Steve

Whoaaaaaaaa https://www.idlethumbs.net/tonecontrol/episodes/amir-rao-greg-kasavin March 1, 2014 Amir's dad's living room. Computers on folding tables. One busted old car. These are the humble beginnings that would lead to the hit indie game Bastion. Amir and Greg sit down to talk about what came before and after their time in that house, and the design philosophy that they're carrying through to Supergiant's next game, Transistor. Games!

ZOUNDS! https://www.idlethumbs.net/tonecontrol/episodes/tom-francis Tom Francis: Journalist, Game Developer, British. Steve talks to the creator of Gunpoint about his path through games journalism into game development, and his inspirations and approach to designing a stealth game all about throwing yourself through plate glass windows.

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haha don't worry. The only game I spoil on Tone Control.... is my own #ToneControlChillers

That's really awesome to hear! I was hoping that would be part of the value of doing this podcast... I know hearing about how my design idols got into the industry was really important to me when I was in college.

Short answer: yes, definitely.

Yeah, an hour 58 minutes, looks like! So not quite the longest one on record....

Good.

Good.

My guess is actually probably 500k units by the end of the year between additional Steam seasonal sales and if we go into a Humble bundle-- the bundles especially do crazy volume. This will push our average price per unit way, way down obviously, but we won't be complaining. Yes, we're all very happy with these numbers. They certainly put us in a good position going forward!

Wow, oh wow In a very special episode of Tone Control, Steve and Randy Smith got onstage at FantasticArcade in Austin, TX to talk about their games and approaches to game design. Afterwards they huddled in an alley and worked back through Randy's career at Looking Glass, Ion Storm Austin, and through to the founding of Tigerstyle Games.

Silent Storm is the bomb! Brendon Chung also didn't start with programming training and figured it out as he went... you're right, inspirational stuff!

Clutch quote from this episode: "I want any figurative balls, but not actual balls."

Hmm then I scrolled up and noticed my own name exists in the post above this one despite not being in the thread title. So I will stop looking at this thread entirely to maintain surprise/secrecy/whatever the hell is going on, but if the artist of Jake's could email me so I can keep the hell out of spoiler town that would be rad.

Hi all, It seems none of the guys are looking at this thread, but have been made aware of it-- and they pointed me at it, because I'm the one that made the painting Jake's wikipedia image. Could the artist please contact me so we can get the image info on that file updated so it won't get pulled and can be Jake's wikipedia image... ~~forever~~? [email protected]

My pleasure! An excuse to talk to dudes that have made rad games I like...? I'll take it!

I think you're right that making games/levels is a big part of building the tools to more deeply analyze levels you play. Once you know how to set up a scripted sequence, or whatever, you can more readily recognize how the designers implemented the thing you're playing, ie you're more familiar with the component parts and the processes under the hood. So I'd definitely suggest learning a level editor and trying to make your own levels for a type of game you like to play, if you want to start being able to "see through" games more clearly as you play them. It will definitely improve your design sense.

Ah yeah, here's the Peter Molyneux one: http://web.archive.org/web/20050830100952/http://www.gamespot.com/features/petermolyneux/index.html I can't find the Tim Schafer one... it's possible it wasn't in the same Gamespot series. But it talked about his (now legendary) application to Lucasarts in the form of a comic depicting an adventure game about himself applying to Lucasarts.

This is awesome to hear. One of my motivations for making Tone Control was that when I was in college trying to figure out what I actually wanted to do for real, Gamespot published these profiles of famous game designers (primarily I remember reading the Peter Molyneux and Tim Schafer ones) that went all the way back to the very beginnings of their "how did you get started making games" origin stories. And they were all kind of like, I didn't know what the hell I was doing, I knew I liked games, so I just kind of tried to figure out how to make them. And it was kind of like, if these guys started out being Just Some Guy who didn't know how to make a game and then they ended up making some of my favorite games ever, then I guess I can do it too?? So it's really good to hear that the discussions are inspiring to you along those lines.

The minimap and geometry are pretty darn similar. But you'll note that the minimap depicts a basically impossible house, if it were freestanding. Our internal rationale was that house is actually build onto the side of Arbor Hill, explaining away why the 2nd floor would logically be floating off on its own instead of being directly above the 1st floor. But we never actually expressed that anywhere in the game. In the end the architecture of the house was dictated by level design flow requirements, so yeah, it is not a believably-laid-out house when you zoom out and try to picture it from the outside.

Hmm, can you give me a timestamp to refer back to? I probably just meant that the player can't easily conceptualize the meta-shape of the house from the inside (but then the minimap in game shows an approximate layout for broader reference.)

Whoops! Damn! I know it was at least mentioned... but I'll pull it from the "discussed" list. Thanks for the reminder. And yeah, get you a PC! If you have a Mac laptop you can dual-boot into Windows, even. Lots of stuff worth playing imho.... like my game

My official take is that this is incredibly, incredibly fantastic, and my favorite.

Yeah it's pretty goofy but well basically I just can't help myself.

Yes, Lonnie (Yolanda DeSoto) is Latina. Her name implies this, and she and her dad spend Christmas visiting his family (Hector & Maria DeSoto) in Mexico. I am not sure of her mom's descent. But my intent (only vaguely implied) is that Lonnie's dad immigrated to the US, and that Hector and Maria are his parents (Lonnie's grandparents) still living in Mexico. Lonnie was born & raised in the US.