About me
A self-confessed geek, my passions span video games, photography, film, and foreign languages. I built FocalNull and its companion app, DropSlate, out of a desire to carve out a quiet, independent corner of the web. Serving as my personal laboratory, this project marries my love for clean code with visual storytelling—offering a space to document gaming history, share my photography, and celebrate the simple, uninterrupted joy of discovery, entirely free from the noise of modern algorithms.
The build
To bring this project to life, I used GitHub alongside AI coding assistants (Claude, Gemini, and GitHub Copilot). They provided the essential starting point I needed to make my dream of a personal website and free app a reality. Meanwhile, I am studying and learning how to code at home, slowly applying these new skills to the project and my life as I learn.
Visuals and media
I want this space to feel crafted. The site's background, colours, and patterns were built using open-source tools and imagery, keeping generative AI to an absolute minimum (and I hope to keep it that way).
For the game catalogue, the information, release dates, studio credits, and official artwork powering DropSlate and my game pages are sourced via the IGDB API. Game trailers are embedded directly via public YouTube links. I strictly use existing official promotional photos and cover art—never AI-generated versions. All game titles, logos, cover art, screenshots, and videos belong to their respective owners and are used strictly for identification and review purposes.
Impartiality and reviews
To clearly differentiate them from the aggregated critic scores tracked in the DropSlate app, all critiques on this site are explicitly labelled as FocalNull Reviews (or FN Reviews). These are entirely my personal opinions. I am not getting paid for this, and there is absolutely no influence from studios. I never accept sponsorships or paid placements, and I do not use affiliate links. FocalNull is my free, non-commercial side project and is not endorsed by these studios or data providers.
Since
I created FocalNull and DropSlate in November 2026.