Foolish Earth Creatures: February 2026
Progress has been slower this month, in part because I'm now working on the ending of the game, and endings are hard.
John Ayliff (Space Goblin Games) is a creator of text-based games and interactive fiction
Progress has been slower this month, in part because I'm now working on the ending of the game, and endings are hard.
Beyond the Chiron Gate part of the “No ICE in Minnesota” charity bundle on itch.io, which is raising money for the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota.
There are over a thousand other games there (both digital and TTRPGs) so this is a chance to get a bunch of cool stuff while also giving money to help the people being targeted by ICE. (A couple of games in the bundle that I'd recommend are Baba Is You and Extreme Meatpunks Forever.)
I have defeated you, human! But what happens now...?
Beyond the Chiron Gate version 1.1.7 is now live! As well as fixing the backlog of minor bugs, this also adds some blank space at the top if it's running on a phone with a camera set into the screen, so the inset should no longer hide part of the top interface bar.
1.1.7 PATCH NOTES
Happy midwinter celebrations, Earth creatures!
I took a break from working on the game for a couple of weeks over Christmas, but earlier in the month I did some work on a chapter in which the hero braves the air ducts of Vorak's space dreadnought and must face a hunter-killer robot and a whirling fan of death.
Behold the face of Vorak!
This month I've finished rewriting the “Space Interceptors” chapter based on the design guidelines I talked about in last month's dev diary. There's still editing to do, but overall I think it's in pretty much the state that'll make it into the final game.
I've spent most of this month rewriting the Space Interceptors chapter based on design changes I decided to make after the playtest feedback. At the same time I've been writing up design guidelines for myself so I can consistently apply these design principles: things like the kinds of decisions the game lets you make and the kinds out outcomes they will have.

Thank you to everyone who playtested my first version and sent me feedback. This month I've taken a step back from the project to take in that feedback and generally to assess how it's going.
Beyond the Chiron Gate version 1.1.6 is now live on itch.io and Steam, and should be up on the mobile app stores soon.