An Introduction

When I made this blog, I wasn’t quite sure where to start.  I have so much to talk about, but diving right into the details doesn’t feel quite right.  Where’s the context?  Where’s the background knowledge?  So, after thinking for a couple days, I’ve decided instead I will make an Introduction and New Years blog… a little early.

But firstly, I should introduce myself.  My name is MushroomSoupCat (at least, online it is).  I’ve been called Mushroom or Soup online, but never Cat.  Who knows?  You could be the first.  (My pronouns are She/Her by the way.)

It's me!

To give a comprehensive list of who I am as a person, that would take a long time.  A better adjective might be “artist”, a sort of all encompassing word to describe any creative pursuit.  However, there are a few things you might see the most from me as I write my blogs.

First of all, I’m a 2D digital artist, and specialize in comics.  Besides that, I’m also a game developer, but I enjoy making traditional games such as trading card games and board games more, as they use my 2D skills better than most video games.  But a good 2D video game won’t do any wrong!  I’m also a writer, although most of my writing goes into original characters and their comics.  And lastly, I am a textile artist, specializing in crochet and bracelet weaving.

Yes, I said I wouldn’t make a list, and yet I still listed a bunch of stuff.  Trust me, that’s hardly the half of it…

I thought I would take some time to introduce the projects I’m working on and share some creative goals for 2025.  Of course, I’ve been working on creative projects for longer than I’ve had a blog, so it makes sense to catch you all up to speed on what I’ve created so far so that the future of those projects makes more sense.  I’ll still try to give some general context in each of my posts, but this is a nice reference guide to refer back to if you’re unsure of what project I’m talking about.

As for my projects, I’ll give some basic information about each, and most likely delve deeper into some of them in later blog posts.  I’ll note if I have any plans to delve deeper into the project’s backstory in my description of the project itself.

My first and oldest project is a little comic called Tvornik (tuh - vor - nick).  Little is in italics just for emphasis on my sarcasm.  Because really, Tvornik is nowhere near little.  I began the project about three years ago when I met a set of triplets.  Being an only child, I always had a love for sibling dynamics, so finding a set of triplets in real life really set off my story alarms.

Due to my love for cool magic, I decided to make Tvornik about a school of magical people (called Tvornik) with different categorizations of their powers.  The story is heavily inspired from the Grishaverse books by Leigh Bardugo, specifically Shadow and Bone.  I took the ideas of a Slavic setting and power categorizations and put my own spin on them, making something almost unrecognizable in the end.  That really teaches you a lesson that, no matter how heavily inspired a project is from another piece of media, as long as you mix a bunch of media together and work it enough, it will still be original in the end.

Tvornik V2 Cover Page

Since its creation, Tvornik has had two official versions, both of which can be found on my website tvornik-comic.com.  The third version is currently being made from the ground up, taking everything I learned and am learning from the old versions of Tvornik as well as my other comics to make something bigger and better!  (hopefully not bigger actually, Tvornik version 2 was huge)

Tvornik is such a giant endeavor and influence in my life that I plan to make at least one other post explaining the history of the comic and the idea, so look out for that in the future!

The next project up is actually quite similar to Tvornik, as it was inspired by the characters of Tvornik.  Because yes, I take inspiration from my own creations.  An Infinitely Small Point of Light, which will be abbreviated to AISPOL for the sake of simplicity, was originally a novel about magic and vampires.  As of now, I’m unsure whether I want to keep it a novel or make it a comic.  I already have a major comic in the works (Tvornik), so it may be better to make it a novel.  I’d need to do some research on where to post it if I decide to post it in episodes the way I post my comics.  I think Webtoon or Tapas might have some writing features on them, as well as some other apps.  You’ll see me figure out my preferred project format as I write my blogs, so expect more AISPOL content in the future.

I’ll keep going on stories for now by talking about two of my more recent stories, both based on the same small group of friends.  I’ve discovered that I get most of my inspiration from people I know, specifically people I find cool.

The first is untitled as of now, so I may just refer to it as “Julia and Issac” for now.  The story is about a witch named Julia and her black cat familiar named Issac.  I have plans on making that a comic for sure, and, because of it’s shorter nature, I may start working on it before Tvornik comes out.  I’m trying to pace myself in making comics, slowly making longer and longer comics until I can handle the beast that is Tvornik.

The second is a story I am also unsure of the format of.  It once again doesn’t have a name, but I can refer to it as “Suni and Rayne”.  This story is about an engineer (Suni) and the robot she made to commemorate her dead friend Rayne.  Robot Rayne ends up being possessed by malware and becomes sentient, causing a whole host of problems for Suni.

I have a few other story ideas as well, including a zombie apocalypse story about a group of classmates and their epic teacher (looking at my game development teacher here).  This story may end up becoming the background for a trading card game I have an idea for, which I think I’ll explain next.

The Arena is a fighting ring style trading card game in which you play as up to 3 different characters with their own spells and mana.  There are 6 total power types (Fire, Water, Earth, Air, Light, and Dark), and a multitude of characters for each power type.  The story will help me exercise my character creation skills and continue my addiction to creating magical stories.  Currently, I only have a couple of characters and a little stack of index cards for testing the game out, but I hope to create more soon!

Now that I think about it, that zombie apocalypse story seems different enough from The Arena that I could probably add it to my list of comic/novel stories.  It would most likely be a comic, as I’d love to have some fun with drawing those cool looking characters.

Up next is a card game I’m working on with a couple friends that I’ve gotten pretty far in.  It’s called Revolution, and it’s a fantasy themed war card game, heavily inspired by, you guessed it, the card game war.  I played once with my younger cousins, and thought it was interesting but quite boring and luck based, so I decided to upgrade it when making Revolution.

The game was originally made for a game jam hosted by my game development class, but, even though it was only made in 30 minutes, it turned out so good it needed to be real.  So far there’s only rules for using playing cards and six sided dice, but we hope to make special cards for each faction of fantasy races (maybe even with special powers depending on the faction) as well as flags instead of little tokens for markers and maybe special dice designed to fit with the theme of the game.  Who knows?  We’ll see where the road takes us.

I also have a couple of video games I’m currently working on.  The first is a game for a school competition, an animal shelter puzzle game called “Sunshine Animal Shelter”.  Thinking about it, I really need to get back to working on it, as I’m the only programmer and designer, and it’s due in February.  Remind me to work on that please.  Because that’s in, like, one month… Oh no.

The other is another game jam game that, as of right now, is due in… 5 days.  Oh no times two.  It’s a little secret santa game jam, where you make a game for another secret person and gift them the game.  For the game jam, I’m making a visual novel roguelike, and the artist and designer on the team, who found me through my twitch streams, is really passionate about it.  My next post will probably be a post mortem of sorts on that game.

There are also some plans to continue the game after the jam is over, but as of right now we really need to get a product out for that giftee.

The last project I have is actually a school project, a capstone.  This project is a learning experience, a project in which I practice making comics until I’m ready to tackle my passion projects.  I’m starting with 4 panel mini comics and slowly working my way up to multi-volume series.  The next step will be one page comics, then 2-5 page comics.  Those will probably take up the rest of the school year, but I’ll keep the project going beyond that.  The next step will be Scott McCloud style 24 page comics which will be combined with all the previous comics into a self made anthology, and then it will be one volume graphic novels.  By that point, I should be comfortable enough to move on to my true passion projects, which is really just Tvornik and maybe AISPOL.

That also reminds me, I really need to look around for some anthologies that are looking for submissions.  I’d love to be a part of something like that.

The next and last thing for this blog (man, this is long) is a list of goals I have for 2025.  Most of these are related to the projects I just mentioned, with some hopeful capstones for where I want to be at specific points in the year.

I need to finish my school capstone before late April, which is when the booth where I’ll sell those comics is.  I plan to have a small booklet of mini comics and a small anthology of one and 2-5 page comics to sell at the booth as well as maybe some stickers and a coloring book.  We’ll see about those last things.  Whatever I make, it might be fun to sell them online as well.

Beyond April, I plan to continue the project on my own time.  If I were to make a few capstones for that, I want to have a solid grasp on 2-5 page comics by August, and then have a 24 page comic or two by November.  From then on, I can start working on a full volume comic.  I’m thinking of either Julia and Issac’s story or the Zombie Apocalypse story.

In terms of games, the video game for school is due in February, so I need to get cracking on that.  There’s also an event at my technical school where we spend a weekend making some sort of really cool project, and I’d like to participate in that if possible.

As for some of the other games, I’d really like to have the final version of the secret santa game jam game by August of 2025.  Games are really hard to predict, however, so it may be a while after that before it’s finished.

In terms of Revolution, I’d love to have a finished version by April, and then a full version by the end of the year.  The finished version should have at least two factions and all the rules, and then the full version should have expansions on the finished version.  Who knows, maybe I won’t put it out until it’s fully finished.

And in terms of The Arena, I don’t have many goals for it, but I’d love to see it develop throughout the year.  It’s a lot of fun to make trading card games, especially because of how living they are (meaning they grow even after being published).

I’d also like to write a first draft of one of my novel ideas, maybe even AISPOL, and possibly start a podcast as well as this blog.  Maybe that’s a bit of a commitment.  Although, I’m literally talking about ten (yes, ten) different projects I want to work on.  Unfortunately, this is a pretty common problem for me.  I tend to overcommit to things and then burn out, especially when it comes to my own projects.

Honestly, I’d like some advice in the comments on two things.  The first is whether I should make a podcast.  It would probably be every two weeks or monthly, and it would possibly be me reading aloud short fiction I’ve written.  I’m not sure though.  I already have a YouTube channel, that seems like quite the addition.  The other question is, do I have too many projects?  Like, seriously, is ten or so too many?

One last goal I might make is about my social media.  I think I’d like to get into a schedule with posting on YouTube as well as Instagram.  On both I post mainly art related things, and do more deep dives into the process of me making my projects.  Along with Twitch streaming about twice a week, I really have a lot going on right now.  I’m genuinely not sure how I’m balancing it the way I am.  It’s kind of crazy honestly.

Anyways, I’ve been rambling for a really long time at this point.  Thank you if you’ve read all the way up to this point, and I hope to see you again in future blogs.  Now, I’ve got to go make some little doodles for the art for this blog.  I’m thinking of making art for each blog to knock out two birds with one stone and have some images to post to Instagram as well.  

Alright, Soup out!