Nice Games Club - a gamedev podcast!

This week, it's Ellen's first rodeo as your permanent nice host, Stephen looks forward to watching someone else play The Last of Us Part II , and Mark is a bad VR person. Bulletin topic (Recent releases) Timecode 0:14:55 Remakes: FFVII Remake Persona 5 Royal Saints Row: IV - Re-Elected Doom 64 Delays Last of Us Part II Iron Man VR Marvel’s Avengers Half-Life: Alyx Switch Lite (Coral) Bulletin topi...

Martha has a big announcement, Mark tells the story of Babylon 5 , and Stephen owes everyone a hug. Also, Ellen is back in the (distributed) clubhouse with her own big news! Stephen didn’t know what the word " Emeritus " means, so he put it in the notes: "Holding, after retirement, an honorary title corresponding to that held last during active service." In Animal Crossing: New Horizons , NPCs can...

Ellen Burns-Johnson joins us once again in the virtual club house to discuss Redundancy and Arcades! Ellen teaches us about how we learn, Mark balances the game, Martha only plays the best character, and Stephen has a revelation. Photo Credit: Michelle Bruch, from this Southwest Journal Article about the Donutron 0:13:01 Redundancy The Forgetting Curve hypothesis by Hermann Ebbinghous Wikipedia Th...

This week, your nice hosts put together a design document for a co-op game of corporate espionage. Martha wants to crawl through vents, Mark wants low stakes moral choices, and Stephen wants everyone to yell at everyone. On Wednesday this week, Mark presented a in-depth postmortem on the production of Widget Satchel for the April IGDATC monthly community meeting, held remotely on Twitch. You can "...

Your Nice Hosts are still recording remotely while we physically distance ourselves! We talk about our new normal and give each other advice on Working From Home and Games to Play while we stay inside. Stay safe out there, Nice Listeners! We are all in this together. How did Animal Crossing’s Isabelle and the Doomguy become best friends?  -  Julia Lee ,  Polygon 0:09:00 Working From Home Because I...

This week, Stephen is crowned the new King of Transitions, Martha gets around to playing two games she'd been meaning to for awhile, and Mark briefly impersonates a saxophone. 0:06:19 Unlocks Stephen's Unlock Taxonomy: Achievement-based: Do a thing, get unlock related to thing. Experience-based: Play the game, get a thing based on how much you've played. Loot-based: Play the game, get random thing...

Yes, yes, we know GDC was cancelled, but your nice hosts still had plenty of stuff to talk about, including how GDC itself adapted itself into a non-event, how some business still got done, and next-gen hardware news from Microsoft and Sony that was too big to be rescheduled. As part of an industry-wide effort to give people something to do while they're stuck inside, Mark gathered a few Twin Citi...

This week on Nice Games Club, we talk about Naming Things and Rhythm Games! Stephen lays down a beat, Martha brings up fuzzy math, and Mark uses every excuse to talk about Star Trek . We mentioned the previous Train Jam episode (#17): GDC 2017 Special (Part 1) 0:17:47 Naming Things Google Trends 0:52:45 Rhythm Games Harminix's next music-making game puts your DJ skills to the test Christine Fisher...

Your nice hosts finally get around to some classic topics in this week's episode. Mark explains why Widget Satchel takes longer to download than he'd have liked, Stephen is worried that you might learn the wrong lessons, and Martha disagrees. It took some sleuthing, but Mark found proof that Crunch, the mascot for the Minnesota Timberwolves, was named for the Nestle candy bar. 0:02:48 Day-One Patc...

Ellen Burns-Johnson joins us in the club house to discuss the latest in game dev news! We talk about the latest releases, GDC getting "postponed", Kickstarter unionizing and more. Be nice and have a listen! Bulletin topic (Recent releases) Timecode 0:05:34 HyperDot  is a local game by Stephen's brother Charles! Buy it! Bulletin topic (News) Timecode 0:20:22 Important GDC 2020 Update  -  GDC Train...

We're back! This week, your nice hosts talk about what they did over their winter break, from taking up residence in a new clubhouse, to developing a new logo and website, and more! But in the end, everything is still nice. Highlights of this extra-long special episode: Martha proposes a Nice Games Club IDE color theme... ...Dale joins the show to point out that making a logo for a podcast is hard...

#149 Buttons and Triggers and Sticks, Oh My! Nice Games Jam 2019.09.25 This week's episode is sponsored by Codecks , the project management tool for game developers, by game developers! Sign up for free at http://codecks.io/nicegamesclub to let them know we sent you! It's another Nice Games Jam! This time, our boyfriend Dylan sent in a particularly interesting challenge, asking your nice hosts to...

#118 "It's Black History Month, y'all!" Roundtable 2019.02.26 In this episode, your nice hosts make sure you know that Treasure Stack, the game Stephen "is paid to work on," is coming out Friday, March 1st! Mark then gives a primer on some audio basics that will help you understand how sound works, and works in your game. Even if you're bored by that, be sure to stick around for a discussion Steph...

#143 Ants of Destiny: Morsels of the Queen Nice Games Jam 2019.08.13 This week in the clubhouse, Stephen is still away in New York. Ellen is back to help out with a Nice Games Jam! Our prompt: create a JRPG-inspired game in under an hour. But like any good JRPG, it took twice as long to complete as expected... Ellen's handwritten notes are worth a look! (PDF) And here's the Wikipedia page for Weev...

#120 Developer/Publisher Relations Interview 2019.03.12 This week, August Brown (senior producer for Kongregate Publishing) enters the clubhouse to reveal the secrets of successful developer/publisher relationships! Your nice hosts learn what publishers expect from a pitch, how forming a relationship with a publisher isn't always strictly business, and that publishers also think you're not chargin...

#115 "Steal this episode." Roundtable 2019.02.06 Your Nice Hosts are back from PodCon 2 and fresh off the Global Game Jam where Martha wrote a game for the first time! We talk all about that experience as well as celebrate Public Domain Day for the first time in 20 years. Mark guides us through the history of copyright, Stephen jams in 3D and Martha is a totally normal McElroy Fan (tmtmtmtm) Photo...

#141 Nostalgia and the Lo-fi Aesthetic Interview 2019.07.30 Wishlist/purchase Anodyne 2: Return to Dust on: Steam | Itch.io | Kartridge | GoG This week, your nice hosts are joined by Marina Kittaka, artist and co-developer on the upcoming Anodyne 2: Return to Dust . Marina made the 30-foot journey from her desk to the clubhouse in order to discuss Anodyne's theme of nostalgia, the "personal" authe...

#100 "100 times nice." 100th Episode Special Special 2018.08.22 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! 100th Episode Special  0:00:27 Meta Our evil counterparts, Evil Games Club, have released two episod...

#94 "Somebody's first episode." Roundtable 2018.07.10 You can wishlist Widget Satchel and Claw Breaker on Steam right now! You can also add Widget Satchel and Claw Breaker to your itch.io collection! 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....

It's time once again to bring you the Nicest Games of 2019! Or rather, the nicest games that we played in 2019. We also talk about our game dev resolutions and the games we are excited for in 2020. We also have some programming news! We are going on hiatus until February 2020 to work on a revamp of our website and logo. We will be bringing you some of the nicest episodes from the past year or so t...

Evil Games Club is back! Dale, Adia, and Dylan are here to correct the score and give their take on past Nice Games Club topics, including "Writing For Games," "Reravel," and "Video Game Nostalgia." They’re at it again—being evil, that is! Felix Drags Dale Through The Marvel Universe (a podcast) Dylan thwarted Dale's attempts at taking publicity photos. 0:10:00 Writing for Games The Interactive Fi...

This week on the show, your nice hosts take two very different in-depth approaches to a topic that pops up a lot on the show:  the ever-challenging calendar math! We spoke with Jajeev on a recent episode about UI design. User Interfaces We recently spoke with Martha's dad about board game design and his work writing cross-compilers for 8-bit computers. Board Game Design 0:07:41 Calendar Math (Prod...

Widget Satchel is out! Go buy it on Steam , Itch or Switch ! Your Nice Hosts celebrate by talking all about Widget Satchel- related topics, like Metroidvania level design, world building in platformers, and (of course) ferrets! Widget Satchel is out! Buy it on PC and Switch here: Widget Satchel on Steam Widget Satchel on Itch Widget Satchel on the Nintendo E-shop Widget Satchel has ferrets, unlike...

This week, our boyfriend Dylan gave your nice hosts a prompt to create "a narrative game where the story is told backwards." This one is a slow burn, but it really cooks by the end! With Stephen still away, Dale LaCroix (she of Evil Games Club and your nice social media manager) re-enters in the clubhouse to help create this week's game. But Dale didn't just join your nice hosts for this week's ja...

Nice Games Club Social Media Manager (and Evil Games Co-host) Dale LaCroix joins us to discuss Localization and Navigation, both in games and IRL. Is Google Translate enough for your game? Will your awesome pun work in Spanish? What do Ikea and airports have to do with level design? Stick around past the outro for more Dale Travel Tips! 0:18:42 Localization Gamedev Polyglot Google Spreadsheet 1:00...