Batteries for Lake Havasu

I remember loading up on batteries before a drive to Lake Havasu. I remember connecting Game Boys with a link cable and playing with friends right there beside me. I grew up with an NES from day one, but I wasn’t prepared for how amazing the Game Boy would be.

Lately, I’ve been spending more time with older games. Modern releases often ask for a lot of money and patience, along with faith that the promises will eventually be met. A game running well on day one shouldn’t feel like a breath of fresh air.

I wanted to make something for that little handheld I still love. A tribute to the hardware, and to the games that left their mark on me: King’s Quest, Zelda, Fallout, and Wing Commander.

There are incredible games I have simply missed, too. Titanfall 2 was one of those for me. My backlog keeps growing while new releases compete for my time and money. Returning to older games has given me plenty of reasons to keep playing, and plenty to think about while making something of my own.

I remember where I took my Game Boy and who I played with. Putting in a cartridge and playing was enough. I wanted to make a game for that hardware, with some of the exploration and challenge I loved growing up.

King’s Quest was one of the first graphical PC games I played. I remember sitting with my grandfather at his Tandy 1000, exploring a world that offered very little help. I loved having to find my way. When I think about where I am today and how I got here, I can draw a direct line back to those moments.

Zelda gave me that same desire to explore. There was real-time combat, room to approach things in different ways, and that incredible feeling of progressing and becoming more powerful. Fallout brought another feeling: everything is lost, so where do we go? How do we survive? Those are different experiences, but I wanted to see what their influences might become in my own game.

Wing Commander is another game I spent countless hours playing with my grandpa. The almost-3D graphics and proper sound amazed me. It was also the first game that made me cry when I lost my wingman. I still remember how that felt.

When I pictured the game I wanted to make, Link’s Awakening DX was a reference. To me, it shows what the hardware could do in the hands of people who knew it deeply and loved what they were making. True masters of their craft. That is an intimidating standard. It also helped me describe the care I wanted to put into this project.

I wanted a more methodical approach to combat, though. Exploration could happen in real time, with combat giving me time to stop, consider the situation and make a tactical decision. That combination became the starting point for Wasteland 2x86. The earliest recorded version was called WASTELAND 2089. I changed the name as the project developed.

I’m writing this after the fact. The first recorded commit is October 15, 2026, and I wish I had started keeping these notes in the moment. I can recover what changed from the repository. I want to preserve the memories around those changes while I can still describe them.

I remember the first version running. There was an actor sprite moving in the four cardinal directions. I yelled for my wife and kids to come see it. I was six years old again, showing my mom that I had beaten Bowser.