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Reading List (April 2022)
🕑 Added 2022-04-27 05:29:00 +0000 UTCHello!
Welcome to your reading list for April. This month we've got tilt-shift Elden Ring, sales number breakdowns, DIY immersive sims, and wrestling with director intent.
Enjoy!
The Design of Games
[Watch | CC | 23 mins] How Disco Elysium Was Made After Hitting Rock Bottom - “Before attempting to make a video game, Robert first wrote a book that ended up becoming a big failure which launched him into a deep depression.”
[Read] What does your narrative system need to do? - “This is a question that comes up very frequently in the narrative design conversations. This post is a tour of some possible answers.”
[Watch | CC | 21 mins] Why Tunic Hides It's Tutorial - Adam from Architect of Games looks at the latest indie darling, Tunic, and the clever way it turns the instruction manual into a resource.
[Watch | CC | 40 mins] Mechanical Critique of Elden Ring - A little long, and a little meandering, but it has some interesting takeaways on the nuts-and-bolts of Elden Ring gameplay.
[Read] How VR games trick you into thinking objects have weight - VR grip and trigger buttons add significant physicality when holding objects. But “picking up items is one thing, throwing them accurately is another.”
The Business of Games
[Read] The 8-year process behind Playdate’s glorious crank - “From nearly day one, Panic’s portable console has been defined by a single feature hanging off its right side”.
[Read] Sales Breakdown: A Couple Pocket Months Later - As always, Yacht Club Games’s ultra-transparent breakdowns prove interesting. This one’s for puzzle-action hybrid Pocket Dungeon.
[Read] Making A Game 2022 - A not-quite-serious guide to making your own game.
The Development of Games
[Watch | 11 mins] How Mortal Kombat 2 cheats against you - Arcade games are designed to beat you. Modern Vintage Gamer breaks into the Mortal Kombat code (kode?) to find out how they did it.
[Watch | 20 mins] Can I Teach Myself Game Development by Making an Immersive Sim? - Jeremy, from Noclip, is trying his hand at game dev. Just like me, he immediately falls into the trap of analysis paralysis. Whoops!
[Read] Feature: The Story Of Affordable Space Adventures, The Wii U eShop's Best Exclusive - “With the game now reaching its 7 year anniversary, and with its imminent disappearance from the Wii U eShop in mind, we caught up with key figures behind its creation.”
[Watch | CC | 54 mins] The Making of Among Us - “Noclip talk to the developers at Innersloth about Among Us. F’rom it's humble days as a mobile party game, to the online sensation that, for a time, took over the world.”
The Playing of Games
[Watch | CC | 17 mins] A.I. Learns to Drive From Scratch - “I made an A.I. that teaches itself to drive in the racing game Trackmania, using Machine-Learning.” The clips of thousands of cars all driving at once are oddly beautiful.
[Watch | 3 mins] Gilbert Gottfried Voices Our Favorite Games - The late Gilbert Gottfried lends his dulcet tones to gaming’s most infamous vocal performances. Lost it at Super Mario 64.
[Watch | 25 mins] How Resident Evil 7 Changed Speedrunning - A love letter to the RE7 speed running community, who quickly came together to grind this game into a gooey, hour-long paste.
[Read] We Spoke to 'Let Me Solo Her,' the Elden Ring Community Hero We Need and Deserve - “It took him 242 tries to beat [spoiler] the first time. Now he's killed her nearly 400 times to help others.“
[Read] How Elden Ring's Silliest Memes Get Lost in Translation - “For players who don’t speak English as their first language, Elden Ring’s many meme-messages can be far more of a troll than they were ever intended to be.”
The Art of Games
[Watch | 14 mins] When the Music Fits the Action Perfectly - 8-bit Music Theory turns his sheet music to Kirby and the Forgotten Land’s bonkers Brawl at the Mall boss fight.
[Watch | No voice | 3 mins] Tiny Elden Ring - “Using Tilt Shift to turn Elden Ring's Land Between into a miniature world. With its tiny inhabitants waddling around going on about their lives.”
[Watch | CC | 7 mins] The Three Biggest Ideas in Animation (And How to Use Them!) - Not about games, but this simple (and gorgeous!) explainer on the basics of animation should prove useful nonetheless. Part of a series.
Beyond Games
[Watch | 15 mins] Martin Scorsese Said I Was Wrong - An interesting dissection of how we discern director (or developer?) intent in art.
[Watch | 36 mins] The Film Bro is Dead - “After almost a decade of use (and misuse) on the internet, it's time to unpack what exactly the film bro is, why he's significant, and how social media killed him.”
Comments
jt
I agree with the earlier comment about the reading list being my favorite reward - I always look forward to this! Really enjoyed the design and art sections of this one. Thanks for taking the time to putting this together!
Brent Sacks
Can’t wait to dig into these! Thanks for sharing!
