuss it with me though
"I have a feeling of hope, that things will get better, that I can do it. While I look back, I've could've done things differently and had better results. But through all the mistakes I've made, I've learnt and I've grown; and as long as I'm not dead there is always tomorrow.While I probably haven't taken the best path, the path I've taken is my own and I will do the best I can to walk it."- Comment from "The True Inferno" on Sewerslvts channel
Small Portfolio
Gift for lunex
Serious Sam 2 gamenight poster
Personal Sona
Scrapped Friday Night Funkin Peppino mod
Yung Venuz First Person Sprite Animations for Doom II
WAR! Fanart for Pizza Tower
Usually I would conduct the past year in a Twitter post (I refuse to call it X), but considering the baby money man with his childish attitude and receding hairline cannot behave himself, I ought to write it into here.2023 in hindsight was a great year. Pizza Tower finally came out fresh from the oven after 5 years, and our mod BYOC got its public release in Q2. I got to meet people all over the world at Insomnia i71, was invited to the hugs.tf charity livestream event in Lancaster, I am moving into my final months of my apprenticeship and made several long lasting memories with the people I care the most about.The trip to i71 was especially fun. I have made a lot of good lasting memories on that trip. Like our little party in the best room of the Genting hotel, blasting the Bruno Powroznik video about shoving things up his arse, and the boys yelling each object with such a passion that could only be replicated in Britian. Or the moment a pal and me stormed out from the Pub Quiz venue, shitfaced drunk and hopping like absolute dumbfucks to L O N D I S in the NEC, shouting BOOZE all over again with me making the worst Scotsman impression I could muster as a german person.The hugs.tf livestream was incredible as well. Raising $30000 for charity is something amazing and I am very glad to be part of it.
Met new people there as well, alongside seeing familiar faces.Aside from that, I've met people from all walks of life. People that I can still remember on this cold December month. I really want to thank each individually, but there would be too many to count. The people I have joked around with and talked to, the people that I have listened to and how they shared their own troubles with me, comforting them. The people I met outside (including the internet), the people that messaged me to invite me to social events. The people that checked up on me, asking how I am feeling.One event however was really special. The release of Pizza Tower. Having anticipated the game for over 5 years and getting really integrated into its community, the moment that Buy Button on Steam appeared I was floored. All gamenights before with my friends, all the art, everything the devs and me have done has culimated into this one single moment. Pizza Tower is not only a phenominal game in its own right, but is a celebration of all the previous memories I have personally experienced the years prior from 2020 to 2022. The laughs, the collaborative effort for BYOC, the projects we worked on together. I was unable to have a feeling of a tightknigkt community before due to personal issues I have not fixed on until 2020. Now I have it. And it's the best feeling anyone could ever have.Really, the best way I can summarise 2023 is that it is a sum of the best parts from the previous years. All the hard work that has gone into improving my Quality of Life is paying off big time now, and it's only going to get better from here. While I am nowhere done with bettering myself and getting help, the fact that I can stand in front of you today is incredible.All the trials and tribulations have culimated in this year of "I can finally say I can live." I can say "I feel alive." After all the past 2 decades, it is finally over. I can live. With you. Everyone else.Happy new year. Stay safe out there.
Stop revealing your personal weaknesses online.It doesn't matter in whatever context you openly talk about your triggers, DNI lists, mental illnesses or whatever you want to call it.Openly presenting your weak points like this can be used with malicious intent, and WILL be. You are more easily manipulable. You will receive targeted harassment and said people will use the information you reveal on your bio to press your buttons in even more uncomfortable ways you didn't even think of.Shut up and take that list off. It's basic internet etiquette 101.
We write the 10th of November, 3 PM. I finish my workday from home, and boot up Return of the Obra Dinn, a game that sat in my library for 5 years. I solved about 40% of the passenger manifest fates and still have some tough nuts to crack. I join the voice channel of my friends server. A few hours later, I saw the ending with three other people from two different friend cycles that joined in to see my live reaction. The credits role, and a few tears in my eye begin to form.That's really the core message for me. 2024 was a year of spectacle and change. A lot of my familiar spaces were turned on their head in both good and not so good ways, but mostly the former. I pushed myself outside my comfort zone more often than usual. There is honestly so much to go over, and so little time, so I would like to highlight a few notable achievements from this year.- The culmination of 5 years of hard work finally paid off. I finished my apprenticeship of 3 years with a final mark of an impressive 81% and was hired afterwards to stay with my current employer. I get a good salary, have hours that I can self-manage, and can even work from home whenever I want to. I've received also a small honorary prize in regard to my self-developments over the 3 years that I took this apprenticeship.Usually, these prizes are given out to people that reach extraordinary marks or show above and beyond engagement to their vocational school. Luckily, this prize is flexible, and I was chosen to be given it, with the reason being that my improvements over the 3 years were so substantial that I became a golden standard on how a good employer and a vocational school can massively improve the QoL for any student in whatever aspects they need.- I finally got the tools I needed to beat ADHD into the dust. For years I have suppressed the idea of ever getting diagnosed, but this year marked a turning point in which I said, "enough is enough" and finally got it out of the way. The amount of relief I had when a professional confirmed my suspicions sent me on an emotional rollercoaster. Glad to finally lay this suspicion to rest, and sad for how many hours I have lost if I just went after the diagnosis sooner.However, grief brings only one so far. Once I got my bearings I used my newly found superpower of "finally fucking functioning like a normal adult" to abuse and do stuff I always wanted to do for the longest time. Elvanse, you kick ass. Thank you for carrying me through this shit.- I massively levelled up my artistic skills. I scouted out more brushes for my 2D artwork, became more comfortable with doing colouring, and finally found a style I like to draw. I even went as far as to dedicate an entire month this year to learn the basics of Blender, and practice making humanoid models.Since I knew how to import existing 3D models to games like Bomb Rush Cyberfunk and Beat Saber, it made only the most sense to put the funky alien into those games. The former even netted me a repost on TourDePizza's twitter account, which is still so wild to me.- While this is only a passive, I think thanks to me pushing and plunging myself so often outside my comfort zone this year, I became more open to just letting things play out and taking them for what they are, rather for what they should be to appease to my niece tastes.As an example, this year saw the release of Cyan World's remake of RIVEN, a sequel to the notorious difficult and charming logical puzzle game MYST from the late 90s. Despite RIVEN still having hard puzzles that are on the same vein as MYST, I found that I had a fantastic time with RIVEN and managed to mostly play through the game without any outside help whatsoever. For the few puzzles I got stuck on, I was at least on the right track and thought about the hints in a wrong way.After beating RIVEN, I used this newfound confidence to finally try out and finish Return of the Obra Dinn. I finished the entire game with all fates solved within just 2 play sessions, which speaks volumes to my version of a few years ago. I would not have dreamed of ever giving this game another try. I just felt it wasn't for me. Now, I feel more ready than ever to plunge into unfamiliar activities, gernes etc.I have realised doing this is super important, as otherwise, I may end up missing out on experiences that are genuinely fantastic, or a much-needed pace breaker from the usual comfort zone I am used to.- This year, we finally got to see ANTONBLAST, a culmination of over 3 years of hard work from the international dev team Summitsphere, where the dev testing lead [c] was so kind to invite me to a group of community playtesters that got to try the game way earlier. I have sunken now a three-digit hour sum into a game that is, at best, eight hours long for 100% completion, and I would gladly do it again for any future content patch or for their next project.The fact I was able to do this at all is so awesome that any form of a million spammed “Thank you” messages to every single dev member would not be enough to express the gratitude I feel towards everybody that I am able to call a friend.I feel that’s really the core message here. Gratitude.I took a little fun art quiz on what I create art for a few weeks ago, and it said the following that really stuck with me:“Your art is thanks to every good fortune you’ve received. It is a tribute to a feeling you have vowed never to forget. You count yourself as incredibly lucky, and your work is a testament to that.”I like that wording a lot. It feels like I have completely lucked out on so many aspects of my life, but I mustn’t forget this good fortune didn’t come without doing any work on my part.“It is proof this world and this life need not be such terrible things.”The only minor addition this sentence could do to completely shatter me emotionally even further is to replace “It is” with “You are”. Because this is right. No matter how I slice it, it’s true. I am a person able to bring joy to people when they need it, just with my own unique way. That is such a powerful ability to have – I must make sure to never lose it.Have a good rest of the year everyone.
Once again, another year passes. I will be honest, part of me is always looking forward to writing these yearly callbacks. No matter on how difficult they ever get, these yearly "reviews" are an important forefront to setting the record straight on how things really are. That said, 2025 came along with its own unique challenge which I will get into shortly.2025 was a year of discovery, love, struggle and acceptance. I was sent on an emotional rollercoaster throughout this entire year. I got to feel love of the extra magnitude, met people who have reshaped into who I am today, and had to battle through the trenches of low-blow depression and burnout. Even with that, the highlights of the year were still plentful:- At the end of Feburary, Porter Robinson visited Germany at the Fabrik in Hamburg as part of his SMILE! tour. I snagged a ticket immediately and during the weekend got to hear the best live performance of the recent decade. I love Porter Robinson's music, especially starting with Nurture, so to hear an artists music in such a celebration was a wonderful treat.- I paid a visit to America, Minnesota this year! I still find it insane I can just say that casually out loud! Alongside buddies from the Pizza Tower speedrunning scene, we spent the better part of a week inside the Milton Hotel for Summer Games Done Quick 2025. It is by no exaggeration that this week was the best one I ever had in my life this far.Not only got I to visit the States, I had the oppotunity to meet face to face with Nightmargin and gir from Future Cat, the two people who shaped my entire teenagehood with OneShot. Seeing the run performed by KyoshiCadre, alongside both devs in the crowd, was like fate gifting me the best possible version of a happy ending.Chi Xu from D-Cell Games was there as well, with whom I had contact before. We ate breakfast together on the last day and chatted about all sorts of things.Fate was not done yet however. To my surprise, Dr. Robotnik's Ring Racers was part of the GDQ schedule too. Before I could blink, I saw myself in a restaurant alongside a member of Kart Krew and the runner for the game with a friend of hers.Meeting with general friends who are stationed in America was also nothing short of a treat. Shoutouts to SoaringSloth, impossablank, raxd, Ellie, Dorkus64, Leon, and Rhea: Hope I didn't forget anyone. You all made this week special.I want to reiterate this point that this week was INSANE as so many building blocks from over the years fell into place within this ONE week ALONE. I feel eternally lucky to have been granted the possibility.- In September, I took a visit to London and met up with Limey from the now defunct DFS TF2 server. We spent and bantered most of the week together, as I was in London to visit all four liveshows from the fictional band Gorillaz. They held a liveshow for each of their first three albums at the Copperbox arena, alongside a mystery show which we know of as the new album coming out next year, The Mountain. All these live shows were fantastic and Limey's company was especially a treat. It definetly felt like I catched up on two decades of live shows experiences, hehe. As a ripple effect, I reconnected and catched up with old friends from DFS by being invited back to Strello's server. I was welcomed back with open arms, and it was nothing other than pure joy to chat on what I was up to these past 5 years.- I confessed my love to XBC. He's been my partner in crime for over half a decade, and if you end up always working on something together, your heart may start feeling funny. My confession to him was comparable to dropping a nuclear bomb on his head. I sent his entire world view crashing down. He questioned his sexual orientation twice over and it took him a month or two to adjust. Ever since then, XBC has been loving me to an extent I don't think I have ever seen. Being in his company puts me at ease and massively helps me with getting my mental struggle in order.Speaking of, this year sadly had a lengthy period of chronic depression that I had to work extra hard to get out from. It's getting a bit personal, but this section is absolutely crucial to rounding out this year review.
The CrashStarting with July, my mood was generally down the drain and I started to develop a cynical outlook to everything I was doing. In short, I had severe burnout from trying to satisfy other people's needs. I was stressed, had to cry a lot, and needed to keep my personal anger at bay.There was no other way around it - my chronic depression got the better of me. It started when my parents said mean things, even though they meant well. Their statement was sometime last year "We worry you are missing so much from life by just being up in your room." My chronic depression said "And I took that personally". All's OK with my parents, they just sadly don't know when to use the right words sometimes.Especially with 2025, I tried to make a statement that theirs was full of bollocks. I expanded my hobbies, looked for new venues, tried to branch out even further.Mix this with having to keep up with general responsebilities in life, my projects, my desires... sacrificing my limited time even more, ignoring what I love... it all adds up to a breaking point this year where I spent hours alone, crying away for no one else to see.I was breaking, no, killing myself by trying to do way too much at once. Even outside of what my parents said - my soul wants to be productive, to meet, to experience. It yearns and cries to work like an absolute tiger. Yet, I didn't allow myself to feel love. I didn't allow myself to stabilize. To rest.2025 was a big lesson in how to deal with that - balancing the desire to commit to hobbies, learing new things, while still allowing room to breathe. Honestly, my output was insane from the past 2 years, and my body was slowly forcing me to take a chill pill. I took it possibly a bit too late, as July to September were some of the darkest times I have felt as of recent.I came out the other end victorious, bandage wrapped around my hands. My emotional safety net was seriously tested during these months, and I am proud to say it passed the exam with flying colors.
The Happy EndLife sometimes throws you the craziest stuff down your way.I have proven to myself this year that I do not merely "rot" at home - I contribute. If I want something done, like actually done, I will stop at nothing to make it a reality. Whatever it may be.I am powerful. Without the blink of an eye; I will learn a 3D program in 3 months. I will pick up a new language. I will write. I will draw. I host, I scream, I laugh. I expand. I seek. I document.
ClosureToby Fox hosted a 10th anniversary stream for Undertale this year. It ended with the following words:The world is as big as you want it to be.Where will you go next?In short: Wherever it will take me.Truth be told, I don't know how my world will look like in the far future, or what I should seek next. For everything good that has happened to me in 2025 however, I seem to be on a pretty good path.I seek out my world and reshape it into what I want it to be. Some things might not land, but that's ok. It doesn't have to be.I am grateful for the life I have been given. For this reason, I must keep going, no matter the struggle. I will not give up.I hope you are part of my world for the years to come, and that I get to be in yours too.To whoever reads this, I wish you merry christmas and Happy New Year.With much love, CrayFray. <3
