Nice Games Club - a gamedev podcast!

Your nice hosts talk big picture and get deep into the weeds this week. Mark runs Flash at 60fps on the Switch, Ellen makes a Star Trek reference, and Stephen wants more games that aren't fun.Hey you! If you're porting a project, whether it's just to a new Unity build target, or to a whole new codebase, we want to hear about it! contact@noblerobot.com or @NiceGamesClub.GDC’s summer event will be digital only - Megan Farokhmanesh, The VergeNeat things that Star Trek Online did with Star Trek lore - Eliot Lefebvre, Massively Overpowered0:11:09Fun in GamesAssassin’s Creed Valhalla Is Bringing Back The Instakill Hidden Blade, In A Sig…Stephen TotiloKotakuAssassin’s Creed Odyssey Developers Say Breaking Series Traditions Made For A B…Stephen TotiloKotaku15 things you can do to make Breath of the Wild feel new againPatricia HernandezPolygonRaph Koster's Theory of Fun, ten years onLeigh AlexanderGame DeveloperSolaris (1972) - trailer0:44:11Porting Your GameYour Indie Game on Console: A Practical Guide to PortingThomas O'ConnorGDCOUYA works with Xbox 360 and PS3 controllersRik HendersonPocket-lintMicrosoft Windows Astoria bridge for Android is deadJan VermeulenMyBroadbandHaxe (programming langauge)WikipediaPost-Mortem on Transitioning from Flash to HaxeDoug PearsonGameDaily ConnectC-- (programming language)WikipediaIntroduction to OpenFLHaxeFlixel documentationEpic Games' Unreal Engine Heads To FlashKris GraftGame DeveloperAdobe Flash Player Export in Unity 4.0Ralph HauwertUnitySunsetting FlashDavid HelgasonUnityDevelopment of Duke Nukem ForeverWikipedia

Mark gets back to Metro Nexus, Stephen explores the strange land where in-game and real-world economics overlap, and Ellen makes sure we have good posture.Metro Nexus is running on the Switch!Global Games PitchIGDATC Widget Satchel Postmortem - igdatc0:11:20EconomiesCurrencies in Star Trek OnlineGamepediaHow Warframe built an ethical free-to-play economyBen KucheraPolygonI Am Not At All Relaxed by Animal CrossingCecilia D’AnastasioWired0:55:15ErgonomicsThe Gamer’s Guide to Ergonomics: Your Posture, Chair, Desk, Fingers and everyth…Matthew Hwu1HPYour posture is killing you: What gamers should know about ergonomicsRoman JakobVentureBeatHerman Miller Embody chairMark's very neat workspace."Kind of messy. Don't show my mom." ~ StephenEllen's workspace. Rustic. Dog.

Mark interviews Sébastien Deguy and Jérémie Noguer, the Vice President and Principal Product Manager of 3D & Immersive at Adobe, about developing Substance, the leading suite of tools for 3D texturing and material creation.In a wide-ranging discussion, your nice guests reveal what it's like joining a big ol’ company like Adobe, how to design a tool for multiple audiences, the difference between "black magic" and "white magic," and how COVID-19 is impacting their teams.They also share a peek into the future of licensing and subscriptions for Substance and Adobe's other 3D tools, and the reason they haven't been able to release a Blender plugin yet.Building SubstanceArtProductionToolsSubstance & 3D News Livestream (GDC 2020 Keynote) - GDC, YouTubeAdobe Announces Substance Designer and Painter Updates - Animation World Network

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)Timecode0:14:55Remakes:FFVII RemakePersona 5 RoyalSaints Row: IV - Re-ElectedDoom 64DelaysLast of Us Part IIIron Man VRMarvel’s AvengersHalf-Life: AlyxSwitch Lite (Coral)Bulletin topic (News)Timecode0:31:59EventsConfirming your nice hosts' suspicions, just after this episode was published, GDC announced that GDC Summer will be an online-only event.San Diego Comic-Con 2020 is officially canceled due to coronavirus - Tracy Brown, Los Angeles TimesMedia drama!Press Sneak Out - Jason Schreier, KotakuJason Schreier (and co-hosts) took his podcast to the Maximum Fun network.Two More Editors Depat G/O Media in Ongoing Exodus - Brandon Katz, ObserverVox Media Furloughs 9% of Staff for Three Months, Cuts Salaries and Benefits - Todd Spangler, VarietyValorantWhy Valorant’s anti-cheat system has to launch when your computer starts - Austen Goslin, PolygonRiot places $100,000 bounty on Valorant anti-cheat system bugs - Jordan Gerblick, GamesRadarValorant makes you watch before you play—that’ll change online games forever - Sam Machkovech, Ars TechnicaHardware ShortagesResellers Using Checkout Bots Are Driving the Nintendo Switch Shortage - Joseph Cox, MotherboardNintendo Switch Is Sold Out Everywhere, So This Guy Built One Himself - Matthew Gault, VicePS5Sony Plans Limited PlayStation 5 Output in First Year - Takashi Mochizuki and Yuki Furukawa, BloombergPS5 controller, the DualSense, officially revealed - Connor Sheridan, GamesRadar

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 be seen breaking character after you walk away from them (via Twitter).0:13:13Ending ProjectsDefinition of DoneAgile Alliance"A Work of Art Is Never Finished, Merely Abandoned"Quote InvestigatorAdam Savage On Why Mythbusters EndedB. Co Creative AgencyYouTubeHow Babylon 5 went from space opera to space junkBen GazurThe GuardianTHE INSTITUTE: a 2013 documentary filmThe Perplexing Final Chapter Of San Francisco’s Jejune InstituteRick PaulasThe Awl"How I Met Your Mother" Kids Kept Show's Ending Secret for 9 YearsBrian Anthony HernandezMashableThe reason Rebecca Sugar made Steven Universe Future, and why it’s the actual e…Tasha RobinsonPolygonRock Band Network Shutting Down After Four Years and Over 2,000 SongsEddie MakuchGameSpotProject management triangle (aka: "The Iron Triangle")Wikipedia1:11:55Starting ProjectsMark's "Noble Menu" system for Unity is available on Itch.io.

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 Donutron0:13:01RedundancyThe Forgetting Curve hypothesis by Hermann EbbinghousWikipediaThe Distributed Practice learning strategyWikipedia0:50:39ArcadesWhy You Can't Call It a "Barcade"Brenna HouckEaterDino Dash Abdel ShahiedYouTubeThe 'Donutron' Arcade at Glam Doll Donuts in Minneapolis

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 "attend" the meeting ex post facto on the IGDATC Twitch channel!Prompt"How about an asymmetrical couch co-op game? Maybe it's meant to be played with a younger sibling, or maybe it's a teaching tool."Game typeDesign documentPlayer count2RulesPremiseTwo players, who are a team of freelance infiltrators. One player is out in the field doing their thing (1st-person perspective).One player is a hacker at home base, providing assistance to the field player (in VR).Spy theme, corporate espionage.Field player observes the scene, gathering information for the hacker so they can do the hacking.Field player does some deduction, but they are playing an action game, while the hacker player is playing a puzzle game..Hacker is doing their hax from a kind of holographic computer interface (Minority Report-esque perhaps). They do not see what the field player sees directly, but have many resources at their disposal (camera feeds, scanning tech, etc)Hacker manages resources and allocates mechanical abilities to the field player based on mission requirements and moment-to-moment events.Game is a series of missions, Hitman-style, selected in any order. Each mission contributes to a larger narrative of rival companies/factions.Pre-MissionPlayers see information about future missions, the team chooses the next mission, but the hacker player literally picks it, opening up potential conflict between players.Throughout the campaign, various moral choices can crop up. The team can choose their missions based on which client they support, or they can chose to become double agents, thwarting their client's goals.Example MissionInfiltrate a restaurant that actually is a complicated science lab to steal a secret recipe.First task: sneak past into the entrance of the lab: Hacker player needs to manipulate orders and customers so that few people see the field player.Field player observing the state of play in the restaurant and doing the actions.Second task: get past a bunch of lasers. Hacker player can take out some lasers and protect the field player using shields.Field player gets past the lasers through first-person platforming actions.Third task: get the recipe. Field player is sneaking past guards or other security obstacles.Hacker player is opening vault with the recipe and doing stealth gadget things.Getting to the recipe, do you steal the recipe or copy the recipe down? Do you want to simply defeat opponents, or destroy them?As with mission selection, one player (the field player in this case) literally makes the call, but the game encourages the team to choose their course of action together.Last task, get out of restaurant Option for field player: could sneak through vents, or take the same way out, or run past guards in a mad dash to escape.In the case of a "stealth fail state," hacker player must hacking frantically to resolve the situation quickly (i.e.: convincing the guards it was a false alarm, disabling the lights to give the field player time to hide, etc), while field player is explicitly avoiding conflict.

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, Polygon0:09:00Working From HomeBecause Internet, a book by Gretchen McCullochCollaborate with Live Share (Visual Studio Code)0:34:14Games to Play While Social DistancingCharles made a HyperDot painting in Animal Crossing@DarkaysTGTwitterYour Complete Guide To The SimCity DisasterJason SchreierKotakuWe talked about Martha's love of 'safe zones' in this previous episode (#104):"Safety gone!"

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.0:06:19UnlocksStephen'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.Currency-based: Earn in-game currency, pick an unlock to purchase.New Game Plus: Complete the game, get new content on second playthrough.0:39:26Case Study (Mutazione & Later Alligator)MutazioneLater AlligatorWe played though one of Martha's favorites in a previous video episode:Nice Plays: Pajama Sam 2 (1998)Dr. KatzWikipedia

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 Cities indiedevs to sell a bundle of their recent titles at a deep discount. It's the Twin Cities Indies Say Stay Inside Bundle! It includes 5 full games (Adjacency, Joggernauts, Newt One, Verdant Skies, and Widget Satchel), and it's available on Itch for the next two weeks at 84% off the normal price. Stay home and enjoy!Mark joked that the Summer Olympics would be the next thing to be postponed, and sure enough, a day after we recorded this episode, they were.0:12:40The GDC That Wasn'tGDC on TwitchGDC's channel on YoutubeGDCYouTubeGDC Summer is (currently) planned for August 4th-6thIGF Awards 2020: Finalists and winnersGDCA 2020: Finalists and winners0:39:52Next-Gen Console RevealsXbox Series X: A Closer Look at the Technology Powering the Next GenerationWill TuttleXbox WireThe Road to PS5: A talk by PS5 lead system architect Mark CernyPlayStationYouTube