sometimes i wish i was born circa 30 years ago and got into programming at the peak of the home computer revolution.

me, some guy i met in uni who calls himself Gibby "The Splice" Ronnalds, and a random executive from a AAA publisher who decided to give us $15,000 based on a newspaper ad we bought as a joke. we're given twelve weeks to make the top down shooter we promised we'd been able to do. all i have is a C compiler i got on a floppy from a garage sale, and all gibby has is an amiga with a cracked copy of the ultimate soundtracker. we don't have an artist, but i notice my mum's cross stitching patterns look remarkably similar to pixel art, and i give her a stack of grid paper and a box of coloured pencils and tell her to have at it.

the game is looking to be pure unadulterated dogshit right up until nine days before release, where a bug that causes the AI planes to go hyperspeed inspires us to add a "nitrous" mechanic. we rename Flyin' High with Gibby to Aeronauts! and rework the entire game from a WWII dogfighter to a racer. the publisher is furious, but we sneak into their office after hours to write a bunch of floppies and distribute them to Computer Gaming Madness magazine. the guerilla reviews are phenomenal, we get the green light. critics call out the sprite art as the highlight of the game.

the publisher was trying to scam us by giving us 10% royalties on a game they thought would bomb, but we become millionaires. they can't write floppies fast enough to keep up with sales.

thirty years later, in the present day, we're bought out by activision to make a battle royale mode for Call of Duty: Samsung Smart Glasses Edition with Bixby.