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Facebook's cloud gaming aspirations, why social gaming took off & more!
What's up with Facebook's cloud gaming push? Why did social gaming take off during COVID? And how do you write the perfect pitch email? Discovery news galore within...
Oct. 28, 2020
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Reworking PUNCH-OUT!! for Mobile: An Extremely Deep Dive into Election Year Knockout
Literally every design decision in excruciating detail. Our goal: Zero compromises to gameplay or humor.
Oct. 27, 2020
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A Three-Level Short Story - The Level Design of Die Young: Prologue
The article describes the process that guided me in designing the levels of DY: Prologue, and my attempt to translate a three-act story structure into level design. It covers a tutorial level (Act 1), a multi-path level (Act 2), and a boss arena (Act 3).
Oct. 27, 2020
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Call for data: (Steam) game revenue over time!
Sure, let’s say your game made $50k in its first week on Steam. But at the end of Year 1, will you have $100k or $250k? Fill in the survey to find out averages! (Plus: bonus takeaways from previous surveys.)
Oct. 27, 2020
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The Zynga Analytics Platform in 2020
Zynga's Python-focused analytics platform
Oct. 26, 2020
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Bending Blightbound's world to lower the horizon
With some shader trickery, perspective can be manipulated to achieve unrealistic, but more interesting compositions. This post shows how in Blightbound we kept the horizon on screen by subtly bending the world.
Oct. 26, 2020
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Facebook gears up for the world’s first ad-supported cloud gaming service
Games industry analyst's take on Facebook launching a free cloud gaming service - Focusing on Facebook's position in cloud gaming, 'cloud playable ads' and the increasingly contentious relationship between cloud gaming companies and Apple.
Oct. 26, 2020
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PlayStation's new (web) store, genre viability & more 2
What's up with the new PlayStation web store? How about genre viability on Steam? This and many other questions will be answered in the latest game discovery round-up...
Oct. 24, 2020
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GAN-Supported Concept Art Workflows
We all love the fact that computers can execute annoying work for us. Work we already know how to do. And now there’s a new kid in town: Style-GAN’s - short for Generative Adversarial Networks that can support the creative vision of your team.
Oct. 22, 2020
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Screen Space Reflections in Blightbound
SSR is a fun technique for creating detailed, dynamic reflections in games. This post shows how I implemented SSR into Blightbound and how it works. It also goes into the tricks I used to make it have good performance, have fewer artefacts and look good.
Oct. 22, 2020
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We need to talk about Steam & China 2
What's going on with Steam in China, and what's going to happen in the future? Take a trip though the possibilities, the government licensing complexities, and more!
Oct. 22, 2020
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The Dark Side Of Ray-Traced Ambient Occlusion (RTAO)
In this post, you will learn the Unity secrets behind Ray-Traced Ambient Occlusion (RTAO). Let’s make your game look the way you intended.
Oct. 21, 2020