Nybbles and Bytes

<div>Hello there! I'm June Tate-Gans, an embedded software engineer that has been doing software engineering for well over half my lifetime. I grew up with retro computers since the Commodore 64 days, and have always had a fondness for these machines ever since I was little. One thing I was never able to really get into, though, was writing games for these machines. After moving onto PCs and servers many years later, I became a professional software engineer in my own right. I now write kernel drivers by day, and build games at night. My love for these old machines, however, never waned and ultimately drove me to buy and restore a Commodore 128D. Once it was working, I was puzzled: what do I do with it now? There was some software still being developed for these machines, but most of it was few and far between. I wrote a few BASIC programs here and there, but ultimately, it mostly lay dormant. That question stuck in my head for years until I wrote a small game for a 48-hour game making competition that looked and felt like it belonged on the machine, called <a href="http://www.theonelab.com/files/ld48/26-minimalism/">Minimalist Dungeon</a>. I then came up with an audacious idea: let's actually port this thing to a retrocomputer! In that instant, Nybbles and Bytes was born: I decided to film a series of videos detailing the hardware of the Commodore 128D and the game development process. It is my hope that these videos will inspire others to write games and software for these older computers, while also helping others learn about how computers work at a much simpler level. Nybbles and Bytes is a bi-weekly (once every two weeks) gift to the retro computing community: all of the videos will be made available for free on YouTube. Unfortunately, making these videos takes a great deal of time both in research, producing, scripting, programming, and also the equipment costs. This is where Patreon comes in: I hope this platform will help me to defray costs, but also engage with the community more. What this will be used for:<ul><li>I'm planning a supplemental series called Nybbles and Mouse Bytes that will be shorter, but more focused, subscriber chosen content. Patreon subscribers will get access to a poll to help direct the content of these additional series. Nybbles and Mouse Bytes will be released early to Patreon subscribers, but later published for free on YouTube, just like the main Nybbles and Bytes series.</li></ul> What this isn't:<ul><li>The ability to completely drive my content. I still get to say and do what I want based upon the plans I've put together already. I want community input, but not a complete takeover of the content I already have planned.</li><li>Paid subscriptions for subscriber-only content. Aside from the above early releases of content to subscribers, all of my content will eventually be made free for anyone on YouTube.</li></ul> Do you have to subscribe? Nope! All of my content will ultimately be available on YouTube free of charge. This is just a means to help defray the costs of production. Why per-video subscriptions? I've chosen a per-video subscription method because my videos tend to come out infrequently as I have a day job -- charging a monthly fee would be unfair in this case, especially if I end up sick or otherwise unable to produce a video according to a schedule. My day job takes priority, so if I have to go overseas to work for a few weeks, that would be unfair to my viewers. </div>

Free

Thanks! You get access to the N&amp;B Discord private patrons channel.
 
This should help defray some of the costs relating to equipment and lighting! If just 10% of my viewers chose this, I could get a better camera with zebras to be even higher quality!

Bits

Yay! This tier gets a shout out in the next video for their patronage when you first sign up for this tier, plus everything listed above.
 
If enough people do this, I might be able to pay for a cameraman!

Nybbles

Wow! You're awesome! You get early access to the next Nybbles and Mouse Bytes episode and everything listed above!

Bytes

Doubly awesome! You get everything listed above, plus access to the subscriber poll to help me decide what to focus on next in the Mouse Bytes video!

Words

Doublewords are the ultimate tier -- double unicorn rainbows all the way! If you sign up for this, you'll get all of the above, plus I'll send you a copy of the game's map editor (once it's ready) so you can help build the game!