rohlfinator

There's also an open-source version of Reflector called ILSpy. It preserves most names -- I think it only generates names for variables declared inside a function, so a lot of codebases are still decently readable.

IIRC they said that they wanted to avoid bringing any more attention to GG by mentioning it on the podcast. That's been a common excuse, but in GB's case I think it has some validity -- they've occasionally mentioned that the Giant Bombcast has a lot more mainstream reach than any of their other content (including the site itself). A large chunk of the Bombcast audience likely doesn't follow gaming closely enough to be exposed to things like GG. I'm not saying that excuses their (relative) silence, but I think that dilemma is more of a concern for GB than for most other outlets.

I really enjoy that Unity posts most (maybe all?) of the talks from the Unite conferences on their Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/Unity3D Lots of the content is pretty Unity-specific but there's still some good stuff there that could be generalized to other platforms. A few that I've found interesting so far: Generating Procedural Dungeons in Galak-Z: Building a new universe in Kerbal Space Program: Nurturing Large Projects: How We Structured Hardware: Shipbreakers:

Yup: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=408881255

Nice, I recently picked up a PS3 and have been waiting for an excuse to grab a few of those PSN games. If only Journey was on there too, I could knock out most of my list. Do any of those PS1 classics still hold up?

There's a pretty sizable crowd out there that has a fondness for Nintendo but isn't going to buy every Nintendo console or handheld that comes along. I think a big chunk of the Wii base was like that -- they bought the Wii for Wii Sports or Wii Fit, then bought a whole bunch of Mario games to go with it. A lot of those Wii users moved on to mobile, so it makes a lot of sense for Nintendo to cater to them there.

Time has an interview with Iwata where he says that development will be primarily handled by Nintendo, and DeNA will mostly handle the service side: http://time.com/3748920/nintendo-mobile-games/ Huh, weird. The Pokemon Company is a separate entity from Nintendo, right? Hopefully Nintendo proper can do a better job.

It seems like Nintendo has always dabbled around the edges of a lot of the ideas that lend themselves well to mobile -- second-screen gaming with their console/handheld connectivity and the Wii U, "appointment games" with Animal Crossing, "companion apps" with various Pokemon products, etc. Most of the time that stuff has been horribly impractical... maybe those ideas can finally shine if they're on a platform that more people actually own. A good Pokedex app alone would probably make bank, judging from how many knockoffs there are on mobile already.

Looks like it -- a couple of firings of people who sent blatantly racist emails about the Obama family. Apparently racism only exists if you have it in writing, anything else can be handwaved away.

Ah yeah, the curse of the hardware peripheral. I think it's similar to a console launch, there needs to be several top-tier games with the promise of more to come. Valve is one of the few who I think could pull it off -- something like a "VR Orange Box" could be an attractive selling point.

Yeah, I'm having a hard time getting excited about new hardware announcements when it seems like the software piece is still a long way off. It's hard to tell if these companies have strong plans about the future of VR or if they're just trying to jump on the bandwagon early.

You mentioned Romero's Devs Play episode, he also did a similar Doom playthrough with IGN awhile back: Double Fine also has some videos of Tim Shafer playing Grim Fandango, Full Throttle, and Day of the Tentacle: I watched a bit of this Conker's Bad Fur Day playthrough a while back, though all I remember is a fair amount of swearing and discussion of Rare's weirdly competitive office politics:

I saw some speculation that Source 2 games may be required to be Steam exclusive, which would allow Valve to make the full-featured engine free with no (other) strings attached. That might be attractive to some developers, I suppose. But yeah, without more info it does seem like a hard sell compared to the other two.

Half-Life Three Confirmed Eh???

How is that book? I recently ordered a copy after seeing it recommended elsewhere (and suspecting that my current project is on a similar course).

In fairness to Jake and Chris, "Nuts and Bolts" sounds like the kind of cheesy innuendo that would be a Ratchet and Clank subtitle.

Seeing David Duchovny in this week's episode inspired me to finally check out The X-Files on Netflix. I just finished S1 E12 -- "Beyond The Sea" -- where Don Davis (Major Briggs) guest starred as Scully's father. In the same episode, I noticed a familiar-looking face for a brief second during a scene when one of the victims is asked to identify their attacker: Not sure if it was intended to be a Twin Peaks cameo (or if it's even the same actor) but it made me do a double-take.

I think it's a good goal, but for me the skepticism comes from wondering what happens if/when the profit is no longer there (or is no longer perceived to be there). The capitalist forces are a big part of what caused the games and comics industries to double down on the young white male demographic at the expense of all others in the first place. Also, the profit angle really only works for cohorts of a certain size -- it's going to be a lot easier for the powers that be to dismiss an underrepresented group that makes up (for example) 1% of the population. Ah yeah, "socially responsible investing" -- Wikipedia has a pretty comprehensive list here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socially_responsible_investing

I'll second this! I actually picked up the Ico/SOTC HD disc so I could replay them after watching this series. It's still kind of wild how many cool things SOTC does that haven't really been matched after almost a decade. I'm really enjoying her Skies of Arcadia vids too.

It's funny how a group who professes to hate "professional victims" is totally okay with a guy who constantly goes out of his way to seek out mild criticism so he can use it to rile up his supporters. I'm barely active on Twitter and this is the third or fourth time I've seen Wardell drop into a conversation unprompted like this.

http://www.twitch.tv/streamfriends Haven't caught a lot of their streams live, but I've enjoyed what I've seen of Stream Friends. It's usually a pretty chill stream, and conversations range anywhere from goofy nonsense to serious games crit, which is something I don't see a lot of on Twitch.

Devs Play is fantastic, I really enjoyed the Earthbound episodes with Ben Burbank. Roguelike Radio is one I don't see recommended very often: http://www.roguelikeradio.com/ They tend to jump back and forth between discussing an individual game (often with the game's author as a guest) or doing a deep dive into an individual mechanic. Obviously it's very roguelike-focused, but a lot of the design discussions could apply to other genres as well. Also, I'd highly recommend listening to the back catalogs for both Infinite Ammo and Brainy Gamer, even though they're dead they're well worth a listen.

Ah yeah, I definitely recognize TheOneGuy! How's it been? That was a cool forum, sadly it seems to have really slowed down.

That would be me! It's been a while! I also hung out on NeoGAF for a while but I've been taking a break from posting there.

Definitely -- the controls felt kind of clumsy at first, but once you get the hang of things it's really fun to pull off tricky jumps. Kind of gave me a Just Cause 2 vibe with how natural it feels to do gravity-defying stunts and land safely. I do wish the game was a bit longer... it's nice that it doesn't wear out its welcome, but I would have liked to see one or two more large landmasses. I felt like the exploration peaked about halfway through, and the last section was a bit of a grind with not a lot to do or see.