M Gruar

@mgruar

Independent Game Developer, Littleton MA Bike/Ped Advisory Committee, Father of 3, American and British (sorry), among other things. Pronouns: TBD Glacies delenda est #gamedev #indiedev

1.145 Folgt2.999 Follower1.913 Posts

Website Bluesky

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Ist das dein Profil?Übernimm es — dann gehört dir mgruar.dirty.social.Profil übernehmen

M Gruar@mgruar· 20d

Super exhausted from @godotcon.bsky.social , so a couple of days late, but... Iron Village is on sale for 40% off as part of Steam's Train Fest! store.steampowered.com/app/3011060/... #citybuilder #pixelart #godot #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev

Steam Train Fest
July 20-27 at 10am PT (UTC-7)

In the background is a steam train with a tender and four passenger carriages on top of a very high and long viaduct. Further in the packground is a picturesque view of some mountains, hills, and an evergreen forest.

In the foreground is Iron Village's capsule art, alongside a price label showing -40%, $4.79 (USD)

M Gruar@mgruar· 21d

Perfect timing with the Onion, our senators clearly understand this

At the top: the post from Mekka
At the bottom: a post from the Onion, with the caption "Cobweb-Covered Skeleton Gripping Senate Desk Expected To Seek 15th Term"

M Gruar@mgruar· 23d

"It is child abuse to bring a baby on a plane." Welp, not going to beat this hot take, time to stop scrolling and go to sleep.

(Name censored)

(Anti-cyclist label)

Family member deaths and health emergencies are good excuses. Celebrations? No. Sorry. Send a gift and go out and visit when the child is 3. It is child abuse to bring a baby on a plane.

M Gruar@mgruar· 27d

It's definitely odd to see an official state website say "idk, go ask California". (I mean, it makes sense, we haven't really had to deal with this until this decade, but it stood out.)

AIR QUALITY ALERT for fine particles for Massachusetts - Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups (USG) - Air is forecast to be unhealthy for sensitive groups, including those with lung or heart disease, older adults, and children. For information on how to protect yourself from smoke, visit:
California wild fire smoke website

M Gruar@mgruar· Jul 9

I still exist! And so does Project OY! Just popping up for a little dev diary. lunarchippy.games/2026/07/09/d... #devdiary #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev

An in-engine shot of something being worked on for Project OY. There is a rail line traveling through a valley flanked with snow capped mountains, crossing a small river. Pixel art clouds float above it all.

M Gruar@mgruar· Jul 2

A little surprised I didn't end up further left, lol

You are...
The Union Organizer
patron saint: Cory Doctorow
AI is a real tool being used to extract real labor value from real people without paying them. You don't care about the singularity — you care about the artists, writers, and workers getting strip-mined by capital. You're not anti-technology. You're anti-theft.
Impact: -1.1 • Valence: -4.9

M Gruar@mgruar· Apr 18

Lol

A yellow Hummer in a Market Basket parking lot. A fluorescent yellow "For Sale" sign is stuck on the back.

M Gruar@mgruar· Mar 26

Off to PAX East!

A silver and purple MBTA commuter rail train is pulling into Littleton station.

M Gruar@mgruar· Mar 24

Hard to believe Iron Village has been out for a whole year! To celebrate, the 1.3 update is now out, including a couple of bugfixes, a new train, and placeable growable trees! lunarchippy.games/2026/03/24/d... for full release notes. #gamedev #indiegamedev #citybuilder #pixelart

M Gruar@mgruar· Mar 17

Lol, occasionally the old Google shows up, this time (correctly) marking its own Gemini advertisement as spam.

Email subject: Michael, create music, try Nanon Banana 2, and more (Spam)
From: Google Gemini
to: me

Why is this message in spam? This message is similar to messages that were identified as spam in the past.
[Report not spam]

M Gruar@mgruar· Feb 24

After a crazy few weeks, including a blizzard-extended February vacation, it's time for another dev diary! Still nothing Lunar Chippy related yet though, so here's more games I played, including brief thoughts on CS2. lunarchippy.games/2026/02/24/d... #gamedev #indiegamedev #devdiaries

A picture of a tree sapling at 800% zoom. (Teaser image of Iron Village.)

M Gruar@mgruar· Feb 12

Iron Village is on sale for Valentine's... so of course I had to put together a silly little Valentine's train, complete with heart-shaped puffs of smoke. linktr.ee/lunarchippyg... #IronVillage #gamedev #indiegamedev #indiedev #citybuilder #townbuilder #pixelart

M Gruar@mgruar· Dec 31

Looking back on 2025... or at least, the gamedev related parts, not the dumpster fire that is everything else. lunarchippy.games/2025/12/31/d... Iron Village is still on sale for 30% off if you haven't snagged it yet! store.steampowered.com/app/3011060/... #indiegamedev #devdiary #citybuilder

Iron Village at BostonFIG, December 2024

An image from Iron Village 1.1, showing off some of the (then) new features.

Another sneak peek at Project OY. A person looks out the window of a wooden train car.

M Gruar@mgruar· Nov 23

The Puritans & Capitalism Sale for Iron Village started yesterday, but rather fittingly I was sick and had a fever for the past two days... Anyway, you can go buy it for 30% off on Steam or Itch! #IronVillage #gamedev #indiegamedev #indiedev #pixelart #townbuilder #citybuilder

A train is traveling along the tracks, carrying a car full of gold and treasure, with two people with pilgrim hats on top. The two panels on the bottom read "Puritans & Capitalism Sale" and "-30%".

M Gruar@mgruar· Oct 27

A new dev diary, this time about a concept I made up (that probably already exists): Semi-Automation! lunarchippy.games/2025/10/27/d... Also, the biggest teaser of project OY yet! #IronVillage #ProjectOY #devdiary #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #townbuilder #citybuilder

A screenshot from the development of Project OY, an unannounced game under development. A naked & bald pixel art character (well, implied nude) is standing inside a boxy train car, visible from outside the front windshield.

M Gruar@mgruar· Oct 10

Hahaha, ooof, I've been there 🙃

Steam Review:

👎 Not Recommended
0.3 hrs on record

Posted: March 27

Nice game. Refunded for trans flag train. Keep gaming fun not political.

M Gruar@mgruar· Oct 3

Managed to get a weekly streak of these dev diaries going... it's #61! Looking at the timing of sales so far, plus an excessively cryptic teaser for Project OY. lunarchippy.games/2025/10/03/d... #IronVillage #ProjectOY #gamedev #devdiary #indiegamedev #indiedev #steam

A graph of net sales over time: The y axis is net sales (i.e. sales minus refunds), stretching up to 1500, the x axis is time, stretching from mid-March through today. A series of numbers 1-6 annotate the graph, which are explained in the linked dev diary.

M Gruar@mgruar· Sep 26

The Iron Village 1.2 launch has gone pretty smoothly! Just in time to switch work to a... project OY? It's Dev Diary #60! lunarchippy.games/2025/09/26/d... #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #godot #devdiary

A very-cropped screenshot from Aseprite. There's three windows and a door (with its own window) on a rectangle with a light green stripe and a teal/turquoise background. There's also a black trapezoid at the bottom.

Windows and door frame are by https://jamiebrownhill.com/, and no I'm not (yet) providing further context outside of credits :)

M Gruar@mgruar· Sep 18

Tomorrow - the long distance train arrives at Iron Village 1.2 at 13:00 EDT (17:00 UTC)! (Yes, I meant to post this >2 hours earlier. Oops.) #IronVillage #gamedev #indiegamedev #indiedev

19:30 Platform 18
Nova Porthladd
Calling at:
Cochlurca
Iron Village
& Nova Porthladd

Iron Village 1.2
Releases 18 Sep @ 13:00 EDT
(17:00 UTC)

M Gruar@mgruar· Sep 10

So uh, yeah that's a lot of villagers. (For context, there used to be a population cap of 120, but it'll be adjustable in 1.2.) #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #pixelart

A cropped screenshot of Iron Village. The population is 208, with enough housing for 210. Notably, this high of a population count is not possible before version 1.2.

M Gruar@mgruar· Sep 5

Windows, Charts, Spreadsheets, and... LinkedIn? It's Dev Diary #57! lunarchippy.games/2025/09/05/d... #IronVillage #devdiary #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #godot #opentowork

The updated Railway Status *window*, with a set of buttons arranged at the bottom to access more information.

A *chart* showing the current production rates for resources in this town.

A *spreadsheet* of population statistics, covering population, housing, jobs, major issues, and food & water consumption.

M Gruar@mgruar· Sep 3

So it's a pretty minor feature, but I'm really glad I managed to squeeze this in for Iron Village 1.2: Full Town Screenshots. Now you can press a button and spit out an image containing all of your town! More details about 1.2 in the next dev diary. #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev

A screenshot of the town I've been using for testing Iron Village 1.2. You can see the whole map, including tunnel entrances on the sides where the trains enter and exit.

M Gruar@mgruar· Aug 27

Finally put together a dev diary, this time about the ***Iron Village Cinematic Universe*** lunarchippy.games/2025/08/27/d... #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #worldbuilding

A topographic map of a continent, placeholder name “Amé”, in a window of Inkscape. Just to show the insane scope of what I’m talking about.

This is a Köppen Climate Map of the same area, to give you a sense of the info I’ve been tracking.

Some very rough sketching I did to try to vaguely map where the Iron Realm (cyan), Iron Village (purple), and Nova Porthladd (Maroon) would be. Note that Nova Porthladd is probably going to be a tiny bit south of that circle, at the mouth of the slightly larger river.

M Gruar@mgruar· Aug 11

Turning Points: The day job is coming to an end, but what are the plans for Iron Village? And what's this about game #2? lunarchippy.games/2025/08/11/d... #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #townbuilder #citybuilder #godot #devdiary

A train coming up to a 90 degree curve in the tracks. The engineer driving the train is confused, with a giant visible pink question mark above and to the right of their head.

Disclaimer: Not in game footage. No curved tracks are planned for Iron Village, sorry.

A screenshot of Iron Village. The Immigration Office has been built across the tracks from the Headquarters, with an overpass connecting the two.

M Gruar@mgruar· Aug 2

Coming soon to Iron Village... spreadsheets! #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev

A screenshot of Iron Village with a "Population Statistics" window. It shows "Villager Issues", "Total Population", "Jobs", and "Homes", none of which are implemented yet.

Then there's a divider, and a spreadsheet of water and food resources with the consumption & production rates.

M Gruar@mgruar· Aug 1

So uh... can anyone fill me in on what lorg is?

M Gruar@mgruar· Jul 30

Iron Village 1.2 is going to be all about your workers and resources, so... (New Dev DIary: lunarchippy.games/2025/07/30/d...) #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #devdiary #pixelart #townbuilder #citybuilder

A preview image of the Railway HQ, level 2. It is built on top of a decently sized hill.

A preview image of the Railway HQ, level 3. The main building is now one story taller, and two extensions have been added to the sides.

A preview image of the Railway HQ, level 4. The main building clock tower is now another story taller. The extensions have widened, and a new story has been dug into the ground. The facade has changed to be part stone, part half-timbered.

M Gruar@mgruar· Jul 18

So I've been messing around with some things in Iron Village/very early prototyping the next game. I went ahead and removed 2 pixels of height from some of the train cars and locomotives, and is it just me, or does it suddenly look like way better proportions? #gamedev #indiegamedev #indiedev

An image of a locomotive from Iron Village, in Aseprite. (This one is technically an older asset, but not substantially different from the one in use now.) On the left is what happens when I cut the height by 2 pixels - I'm annoyed I hadn't done this already!

M Gruar@mgruar· Jul 15

It feels like it's been awhile, here's another dev diary! Taking a look at what's planned for Iron Village 1.2! lunarchippy.games/2025/07/15/d... #IronVillage #gamedev #indiedev #indiegamedev #godot #pixelart #solodev #townbuilder #citybuilder

A window in Iron Village, showing:

Maximum Production Rates

This window shows the maximum attainable production rates of your buildings, not counting the time required for villagers to get to work and fulfill their needs.

Mushrooms 5.1/4.8 -> Potions 2.4/Hour
Water 82.5/8.4 ---^V
Wheat 15.0/12.0 -> Flour 6.0/6.0 -> 12.0/Hour
Cow Milk 8.0/2.0 -> Cheese 2.0/Hour
Sheep Wool 4.0/2.4 -> Clothes 2.4/Hour
Iron Ore 24.0/4.0, Coal 24.0/4.0 -> Steel 8.0/7.2 -> Tools 4.8/Hour and Jewelry 2.4/Hour

The Railway Headquarters on a hill to the right of town, overlooking the tracks. A sign next to it says the name of the railway, "Faearnic Railway".

A screenshot of a town showing some new resource storages, including coal, wood, stone, and steel.

M Gruar@mgruar· Jun 30

Two quick updates: (1) Iron Village is in the Steam Summer Sale for 20% off! Save a whole... $1.80! Probably not much, but it adds up if you buy too many games this sale, haha. (2) The version number went up twice. Here's why: lunarchippy.games/2025/06/29/d... #IronVillage #indiedev #indiegamedev