Episodios

  • Nice Games Jam: "The Bike Boom"

    Nice Games Jam: "The Bike Boom"
    Jul 18 2024

    In the first Nice Games Jam in a few months (and we made it a long one!), your nice hosts explore the history of bicycles to develop a racing board game.

    • Our last Nice Games Club episode:Eddies
    • Two Wheels Good - Jody Rosen
    • Safety Bicycle - Wikipedia
    PromptDesign a racing game in a historical setting.Game typeTabletop gamePlayer count2 - 4Materials

    Map book

    4-sided dice

    Meeple to represent racers

    Setup
    • Choose a map to race on in the map book (only one made right now)
    • Choose a starting point and an ending point on the map
    • Draw a conditions card from the conditions deck (not made yet! We just used rain, where you have to make a Stability check each time you make a turn)
    Rules
    • Same area through time
    • You choose your rider and bike (each with different stats) based on how the map looks
    • You spend your resources to get new bikes or upgrade a bike
    • We started with penny farthings (bad stats), you can buy better ones later.
    • At the start of the race you draw a “condition”, affects the course to make more stability checks
    • You also randomly get a start and end place (we just set it as corner to corner for testing)
    • Types of stats:
      • Speed: how far you can go
      • Weight: how heavy your bike is, how hard uphill is and how fast downhill is
      • Capacity: how much you can hold on your bike
      • Stability: how easy it is to get past stability checks
      • Durability: how much failing a stability check affects you
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  • "Ellen's going to be so mad!" Creative Direction; Time Management

    "Ellen's going to be so mad!" Creative Direction; Time Management
    Jul 12 2024

    Time is money, friend! Okay, not always. Sometimes time is a puzzle involving many interlocking responsibilities. That’s Beth’s situation, and she asks Mark and Stephen for advice on time management in the second half of this roundtable episode. During the first half, Stephen shares some BIG NEWS that will soon place some additional responsibilities on his shoulders. Beth and Mark offer suggestions.

    • Narrative Nuance
    • Verdant Skies
    0:4:40Creative Direction

    A previous episode relating to Stephen's big news!

    Nice Thinking: "Sledgehammer Bride"0:31:35Time ManagementPomodoro TechniqueWhat is a sprint?Scrum.orgThe Eisenhower Matrix (important vs urgent)Wikipedia
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  • The Intersection of Puzzle and Story (with Ron Gilbert)

    The Intersection of Puzzle and Story (with Ron Gilbert)
    Jul 5 2024
    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 StoryGame DesignNarrativeProductionReturn to Monkey Island will have a hint system because the internet exists now - Joshua Rivera, PolygonVerdant Skies - SteamClassic Game Postmortem: Maniac Mansion - GDC, YouTubeThe 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).Ron GilbertGuestOwner of Terrible Toybox, the designer/creator of Monkey Island, The Cave, Pajama Sam and the designer/co-creator of Maniac Mansion, DeathSpank and Thimbleweed Park. Co-designer of Return to Monkey Island.External linkMastodon - @grumpygamer@mastodon.gamedev.placeBlog - Grumpy GamerStudio - Terrible Toybox
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  • "The super-powerful beam or whatever." Code Libraries; Game Overs

    "The super-powerful beam or whatever." Code Libraries; Game Overs
    Jun 27 2024

    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
    0:07:41Code LibrariesBest practices for writing code commentsEllen SpertusStack Overflow BlogDeclare namespaces to organize typesMicrosoft LearnYour nice hosts discussed licensing in a previous episode:"What's a little grand larceny?"Game OversAlternatives to the Game Over screenGame 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.
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  • Game Production (with Ryan Adams)

    Game Production (with Ryan Adams)
    Jun 20 2024
    This week we invite Ryan Adams, of Corgi Art House fame, to discuss his expertise in game production. Ryan shows us how production is more than just moving tickets around, and how valuable it is to have someone on the team organizing tasks for everyone. But also, there's plenty of moving tickets around!Game ProductionProductionCorgi Art HouseBlood On The Thames - SteamClickUpBuilding Better Games - Benjamin Carcich and Aaron SmithBecoming a Game Producer - Pauline GepilanoHow to prepare yourself for Game Production - Creative Assembly, YouTubeFive Traits In A Good Producer - Timothy Cain, YouTubeRyan AdamsGuestRyan Adams is a junior producer at Corgi Art House.External linkLinkedIn
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  • "One thing cannot hold all the passion I have." Pivoting; Working on Multiple Projects

    "One thing cannot hold all the passion I have." Pivoting; Working on Multiple Projects
    Jun 13 2024
    This episode recounts each guests' recent project - Stephen is developing a new spirit for Spirit Island, Ellen is getting into music, and Mark talks at length about his car. The club helps Ellen process a recent pivot her company had to make. And Mark reveals some simple insights from his life: urgent vs. high priority, he has an irritating existence, that he's very restless, that he's skeptical of his satisfaction, somethings that I know very well, being married to him. The episode ends with a pitch build an emotional support group on nicegames.club/discord, by asking everyone to share how they structure their time.Stephen and Spirit IslandSpirit Island - Board Game GeekEllen gets into musicMark's SmartCarThomas Jefferson was born in Virgina - WikipediaMark changes out his car panels - Mark LaCroix, ThreadsPlease support us financially and emotionally through the following:patreon.com/nicegamesclubnicegames.club/discord0:11:20PivotingTango Gameworks of Hi-Fi Rush was closed0:40:27Working on Multiple ProjectsThe Eisenhower Matrix task managment matrixAsanaThe days in the lives of creative work from Mason Curryin a circle chartdeMilkedin an infographic Open Culturein an articleThe Marginalian
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  • Creative Process & Workflow for Music (with Kobe Anthony (aka MEMODEMO))

    Creative Process & Workflow for Music (with Kobe Anthony (aka MEMODEMO))
    Jun 7 2024
    As MEMODEMO, Kobe Anthony creates music for video games and inspired by video games. In this episode, we learn about Kobe's creative process for composing music. He also shares a bit about how he uses his DAW (digital audio workstation) to capture sounds and convert them into melody and beats. Also featured in this episode: memes, rhythm games, and three seconds of terrible beatboxing.Creative Process & Workflow for MusicAudioIzotope RX 11 (audio repair toolkit)XO by XLN Audio2 MelloNot in the Groove (game)Sideshow Bob Stepping On Rakes Compilation - Cartoon Vids, YouTubeRolling Sampler777 - RoughSketch, YouTube"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity." - Hanlon's razor, WikipediaKobe Anthony (aka MEMODEMO)GuestKobe is on Bandcamp, YouTube, Soundcloud, Ko-Fi & more. Here's his Linktree!From a student spotlight piece by the University of Oregon:Kobe came from a musical home, so his love for making music started when he was very young. “My first memory of noticing music in video games was when I played Sonic Heroes for the first time as a three-year-old. I remember hearing the theme song and it was, quite literally, life changing,” Kobe explains. From there, he started playing with GarageBand and, eventually, as he got older, started making original music on a much more advanced system MIDI. Kobe published his first song at eight years old called “Chaos Angel Error Emerald,” a remix of the theme song to Zone 7 of Sonic Advance 3, “Chaos Angel.”Under the pseudonym MEMODEMO, Anthony has over 5,200 monthly listeners on Spotify, over 4,500 followers on Soundcloud, and over 370,000 subscribers on YouTube.
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  • Nice Thinking: "Dialogue Through Goals"

    Nice Thinking: "Dialogue Through Goals"
    May 29 2024

    Stephen brings a half-baked thought into the clubhouse for this Nice Thinking episode: how can we improve dialogue systems? He's got some opinions, which Mark and Ellen immediately debunk, but it leads to some engaging conversation.

    Dialogue Through Goals
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