Today is my 10 YEAR ANNIVERSARY since I made my Newgrounds account, at least according to the date on my page. Kinda crazy to think about I've been around on here for 10 years, then again Newgrounds just celebrated 30 years so as they say, time waits for no man. I figured I'd take a moment to highlight some of the best moments I remember. Luckily, I've taken several screenshots to fill the post and kinda keep the story going. Before I start, huge thanks to @TomFulp and the friends I've made on Newgrounds, and the community as a whole. This place has been like a little home for all my creative bursts and demented ideas, which you all seem to accept and indulge. Much love <3

2015

I think the first time I recognized Newgrounds as a site that was more than just for flash games was when I was listening to Sleepycast. Their stories that took place on the site made me curious enough to check it out. Once I learned it was also an art and animation portal, I decided to make my own account. I had posted some of my art online before then but thankfully that's all lost to time. I can't even remember the usernames I had used for DeviantArt or Tumblr (yes, I had both) but I do remember one username, Generatawarp I think. But it sounded too close to "genital warts" so I thought this would be a good time to change that with a new account.

I don't talk about this much so this is fun. The name "Arzonaut" comes from two things. It was a combination of two other username ideas I thought would be a good fit. I thought it be cool to reference something so I went through a ton of stuff I liked at the time and just tried to get some ideas. One of them was Heavy Metal magazine. I love the 80s movie and the comics too. Which is where the first part of my name comes from, Arzach, from the comics. The second part of the name comes from Black Sabbath's, Supernaut,

Anyway, I didn't want people to look up either and not be able to find me. I combined the two and it sounded cool, and the rest is history.

There's not much else I remember about 2015, I was a sophomore in high school and I don't think I took art seriously yet. There is ONE drawing posted in 2015 and it's ASS. It wasn't until a few months later that I changed all that.

2016

I met two key figures in my art journey then, @frootlupin and @Kazukoto. If you wanna blame anyone for the things I draw, blame these two. Frootlupin helped shape my humor, and introduced me to a whole bunch of stuff to get into like games and movies outside my scope. But Kaz was the one that got me seriously into art, specifically digital art, more specifically H3NT@1. Inspired by guys like Spazkid, Zone-tan, and yes even Shad. I wanted to get better at drawing pinup illustrations. I still don't know the main motivating factor behind that. Sure, I was still a teenager and I'm sure any teen who draws is gonna draw porn because duh, puberty. But it stuck with me for some reason. I don't think artists choose their muse, it just shows up and next thing you know it becomes a part of you.

Four whole drawings were posted here. Not a whole lot to faun over, no idea what else I was doing at the time as it was practically 10 years ago. But still, I remember those little draw-calls I had. Just learning a few things and slowly getting better at digital art.

2017

I graduated high school. I only bring this up because that was the moment I felt like it was now or never to take art seriously. If I was gonna have any shot at doing this as something more than a hobby, than I would have to get better. Granted, my outlook on that has swayed back and forth since, but back then I seriously meant that. Around the end of the year I really started to pick up momentum, posting art more frequently. I also started to let go of my own limits and tried to loosen up my style, drawing more of what I'd like to see. Don't get me wrong, it was still dog doo-doo, but I really felt like I was trying to get better.

I remember when @PhantomArcade posted a comment on my Yagiko drawing and I was like "woah, that's the dude who animated Rebident Ebil." You may not like that toon but I sure did lol.

I was taking inspiration from more and more animators in my art. As dedicated as I thought I was back then, there was something I was seriously putting off. I wasn't animating as much as I should've. I've been animating digitally way longer than illustrating, and I've always wanted to be more of an online animator at the time than just an artist. I used the excuse that my art wasn't good enough yet, so I shouldn't animate until I got better at drawing. Don't use that excuse, absolutely stupid. You can still draw like shit and be a fantastic animator, especially if it's funny.

2018

Some notable things happened in 2018. One of my drawings got frontpaged for the first time. I put out my first "popular" work, Braixen Breeds. A comic where Braixen gets fucked, yes I know how putrid - how vile. And I started getting commissioned for the first time. But more importantly than that, I felt like it was time to finally start animating again. If you look at the screen shot there, you can see my first animation uploaded to Newgrounds. It's lost to time now but it was a clip taken from It's always sunny. I made it for college, and uploaded it as a test just to feel out the room. Around the beginning of that year, the Dragonball Z Collab dropped and I was really disappointed in myself that I didn't even try to make a cartoon for it. Like I mentioned before, Sleepycabin brought me to the site, and I really thought it would be awesome to be a part of a collab like the Street Fighter Collab and the Metal Gear Collab. That's why, when The Smash Bros Collab sign-up was announced I immediately procrastinated till I wanna say a month before the first estimated deadline, stunning.

Half-drunk and way late into the night, I messaged Dave practically begging him to let me do something for the collab, even it was like a background or simple thing, and wouldn't you know it he actually replied back. That's so unlike you Dave! No seriously though, I was stoked he gave me the opportunity to prove myself. I wasn't officially in yet so I had to provide something to get that approval. All I had was a bare-bones script and some sketches, which wasn't much to go for because anyone can write a script - and I still don't think parody cartoons are my strong suit. But once I showed Dave the little scene of Wii Fit Trainer eating out Samus I got the OK.

That's what really got my foot in the door with the community, I felt like I was finally doing something right. I got to meet a bunch of artists I liked and new ones too, even @spazkid added me as a friend, that was mind blowing. Somehow I think I finished just before the supposed deadline, and we pushed the date back even further lol. Seeing the Collab drop right after Christmas was like the ultimate, last-minute Christmas present. I watched it with my bros and we laughed the whole way through. But nothing beats the Smash Bros style announcer shouting "ARZONAUT" on the character select, truly a great feeling. I know I come off as dick-riding here, but seriously thanks for letting me in the collab, man.

About a day after, I released the uncensored version. I never intended to do this, I wanted any and all parts I animated for a collab to just be a part of the collab, Hence why Peefa was never released elsewhere by me. But since this is Nintendo, we decided it would be best to keep the collab M rated instead of A. I'm glad people like that cartoon, I wouldn't say it's my best work or anything. Someone pointed out that it's very similar to Jeff's Marvel Vs Capcom Ironman bit, and they're right. It's also inspired by the FUCK YOU, BALTIMORE commercial. One other thing I can mention, there's a sound clip in there from Speedo's S.E.X cartoon which I always felt bad for using because it's literally the easiest thing in the world to make an orgasm sound effect but back then I was an incompetent dumbass, more then than I am now. I've always worn my influences on my sleeves, and you can really tell. Regardless, it was my first real cartoon and I'm still more or less happy with the results.

2019

So, as any online animator does, I naturally decided not to upload another cartoon and sit on projects for a whole year. Fun! That isn't to say I didn't get anything done in 2019, quite the opposite. But I definitely fell for the trap and promised more than I should've. I still feel bad for asking some friends to voice for potential cartoons I was working on but never got released. That's probably why now I mostly do all the voices with just Frootlupin, just so I don't have to waste someone else's time. There was the never finished Mega Man cartoon, and my bit for the One Piece Collab, and a whole lot more that never saw the light of day. Some advice for people starting out, don't force yourself to make cartoons because you feel you have to. Have passion for the project you wanna do, then work on it. Otherwise, you'll lose motivation fast. You'll feel worse if you ask for help on it, only to not get it done.

On the flip-side, someone else asked me for help on their project. One of my very first fans @ninjamuffin99 I think reached out to me so I can do some promo art for his game, Monster Mashing. I say "I think" because honestly it was so long ago that I don't remember who talked to who first. It was really cool to have my art displayed on Steam though, even if it was a small indie game. A few months after that, Cam asked if I could do art and animation for a thing called Ludum Dare 44. Yep, one shy from the one we all know. We made a game called Paristroyer and this was my first time animating for something other than a cartoon. It was a lot of fun to come up with art and the assets, even in the small window of time we had. I remember we mapped out a lot of ideas for it, but with only two days you really couldn't do much. Even though the game's kinda meh, somehow. SOMEHOW. it got monthly-first. Later, he asked if I could be on Groundspatrol, a newgrounds podcast before the Newgrounds podcast. Odd to listen back to honestly.

I participated in my first con that year, and sold prints for the first time. While I was still trying to break into more animation, it was nice to see my illustrations have a monetary value to some. Looking back, I felt like I should've been less reserved online. Even with my interactions with friends I made, I was always shying away from anything that wasn't a personal-project. That was arrogant, and I've been trying to get better at that since.

And lets not forget,

2020

There's a lot that can be said about this year. It was one of the best and worst years of my life. I'm not gonna reflect at all on the worst of it. I've done that enough, and you can read about it here,

Part 1

Part 2

I remember that Covid-19 kinda put me in a rut, art-wise.Just the general lock down, me dropping out of college at the time, and other shit really put me in a block. But I think what got me out of it was seeing Picollage 2020. I don't know why, but seeing that culmination of artists getting together to celebrate 25 years of Newgrounds lit a fire under my ass. Even though I didn't get to participate in that one, something I would always remember until recently, I felt like I had to get back into it! If you look closely though, you can see a reference to Paristroyer done by @digimin.

One thing that really encouraged me was being featured in Slightly Artistic. Just hearing those boys gush over my Amy and Rouge piece, and Cory recognizing Topaz (which was a reference to Sonic XXX) made my day.

I think this was also the first time I tried experimenting with pencil lines and a more cel-shaded art style. But to get to the GOLDEN moment of the year. The Final Fantasy 7 Collab was announced and that felt like the time to make a come back. There's not much more I can add to the development of Peefa that I didn't talk about in this 5-year anniversary post. But I'll sum up some funny things that happened. I remember when Dave had to make a whole other chat just for NSFW updates on cartoons for me and Cory, calling it "cartoons that would make Stamper proud." Couldn't agree more. This cartoon was made during the worst bouts of my last months in college. I would purposefully wake up at 10PM and sleep at 2PM the following day to avoid daylight or interacting with my roommate. I remember taking breaks between animation and going on walks at 4AM, and running into someone else occasionally and thinking to myself "is he a serial killer, does he think I'M the serial killer?" I also remember working a lot with Cory on this one which I don't have to tell you how ground breaking it was for the dude who set me on the course to be a porn animator because of Powertrip to be giving me animation tips. If it wasn't obvious, those sex scenes are a reference, if not blatant rip off, of Frapper Spirits/Hitsuki, with some Spazkid animation thrown in there as well. I want to try to animate without using references too much anymore. It's really apparent, and I can't hide behind "it's an influence" forever. But, I love Peefa, and I'm glad everyone else did too. This was also when I got to meet @snackers, someone who has been a long-time friend of mine through Newgrounds ^_^

Things were really on the up and up...and then, well. Let's skip to 2021.

2021

After a series of events I don't want to describe occurred, I was back! With the help of a lot friends and artists here on Newgrounds, I was still able to make posts. By the time I had a normal living space again, I was kind of trying to come back full force into art. No clear goal in my mind other than to try to have fun with it. I was doing all sorts of freelance work at the time, mostly commissions. I even helped my buddy FrootLupin put out his first cartoon, a passion project we had been working on for a while. Another thing that really rocked was being a part of the Newgrounds Summer Animation Jam. It was a small thing, especially since I still wasn't in the right headspace to go full into animating again, but I used it as a chance to work on a project I've always wanted to, even now. I made a mock-parody trailer for my show Goblin Squad. Even though it was fake, I think I really did want to make that an official cartoon by that year lol. A lot has changed about that little universe I'm always peddling away at, maybe some day I'll actually put out an episode.

I also got to chat with @mkmaffo for the first time, who's also been a long-time friend on the site, we drew GF's thighs and bonded over that :)

Another amazing thing that happened, I released my most popular illustration to date, Newgrounds is Down which for a while was the official art for when Newgrounds actually went down...

This absolutely blew my mind and is probably one of my favorite moments from being a part of the Newgrounds community. It's things like this that just make being a regular member so special, you get to do stuff like this that has huge impact. Even though the site has reverted back to its original art now, I still look fondly back on those years my art would show whenever @Luis spilled beer on the server.

I also was invited to work on my second game jam. I worked with Snackers, @carmet, @jack, and my long-time GOAT @nerostratos. to make Embryo Go Go!. I think we had a week this time around, which is a lot more than two days, and really gave us time to put more love into making a game. With the extra hands, I felt like our idea came more into fruition. It's not a perfect game, but damn do I love some of the stuff we worked on with that. BTW, Embryo Go Go abbreviated spells out EGG. This was for the Egg jam, and I'm surprised not many people caught that.

To end off the year, I participated in a small charity thing hosted by @thenewgroundspodcast to create Christmas themed Newgrounds stickers. Where I got to work with @POSTBOY on some of the stickers. A lot of fun was had wrangling that all together.

2022

This was an interesting year, it was the first time I started to get real work as a freelance animator. I had helped on FlashGitz and Meatcanyon cartoons and got paid for it, an unheard of concept for me. I also participated in the FLCL collab with a small entry. Now I'll admit, I reacted kinda like a dick, but I was pretty upset that I was asked to censor some of my cartoon. I didn't think it would ever come out, so I uploaded it myself years before it was released. I haven't joined a Reanimate since, and I probably won't again.

I also did a cartoon for the Evangelion Collab, which is where I got to meet @magibauble, @arkoirisangel, and other cool artists. My memory is a bit fuzzy on the development of that one, but I do remember that I was a little concerned at putting out my first cartoon that wasn't NSFW. I didn't know how people would react, and I thought they might find it unfunny. But honestly, it wasn't a bad reception, and magi even put it as the cold opener to the whole collab. I also helped out on Lunar Kicks, though it was just a small bit of animation.

I flew out to Anime Matsuri in 2022 to participate in another con. Got to sell art and stickers again which was dope! I did have my car broken into the first night, don't fuck around in Houston, which kinda soured my mood. Sorry if I acted like a socially-awkward dick, again I really can't stress enough how much being a shut-in artist and not going out and interacting with people stunts your sociability. But overall, I had a fun time in Texas. I managed to break even, which was enough for the flight out, and I had some traditional Texan barbecue to end the trip.

Last thing I can remember was @stradomyre asking me to do some promo work for their game Dead Estate. I drew Jules and this is still probably one of my favorite illustrations ever. But I gotta rip into Steam a bit for making me censor it so much. Oh well. Sufficed to say, I fuck with the milkbar lads and should they ever need another artist or animator on the group they know where to find me.

2023

Not a whole lot can be said about 2023 that I haven't already talked about here. I graduated college, started a "career", and went to Japan. But this is when I seriously considered leaving all this behind. Big mistake! Not sure why I ever had a moment where I thought I would no longer be doing art post-graduation. It's an integral part of my life, and I wouldn't change that no matter what. Every artist feels like that maybe at some point. I did put

I did put out a personal favorite of mine, Friday Night ABORTION. Didn't do as well as I had hoped, but I still like it. I consider it a sequel to Cory's Pico Day cartoon. That's why there's that whole bit of Pico's dad sucking cocks in hell. Plus, I always wanted to mock the Exorcist in some fashion. This toon was made for what would've been the Pico Day Collab, but it was never released because SOMEONE didn't get around to finishing the credits...lol. I had a few friends help me on this cartoon, but only the true homie stayed on it. Guess they didn't want a cartoon they worked on with the name "ABORTION" in it.

In a lot of ways, 2023 sucked more than 2020. Sure, unforeseeable events plagued 2020. But 2023 was inexcusable. There's no reason to give up something you love because you feel it's the right time. It only adds to your worsening mood. I felt worthless for a while because of that. I guess I'm just a masochist, maybe I felt that everything I did at that point amounted to nothing, and that in the end nobody cared. For that I wanted to punish myself and give up the one thing I enjoyed most. I don't have to tell you how immature that is - just don't ever get to that point. And if you do, remind yourself that you only create for yourself at the end of the day - nothing more.

2024

Once again, I summed up the whole year here. This was to highlight 10K fans here on Newgrounds! Out of all my platforms, I've garnered the most fans here. It's not that it's a numbers game, but to have that many people like my work is still pretty cool. Looking back, I reflected on the fact that I was a shut-in most of the year and I didn't get much done. But I don't think that's entirely true now. I may not have done much in the scope of other years by comparison, but since 2023, I really think I got my groove back. First thing was Cookin' With Fatty, it wasn't anything significant but I remembered how fun it was to just work on something simple with friends just for the hell of it. Me and Frootlupin used to laugh at this clip for years and always joked that it would be dope to see it animated. This was something we worked on together for a while since we were both out of the game.

Another thing I really love about 2024 was putting out my first porn game with @stepford, Yukari Takeba: Social Link Maxxxing. I have always wanted to parody the scene in Persona 3 that takes place in the love hotel, it was ripe with potential. Plus, the idea of Yukari getting cummed on and shouting "Stupid faggot, little cock sucker!" in retaliation was always an idea I had to incorporate. I know Yukari gets hate on a lot, rightfully so she's kind of a bitch sometime, but I love her still. This really was a labor of love just for me and my taste. I've always wanted atleast one meet n' fuck style game on my Newgrounds page, mainly cuz of Zone-tan. While there's not much "meet", there's plenty of meat.

I also hosted the Brazil Day art contest with a hand full of other artists! This was a lot of fun and a way for me to give back to the community in some way. I'm not sure why, but Newgrounds just seems to resonate well with a lot of Brazilians I guess. If you're curious about it, browse the winners and some of the great posts here! Not sure if I'll host one again this year, got a lot of work on my plate now, but I would love to see it happen at some point. This also got me interacting with @matthewlopz and @oddlem through her OCtober - still waiting on that art trade. :D

2025

I don't want to gush over everything that has taken place in 2025 yet because the year's still going! But I really feel like I'm at a point where I'm getting more and more comfortable with my skill as an artist. I'm not at my height, but I would at least consider myself somewhat competent now. But I'll touch on a small thing for now, Picollage 2025.

As I mentioned, I didn't get the chance to participate in Picollage2020. I took that as a means that I just wasn't doing enough to deserve a spot. I swore then that I would do anything I could to try to get a spot for the next Picollage, I had 5 years after all. I worked with the Picollage 2020 print hanging by my wall all that time as a constant reminder. By the time 2025 rolled around, I started to wonder if it was gonna happen at all. So I reached out to @sabtastic and asked if I could join, if it was even gonna happen. To my surprise it seemed like no one was hosting one for this year. She gave me the go-ahead to host it myself if I wanted and I said fuck it, why not. So I grabbed as many people as I knew and interacted with through the community in the past to see if I could make this happen. It was like a culmination of all the progress I made in the last 10 years. Somehow it all came together really well, and all the artists pulled through with great work! I always wanted to be a part of Picollage, but I never knew I'd host Picollage. Couldn't have been done without the help of everyone here in the community, and that's what I love most about the site. Some of us may be close, some of us strictly talk shop. Some of us rarely talk ever. But when it comes time to pull together to make something great, it's all hands on deck. To make something just for passion, just for the love to create things. That's Newgrounds.

Picollage icons by @evilsk8r and me!

There's so much more I could mention, the tiny interactions I've had, the memes I've shared in, and just the fun I've had browsing. But I think that about sums it up for now. All I can say is I wonder what the next 10 years will hold. I'm not going anywhere - and I hope that Newgrounds sticks around and puts up with my shit for a long time to come.

LONG LIVE NEWGROUNDS!!!