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The Intersection of Puzzle and Story (with Ron Gilbert) [Nice Replay] Jan 02, 2025

Show notes

#354The Intersection of Puzzle and Story Interview2024.07.05

Narrative designer and pal of the program Beth Korth fills in for Ellen as guest host this week and next!

Your nice hosts welcome famed designer Ron Gilbert (Monkey Island, Thimbleweed Park) into the clubhouse to discuss the virtues of inexperience, friction for its own sake, how it's all about story, and it's puzzles all the way down.

The Intersection of Puzzle and Story

Game Design Narrative Production Return to Monkey Island will have a hint system because the internet exists now - Joshua Rivera, Polygon Verdant Skies - Steam Classic Game Postmortem: Maniac Mansion - GDC, YouTube

The phrase "confederacy of dunces" derives from a Jonathan Swift quote.

Examples of movies that feature a poorly-received genre twist include Serenity (2019), Remember Me (2010), and Safe Haven (2013).

"The super-powerful beam or whatever." Code Libraries; Game Overs [Nice Replay] Dec 27, 2024

Show notes

#353"The super-powerful beam or whatever."Roundtable2024.06.27

This week, your nice hosts talk about code that isn't yours and ask about the natural conclusion of the narrative. Mark is handy, Ellen kinda wants to add a note, and Stephen is grounded.

It looked so easy in the brochure, but the brochure lied - Antony Ingram, Hagerty

Code Libraries

0:07:41Mark LaCroix Production Programming Tools Best practices for writing code comments - Ellen Spertus, Stack Overflow Blog Declare namespaces to organize types - Microsoft LearnYour nice hosts discussed licensing in a previous episode:"What's a little grand larceny?"

Game Overs

Stephen McGregor Game Design Narrative Alternatives to the Game Over screen - Game Developer

We didn't mention it in the episode for some reason, but our "Metroidvania-lite" game Widget Satchel had no deaths, game overs, or failure states.

Nicest of 2024 Dec 20, 2024

Show notes

It's a cheery and bright episode to get you through the dark cold days of winter! ☃️ Your hosts (plus guest Joanna May) wrap up 2024 with a readout of their nicest things from the year—nicest games, nicest accomplishments, and nicest procrastinations. Plus, plans and projects for 2025, some soft resolutions, and a review of some exciting upcoming titles you're likely to see hit various storefronts in the next calendar year. A happy year's end to all!

Cover image credit goes to Animal Crossing World.
This year's selection of Nice Replays start next week. See you in 2025!

2024 Accomplishments

Mark

Founded a 501(c)(3) organization, Nice Games Alliance.
Got a new job, on a still unannounced game.
Renewed the lease on the Noble Robot office

Stephen

I made two movies! (Or at least I will have by the end of the year)
Immense progress on Future Club game

Ellen

My RSV game won multiple industry awards
Hired Lydia
Running out of plant room

Joanna

Solved generalized serialization
Palette generation too
Lots of iterative things that were worked on last year

2024 "Nicest" Games

This is not a “best of 2024” or even a definitive list of our favorites. It’s just a few games we want to be nice to.

Ellen
- We Were Here series
- Bonza
Mark
- Astro Bot
Stephen
- Dragon's Dogma II
- UFO 50
- Puzzmo
Joanna
- Helldivers II
- Breath of the Wild

2025 Most Anticipated Games

Ellen
- Metroid Prime 4: Beyond
- Winter Burrow
- FragPunk
- Borderlands 4
- Rift of the Necrodancer...???
- Lunar: Remastered Collection (for Eric)
Mark
- Civilization VII
- Star Trek Ascendancy: The Final Frontier (the Gorn!)
- The Switch 2
Stephen
- Dragon Dogma II DLC (I’m cheating I know)
- Civilization VII
- Honestly probably Switch 2 stuff, too
Joanna
- Paralives

2025 Resolutions

Ellen: Finally put together a portfolio site!
Mark:
- Dreamsettler, again!
- Unannounced project
- Release Operators!
- Get Nice Games Alliance some sponsors/donations!
Stephen: Play more games! Do more stuff outside of my apartment.
Joanna: Put out a bigger better game demo!

Serialization (with Joanna May) Dec 12, 2024

Show notes

We invite Joanna May into the clubhouse to discuss serialization. We get ever so slightly closer to discovering what serialization even is with Joanna's help! We also have a little time to throw a little shade at Stephen's commenting style and brackets on their own line.

Serialization

Programming Tools Serialization - Wikipedia BinaryFormatter migration guide - gewarren, jeffhandley, terrajobst, adamsitnik, Microsoft Learn @JsonSubTypes vs. Reflections for Polymorphic Deserialization in Jackson - Ovidiu Mihai Tacu, Baeldung What are the advantages of just-in-time compilation versus ahead-of-time compil… - Stack Overflow Introspection - jolexxa [Joanna], GitHub IL2CPP Overview - UnityMartha had mentioned unit tests (which Mark and Stephen still don't do) in a previous episode.“That wasn’t the angle I was going for.”Chickensoft Development Philosophy - Chickensoft

Nice Games Jam: "Space Mall Mystery VHS Game" Dec 05, 2024

Show notes

In this episode Lydia is back in the clubhouse to discuss her first job, and to help make a game about said job. But, because your nice hosts couldn't choose just one, it is also about Ellen's job at her parents' pet store, and Stephen's first job. Mark's also.

When introducing Lydia to the concept of a nice games jam, the stages of the nice game jam are referenced. Here are the stages: 1) Panic 2) Prompt 3) More Panic 4) Scramble 5) Oh, we can do this 6) We did this - let’s do more
We have throw pillows now
While designing this game Stephen mentions the phrase "experience bij." This comes from the 'Star Trek the Next Generation Interactive VCR Board Game."
Star Trek the Next Generation Interactive VCR Board Game - Board Game Geek
Compilation of "Experience bij." - YouTube

Prompt"Create a game based on one of your team’s first job (either gig-based, such as babysitting or lawn mowing or paycheck based), but set in a world with either evil robots, monsters, or aliens."Game typeTabletop gameMaterials

VHS tape

Mall map

Rules

Takes place in a mall, in a starbase
- Theater, retail, pet store, cafeteria
- Pen and paper RPG, players need to figure out what’s going on outside without leaving the mall/their jobs
- Communication is limited somehow
- Nosy kids?
- Point where we’re in too deep?
- It’s now a VHS tape/DVD game.
- Each character has unique roles and abilities based on their job
  - Cafeteria unboxer person, sees recycling bins, can make things out of trash
  - Retail, interacts with customers regularly
  - Pet store, young kid who does mischief things
  - Theater, technical expertise, interacts with other staff of theater
- Mall wide announcements (security, mall, etc.)
- Different locations have a stack of cards containing information, they have unique ability to access these different decks. Info from cards cannot be talked about, you need to move to another player to give them that information.
- NPCs move on a track separately, they move during the “computer” turn, the mall is a separate turn/entity
- NPCs control how much players can move (they may have customers they need to deal with)
- Each round the players have certain actions, different actions if there are customers in the store
- Some cards are gossip (from customers), some cards are evidence (physical things you find)
- Some of the gossip is false, good/juicy information is rare
- Narrative
  - Three acts
    - Act 1: Something’s going on!
      - Busier than normal, more security, longer shifts than normal because everyone needs to be in the mall, the management wants to keep everyone there
      - A lot of the rumors are about not being able to do their regular jobs outside of the mall
    - Act 2: It’s one of three things
    - Act 3: Did we figure out what’s going on?
- You have to figure out what the threat is, afterwards pick some number of ways to deal with it, depending on the response you have a list of tasks to complete to fulfill. If the tasks you did relate to the actual threat, you get points.

Digital Escape Rooms (with Lydia Symchych) Nov 28, 2024

Show notes

All of your hosts are together in the Clubhouse for a special interview! Lydia Symchych is an impact game designer who has been working with Ellen over the last year. Today, she shares her experience of making an escape room that needed to be rendered in both "physical" and and digital environments. Also, sound effects and pillows.

In the USA, November 28th is Thanksgiving Day, and November 29th is National Native American Heritage Day. Happy holidays, if you're in the USA—and if you're not, we hope you have something to be thankful for. 💖

Digital Escape Rooms

Game Design Articulate Storyline 360 HyperCard - Wikipedia Exhibit Design - Wikipedia Escape Room Races with the Lads - Northernlion, YouTube Escaping a Room of Terrors - GameGrumps, YouTube

Nice Thinking: "Iterative Game Jam" Nov 21, 2024

Show notes

Your nice hosts chew over a concept Stephen brings into the clubhouse: a series of "game jams" where participants iterate on one specific idea in each session.

0:04:30

Iterative Game Jam

Meditations

Arvi's cats basking in the Finnish sun: — **Puzzle Systems (with Arvi "Hempuli" Teikari)** Nov 15, 2024
Show notes

Releasing 2019's "Baba is You" after more than a decade of making puzzle games was a milestone for this week's guest, but it was also just the beginning of his design journey. Arvi "Hempuli" Teikari talks to your nice hosts about the balance between giving players freedom and constraining their expression, the pacing and sequencing of individual puzzles, what happens when a "cool" design annoys players, and more.
Arvi's cats make a spirited apperance in the back half of the episode. Here they are basking in the Finnish sun.
Puzzle Systems
Game Design Tools Multimedia Fusion 2 - Clickteam Clickteam Fusion 2.5 - Clickteam Construct - Scirra Ltd MP2 MP2 Chowdren Engine Bring the ice cube to the goal without exposing it to heat. - Increpare PuzzleScript - Increpare Covechrome - Hempuli, itch.ioYou nice hosts previously discussed what happens to players who become developers in:"Numbers go up."

Nice Games Jam: "Soapbox Derby OF TIME" Nov 07, 2024

Show notes

In this episode Ellen usurps the normal process for a nice game jam prompt to explore her own idea on tabletop mechanics. Who would have thought the scoring system for this game would be 'Points for the Future War'?

Stephen's One-Minute Movie - Stephen McGregor's Group, YouTube
Discussion during development
Subbuteo
Soapboxderby.org
Bullet Bill Soapbox Derby Car - Lou Whitmire, Mansfield News Joural

PromptMake a tabletop game where the core mechanic is modulating the friction on the board.Game typeTabletop gamePlayer count3-5Materials

Board - 5x5 grid where tiles can be placed

5 racer sleds

Racer weights

Tiles with different friction coefficients (terrain tiles)

Mission from HQ Cards

Special Objective Cards

Setup

1) Racer sleds and racer weights are randomly distributed to the racetrack row. 2) Each racer sled gets the name of a racer. Each racer name should be silly, like Jenny Too-fast or Billy Tumble.
3) Each player draws two Mission from HQ cards and picks one to be their secret objective.

Rules

Players are given each a set amount of time-travel credits.

On their turn, each player uses a time-travel credit to either replace or swap terrain tiles.

When each all players have spent their time travel credits, the race is on! All racer sleds are released from their starting box, and the results of the race are observed.

Each completed mission results in the number of 'Points for the Future' on the mission from HQ card awarded to that player. The number of points is based on the difficulty of the mission.

After the weekend derby is complete (15 rounds), the player with the most point for the future war is declared the winner, but not for 20-30 years.

Tutorialization with Puzzles (with Luke Spierewka) Nov 01, 2024

Show notes

"Tutorials shouldn’t feel like tutorials!" Like most aspects of game design, it's an easy concept to summarize but a difficult one to pull off. Luke Spierewka and the team at Afterburn Games have mastered it, using their charming approach in successful titles like Golf Peaks and Railbound. Come learn the arcane secrets of the puzzle game tutorial! Also featuring some great room sound.