Nice Games Club - a gamedev podcast!

Latest Episodes:

"Put it in a WordSpace!" Modding; Self-publishing Must-haves Sep 11, 2018

Show notes

This week on Nice Games Club your nice hosts talk all about Modding and Self-Publishing Must-Haves. Stephen explains different viewpoints on mod-ownership, Martha goes fishing on easier mode and Mark makes too many gifs.

0:05:00

Modding

"Who owns the mods?"Yonnie Ming Kow and Bonnie NardiFirst MondayThe Requiem mod team tells its community about the delays to their update here.RedditNexus Mods is a great place to find community created mods.Wrye Musings is a blog from a famous Elder Scrolls modder who writes about vari…0:44:30

Self-publishing Must-haves

You can find good examples of gifs on the Widget Satchel Steam page.SteamLearn more about how to make a good website on our Website topic in our episode"Ugly and hard to use."“How we Used Discord to build a dream community for our game Descenders”Mike Rose DiscordWe have had friend of the pod/media relations wiz Holly Harrison on the show to talk about Community Management and Media Relations in our interview episodeCommunity Managment

Code Comment: "Verdant Skies" Sep 06, 2018

Show notes

This week, we look at Verdant Skies, the sci-fi life-simluation game from Howling Moon Software, available now on Steam, Itch, and Humble Bundle!

We're joined by two of the game's developers, Andy and Beth Korth, as well as their little one, Gabe. All three are making their second appearances in the clubhouse, as they were the program's very first guests back in our second episode (exactly 100 episodes ago)! We've already booked them for episode 202!

Video

"Don’t start with me." Pitching to Consoles; Turn-Based RPGs Aug 29, 2018

Show notes

This week, Mark doesn’t respect your secrets (but will keep them), Martha tells us where D&D really comes from, and Stephen reveals that he will play a Kirby RPG if someone makes one for him.

0:05:11

Pitching to Consoles

PlayStation

Information is on the PlayStation Partners site. Your first step is to fill out their company registration page.

Xbox

Information is on the ID@Xbox site. Before submitting your game, your first step will be to apply to the program with basic information about your company.

Nintendo

For Wii U and 3DS development, registration is open to all developers on their developer portal.

For Switch development, just send them an email! ThirdPartyPublisher@noa.nintendo.com.

General Business stuff

We talked about starting a business for your game studio in a previous episode."I trolled myself."“Not-for-profit game developer faces major obstacles” Colin CampbellPolygon0:52:15

Turn-Based RPGs

“How to choose the least annoying Octopath Traveler”Brian GilbertPolygon“The Dungeons and Dragons Session That Became a Real-Life Phenomenon” Lewis PackwoodKotakuRPG Maker

Martha in the Clubhouse — **"100 times nice." 100th Episode Special** Aug 22, 2018
Show notes

In this episode, your nice hosts celebrate 100 episodes of Nice Games! We reminisce a bit on how the podcast has been going and go behind the scenes on what it takes to release one of the episodes.
Thanks for listening to us 100 times!
0:00:27
100th Episode Special
Our evil counterparts, Evil Games Club, have released two episodes so far...Evil Games Club! and this one Evil Games Club 2!Martha in the recording studio aka "Clubhouse"StephenThe Microphones we use to record.The audio interface (hardware) we use to record

**"100 times nice." 100th Episode Special** Aug 22, 2018
Show notes

In this episode, your nice hosts celebrate 100 episodes of Nice Games! We reminisce a bit on how the podcast has been going and go behind the scenes on what it takes to release one of the episodes.
Thanks for listening to us 100 times!
0:00:27
100th Episode Special
Our evil counterparts, Evil Games Club, have released two episodes so far...Evil Games Club! and this one Evil Games Club 2!Martha in the recording studio aka "Clubhouse"StephenThe Microphones we use to record.The audio interface (hardware) we use to record

Code Comment: "Fingeance" Aug 15, 2018

Show notes

This week’s episode is another edition of Code Comment, where your nice hosts look at the project, code, assets, and design of an indie game in development to see how it’s made.

This week, we are joined by Lane Davis, Charles McGregor and our co-host Stephen McGregor to take a look behind the scenes of their cooperative shoot-em-up Fingeance! Lane shows us how he and Stephen design levels for different difficulties, Stephen explains how they use 'Object Pooling' to spawn bullets and Charles breaks down his music tracks to show us how he sets the emotion for each level. It's the episode that is definitely three three three!

Video

"I like naps." Developing Ideas; Game Dev Success Aug 07, 2018

Show notes

This week, a listener gives Martha a great topic, Mark establishes a Do-ocracy, and Stephen has trouble with transitions.

0:05:48

Developing Ideas

The book Martha recommended is "If You Want to Write" by Brenda Ueland. It has been described as "the best book ever written about how to write" but its advice applies equally well to all types of creative work.

0:36:10

Game Dev Success

Virtual Reality (with Andrew Fladeboe) Jul 31, 2018

Show notes

This week on Nice Games Club we interview VR Developer Andrew Fladeboe about his dream-like VR experience/thesis project Oneirogen! We explore the infinite and paradigm changing possibilities of VR, learn how Andrew brought his virtual experience into the real world as an installation and get his advice for creating change- make more weird art!

Picture is a screenshot of Oneirogen by Andrew Fladeboe

Virtual Reality

VR / AR / XR Oneirogen on Steam Alchemists - Wikipedia Joseph Campbell - Wikipedia Carl Jung Cave of Forgotten Dreams film by Werner Herzog

"But WE know what we're talking about." Level Design; HUDs Jul 24, 2018

Show notes

This week on Nice Games Club your nice hosts discuss the good, the bad and the ugly of Level Design and Heads Up Displays. Mark has opinions about Sonic, Stephen picks his hill to die on and Martha brings in a pinch hitter.

Picture from this Reddit thread on MMO HUDs

0:14:19

Level Design

Ten Principles of Good Level Design (Part 1)Dan TaylorGame DeveloperMark and Stephen rant about Sonic the Hedgehog’s level design, but here’s a def…Satchell DrakesYouTube

Koichi Hayashida is the Level Design Director for Mario Galaxy/Director of Mario 3D Land (and lots and lots of other Marios) that Mark mentioned.

The Structure of Fun: Learning from Super Mario 3D Land’s Director Christian NuttGame DeveloperBug! gameWikipedia0:53:49

HUDs

Diegetic HUDs and UITV TropesThe Moon Fields by local dev Lunarsignals

Code Comment: "Metro Nexus" Jul 17, 2018

Show notes

This week’s episode is another edition of Code Comment, where your nice hosts look at the project, code, assets, and design of an indie game in development to see how it’s made.

This week, we look at our first non-Unity project (!!!) as Mark walks us though the ActionScript codebase of Metro Nexus, his in-development homage to the classic(?) arcade-era game City Connection. We also look at the art asset workflow Mark designed for the game.

Video

"Somebody's first episode." Language of Games; Sequels Jul 10, 2018

Show notes

This week, Martha admits to piracy, Stephen tells Nintendo to just stop making GameCube controllers already, and Mark tells his favorite video game story which is about buttons because Mark is boring.