BLEEDING HEARTS! My new creator owned book with @StipanMorian, Matt Hollingsworth (goat), Hassan Otsmane Elhaou (Nope), coming from VERTIGO COMICS! (that has a nice ring, doesn't it?)

So...what it about? (6 page preview below)

On 8 October 2025, Niyazi Sayın died.
He was a man of many talents and known by many titles.

A master of classical Turkish music.
The greatest virtuoso of the instrument called ney.
An ebru artist.
A photographer.
A painter.
And, perhaps less famously... My father.

Some experiences come with a built-in soundtrack. They’re inseparable.
A certain song, a particular riff, forever hardwired into your memory of a specific time and place.

youtu.be/PGJYpIZkEuw?...

I have a passionate love for certain things that I simply can’t explain properly to other people. Some things sound mundane even when you use the right words. Others just defy description entirely.
Ayreon is one such thing.

Some games are classics. A few are legends. And then there are those rare ones that feel like they’ve always been with us, whispering from the cartridge, diskette, or pixelated memory card save...
To me, Final Fantasy Tactics was timeless from the moment I have played it.

I know I said I wanted to focus on positive things here. But this particular issue has been annoying me for a long time, and I think it’s worth addressing: clickbait headlines in video game journalism.

I had surgery. Yep… that’s why I’ve been missing in action for a little while.

Captain Goat is what I can only describe as a satanic sea shanty—and lately, I can’t stop listening to it.
The obsession began right after the Iron Maiden concert in Warsaw, and while it was unexpected, it’s not unprecedented.
youtu.be/xRSFJm803os?...

One of the games I’ve been genuinely looking forward to is Mayhem Brawler II.
Not because the developer is Turkish.
Not because I happen to know the guy behind @heroconcept.bsky.social
But simply because the original was pure, unapologetic, comic-book-infused arcade fun.
youtu.be/Px2JjmE8MTw?...

It’s unbearably hot in Istanbul, and I’m cooling off with a comic I can’t put down: Absolute Martian Manhunter, a modern classic in the making, and arguably one of DC’s most underrated current projects.

Do you remember what made you want to do your job?

Can you trace it back to a single, formative experience, a moment of pure wonder when something inside you quietly declared:
“I want to do this for the rest of my life”?

I can.

“Ozzy is dead,” someone whispered—barely audible, yet somehow cutting through the thunder of guitars and drums.

Then someone else repeated it. And someone after that.
The whispers spread like wildfire across the crowd.

Is it true?
Is he really gone?
Are you sure?

There are two things you come to realize after spending a decent amount of time as a video game developer:

Everyone thinks your job is awesome and they’re secretly envious of you.
That’s because they don’t think it’s a real job.

It’s been a while since I’ve had an online presence, but that changes now. As someone who’s spent years designing games, shaping narratives, teaching game design, and obsessing over storytelling, I’ve realized it’s time to bring that energy into a more personal, public space.