106 posts tagged with games.
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Murder in the Dark: An Outline History of a Murder Mystery Parlor Game
"Murder in the Dark" was a murder mystery parlor game that was widely published and played from the 1930s to the 1980s. This weekend, I worked up a long blog post giving an outline history of the game, supplementing many previous fun facts about parlor game history.
Gridflip
Gridflip is a tile-flipping puzzle game where you have to flip the entire grid from white to black in as few moves as possible. It's playable in browser, and contains 3 slightly different game modes, high scores, and saves.
Quest Heroes
Quest Heroes is a sort of cute and cuddly (and hand drawn and fairly rough) card game version of 80s role playing board game classic Hero Quest which I made for my niece and nephew the other week (who both love Hero Quest a lot for some reason)
Little Riddle
My mom loves word games. Inspired by this comment on the game "Road Toad", I built a super simple browser app that provides a 'Little Riddle' to a two-word answer that always rhymes.
If you are stuck, you can receive a hint or a letter. I built in 'making and sharing' so my mom can send me and the family riddles she likes. I hope someone on Mefi enjoys Little Riddle as much as my mom does. I am pretty happy with how it turned out. [more inside]
Where in the World
'Where in the World' is an interactive web based game in which you try to locate notable places or historical events on a map. You are given a series of 10 locations to find on a map. You try to get the lowest distance between your guess and the actual location. [more inside]
The Infinite 8-Bit Computer Game Character Archive
The Infinite 8-Bit Computer Game Character Archive generates character histories for an infinite amount of imaginary 8-Bit computer game characters from an infinite amount of imaginary 8-Bit computer games from some endless 1980s somewhere. [more inside]
Various new translations of yet more old games
In the past year or so, I've added several new translations and comments on games that have mostly been left out of the history of roleplaying, story games, fantasy games, etc. Highlights include seven classical mythology games from the late Renaissance (including the mildly LARP-like "Game of Ceremonies," in which players make sacrifices to Venus and Cupid), a translation of the novel Jeux d'esprit written in 1701 by Charlotte-Rose de Caumont de La Force (who gave a complete version of the collaborative storytelling game "Le Jeu du Roman," along with other games depicted in the novel), and trying out a new format, "Kriegsspiele, Parlament, and Prince Albert: light roleplaying in German, 1796-1893" (a blog post on parlor games and live action military-themed games with roleplaying elements).
Scorecard.gg
Free minimal scoresheet tool for your favorite boardgames, including Scrabble, 7 Wonders, Kingdomino, Scythe, Agricola, and Yahtzee!
The Coin Toss World Cup
"Come one! Come all! And welcome to the ultimate test of skill... That's right, live from the Independent Monetary Kingdom of Coinland, it's time once again for The Coin Toss World Cup! 8 billion players from all around the world! One solitary winner! Who will it be? Who knows! But it could be you! And it has to be someone!" The Coin Toss World Cup is an exciting game of skill and talent in which YOU could become the number one "heads-or-tailser" in the world! All you have to do is choose (and not lose)! [more inside]
Have You Played?
Learn about the videogames you should play and how to think about them! Have You Played is a free weekly newsletter for novices and experts alike, written by an award-winning game design and journalist. Every post starts with a simple description of exactly how the game works and what you do in it, then explores what makes it uniquely good or flawed. I've covered games including Pentiment, Season, Terra Nil, Cyberpunk 2077, Honkai: Star Rail, and many more!
Known Leaders
Here's a tool to fill you in on who the leaders (you know, the important ones it the front of the band photos) of various bands are. It will also tell you about games and novels. [more inside]
Word Searches for Dad
My dad Perry is really into word searches. I decided to build a website for him called perryspuzzles.com. We are both happy with the result. 32 different categories with puzzles like The Empire Strikes Back, Better Call Saul, and one dedicated to my friends at metafilter. If the puzzles aren't hard enough, you can always enter into ludicrous mode. If 5000+ puzzles isn't enough, you can make your own and share it with your puzzle loving friends. Your feedback is greatly appreciated and I hope you enjoy.
Everybody Wins, the greatest board games ever made
I've done a book. This one's called Everybody Wins and it's an overview of the rise of modern board games over the last four decades, using the German 'Spiel des Jahres' game of the year award as a lens. The publishers have done a gorgeous on it, and it's released in the UK today, and then in March in the USA. Ebook out now, audiobook to follow. It's a big, chunky coffee-table tome and I'm really pleased with the way it's come out, both as a piece of history and as reviews of 44 very different award-winning titles, ranging from household names to mostly forgotten footnotes. [more inside]
You've Been Played: How Corporations, Governments, and Schools Use Games to Control Us All
My book about gamification is out! You've Been Played (Bookshop.org, Goodreads) examines how points, badges, and leaderboards are creeping into every aspect of modern life as tools for profit and coercion. It’s a critique of gamification, sure – but by an actual game designer, games journalist, and former neuroscientist. And it goes far beyond the usual suspects like Fitbit and Duolingo to look at the historical roots of gamification. Foucault, Lewis Mumford, Skinner, medieval indulgences, Taylorism, ARGs – this book has it all! Reviews, talks, and excerpts inside... [more inside]
Early Collaborative Games of Fantasy and Imagination
A few months ago, I posted a rough translation of the rules to a collaborative fairy tale storytelling game more than 200 years old. I've now put that onto a Neocities site with many additional translations: a total of 5 variants of the same game re-published many times between 1801 and 1867, several variants of a game the same age that involves role-playing, and several variants of even older poetry and nonsense games related to the Surrealist game "Exquisite Corpse." There are also pages and translations explaining the history of the games' penalty phase, offering advice on running demos of the storytelling game especially using motifs from the earliest "secondary world" fantasy novel, and possible round-robin storytelling from the 1600s-1700s, as well as links to many additional sources for parlor games from 1551 to 1899.
Penga, a penguin physics game
I recently integrated Planck.js into a client's product and wanted to reuse that knowledge to make a fun game, so I picked an idea and tweeted along as I refined & built it. [more inside]
BOKEH game
I wanted to make a simple webgame similar to those old Flash ones where you eat smaller fish & avoid bigger ones. A 'budget' of 1-1.5 days seemed sensible and I tweeted updates while building it.
Set Side B
I thought to myself, what was the least zeitgeisty thing we could create in this year of our frog 2022? As a result, me and a couple of friends have started a new gaming blog, called Set Side B! I was inspired by the final loss of the archives of old GameSetWatch, where I wrote @Play long ago. You can still find it on the Wayback Machine, but even so, that site hasn't been updated since 2011 anyway. Set Side B is our effort to do something about its loss. I will be writing on a bunch of topics there, both shortly and longly, but mostly shortly. Including roguelikes. Please enjoy our overbearing randomess!
A narrative game system over 200 years old: "The Impromptu Tale"
I worked up a rough translation of one of the collaborative story-telling games linked in this post: Pre-Surrealist Games. It's called "The Impromptu Tale," and there's a lot to it that modern tabletop gamers may find familiar.
You think you're addicted to Spelling Bee?
Here's my NYT Spelling Bee inspired game, Spellbound. Besides coding it up, I created all the word lists. Compared to the NYT, there is more food and plants, fewer chemicals and fish, and no words that would embarrass anyone playing with their children. Free, no ads, no shared data, just for fun. And you don't need a subscription to the NYT to play it.
DNDle - Wordle, but you're picking stats to guess D&D monsters
It feels like there's a Wordle clone for everybody nowadays. But I decided to go in a slightly different direction when I made DNDle, a game in which you try to guess the Dungeons & Dragons "monster of the day" by assigning values to its attributes and being told where you've got them right. [more inside]
So I made a Wordle clone (with some extra features)
I have been playing Wordle for a few months with friends from a Discord, and I really liked it, but I felt it had some shortcomings that I wanted to address. So, I made a Wordle clone. It's mostly the same as Wordle but [more inside]
Saturday Afternoon Ikea Trip Simulator
Saturday Afternoon Ikea Trip Simulator is a (one joke) text adventure designed to simulate the experience of going to Ikea on a Saturday afternoon (other times of day and/or days of the week are available upon request). [more inside]
Armoured Commander II
I just released my game, Armoured Commander II, out of Steam Early Access. It's a sequel to a project I posted here nearly six years ago now. The game is a turn-based roguelike where you command a tank and its crew in world war II. Combat is brutal and unforgiving, and survival is the goal. [more inside]
Rootin' Tootin' Cowboy Shootin'
A cowboy shooting game!
Made mostly by my 13-year old son, with programming & useability support from me. [more inside]
Chess Patch Notes
The history of chess rule changes presented as if they were patch notes from a Blizzard game like Overwatch. Seems fitting with the recent AlphaZero work exploring chess variants and the joining of forces between the gaming and chess streamer communities. Some background here.
Mixolumia
Mixolumia is an entrancing, musical block-clearing puzzler released on itch just the other day. I wound up documenting the 18-month development process in a big twitter thread (also in twitter moment format) that folks have found interesting. Besides bringing a fresh twist to the puzzler genre, Mixolumia also has a dynamic soundtrack (by Josie Brechner and myself) that responds and evolves as you play. The cool thing is that the music system is open to players to create and share their own songs/sound packs. There's documentation on how to do that if you're interested in reading how it works. The game comes with a wide range of color palettes and players can customize and create their own as well. [more inside]
Fifteen Monsters All In A Row
Fifteen Monsters All In A Row is a short text adventure/twine game (which should work in any browser), where you have to confront fifteen monsters (in a row), which I made for/with my five year old niece and two year old nephew, who designed the monsters, and wrote some of the stories. The game contains 15 monsters (all in a row), several secret monsters (occasionally in a row), multiple solutions to every problem (almost), some exciting stories (occasionally), at least two jokes, and even a super secret special ending. [more inside]
Ultimate Quarantine House Selection!
A little toy that generates fresh instances of the "Pick Your Quarantine House" meme/game. Potential roommates are drawn from a pool of 3000+ celebrities and historical figures. [more inside]
a Twine game about the Queen under the Hill
"Eyes of Tree" is a hypertext game about the price you pay for loving the fairy queen. [more inside]
Hit the High Notes singing game
Sing to your browser and see how high you can go compared with 27 famous singers. I've been working on this for a while, struggling to get robust cross-browser pitch detection, then eventually found a combination of hacks/libraries that does the trick.
VOLE.wtf - malevole reborn
Way back in 2002 I launched malevole.com, a site for my daftest creative projects, and tried reaching all the cool bloggers with a $10 MeFi text ad featuring an ASCII vole <",_,)~ This seemingly worked, and the site had a few viral hits, but by the end of 2004 I was too caught up in my day job and let it rot. Nearly 15 years later, I've brought it back with a completely new look, some revamped old stuff, and lots more lined up. [more inside]
Would you like to play a season of Eat Poop You Cat over email?
Eat Poop You Cat aka Telephone Pictionary (BoardGameGeek, MeFi, and this isn't the first MeFi Project) is a game of making art -- often badly -- and writing. Assuming 8 people play a season, each player's responsibility will be for 4 artworks and 4 sentences over the course of about 12 days. Each completed game is posted to Tumblr and sent to a group email for communal reaction.
- Some past favorites:
- #013F: “Up from his mouth rose a volcano steaming with blistered robots fighting off evil bats."
- #010B: “The sun ws setting over the machines as they completed their work enslaving humanity and only one robot was remorseful as he tried and failed to paint a landscape of the scene in front of him."
Make money. Rip off hard-working people. Earn cool stuff for your desk.
From the team that brought you Payback and Stax comes our newest financial literacy game: Shady Sam. [more inside]
Telephone Pictionary, Correspondence Edition
A web page featuring a super-basic set of printable instructions I've created to play Telephone Pictionary (a.k.a. Eat Poop You Cat) via snail-mail. Scans of completed correspondence games included. (Direct link to instructions on Google Docs)
fcc-git-nomic: A game of Nomic played via Github
I learned about Nomic games a few days ago, so made one to help new developers learn the basics of Github pull request workflows so they can contribute to open source projects. It's aimed particularly at the freeCodeCamp community, but all are welcome. Even if you are a seasoned Github contributor, you are welcome to play, too, because Nomic is an extremely fun game!
Roguelike Celebration, October 6-7 2018 in San Francisco (third annual!)
A bunch of my friends and I like roguelike computer games, and we keep organizing an annual community conference for players and developers of games in this beloved genre (such as Nethack) and games they've influenced (such as Dwarf Fortress). If you're into this kind of thing (or curious about it) and nearby, please join us for some neat and thoughtful talks about roguelikes, retrocomputing, procedural generation, and game design!
Pierre Menard's The Asteroids
Perhaps the most significant game of our time [more inside]
256 Farben: The Game
After a visit to SFMOMA, I was inspired to turn German abstract artist Gerhard Richter's "Colour Charts" into a block-breaker game. [more inside]
EXTREME MEATPUNKS FOREVER
I'm making a serial game that's half visual novel, half mech brawler, about gay disasters beating up neonazis in an alternate universe version of the American Southwest! Here are the first two episodes.
Will Not Let Me Go
Dallas, Texas. 1996. Fred Strickland has Alzheimer’s. An interactive story about memory, loss, and love.
Numbers
What do the numbers coming from the shortwave station mean? Who is behind it? Who wants to help you find out... and who will stop you at any cost?
A Twine game about numbers stations, made for Global Game Jam 2018, with music by Zarkonnen.
This Room Will Kill You
This is my first game -- a surreal, story-driven RPG with horror elements -- inspired by The Stanley Parable, Yume Nikki, and all the wonderful 90s jRPGs that I grew up with. [more inside]
Haunted Floating Eye - A Lair Defense Game
Haunted Floating Eye is my newest pay-what-you-can ($0 is fine!) game, in active development. You play a magical floating eye monster who has decided to take up residence in a naturally occurring cliff face, as your kind often do. [more inside]
What The $!#&@! Do They Need Now?
A point-and-click game about the recent US Travel/Muslim Bans, made as part of Indie Train Jam 2017. [more inside]
The Throwin' Rocks at Fish Roleplayin' Game
A role playing game like no other. [more inside]
Liberation Circuit - Rogue AI Simulator
A free (GPL) real-time-strategy/programming game where you must escape from a hostile computer system. A screenshot; the trailer (youtube); some more gameplay (also youtube). For Windows (the executable is available from the github release page at the main link) and can also be built on any system supported by Allegro (Linux etc.). [more inside]
Civic Games Contest
Announcing the 2017 Civic Games contest, a design competition for analog games that seek to promote the understanding and/or practice of good citizenship! [more inside]
odlaw.
Odlaw (as seen on Waypoint) is a two-player stealth game about visual distraction. You and your opponent must seek each other out in a field of one hundred fake players, but with such a populated space, the first challenge is to find yourself. There's also a black-and-white mode for folks who have trouble discerning color.
The Seers Catalogue
An multimedia storybook and its inscrutable magazine, The Seers Catalogue is a world of weights and measures, strange encounters and necromantic cabals, where the key to all secrets is an obtuse and enthralling magazine. [more inside]