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Happy National Blueberry Muffin Day!

Love you all.

Can I thank you for making my 2 favourite switch games out there. I genuinely love both squidlit games so much and I'm so grateful that you created them

Dawwwwww

Thank you so, SO much for reaching out. My day is so much better now. I’ll make sure to let Plip know too!

Sorry they take a while! Squidlit 64 is still a couple years out at this rate. Sam, my spouse who helped make the first two, is working on Diablo 4 now, so I’m on my own for this project.

~Alex

(Plip told me to tell you “howdy”)

Squidlit 64 update!

Sorry it’s been a while. I had a collision bug that made it hard to get good footage. It’s all better now though!

I have several things to show, and first on the agenda is the addition of a personal favorite Squidlit enemy, wallop polyps!

There’s also updated attack swings, and the water isn’t purple anymore. Woo!

the idea that any enjoyment of children's media as an adult is somehow inappropriate, pathetic, or self-infantalizing is something i hate more and more every time i see it.

really what this belief suggests to me is that there are tons of people who think children's media either can't or shouldn't have any genuine artistic merit. and it's rude and cruel to the people who dedicate their life to making things to kids to act like nothing they make can have any real value since it's just for children. and it's rude and cruel to children themselves to act like nothing that's made for them should have any real value as, if the creative works you're exposed to as a child are just placeholders.

i think art made for kids can be good! i think art for kids should be good! i think you need to take a very different approach when creating/engaging with art made for children, but i don't think this somehow prevents it from being meaningful or worthwhile! and if you do think that i genuinely am not sure how you can justify that belief without also believing kids are too stupid for real art or not deserving of it.

I wonder if I’m the first person to eat Dinosaur Egg Oatmeal with macadamia nuts.

I made a little friend last night

Earth Day is for the Worms!🐛 🪱 🌎

You love to sea it 🌊

📷 credit: Alexander Semenov’s Underwater Photography & Ocean Exploration Project titled «Aquatilis»

This is now the official dance to Squishy Road

i dont know what type this is but look… he has golden shoes…

Hes mr goldenshoe

If you’re in the mood to drop bug knowledge, I’m sure Tumblr would enjoy an explanation for the jumping venomous “camelback spiders” that conservative social media is convinced have been attacking our brave soldiers

lol, again?! I remember this also happening when America invaded iraq back in like 2003. I think the name "camel spider" was even first coined then; in books the only common names I knew them under before then was "sun spider" and "wind scorpion," both of which are much cooler as well as more appropriate for something that runs as fast as the wind in bright, sunny places. But they do "chase" people in order to try and cool off in our shadows, leading to the belief that they're aggressive, and basically all the terror of them started because soldiers made up stories about them just to scare younger newer recruits as a prank, insisting that they're venomous or parasitic or that they'll chew your nose off while you sleep.

I think their tiny close-set black eyes and giant fat mouthparts give them an adorable sweet dopey face, though from the side it becomes sick and rad:

They can bite very hard and easily draw blood if you upset them, but they want to be left alone. Their jaws are only so big and strong because they're the arachnid version of a shrew: a fast-moving high energy predator adapted to quickly take down and devour everything else it comes across up to a couple times larger than itself, like lizards and centipedes!

They call this kind a teddy bear solifugid:

Anyway while we're on the subject of public misconception towards living things (which is completely understandable because have you SEEN living things? There's like dozens of them!) here's a fresh rundown of some common mistakes about bugs!

Arachnids aren't just spiders! They're also scorpions, mites, ticks and some real weirdos out there

Insects with wings are always finished growing! Wings are the last new thing they ever develop! There can never be a "baby bee" that's just a smaller bee flying around.

That said, not all insects have larvae! Many older insect groups do look like little versions of adults....but the wings rule still applies.

Insects do have brains! Lobes and everything!

Only the Hymenoptera (bees, ants and wasps) have stingers like that.

Not all bees and wasps live in colonies with queens

The only non-hymenoptera with queens are termites, which is convergent evolution, because termites are a type of cockroach!

There are still other insects with colonial lifestyles to various degrees which can include special reproductive castes, just not the whole "queen" setup.

Even ants still deviate from that; there are multi-queen ant species, some species where the whole colony is just females who clone themselves and other outliers

There is no "hive mind;" social insects coordinate no differently from schools of fish, flocks of birds, or for that matter crowds of humans! They're just following the same signals together and communicating to each other!

Not all mosquito species carry disease, and not all of them bite people

Mosquitoes ARE ecologically very important and nobody in science ever actually said otherwise

The bite of a black widow is so rarely deadly that the United States doesn't bother stocking antivenin despite hundreds of reported bites per year. It just feels really really bad and they give you painkillers.

Recluse venom does damage skin, but only in the tiny area surrounding the bite. More serious cases are due to this dead skin inviting bacterial infection, and in fact our hospitals don't carry recluse antivenin either; they just prescribe powerful antibiotics, which has been fully effective at treating confirmed bites.

Bed bugs are real actual specific insects

"Cooties" basically are, too; it's old slang for lice

Crane flies aren't "mosquito hawks;" they actually don't eat at all!

Hobo spiders aren't really found to have a dangerous bite, leaving only widows and recluses as North America's "medically significant" spiders

Domestic honeybees actually kill far more people than hornets, including everywhere the giant "murder" hornet naturally occurs.

Wasps are only "less efficient" pollinators in that less pollen sticks to them per wasp. They are still absolutely critical pollinators and many flowers are pollinated by wasps exclusively.

Flies are also as important or more important to pollination than bees.

For "per insect" pollination efficiency it's now believed that moths also beat bees

Honeybees are non-native to most of the world and not great for the local ecosystem, they're just essential to us and our food industry

Getting a botfly is unpleasant and can become painful, but they aren't actually dangerous and they don't eat your flesh; they essentially push the flesh out of the way to create a chamber and they feed on fluids your immune system keeps making in response to the intrusion. They also keep this chamber free of bacterial infection because that would harm them too!

Botflies also exist in most parts of the world, but only one species specializes partially in humans (and primates in general, but can make do with a few other hosts)

"Kissing bugs" are a group of a couple unusual species of assassin bug. Only the kissing bugs evolved to feed on blood; other assassin bugs just eat other insects.

how do you make friends with yellowjackets? i tried to google this question and the results were 1. how to kill yellowjackets 2. the show Yellowjackets understands toxic best friends and, bizarrely, 3. Friends with benefits, how to make it work!

just treat them nicely (don't approach too closely, use smooth and calm movements, keep a calm and level tone of voice) and give them space, maybe leave them some sweet fruit juice or meat scraps once in a while in an outside area you don't spend much time in if you want. once they've learned that you won't freak out and try to kill them, they'll offer you the same politenesses back!

bug with a mug

Weevil appreciation

Noticed everyone gives love to moths, but not enough love to silly weevils

Interact with this post or the post linked above to show your love and support to these silly weevils

Weevils of all different textures, sizes and shapes!!! They’re awesome, silly, cute, and ughhhh yes!!

What’s your favorite weevil?•

bug with a mug

Child

ice cream shaped

This is one of my favorites from Super Squidlit’s OST! It uses only two sound channels, but it pulls a lot of tricks with its high run speed to achieve a shimmery effect.

After the first steel drum-like phrase, which is made with a slow chord effect, many notes are stopped mid sound to play a quieter version of the previous note before picking up again. There’s little to no free space left on the tracker!

I finally got split screen working! The game is designed around couch co-op (although single player is still viable) so I needed to figure this out before I get to work on the fun stuff. I’ve also made the game accept multiple squobsters, redid collision detection, and made a primitive threat system for the enemies!

Sorry about the goofiness of the yellow squidlit. They’re being controlled by my feet! :3

Classic

If you asked me as a kid what my favorite animal was, there's a good chance I'd respond "chambered nautilus", though I probably would mispronounce it. I don't know if it's still my favorite but it's definitely up there in the pantheon of weird critters. For this Wet Beast Wednesday, I'll discuss my childhood favorite.

(image: a nautilus)

The nautilus is a cephalopod that lives in a curved shell and looks similar to (but is not closely related to) the extinct ammonites. There are 6 living species in two genera, but 90% of the time when someone is discussing nautiluses they are referring to the most well-known species: Nautilus pompilius or the chambered nautilus. Nautiloids are ancient, going back to at least the late triassic with their more primitive ancestors going back as far as the ordovician period, a time when only invertebrates and primitive plants occupied the land and true fish had not yet appeared. Because of their ancient history, nautiluses are sometimes considered living fossils. I have ranted before on how misleading the term "living fossil" is so I'll spare you that for now. Nautiloids are considered a sister group to the celoids, which contains all the squid, octopus, cuttlefish, and everything else we thinks of as cephalopods. Nautiluses should not be confused with paper nautiluses. Also called argonauts, paper nautiluses are a group of octopi that make an egg case which looks like a shell.

(image: a nautilus)

The most noticeable feature of a nautilus is its shell. The shell is smooth and finely curving, naturally growing in the shape of a logarithmic spiral (though not, as is commonly stated, a golden ratio spiral). The shell has a stripy outer layer and an inner layer coated with nacre. Internally, the shell is divided into camarae (chambers) separated from each other by walls called septa. Each septum has a small hole in it through which a strand of tissue called the siphuncle passes. Most of the nautilus's body is in the foremost and largest chamber. The shell grows new septa as the animal grows, with the nautilus's body moving to a new chamber as it becomes too large for previous ones. Juveniles are typically born with 4 septa, with adults having as many as 30. In addition to providing protection from predators, the shell is also key for regulating buoyancy. The septa can contain pressurized gas or water and the siphuncle regulates their contents by either adding or removing water to increase or decrease buoyancy. Because of its pressurized contents, the shell can only withstand pressure at depths up to 800 M (2,400 ft) before imploding. Oddly enough, nautiluses can be safely brought up from deep waters where most animals would be killed by the pressure changes. To move, the nautilus pulls water into the first chamber of the shell using its hyponome (siphon) and shoots it back out. The chambered nautilus is the largest species, with a maximum shell diameter of 25 cm (10 in), though most get no larger than 20 cm (8 in).

(image: a diagram of nautilus anatomy. source)

Where celoid cephalopods have tentacles, nautiluses instead have numerous cirri. Unlike tentacles, cirri are less muscular, are not elastic, and have no suckers. They are used to grab objects using their ridged surfaces and can hold in so hard that trying to take an object away from a nautilus can rip off its cirri, which will remain firmly attached. In addition, the nautilus has modified cirri that serve as olfactory receptors and a pair that serve to open and close the shell when the nautilus needs to retract into it or emerge. Nestled within the cirri is the beak, which is used to consume the nautilus's primary prey of invertebrates, though they have also been seen scavenging fish. Their eyes are less developed than most cephalopods, lacking a lens and consisting of a small pinhole that only allows the nautilus to see simple imagery. Their brains are differently structured than most cephalopods and studies have found them to have considerably shorter long-term memories.

(image: a chambered nautilus (upper left) next to a rare Allonautilus scrobiculatus. source)

Cephalopod reproduction is quite different than that of other cephalopods. While most cephalopods are short-lived and semelparous (reproducing only once), nautiluses can live over 20 years and reproduce multiple times (iteroparity). They do not reach sexual maturity until around 15 years old, with females laying eggs once per year. Eggs are attached to rocks and take 8 to 12 months to hatch. Males have a structure called the spadix composed of 4 fused cirri that they use to transfer sperm to females. Females lose their gonads after laying their eggs and will regenerate them for the next year's mating season. Interestingly, male nautiluses seem to vastly outnumber the females.

(image: nautiluses mating)

Nautiluses are found in the Indo-Pacific reagion of the ocean and can be found on the steep slopes of coral reefs. They prefer to inhabit waters several hundred meters down. It was once believed that they would rise to shallow waters at night to feed, lay eggs, and mate, but their vertical migration behavior has since been shown to be more complex than that. They have noon been fished by humans for their shells, which have become popular subjects in art and can be made into a number of decorative pieces. The nacre of the shell can be polished into osmeña pearl, which can be quite valuable. Demand for the shells combined with the late sexual maturity and low fecundity is threatening all the species. As of 2016, nautiluses have been added to the CITES Appendix II, making them protected by limiting international trade of their shells. Despite this, they are still threatened and require further protection

(image: a carved and painted nautilus shell from the Poldi Pezzoli Museum, Milan)