Thankful to my Bluesky feed for giving me these two posts from @mamavitelli.bsky.social and @baronduki.bsky.social back to back

Wish I'd taken the time to figure out @oskarstalberg.bsky.social's dual grid concept earlier. It simplifies everything so much while also enabling nicer tile shapes. In short: instead of designing tiles, design the boundary slices between them.

#ProcJam 2025 has just kicked off! A celebration of Procedural Generation for games or art or music or ... well, whatever you want to make something make. Are you building anything this year? The theme is "Cold Places." itch.io/jam/procjam

Today is the day to tell a strange story. The long version we'll tell later, but the short version is this. In an attic, in his late great-uncle's house, @jon.inkle.co found a locked trunk. It took twenty years to open. Last summer he did. Inside was a wiring diagram, and a stack of books.

I don’t post about comics much, but this page composition and the writing - 🖐️ Absolute Cinema 🖐️

GAME DEVS! GAME JAMMERS! ONE MONTH AWAY from this holiday's easiest jam -- TOY BOX JAM! You get a huge pile of gfx, sfx, music -- what will YOU make with all these toys? Join here! itch.io/jam/toy-box-... #toyboxjam2025 #gamejam #pico8 #unity #godot #GameMaker #love2D

This is the Bond reboot. It’s all right here. youtu.be/ekESZIn4y18?...

We all dream of creating games that generate issues of this caliber.

okay, seriously: if we were to corral this, would anyone be interested in contributing? Here is the google form: forms.gle/m2V4j4cDvwNu...

hello! freg!

"Rock Band" was the best video game experience I've ever had and I'm tired of pretending that it wasn't.

Getting in the late autumn mood. 🦊

Unicorn #pixelart #ドット絵

“ Squirk squirk. “ said Lord Squirk #matthewart

One time I was having a spicy coffee with Howard Schultz and I said, “hey man you should add some pumpkin to this. You know, for Fall.”

Yesterday morning I slept in past my cat’s breakfast time, so… he scruffed me! He firmly bit the back of my neck, dug his paws into the bed, and … pulled! The sheer chutzpah of this ten-pound beast trying to bodily haul a 160-pound human out of bed by the neck to get his breakfast! 🤣😼

We know that games bring people together, we know that games encourage people to act - It’s about time our leaders tapped into game design and used it to help bring about a better, more connected, more engaged world!

Hold on, I’m about to make an awkward and desperate plea to my insurance company.

The idea that 'AI can speed up dev cycles' would require a premise that dev cycles are long because people are taking forever to make assets (so you could replace them with shoddy slop and it'd go faster), which you could only believe is true if you've never actually tried to make a video game

I didn’t realize fractals are younger than me! I’ve been fascinated by them since I was a kid. Apparently we needed to create computer graphics to really “discover” them and that’s super cool.

In this VR game you control a raccoon by making hand-puppet gestures. Super clever! At long last games are being designed around my unique skillsets.

Yeah so now I’m like… sorting and organizing vacuum tubes? It’s some sort of deep connection with my ancestral geek past. Also, really satisfying somehow.

An incredible find at the old neighborhood electronics store. I talked him down to $20 for the whole case! #vacuumtubes

Life can adapt to so many niches! There’s got to be alien worlds out there. We’ve got alien worlds deep in our own oceans.

i'm sorry for posting facts:

It's hard to overstate how much loss the game industry is experiencing right now in terms of talent, passion, and expertise.

TRON? TRON. I’m in. New trailer: youtu.be/YShVEXb7-ic?...

Woke from a deep sleep and thought to myself, “Alien is just Die Hard from the perspective of the terrorists” And now I’m broken.

introducing the "puzzle compass," a certifiably correct and statistically proven chart of my infallible opinion what games need added? let me know, because i am the authority on this purely objective study #gamedev #indiedev #indiegames #gamestudies

Game design is so much about coralling uncertainty. Constructing a little pen where uncertainty can prowl around and delight onlookers but never actually escape the confines.

Imagine trying to debug code running on 40-year-old atomic-powered computer hardware that you SHOT into INTERSTELLAR SPACE. The Voyager probes are a triumph of ingenuity! Here’s Scott Manley with a technical breakdown of how engineers fixed the bricked spacecraft from earth: youtu.be/p0K7u3B_8rY?...

The archaeologist unfurled the scroll for the scholar. “And here, remarkably preserved, the oldest in-tact biblical verse. See here, in the old script: “He is risen.” The scholar peered at the text through his loop. “You’re mistaken,” he argued. “It reads: 'He Got High.'”

Good morning BlueSky! I was drafting this post yesterday when the news of more #layoffs hit, and I couldn’t find the heart to finish. But I’m going to plow through. What’s going on in #gaming right now? Let’s look at some charts and data. A 🧵!

At no point did I tell the barber I wanted my hair to look like Javier Bardem in No Country for Old Men, and yet… here we are.

Me: Man, Interstellar was great! Nobody told me! Everyone: We all told you. Me: So, so good. Everyone: We told you, like, ten years ago. Me: Who knew? Everyone: We all did. #Movies #Spaaaaace 🚀

There are a lot of trends in gaming right now - many of them negative - but what’s happening with #Godot these days is inspiring! Look at the range of mechanics and art styles happening in this demo reel. And the engine is open source! The Godot community is incredible. ❤️

Speechless!

The delightful #Naiad was just released. A meditation in beauty as much as it is a game, you glide under the waves of a lovingly hand-drawn world. It's just the balm we need these days! Serene, kind - less about challenge and more about the joy of discovery. store.steampowered.com/app/1813860/...

I recently did a courtesy call with an indie developer. They wanted to talk to me because their game's target audience is ... uh, me. 25-40-year-old women, many of whom are moms. They wanted to know: what did I need to pick up a game? What would bar me from playing? Here are some answers 🧵(1/?):

Friends of BlueSky! It is time to introduce you to Bufus, a fascinating gentleman I met 20 years ago. Bufus is a Sim, and he taught me a lot about open-ended #videogames and #emergence. I hope you’ll come to love him as much as I did in this short #GameDev Thread 🧵 about #TheSims.

This is a remarkable release. If you enjoy old-school turn-based roguelikes (ones that are genuinely, y'know, like Rogue!) then this is a must-play. Bottomless gameplay and unique worldbuilding. Live and drink!

Yesterday I posted a #GameDev thread from @maxnichols.bsky.social that described a game’s possibility space as its “surface area.” I like this analogy because it more accurately describes a game’s scope. Let me explain in this thread 🧵, featuring #GameDesign, Will Wright, and #TheBlob.

Great thread about rewards and crafting systems in games. I've never heard of a game's possibility space described as "surface area" but that analogy is going to stick with me!

Happy Monday, #GameDev crew! Nestled on my bookshelf is this treasure from #Spelunky dev Derek Yu ( @mossmouth.bsky.social ), published in 2016 by Boss Fight Books ( @bossfightbooks.com ). A short thread 🧵 about why I love this book and reference it often:

Lots of great follows in this thread! #GameWriting #GameDev #NarrativeDesign #IndieDev

Huh - half of all Europeans play video games! I wonder what the other half are up to when they should be sleeping? digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/library/s...

Pixelart for beginners is live! Today we will create more Zelda Gameboy tiles! We got 2 amazing pieces of viewer artwork to show. I also finally had time to read into sound stuff and improve the overall setup. We also bought fitting background music! Join us on Twitch: www.twitch.tv/cyangmou

Found in my #GameDev journal for 2-19-2023: "What if that's what wizardry is? We have the tools and talent to create whatever we dream, but to actually create it is a deep well of banal tasks and esoteric understanding. It is not power that limits a wizard: It is patience."

One of the hardest things about being a solo dev is finding large enough pools of assets with a cohesive style to make games. This pack is intended for comprehensive collections of #gamedev assets with enough quantity & quality to make many games. Help me find more 🥺🥺🥺 go.bsky.app/3UgrDw9

This thread is about tabletop game design, but much of this advice translates 1:1 to digital #GameDev as well. A great read about iteration, playtesting, feedback, and more. Thank you Connie!