Six years ago, the year before I got TGF1 and the year after I got a Gameboy color, I thought of game programming as a hard, complicated process, far beyond the capabilities of a mortal such as you or I. My job was to play the little devils. I couldn't possibly imagine that one day I would actually be programming games like the ones I was playing.

But it was true.

Next year, when I turned twelve, I got a copy of TGF1 for my birthday. My dad showed me some of the stuff that you could do with it, and after three hours of work, we produced a very feeble breakout game with ripped graphics and ripped music. I thought the program was dorky and put it away in the closet, and there it stayed all spring.

But one Friday evening, I thought of an idea for a cool game: A beat 'em up with a green lizard and a blue lizard!

And then the wonderful thought dawned on me that I could actually create this!

So, after ten minutes of poking around, I found my TGF1 disc and set to work. I downloaded several tutorials and followed them carefully, sketched out some ideas and made a few mockups.

And then, finally, after two months, the game was finished.

And I realized that game making didn't have to be hard. It could be easy! It could even be fun!

Over the next several months, I turned out about eight new games, from the adventures of a tea bag to the story of a naughty boy named Fat Edward to a game where you must clean up the cat sick as quickly as possible before your parents get home.

And it was still fun.

So, young Klikers, don't think that game programming is supposed to be hard and weird and infinitely beyond you: it's not. It's very possible if you want it to be fun and impossible if you want it to be hard.