Pretentious Game Ideas

Jon and Kyle sit down to discuss player proactivity in tabletop roleplaying. What is the difference between proactive and reactive play? Why is proactivity important for collaborative storytelling? And how do you create a space where your players feel comfortable and encouraged to be proactive? We answer all these questions and more in this jumbo-sized Roleplay extravaganza.

The gang breaks into Death Stranding and Animal Crossing, two games that are perhaps more similar than they first appear.  We discuss how adding friction to mechanics can make the player feel more present in the game world and debate whether there is such a thing as a wrong way to play a game.

The gang digs into the audacious design of Doom Eternal, which manages to be too similar to its predecessor for new players to learn, yet is also too different for some existing fans to enjoy. You can punch the ribs out of a giant brain with a gun bolted on top, though, so Jon and Rob love it anyway.

After taking a few months off, we're back ready to discuss the latest and greatest in digital games... by talking about a five-year-old mobile game.  Rob's been grooving on Clash Royale's clan battles, and the gang discusses how these types of alternate game modes can expand a game's audience by providing multiple modes of play that appeal to different players.

It's the end of the 2010s, and the gang is looking back to try and make sense of what just happened. Join us for a jaunt down memory lane that is almost as insightful as it is exhausting. You'll laugh, you'll cry, and you'll be amazed at how many games we're still playing today came out over a decade ago.

Happy new year, and here's to another decade of great games.

The gang discusses Really Bad Chess, which is actually really good. We dig into how developer Zach Gage made a classic game more fun and accessible, and Rob expresses his surprisingly deep love for Backgammon.

The gang discusses the gorgeous visual album game Sayonara Wild Hearts, heaping praises upon its aesthetics but picking apart its bizarre relationship with its scoring system.

The gang discusses comedy in games and how Untitled Goose Game and What the Golf? each tackle this difficult design area.

The gang discusses Fire Emblem: Three Houses, the latest entry in the long-running tactics RPG series. We dig into how Three Houses uses its character development mechanics to encourage the player to invest in their characters both mechanically and emotionally. We then contrast this approach with those taken in XCOM 2 and Darkest Dungeon to see how each game uses its systems to reinforce its unique themes and tone.

The gang compare the card combat systems in Steamworld Quest and Slay the Spire and analyze how one simple difference massively changes the focus of each game.

Jon and Rob discuss how the developers of 2016's Doom reboot pursued a philosophy of 'push-forward combat', utilizing smartly-design systems and AI to give the player a sense of agency and empowerment.

(We also referred to Doom 2016 as Doom 5, thinking that there had been a previous, underwhelming Doom 4. No such game was ever release -- we were probably thinking of Quake 4 instead. Our bad!)

Jon and Rob are back from vacation, and we're ready to deliver some spicy hot takes! This time: Jon can't stand playing Dungeons & Dragons, despite loving lots of other tabletop RPGs. Improv comedy technique, homebrew magic systems, and bad fantasy novels are all discussed within.

This week we're discussing one of the most important skills for a professional game designer to cultivate -- workplace communication! We share thoughts and personal anecdotes on how to clearly get your ideas across, how to foster a non-toxic work environment, and how to align your whole team behind the same set of goals.

Continuing on from last week's discussion of non-standard RPG stats in games, we dig into the confusingly named stats that make up Bloodborne's progression system. Designs will be analyzed, honor will be challenged, and in true From Software fashion, one of our hosts will die.