I just updated my website for the first time since February 2025 and it feels great to be back!

Why the long break?

My old website was made in Hugo, a complicated Static site generator that I didn't fully understand, which is scripted using Go, a programming language that I don't fully understand. Because of this, I mostly stuck with a default Hugo theme that I didn't really like the look of:

So I already didn't like working on my website, but having to look at the ugly default theme completely killed any of my remaining motivation to post on it.

How did I want to program my website?

I essentially just wanted to code a website in raw HTML/CSS, but with a few extra functions. I wanted to be able to write pages in markdown, I wanted to be able to automatically generate a list of blog posts and an RSS feed, and I wanted a small amount of light scripting so I could insert common headers and footers into my webpages instead of having HTML everywhere.

I also wanted to be able to add small pieces of custom functionality to my posts' markdown, such as being able to embed YouTube videos:

So I guess what I wanted was technically still a static site generator, but one that was so lightweight that it was probably better to think of it as a small metaprogramming layer on top of HTML/CSS/Markdown, a bit like the C preprocessor.

Zine and Phantomake to the rescue

Until recently, I had no idea that things like this existed, so I assumed I was going to have to program it myself. Fortunately, Zine and Phantomake came to the rescue!

I imagine Zine will be the better long-term option for me in the future once it gets closer to 1.0 and adds support for things like custom templates in markdown content (such as embedding YouTube videos), but for now I'm using Phantomake. Honestly, either option works great for me.

I love that I can use markdown for things like this blog post, or entirely handcode the page's main content for things like my arcade game name generator, or anything inbetween! It's a much more comfortable website-building environment than before.

I can make my site look however I want

Now that I understand a tiny bit of HTML and CSS, I can make my website look pretty! I wanted it to look like the Hyper Bun Buster menus, which is also how my game development streams look:

So that's what I did! It didn't take too long to get it working, and I ended up with this:

I love it! It's exactly what I wanted. It feels so empowering to have a website that I can actually control the look and feel of, instead of having to fit my posts in a social media character limit or poorly attempt to wrangle someone else's theme for a static site generator that I didn't understand how to use.

I can post again!

I'm free to write more blog posts! I'm busy working on Hyper Bun Buster for the next few months so I imagine it'll mostly just be game journal posts for the time being, but I love that I have a place I can post things again if I'm in the mood for it.

I'd love to post more about the design of Hyper Bun Buster and how I approach game design in general, but I really can't get over the hump of feeling like I'm not qualified to write about those kinds of things until the game is out. So expect a post on how I design 2D arcade-style action games in a few months!

Until then, I'm going back to work. I hope people like the SAGExpo 2026 Hyper Bun Buster demo when it launches next week!