We're joined by creative director Hannah Nicklin and writer Harry Josephine Giles to discuss Die Gute Fabrik's beautiful new story-driven adventure, Saltsea Chronicles. We dig into the world-building and construction of the playable ensemble cast, the writer's room that pulled it off, and building out design process as design.

Show Notes:

Saltsea Chronicles

Die Gute Fabrik

Hannah Nicklin

Harry Josephine Giles

Ink

Deep Dive: Designing a narrative for multiple middles and multiple heroes in Saltsea Chronicles

Saltsea Chronicles and Writing the Future

Pool Panic

Building a Better Bridge with Ben Wilson

A Paradise Built in Hell by Rebecca Solnit

notgoingbacktonormal.com

'Endemic' SARS-CoV-2 and the death of public health

Rebecca Solnit: When the Hero is the Problem

We talk to our very own Zach Gage about his brand new games website, Puzzmo. We talk about player curiosity, newspaper games, Crosswords, and more.

Show Notes:

Episode 37: Designing Around Language with Zach Gage

Puzzmo manifesto

AVCX

How Hard Could It Be? (crossword puzzle by Rob Dubbin)

Ian MacLarty and Kalonica Quigley join us to discuss their open world physics simulation game, Mars First Logistics. We talk about the tech art behind the game's visual style, the procedurally generated landscape, the humor of the gameplay, and more.

Show Notes:

Mars First Logistics

Catacombs of Solaris

Apartment

Red Desert Render

Out of Bounds: Exploring the Limits of Videogames

Ian's tech art posts

Jumpgrid

Bennett Foddy blog post about zk map

We're joined by Patrick Traynor, creator of Patrick's Parabox, a mind-bending recursive puzzle game about boxes within boxes. We discuss following your gut to what a game wants to be, being part of the puzzle design community, and our core philosophies behind puzzle design.

Show Notes:

Patrick's Parabox Patrick Traynor Linelith I Wanna Be the Guy Fangames Sokosoko Sokoban Stephen's Sausage Roll Singles - Rebecca Sugar Patrick's Parabox OST Osmos Puzzle Level Idea Strategies The Witness Tyler Glaiel - Make and release lots of small games before making a big one Jonathan Blow - Truth in Game Design

We're taking a small summer break, so please enjoy one of our favorite episodes from 2020 with a new introduction from Doug!

The ENTIRE all-star Disc Room team - Kitty Calis, JW Nijman, Doseone, and Terri Vellmann - stop by for a rowdy disc-ussion on their new arcade sci-fi avoid-em-up. We chat about making the Margherita pizza of games, nailing the details to make a simple concept sing, and making the most of team collaborations.

Show notes:

Disc Room

Launch trailer

Kitty Calis JW Nijman Doseone Terri Vellmann

Pizza Margherita

Disc Room Game Jam

VVVVVV

Chris Ware

Monolith

Bit Pilot

We're honored to be joined by Gilles De Coster, host of our favorite Belgian reality TV game show - De Mol - to talk about the process, inspirations, and execution of the sublime game design behind its thrilling, subversive challenges. We spend the first hour giving all the context you'll need to follow along, before diving into the interview. This is a special one for us, check it out!

Show Notes:

De Mol (SPOILERS)

The Mole (inferior American version)

Wie is de Mol? (Dutch version)

The Amazing Race

Every Game in This City

Bestemming X

We're joined by Abhi to discuss Venba - Visai Games' short narrative cooking game about family, love, and loss. We discuss uniting narrative and gameplay, making a very personal game in a commercial industry, and creating a cooking experience with its own distinct flavor.

Show Notes:

Abhi

Venba

Papers, Please

Assemble with Care

Idli

Exit/Corners

Wholesome Games

Laundry Bear Games

Alpha Something - Venba soundtrack

Keel Haul

Abhi's picks:

Favorite cooking videos: Layered Biriyani Kerala Style Fried Chicken Chicken Ghee roast Great Tamil movies to get started with: Merku Thodarchi Malai Kaaka Muttai Kaithi A playlist of songs that inspired Venba's soundtrack

We're joined by Color Gray Games' Andrejs Kļaviņš to discuss their deeply rewarding detective game The Case of the Golden Idol. We discuss building on the game's cross-media inspirations, finding the 'aha!' moments in playtesting, and trusting yourself to trust your players.

Show Notes:

The Case of the Golden Idol

Color Gray Games

Andrejs Kļaviņš

Resonance

Return of the Obra Dinn

gamedeveloper.com interview

GMTK - What Makes a Good Detective Game?

Understanding Comics

William Hogarth

Her Story

Outer Wilds

Dark Souls

Foucault's Pendulum

PostCurious episode

Godot Engine

Mark Brown episode

SpiderHeck

Hercule Poirot

Poker Face show

Under a Killing Moon

We're joined by actor Ashly Burch and Guerilla Games' Ben McCaw and Jochen Willemsen to deconstruct their deeply collaborative work on the Horizon game franchise - building the character of Aloy, the role of performance capture, and carving out nuance and evolution in a blockbuster series.

Show Notes:

Horizon Forbidden West

Horizon series

Ashly Burch

Ben McCaw

Jochen Willemson

Hey Ash Whatcha Playin'?

Tenzin (Uncharted 2)

Gildun (Horizon character)

Seyka (Horizon character)

We're joined by Rita Orlov to discuss her PostCurious catalog of captivating narrative tabletop puzzle games, including her journey from physical and fine art into games, why designers love bouldering, and trusting players to summit her puzzles.

Show Notes:

Rita Orlov

PostCurious

The Emerald Flame

Threads of Fate KickStarter

Lauren Bello

Rita's furniture

Rita's masks

Prague tunnels

Bouldering

Chip's Challenge

Syberia

Rush Hour

Society of Curiosities

Traveler's Guide to Little Sodaburg

Jack Fallows

Voynich Manuscript

Codex Seraphinianus

The Case of the Golden Idol

Mother of Frankenstein