When I turn the key on the back of my wind-up Tasmanian Devil toy from 1992 it spins around on the spot and then falls over AI researchers: is this consciousness?

lol that’s exactly it

Burnham gives high praise to Kinnock - and no mention of Blair.

Today we launch a new free guide for videogames writers on how to navigate your contracts to understand your employment status and to ensure fair and equitable terms Find out more + download the new guidelines 🔽 writersguild.org.uk/games-contra...

Nessa is very smart, and this is a great one especially for people looking to get started in their careers

"Flawless Victory (And How to Avoid It" In honor of Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced's release, here's a brief essay about how I approached the writing of its main narrative, 13 years ago. darbymcdevitt.substack.com/p/flawless-v... Big thanks to @jon.inkle.co for nudging me to write this one.

(The article is fantastic, and you can hear Darby talk in more detail about it on the associated podcast - Episode 2 - www.inklestudios.com/kaleidoscope...)

MYSTERY FANS: The Incident at Galley House is out now -- this is the game built out of Type Help, which was a huge inspiration for us in crafting TR-49. That's why we've teamed up with @eviltrout.com to bundle both games (but that means, since YOU already bought ours, you get an instant discount!)

Hi bsky! I'm looking for game writing/narrative design work, freelance or full time! I have 6+ years of experience working with both AAA and indie studios, shipping over a dozen projects like Borderlands 4 and Endoparasitic and more! You can find my website and portfolio here: www.nessacannon.com

Niche post but i have to make it: i just realised "Babbie" is Scottish, and is a kind of Pig, and Pig talked to Mucor who is both on the Whorl and the Rock, and Horn arrived at the instant of Silk's death, which is not likely to be the same instant as that of Horn's death. Does this matter? Not sure

The trick for a good set of dialogue choices? Set them up, says @fiddlecub.bsky.social Hear the whole conversation at www.inklestudios.com/kaleidoscope..., and if you're picking up the book, it's 15% off with the code BOOKPITCH15 this week.

Under a Binface government, anyone who doesn’t accept human-made climate change as fact will be sent back to school, from Year 1 right the way to A Levels, to see if anything goes in the second time round. #VoteBinface

This bundle is great. www.humblebundle.com/games/narrat...

Today’s takeaway - god bless our NHS

Turns out LLMs have ALREADY invented cold fusion but the seed process requires the extraction of a billionaire's testicle directly through the nasal cavity so it has been SUPPRESSED

In case you missed it, here's Count Binface's appearance on the BBC this morning.

New Kaleidoscope episode! Larian writer @fiddlecub.bsky.social (Baldur's Gate 3, Divinity Original Sin 2) joins us to discuss "Two Tips for Better Dialogues"... and gives us many more than two. Listen in at www.inklestudios.com/kaleidoscope..., or subscribe via your podcast player!

Binface vs Farage is the Britain I recognise and love. “Here, at the turn of the tide.”

Not all heroes have a bin on their head but a surprising number of them do. This is the way!

Game on, Nige.

old money vs "my money"

new james bond villain escapable-death scenario just arrived

This looks very impressive

once a week, 1 billion players should buy an itch.io game for 99c; after a year the entire industry would be radically changed forever

Always remember the Telegraph cryptic crossword I found on a train with the clue “Confused gorilla is green vegetable (3)”. A newspaper for both confused gorillas and the green-vegetable brained!

Only the penitent man shall pass

If I was designing a fancy AAA action game, I would have the default mode for the final sequence drop itself to Story difficulty automatically. Die/reload/&c axes the momentum of tight final stages; I want to improv my way through like a badass not learn a series of micro stages

Cities are big spaces, and we want to feel that scale when we play in them -- @konstantinosd.bsky.social tells us how a dog can help. For the full chat, turn to www.inklestudios.com/kaleidoscope/#podcast

Way ahead, we pivoted in 2019

Took me over an hour to get past security at an airport in First Light so that’s true to life

Been writing up my talk for Develop about the design of TR-49. Only it’s not really about that. No, it’s time for another grand unified theory …

Multi ple great observations from @brunodias.bsky.social here but I’ll paste the one that stood out to me azhdarchid.com/you-must-fre...

As a matter of URGENCY, PLEASE could 100,000 of you sign this petition in the next week: petition.parliament.uk/petitions/77...

Phileas Fogg has wagered he can circumnavigate the world by land, air, and sea in 80 Days. The Complete Inkle Library supports @play.breakthrought1d.org.

There is no such thing as a fake choice. There are only unengaging choices. Systemic effects don’t guarantee engagement any more than emotional content does; equally a Yes / Also yes-style choice can be engaging, in the right context. You want good choices? Great. Make them good.

So - If you like: A) People doing bonkers stuff like this B) Games with great stories C) Studios making bonkers games with great stories... Go and buy Over the Alps on Steam! Please! We're using every penny we get from it to fund our next game at Tributary. Plus it's 50% off and it's great. /🧵

Lots of people asking how we made Over the Alps: The Devil's Quill. Also asking why we made it, which is fair enough! So! A brief thread about how I finished off a game I started back in 2013. 🧵 #gamedev

On pacing dialogue.

We recovered and restored the files for the missing final Over the Alps story, THE DEVIL'S QUILL. Written by @skelicopter.bsky.social this never before seen chapter finishes the game 6 years on. We've also made it free to play, directly in your browser! Go check it out on itch:

Over The Alps! This was the first project I was ever hired to write for!

A short medium post on how we think about dialogue pacing at inkle, in which I ill-advisedly rewrite Tolkein

why is it that the only way to launch the Thesaurus on a mac is to type "thesaurus" into spotlight, which then looks up the word "thesaurus" in the dictionary

Turns out, jump cuts in 3D games are, in fact, excellent. Presumably they’re rare for technical reasons so - is First Light, in fact, the Citizen Kane of video games ?

This one was very close to my heart. Let's dig into dialogue -- that's worth listening to!

I've never seen this before: a short film, inspired by a scene from our adaptation of Sorcery! 2

Hear me out: Playdate for interactive fiction. Turns out it's possible to fit @inkle.co's ink engine on the 50€ Xteink X4 e-reader of internet fame. Who's in?

"Is my complaint directed to a human being? Why should I not be impatient?" - Job (Chapter 21, Verse 4) as he attempts to get his online banking service to allow him to reset his password

A World War II computer. An archive of lost books. A world-changing secret. Get TR-49 with the Complete Inkle Library! Supports @play.breakthrought1d.org.

The most entertaining thing about this is that Atlantis was a city overwhelmed by a rising sea levels brought on by the hubris of its wealthy inhabitants