Hello there,

Just wanted to quickly drop by to announce that I won't be participating Pixel Day, or likely be around here for this week and the next. I'm just really busy IRL and that comes first.

I've been also working pretty hard on .defrag, adding new content and making sure it feels like an upgrade compared to what's currently available, which you can still check out if you want. Testers might be needed at some point, so why not.

That's all for now, I'll see you folks later.

//FD

WARNING! LONG POST AHEAD.

And another year's down the drain.

It's truly been an intense year, for better or worse. I'd like to leave any political banter aside and instead just spend a few words on what I have accomplished in 2016 as Forgotten Dawn, as I've anticipated in the last post.

Games and related stuff

- Trail of Shadows: Origin

The first escape-the-room kind of game I had the chance to design and direct with the guys at X App. It was intended as a side-project to the main series, Tears of the Machine — something fun to make while the big project was in the works. Folks liked the idea and we released the game for mobile in early 2016 after about 4-5 months in the making. It's not over yet, however, as we're still planning something neat for this game at some point this year. ;)

As per usual, I also made the soundtrack which is available here.

Android link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.shadow.game.android

iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/trail-of-shadows-origin/id1102054848?mt=8

- .defrag

This project has a peculiar premise. I made it as a bit of a self-challenge after years of foreplanning and not being able to pull out actual games for myself. I built the core files in about 10 days of non-stop development and I'm still updating the game to this day, in fact, I am prepping the next version (likely the final one) as we speak. It's technically early access as of now, but it can be finished and I'm hoping to put it on Greenlight at some point in 2017. If you like surreal/weird retro-styled exploration games, this game might be for you. :)

The soundtrack, which mostly consists of experimental noise tracks, is available here.

Gamejolt link: http://gamejolt.com/games/defrag/179965

- Tears of the Machine: Episode 02

And here's the main dish. Over the past couple of years, I've pretty much become a de facto co-writer/co-director of this newborn series that still has a lot of potential to unleash, aside from providing the soundtrack and occasionally concept artwork. Episode 02 is the second canonical installment in the series, after Prologue, and Episode 01. In terms of audio, it was an interesting change of pace for me because we intended it to be more action-oriented instead of "in your face" creepy/dark, at least compared to the previous episode. I took inspiration from various video game soundtracks including Half-Life 2, Ratchet & Clank, and the Metal Gear series, and overall it was an interesting experience. The game took about a year to get done, as we planned beforehand, and we're now moving forward to the next projects.

The soundtrack is available here, along with a few sample tracks that I shared here on Newgrounds.

Android link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.totm.game.android

iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/tears-of-the-machine-extended/id1157840414?ls=1&mt=8

Music

Aside the aforementioned soundtracks, I haven't published many solo tracks in 2016 or even made albums for myself. There's actually a good reason for that and yeah, being involved in many different things at once is part of it. Only recently, I've been thinking about organizing my own musical projects better and what I actually would like to do with them. I've mentioned in previous posts how I'd like to organize my future albums into different "series" so that each of them would have their own sound and in the end it would still be me, under the same alias. It's a centralized approach but at the same time it enables me to branch into many different things because that's how my brain works, lol.

Worth mentioning is the creation of The Underground Collective, along with fellow @RealFaction, enabling all kinds of artists from Newgrounds to voice their own ideas and creativity. I hope to make it an annual thing, but for now I'd rather not plan anything in advance and live by a "we'll see" approach. It went surprisingly well, and I really hope to repeat the experience at some point again, possibly by expanding the concept to other mediums, not just confined to the musical realm.

The future

I'm pretty excited to see what can be accomplished in 2017. Bringing my games on Steam starting from .defrag would be great and it's definitely not a remote possibility this time around. I would also love to finish my portfolio website and start dumping content there. I'm also thrilled by what X App will come up with this year, and I'm sure it's also gonna be a busy but satisfying year.

I'm probably gonna upload less solo tracks here and less experiments due to just the sheer volume of projects I'm personally invested in. You've been warned! jk

I'll try to be around here, but I'll honestly just be busy overall and, well, I need to prioritize my own projects and ideas.

With that said, it's been an eventful year and I hope the trend continues in 2017 as well. Huge thanks to everyone who has been involved in any of the aforementioned projects, either directly or indirectly — without you supporting those ideas, nothing would have been done and I think it's important to let you guys know.

So, Happy New Year from Italy! I'll see you folks around, and as always, stay tuned. ;)

//FD

I wish you all a Merry Xmas to those who are celebrating it, and happy holidays to everyone else!

I will write a bit of a retrospective once 2017 kicks in, just as a reminder for myself about what I have accomplished with this project so far and what needs to be accomplished in the future.

For now, let's just have fun, chill with either family or good friends, online or not, and that's about it.

See you in the next year!

//FD

...for now.

Hey guys, what's up?

So, as I tweeted yesterday, I decided to switch .defrag's development status to Early Access as opposed to Complete. I think it simply more accurately describes its current position rather than projecting something that isn't quite there yet.

As I have shared in the past, I am still working on possibly the last update which will be due... when it'll be done. This last update will likely feature more end game quests and some extra characterization, as well as more NPC dialogue. I have been wanting to expand the end game for a while, especially as an attempt to justify the fast traveling mechanic more. I also might want to enable the Speed Hax item sooner at the cost of something. But we'll see.

Also, I've added .defrag to Gamejolt's partnership program for streamers/youtubers! You can read more at this link, if you're interested. Of course, you're welcome to give the game a go and make your own let's play videos at the cost of pretty much nothing, since the game is technically name your price.

So, there you have it. Stay tuned for more updates and I'll see you folks around.

//FD

Hey folks, how's it going?

I've just made a new account on this website, Poetry Soup.

I figured it might be a good place to share my short thoughts, 'cause why not.

I don't call myself a poet, nor I call my writings "poems". For me, they're just short thoughts, contemplations born within the circumstances that have generated such train of thoughts. I do not adhere by form or rhyme. I enjoy the deeper meaning behind words, the imagery they can evoke and their musicality. Often times I prefer synthesis of language over pompous compositions.

Sounds pretentious enough? :P

Don't worry, it's just how I honestly feel about these things and poetry in general. To each their own, right?

I will upload more in the next few days. I got quite the collection...

Feel free to leave a comment or whatever :)

Links to previous albums/singles

sixteen: https://mega.nz/#!gUIggJpD!O79jMND79_Ud5cn-QXnnE_sK93Pb0aN8Xi6puh_CVWE

mangled.bits: https://mega.nz/#!YdxiTLgL!pKI-Ah7xiJSxyNpQrOs2XXdWLtAxPqydO0SA5cbyf3g

Tomorrow Will Be Better: https://mega.nz/#!ERoXRIwB!AVVvpKjungNQqswx005YP24i5VwKuGYG-KCpejqlcCU

Seconds Gone By: https://mega.nz/#!xRAQhD7B!w_7cGXhsylw6ZEoE0ToSr0otxQHoVvY25C2umSXCBqw

Yet another public service announcement :)

I've been thinking about temporarily taking down my albums sixteen, mangled.bits, and the two singles Tomorrow Will Be Better, Seconds Gone By from my Bandcamp.

Reason for that is because I feel it might be better to just share my soundtrack albums there as opposed to treating it like a dump space for anything I come up with.

Until my website is ready, which is gonna take a good while, I'll try to share the aforementioned albums directly here on a file-hosting website like Mega. If you'd still like to pay for them and be a charitable soul, you can support me through this Paypal link. <3

The archives will contain the albums in lossless WAV format, so you can convert it in whatever format you like. About the two singles, your choice if you wanna download them here on NG or through Mega.

sixteen: https://mega.nz/#!gUIggJpD!O79jMND79_Ud5cn-QXnnE_sK93Pb0aN8Xi6puh_CVWE

mangled.bits: https://mega.nz/#!YdxiTLgL!pKI-Ah7xiJSxyNpQrOs2XXdWLtAxPqydO0SA5cbyf3g

Tomorrow Will Be Better: https://mega.nz/#!ERoXRIwB!AVVvpKjungNQqswx005YP24i5VwKuGYG-KCpejqlcCU

Seconds Gone By: https://mega.nz/#!xRAQhD7B!w_7cGXhsylw6ZEoE0ToSr0otxQHoVvY25C2umSXCBqw

That's right. "Noise". With quotation marks.

Let's be honest for a sec. Putting a few exceptions aside, my tracks have been featuring noises of all kinds. Various background static samples, radio chatter, glitches, lo-fi distortion, digital sounds, found instruments, industrial sounds, anything that can be arranged and put on my DAW.

To me, these sounds are an integral part of my compositions, and can't be "cleansed" from their essence. In fact, often times, noises constitute the base upon which I build the musical pillars of my tracks.

As a matter of fact, we can't really ignore these sounds. They're all around us. When we step outside, we're literally bombed with sounds from all kinds of sources. Loud, roaring, invasive, or quiet, subtle, pleasant. When is a sound interpreted as noise? When is something noisy? When is noise musical? After all, it is not a groundbreaking idea. People like John Cage made us think about it, and half a century earlier, Futurists.

I'm not here to bring up that kind of argument, between what's musical and what's noisy. However, I'd like you to reflect about the importance of including such noises within the context of artistic exploration and expression. Personally, sounds of all sorts and shapes are a gold mine of possibilities.

Ever since I started composing, in late 2009, I have been thinking deeply about the possibility of experimenting with noise as a way to look beyond boundaries and so-called standards, conventions. The reason I keep emphasizing the word noise is because after all, whether you disagree with its definition or not, its very existence is down to subjectivity and the need to express a common ground about something that, at its core, is a mere aural source.

So, what does that imply? When you break down the individual components of a musical track, they are like building blocks, each of them playing a role in the bigger picture. When you look at it this way, everything looks pretty much the same. They're all sounds, whether it's a violin playing the 9th Symphony or a jackhammer picked from the streets. Such blasphemy! They're all piled-up boxes — some might be bigger than others, but the substance is the same for everybody. For me, there is no such thing as music and noise. That is simply not my problem as a sharer of content, or even as a listener.

It is ultimately down to a choice, and like all choices, indeed, they carry their own consequences.

I have been meeting a lot of different people on the internet. I love talking to them, for better or worse. Sometimes, I purposefully push the edge by publishing tracks that have a lot of noise in them (think of sixteen and my Hyperion loops). And it's great! I enjoy seeing people participate in some way, it makes those experiments a very interesting social experience. Some may lament the fact that those tracks are too short, which I tend to take as a compliment. Some others might want a "noiseless" version of a few tracks (trust me, I've been asked that), which would be incredibly offensive if I were a pretentious anticonformist asshat. It puts a smile on my face, instead. :)

It doesn't really take a lot of time to establish this kind of creative freedom. In the end, it's about exploring possibilities, about having fun with the world around us, growing as thinking individuals. It surely isn't like a switch that you can turn on and off at will. You can't suddenly start liking certain things, but that's besides the point. Some things are often difficult to approach for a reason. Like this. (It's loud, turn down the volume)

Are your ears bleeding enough? Good, try this.

It's an interesting phenomenon to look past the point of merely liking/disliking novelty. Sure, it's not like I go crazy for the aforementioned links, but I still appreciate the fact that they exist for us to comment upon and at least make the effort of seeing things from different perspectives.

These days, there exist such a vastness of information at the tip of a finger that I can't blame people for feeling lost whether they decide to step outside their comfort zone. And... it's OK, really. We've all kind of rejected change at some point in our lives. Human beings tend to be creatures of habit. We tend to detest the new if it isn't directly coming from ourselves.

Or maybe we just don't like some things.

One thing is for sure, however. Noise is a fundamental part of our experience, and I think it would be very reductive to give it a dry, textbook definition. There's so much beneath the surface, is there? It would be a shame to let it slip past us.

Thanks for reading.

//FD

Hey folks, how's it going?

I've been thinking about something interesting lately. I've been coming back and forth to this idea, trying to better define it and give it a somewhat coherent form.

Looking back at the actual albums I have released so far, you can see a bunch of soundtrack albums and a few releases that vary quite a lot in terms of style and sound. Despite being proud of what I have published, I do feel the need to take a step back and make a few observations.

To me, the way I have been organizing my releases feels... somewhat disjointed.

Let me try explaining why.

If I had to put myself in the shoes of a new listener who has never once seen any of my works and decides to give it a shot, I think it's fair to think that on average, the first thing you listen to will be the one deciding whether you should keep listening or give up entirely.

Now, I consider myself as an eclectic individual. I can do many things and I do have many interests, so my output can vary quite wildly from one release to the next. From cinematic, "epic" trailer-like compositions, to experimental electronic music, to quiet ambiances, etc. You get the idea. So, there's quite a lot to choose from, especially when you start listening to my portfolio here on Newgrounds -- I definitely don't expect people to listen to my whole catalogue.

The effect is similar to getting suddenly thrown into the open sea and grabbing the first buoy you see, ignoring the other buoys on the horizon. In a sense, there's no sense of guidance.

If I had to be my own consumer, I'd probably just give up listening entirely, which is pretty unsatisfactory and definitely not the intended effect.

In short, what it boils down to is the necessity to organize my output better when it comes to publishing new releases/albums.

I came up with the idea of grouping my future releases into different "series".

Each series will have a distinctive characteristic that would make browsing potentially easier for the audience and myself.

Instead of opening new accounts or bands, each series will still be under the greater-scope project Forgotten Dawn. It is centralized in a sense that FD kinda acts as a "container act" for all these ideas, yet at the same time it is fractured considering all these ideas can vary quite differently from each other, even concept-wise. It's kind of like I'm my own label and I welcome all these different projects under my wings, but at the end of the day it's still me.

The way I view Forgotten Dawn, as a project, is that it changes and evolves over time. Whether it's about establishing an identity, or adding new content, or revolutionizing its internal organization.

I think this is the next logical step in building a structure for my project and a way to better organize my own thoughts.

Here on Newgrounds nothing is really going to change in terms of output. Newgrounds gives a basic structure to every musician here based on a chronological order. That, and playlists. So, I think that this new way of organizing my works will likely impact my Bandcamp portfolio and possibly my Youtube channel the most.

When you think about it, it's really nothing groundbreaking. It's a simple idea meant to have a great impact in the long-term for pragmatic purposes.

So yeah, that's about it for now. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. It's still something I'm cooking up, so forgive me if I look like I'm all over the place.

Stay tuned,

//FD

Hey folks, got some good news.

Ever since January I've been working on the soundtrack for the newly published Tears of the Machine episode.

The game is available on both iOS and Android. I can assure you a lot of work has been poured into it, and we couldn't be prouder to finally release this game.

Here are some useful links, and enjoy the soundtrack meanwhile!

iOS version: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/tears-of-the-machine-extended/id1157840414?ls=1&mt=8

Android version: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.totm.game.android

Soundtrack: https://forgottendawn.bandcamp.com/album/tears-of-the-machine-episode-02-original-soundtrack