Today's indie game: Five Elements Chess (game.spotlightor.com/game/five-el...). Despite the name, it's not Chess nor a Chess variant. It's a minimalist turn-based strategy game with some light RNG but a lot of depth. Worth looking at if you like abstract turn-based strategy.

Today's indie game: Discounty (crinklecutgames.com). From what I've seen, this is a game for people who liked Stardew Valley but wished they could play as Shane working at Joja Mart.

Today's indie game: Loco Motive (locomotivegame.com). A LucasArts-style graphic adventure (quite a few of those this year in IGF!) where you have to exonerate yourself as a murder suspect. The writing legit had me laughing out loud. Not super innovative, but top-level craft within the form.

Today's indie game: Dogpile (store.steampowered.com/app/3839300/...). Look I don't know what to tell you, if "core gameplay of Suika Game but with Roguelite-deckbuilder elements and where the things you're dropping onto the playfield are dogs" sounds good to you, then do I have a game for you. Woof.

Today's indie game: CARIMARA: Beneath the Forlorn limbs - store.steampowered.com/app/3570370/... - a short supernatural mystery, probably inspired by Obra Dinn, absolutely dripping with style, and playable to completion in under an hour. I wish this were just Chapter 1 in a longer game, but still.

Today's indie game: No, I'm Not a Human (store.steampowered.com/app/3180070/...). Werewolf/Mafia/Amongus as a single-player VN where you decide which creepy people to trust to let in during a zombie apocalypse, basically. It perfectly nails the creepy/paranoid vibe to make the world feel believable.

Today's indie game: Time Flies (timeflies.buzz). Such a quirky little game, and short, like "plays to completion in under an hour" short. I'd describe it as Minit meets Untitled Goose Game with 250% extra memento mori. Bonus points for using actual lifespan data by country sourced from WHO.

Today's indie game: Strange Jigsaws (store.steampowered.com/app/2702170/...). The creator of 20 Small Mazes (which is exactly what it says in the name, 20 weird variants of mazes) follows up with this, a similar variant on jigsaw puzzles. This game is larger and more ambitious than its predecessor.

Today's indie game: Sol Cesto (store.steampowered.com/app/2738490/...). Falls into the same bucket as 868-HACK and Imbroglio, which are... *looks it up*... omg they call these Broughlikes? That has got to be the worst genre name ever. Anyway, if you like systems and output randomness, take a look.

Today's indie game: Drop Duchy (store.steampowered.com/app/2525310/...). I know what you're thinking: you wish there were a Slay-the-Spire-like where the core mechanic is Tetris crosseed with Carcassonne. Okay, no you weren't, but that's what this is and it works better than it has any reason to.

One IGF-entered game per day that I found interesting. Today: Baby Steps (www.babystepsgame.com). This is what happens when Bennett Foddy gets actual funding and that's all you need to know. Come for the pratfalls, stay for the brilliant dialogue. Try it co-op with one on mouse and one on keyboard.

I present these games in no particular order. Today's indie game: BALL X PIT (www.ballxpit.com). Ball-breaker mobile game w/Vampire Survivor-like progression and Loop Hero-style base-building meta. Yeah, it's a pure dopamine compulsion loop, but a very well-executed one.

For those just joining, my game recs do not automatically mean "go out and buy this now" - they are not necessarily GOOD but are at least INTERESTING to some people. I try to specify who would be interested in each game - but a lot of these are niche so these might not be for you (and that's ok!).

Took an unintended hiatus from Bluesky over the last few weeks as it was IGF judging season so I was busy playing dozens of indie games. I return to... a lot of new followers (hi everyone!) and I come bearing a ton of indie game recs. As usual I'll do one per day from this year's IGF until I run out

I bet Silksong is really popular among professional programmers. It's a game about repeatedly bashing your face into a wall in pursuit of the goal of getting rid of bugs.

Had this idea, looked it up, was surprised no one had done it before. My photoshop skills aren't the best but someone had to, so I give you... Hollow Kitty. You're welcome.

I don't know how to explain this scientifically but the sound that you get from playing a song on a cheap plastic kazoo is the audio equivalent of sticking googly-eyes on something.

This would do a few things. It might force legit journals to get more serious about supporting reviewers. It would call out the danger of a publish-or-perish environment that pushes faculty to "cheat" on their pub count like this. Could help prevent people building on poor-quality papers. (3/3)

2. Flag papers with hallucinated refs and check further to see if they look like the entire thing was AI-generated. 3. Write a paper on prevalence of AI-generated papers in your field, naming which journals were the worst offenders at letting these slip past peer review. (2/3)

Are you an academic at a publish-or-perish institution? Here's a strat for you to get easy bonus publications. 1. Grab some journals in your field. Hand off to an AI (or student, if you're lucky enough to have funding) and have it check references in each published paper to see if they exist (1/3)

I don't post much about current projects (NDA and all) but currently working on a murder mystery / crime drama game so if any of you are big fans of murder mystery novels or Law&Order shows, public beta signup is here: www.wolfgames.net/publiceye

For guys looking for a manic pixie dream girl, they should remember that opposites attract so they should work on their depressed goblin nightmare boy persona.

95% of Leads and mentors in the videogame industry:

Any voice actors in the house? docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

From now on will be referring to the movie Jaws as "Jurassic Shark."

GDC submissions opening early this year - and notably, summit submissions happen at the same time, it's all one round, all talks due Aug 7. gdconf.com/call-for-sub...

Welp, that's enough reading email for today.

Just made this to explain the string section of an orchestral score to gamers. You're welcome.

Just realized that one way of putting it is that Prometheus was the first ever de-liver-y boy.

Just once instead of "Final Fantasy" with a number after it I'd like them to use the other popular naming convention, Fantasy_Final_FINAL_NoReallyThisOne_IMeanItThisTime(17).exe

Every time I see a Cybertruck, I just think... I've seen enough low-poly work to wonder if there's no floor or seats inside because that is absolutely what would have happened if it were on PS2 with a 40-poly budget.

The existence of emotional support animals implies the existence of emotional tank and emotional dps animals.

Okay, so I know that short verbal outbursts in games are normally called 'barks.' I'm really wondering if, internally, the Stray dev team called them that or if they called them 'meows' instead.

RPG design tip: If your game has snakes as common enemies, be sure to also include vending machines in your monster compendium.

Some days, you agonize over what to name your game, because you just know that the perfect name is what it needs to get attention and sales. Other days, some game sweeps a bunch of the awards and it's called Balatro. And then you hear that it's pronounced BAH-luh-trow, and nothing matters anymore.

Environmental storytelling #GDC2025

I have waited 13 years for the moment where I can wear my GDC shirt from 2012 at #GDC2025

It just occurred to me that this is my 18th time in San Francisco for GDC and not a single time in all these years have I seen anyone eating rice-a-roni.

Wow that resonates. #GDC2025

"Zoom in and obsess, zoom out and observe" feels like something I should put on my wall. #GDC2025

Environmental storytelling #GDC2025

Oh dang, crepes are no longer in the north/south underground corridor, but west hall 2f. #GDC2025 #GDCrepes

The people staffing the SUSD bpardgames area are also wearing orange shirts, wonder how many times someone will mistake booth staff for CAs #GDC2025

Omg CA shirts this year are orange and today is St Patrick's day, some people gonna die #GDC2025

Shower thought of the day: mineral water implies the existence of animal water and vegetable water.

So, who all's going to GDC this year? If you'd like to meet up in person, reach out. If your company is hiring systems designers, we should definitely talk.

Finally getting around to playing through Dredge. I've never seen so many fishermen and coastal villagers with so much anxiety about the water. It's like something out there really put the fear of Cod into them.

I continue to be annoyed that "respite" rhymes with spit and not spite.

Last year I attended Polaris Game Design Retreat where I worked with Elaine Gusella, @ianschreiber.bsky.social and @danctheduck.bsky.social on how players collectively decide, and how to create better decision-making experiences. Our paper just got published! ✨ polarisgamedesign.com/2024/how-to-...

Okay, I'll admit that "GTFO" is a truly fine name for an escape room company.