Was going through some old documents and found this cover page I made for part of my Masters degree writing and - I'm sorry, this image goes pretty hard.

If we've already got trapdoors surrounding football pitches, then I've got an idea for how we could spice the game up a bit ...

I have next to no idea what this means but I feel strangely proud?

Been a while since I made a stupid #UnrealEngine #GameDev prototype that tanked my frame rate - but I finally decided to try making that thing every game dev between 40 and 50 years old has dreamed of: the APC sequence from Aliens!

Just started watching a nostalgic video about Thundercats and I don't remember them looking this ... awkwardly naked?

The making of documentary is also worth viewing

UE6 patch notes

Spectral (2016) is another movie you can add to the list of "should really have been a videogame". Trying not to spoil it too much but the movie is literally "Call of Duty x Fatal Frame" and I'm kinda amazed there isn't a game that does that (as far as I know)

I'll be talking at this year's Glasgow Indie Games Fest! The topic is "Post-Modernism & Futurism in Games". The aim is to poke a few holes in what we tend to *think* we are as a medium, and take a look at what makes us what we are ... Can't wait! @glasgowindiegamesfest.org #indiegames #gamedev

Welp

I teach #gamedev, so I mostly make templates to inspire my students. The past month I've been working to integrate @yarnspinner.dev into our @unrealengine.bsky.social teaching, and most recently I've been working on a Disco Elysium-style point-and-click template for them to use.

In case anyone wonders what the dialogue scripting looks like, here it is ... but the wonderful Yarn Spinner Visual Studio Code plugin also lets you view nodes in graph form!

Oh yeah ... using @yarnspinner.dev's dialogue tool, I've implemented a camera system and a full inventory that can add, remove and trade items via commands written into the dialogue system!

Having explored a few options, I've got to say @yarnspinner.dev 's Unreal PlugIn has been my favourite Narrative Design system so far. Really easy to integrate into workflows with everything compartmentalisted into components and some nice detailed information flowing in and out. #gameDev

A little something I call the "Bootleg Pornstar": 2oz Rum 1/2oz Passoa 1/2oz Orgeat 1/4oz Cassis 1/4oz Lemon Sweet, punchy and fruity with a tiki twist. Maybe not for everyone but I like it! (though Havana Club is not the rum of choice for this ... I'm just too broke to restock the bar right now!)

Once again, for the cheap seats ... "Where's the amazing AI movie? Where's the amazing NFT game? Where's the world-breaking Metaverse app?" Technology will not ever do what it's hyped to do, but it won't go away either. It'll always disappoint us, but settle in to find some uses, somewhere.

After some poking around, it seems my VS Code plugin is, indeed, calling itself version 4 despite YS apparently being on version 3? Maybe that's the source of the issue?

Deep in the weeds of trying to form through-lines and structure within the mess that is "Fundamentals of Game Design" #gamedev teaching. Amazing how much this has changed in the past 10 years - these are fundamental principles, but their weighting/importance has shifted as the medium has evolved.

Hard to believe we'll ever top Caledonian Thistle upsetting Celtic and producing this wonderful headline.

Been tossing around some ideas for a Dialog system for #NarrativeDesign in #UnrealEngine. Would this be too "programmer-y" a structure for Narrative Designers? Would you be willing to write directly into this as an interface?

There are a few things I miss from living in the Netherlands - riding a bike through the forest to get to work, freedom to travel/work around most of mainland Europe, and the 10-piece cake selection from Jumbo:

Why is everyone else gets dogs and they get these graceful sublime creatures, and I get two Jim Henson creations, one a chronically depressed lardball and the other a manic malevolent spirit of malcontent?

One little thing I don't see students doing enough in #UnrealEngine is using comments and reroute nodes to leave TODOs and essentially Pseudocode their BPs. I don't think I'd be able to remember everything I meant to do in a BP if I didn't do this!

While grading is keeping me pretty busy, in the background I've been rebuilding my Escape Room Puzzle #GameDev #GameDesign #UnrealEngine template to have a better structure for designers, and it's starting to come back together again at last! Designed to make building puzzles as simple as possible.

I hope you realise what you've just wrought on the low-effort indie horror games market, Epic.

I'm wishing for less teen-boy dream-fulfilment in general. Gimme Marge from Fargo as a game protagonist. Let me solve narrative issues with something other than a gun or a big stick.

I can confirm some things on my Escape Room System: * sliding puzzle tiles work in the "Panels" system * my control scheme for sliding tiles feels HORRIBLE in Panels * I haven't figured out a good setup pipeline yet * I forgot I HATE solving sliding tile puzzles #gamedev #gamedesign #unrealengine

I'm honestly a little bit shocked that sliding blocks took me less than an hour to implement. I'm sure there'll be some issues (not tried them as Panel Components yet) but still ... smart system design creates SO MUCH momentum in your projects! #gamedev #gamedesign #UnrealEngine

Elegant Structured System Design FTW! I was seriously dreading building intuitive mouse controls into my Escape Room Template, but thanks to some smart compartmentalisation earlier, it was WAY easier than I expected! #GameDev #GameDesign #UnrealEngine