iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played!

The Emotion Engine @emotion-engine.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

I think it’s fun that all of the core id guys are now normal charming dorky dad types (Romero, Hall, Adrian Carmack) or ontologically evil freaks (John Carmack, Sandy) with American McGee, an ardent libertarian that now lives on a boat and makes plushies, somehow straddling the line.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 13h

2 of the best Castlevania games also bookend both of the classic eras of Castlevania: A precision platformer loaded with secrets transitions into full-on action adventure exploration RPG with more secrets. $6 to experience them both (if you haven't already) is totally worth your time and trouble!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 13h

Cool! I found Star Fox on the Switch 2 to be a pretty decent remake, even if it does lack some of the intensity and excitement of the N64 version when it comes to graphics and animation. And the controls are modernized. Adding free stuff to make a good thing better is always welcome!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 14h

I respect a game that's made to strongly appeal to somebody far more than one bland enough to try to appeal to everybody. Gamers also have a bad tendency to judge sequels by outsized expectations instead of on their own merits. A sequel that zigs when some want it to zag can still be a lotta fun!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 14h

Word to the wise! (I bought Witcher 3 digitally on the Switch for about $10 during a sale one year, so you can hold out for that too!)

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 14h

I put some more time into Nivalis Nights. I'm surprised how quickly it sets you free to hire managers and run your business so you can get down to running around and doing what you feel like. Of course, I only have 9 lims (currency) in my account at the end of Day 4, so maybe I'm a bad owner!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 19h

This crap makes me ABSOLUTELY CRAZY. Nivalis Nights has been out less than a day and negative reviewers are posting vague displeasure at nothing in particular. It seems coordinated because reviews went up around the same time. They're awarding each other (not the positives) to boost visibility.

Nivalis Nights - https://steamcommunity.com/app/1488490/reviews/?browsefilter=toprated

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1488490/reviews/?browsefilter=toprated

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 19h

I, too, really want to like Cheese Chase. It's a 1994 arcade game that really prioritizes graphical splendor in favor of well-designed gameplay. Art & Magic (the developer) was known for that tendency, unfortunately.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 19h

I took a break from work and spent about 30 min on Nivalis Nights. Since my favorite park of Cloudpunk was walking around the rain-slicked streets enjoying the vibes and finishing tasks, this game's gonna be great. The graphics got a nice overhaul with polygonal 3D characters this time around!

store.steampowered.com

Save 10% on Nivalis Nights on Steam

Grow your business, manage restaurants and nightclubs, make friends and enemies, buy and decorate apartments, go fishing and maybe even find love in a cyberpunk city that stretches from the ocean to t...

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Reposted by Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played!

Mr-GN @mrgn13.bsky.social · 23h

@greatestgames.substack.com

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 23h

REMINDER: If you want Sony to continue to support physical releases, one of the strongest arguments you have is to buy their new games physically rather than digitally! Remember that these decisions are being largely made by looking at spreadsheets, not player feedback.

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Reposted by Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played!

gita “the formalist” jackson @xoxogossipgita.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

There are barely any women or black people in games media and I can think of a couple reasons why but no one will like it

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 23h

A) I miss Rec Room like you wouldn't believe. B) I'm all over a game that's basically Katamari Damacy meets Godzilla! It'll be out in 2027.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 23h

Also, if you don't regularly check out Mothership (a women and queer-owned blog co-created by two of the folks who made Polygon worth reading back in the day and staffed with some amazing writers), you absolutely should!

mothership.blog

A love letter to the rhythm game communities that helped me find myself

It was in the arcade around DDR machines that I first met people like me — kids picked on for being "weirdos," for being neurodivergent, for being queer.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 23h

Here's a great reminder thread that we should uplift the femmes in games journalism and celebrate them for their awesome work!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

I have the LEGO Monkee Kid set that shows the origin of the Monkey King and I also have a LEGO Chinese Dragon next to it. Looks like I need to add a third to the mix!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

If you'd like physical boxes for your digital PC games, @sirrandall.yeold.press makes 'em and does a great job!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

If you're a game dev and want to grab some free human-made assets while you support a great developer in the process, here you go!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

Blue's Journey is an early Neo Geo game by ADK that's brimming with gorgeous graphics and interesting ideas as you journey through a larger than life world. It also has a peculiar premise and a branching storyline as well as a really amusingly endearing translation! #gaming #videogames #retrogames

greatestgames.substack.com

The 16-bit Arcade and Console Era (1990-1995) - Blue’s Journey (a.k.a. Raguy)

If you crossed the Wonder Boy games with Super Mario Bros., you’d get something akin to this delightful action platformer

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

If you've never played Valkryie Profile, you absolutely should! It's one of my favorite RPGs from the PSX era and it has a great story set in Norse mythology building up to Ragnarok with some truly interesting characters!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

NieR: Automata is such a deeply weird, genre-bending game that I was surprised how big it got when it came out in 2017. A lot of that's due to the super sexy design of its lead. 2B is still ridiculously popular after nearly a decade despite having almost no personality. It's quite remarkable!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

Quoted for truth! I saw a spirited thread on LinkedIn today where someone was bragging about all the AI agents they use. Most of the responses were from daily AI users who are absolutely resentful at how quickly this tech has turned their job into managing computer software that constantly lies.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

Here's yet another human cost to AI models - armies of human beings have long had to review what generative AI produces to further train the data sets, and it's often quite disturbing. Even sadder: they're not being paid to report it. Just evaluate how well the output matches the prompt.

404media.co

Humans Are Reading Copilot Prompts — And They're Horrified

Human contractors are reviewing Copilot users’ prompts and uploaded images, according to internal documents obtained by 404 Media. The contractors are also bombarded with users’ requests for sexual AI...

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

So on The Greatest Games You (Probably) Never Played, I'm moving on to mascot platformers from 1990-1995. I was surprised how many good lesser-known ones there are! Here are a few I'll be featuring: Kid Dracula Pig Out Bucky O'Hare Little Samson Gimmick! Rolo to the Rescue Ardy Lightfoot & more!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

Well, I just went through all four endings of Nighthawks! (The not-so-obvious "forget it, I'm outta here" ending is the one I liked the best.) Great game overall. It's simple mechanically, but well-done and quite engaging. I'll likely move on to other topics, but this game's definitely worth it.

store.steampowered.com

Save 10% on Nighthawks on Steam

The secret is out. Vampires have been exposed to the world… and you’re one of them. Seize the night as a modern monster, stepping out of the shadows to build a thriving nightclub empire through fear, ...

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

This is a great reminder I need to go back and finish Skate Story. It's such a neat and interesting game!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 29/09/2026

UPDATE: All I can say is that Nighthawks is full of surprises, and what ultimately happened in the resolution to this plotline was something I never would have guessed! I'm closing in on the end of the game and appreciate the respect it has for its characters. Not everyone's amoral, which is good!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 28/09/2026

My suspicion is most devs don't sell a lot of physical games and won't see them as necessary. But I'm glad the campaign to pressure Sony into rethinking an all digital future is working! The reason we don't want to lose physical media is precisely because of how Sony treats digital storefronts.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 28/09/2026

Given that we now know evolution is really, really good at making crabs, Operation Logic Bomb (an old 90s SNES game) must have drawn the correct conclusions from the evidence available!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 28/09/2026

So I've been trying to understand the stark difference in business models between games made by large studios with large budgets and those made by mid-size/small teams with comparably tiny ones. This article provides a lot of interesting detail. (NOTE: They sell marketing services to indie devs.)

steampageanalyzer.com

How Much Does It Cost to Make an Indie Game?

Median indie game costs $30K-$60K including opportunity cost. Budget ranges for 11 genres and 5 team sizes, with what each line buys.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 28/09/2026

The funny thing is, Xbox had this completely figured out 20 years ago with the XB360. Even though they launched a console with a high failure rate, they took all the wind out of Sony's sails and defined that generation. Then they released the Xbox One and it's been downhill from there.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 28/09/2026

This is one interesting concept for a Dewey Decimal System library shelving simulator!

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 27/09/2026

I really, really hate it when marketing departments create cool stuff that could be viable as a limited-time, pre-orders only consumer product and then ship it to a select few as an incentive to build buzz. I hate it even more when the select few abuse that privilege by trying to turn a profit.

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Reposted by Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played!

Keza MacDonald @mackeza.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

"Influencers" really will receive a box of swag and IMMEDIATELY turn around and sell it for massive profit. Sometimes they even brag about it. It's the games press who are corrupt tho, remember

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 27/09/2026

Since we're on the topic of Castlevania, here's a thread I posted from last year with some of my favorite music from the series! Because Castlevania without good music is... well, it's Harmony of Dissonance on the GBA, one of my least favorite games in the series.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 27/09/2026

I've finally reached the point in Nighthawks where I get a shot at Maze, a seemingly benign narcissist who's started a vampire cult in the basement of his antique bookstore. He's an early ally and not the villain, but he's easily one of the biggest monsters in the game! Can't wait to take him down.

Maze, your first ally and also one of the most troubling characters the more you get to know him.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 27/09/2026

If you've never played this love letter to a film that helped inspire the look and feel of the beat 'em up genre, you definitely need to! It's not only based on the classic movie (with some of the same cast voicing their characters!), but adds a significant amount of backstory.

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 27/09/2026

Today on The Greatest Games You (Probably) Never Played... one you might have! VectorMan was Sega's answer to Donkey Kong Country, and it's still impressive even today. Using all sorts of demoscene-style tricks, BlueSky Software made this great run and gun shooter. #gaming #videogames #retrogames

greatestgames.substack.com

The 16-bit Arcade and Console Era (1990-1995) - VectorMan

A good looking, if somewhat forgotten, run and gun shooter, and Sega’s answer to Donkey Kong Country’s pre-rendered graphics

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Reposted by Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played!

Richard Cobbett @richardcobbett.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

It’s kinda awkward to say that a game has beaten your expectations when you are a chronically anxious person who kinda expected to sell around four copies. That said… calling this a win!

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Reposted by Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played!

Dave Gilbert @wadjeteyegames.com · 27/09/2026

Nighthawks has sold TEN THOUSAND copies in less than one week! For a tiny studio like ours, this is a huge milestone. To all the supporters, backers, wishlisters, and everyone who believed in this game and us, thank you so much.

Lux and Becca from Nighthawks, with the text "10,000 copies sold."

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Reposted by Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played!

Aerial_Knight @aerialknight.com · 27/09/2026

Dropshot 55% off on steam today! store.steampowered.com/app/3465190/...

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 27/09/2026

Time Extension, I love you guys, but what is the point of having a ranking list by release edition and not by the discrete games themselves? It results in Rondo of Blood being #17 and SOTN being #1, but #2 and #3 are games that include Rondo and SOTN and #4 is the GBA compilation that has #6 and #7

timeextension.com

The Best Castlevania Games, Ranked By You

Konami's series turns 40...

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Sean Jordan | Sharing Great Games You Probably Never Played! @greatestgames.substack.com · 27/09/2026

Man, @aerialknight.com doesn't play! We need more black game developers and black video game characters. And in general, we need more games that celebrate what it means to be anything but white, cisgendered, male gazey and hetero. (And I'm saying this as a white, cis, hetero male!)

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