iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

if you're still thinking about it after a couple of minutes, it decides you're human

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dirty secret of the restaurant industry is that they just throw away half the eggs

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it's not inspiring or aspirational but for people who expect to name a genre and have it magically become an engaging experience, there's something honest about showing how empty that is

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I was (and am) going to clown on this in a bunch of different ways but I think it might be... a good advertisement? Someone has a completely surface-level idea, they use the AI to create a basic prototype, see that it isn't very interesting and discover that they don't have much more to say about it

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ever since I saw The X-Files S7E13: "First Person Shooter" I've had this amazing idea for a game

WinRAR Earle @tommchenry.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

1 hour later: "Why does it look so bad? I thought I was going to be so much better at this than NorthernLion! What the hell!"

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Just finished updating our shop with all the new stuff from 2026 INCLUDING DUCKBORNE CHRONICLES VOLUME 1 yourmchenries.bigcartel.com

yourmchenries.bigcartel.com

Your McHenries

Tom and Sara McHenry are cartoonists in Chicago who make comics, zines, stickers and more. This is where you buy their stuff online!

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William B. Fuckley @opinionhaver.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

remember: it saved no net money, social services US citizens are getting cut, and left the US in a weaker place geopolitically. none of the debates about fiscal responsibility, obligation to US citizens first, or 'hard choices' actually apply. they're all bullshit. killed people for nothing at all.

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

we only want 7 things and it's heads

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I would say Ween's 12 Golden Country Greats but the shift is just them doing a particular genre at all

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

feel like I need additional sets for the modern games I've gotten deepest into, the games that influence me most as a designer, etc.

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

impossible to narrow it down to THE 9 but these are a few that stuck with me from my childhood, introduced me to new genres, and led me down the path to becoming a game developer

3x3 grid of nine games: Commander Keen in Goodbye Galaxy, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Tyrian, Chrono Trigger, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, Pokemon Silver, Command & Conquer: Red Alert, World of Warcraft, Minecraft

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

we made some extremely corn-forward cheesecake... can probably just stick a wick in that if you like

Mike Cook @mtrc.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Reposted by alex

New Post: Why I Love AI Next month it'll be twenty years since I went to university, learned to program, and studied AI. I wrote about why I loved it, why I still love it, and why, unfortunately, it no longer exists. www.possibilityspace.org/blog/posts/i...

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

ok but this aesthetic actually goes hard

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Definitely thankful that I can find some paid games work in the US, but deeply uncertain about the next few years on several different axes. I guess we'll simply have to see what happens! And try to survive it!!

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On the optimistic side, there are such great tools available now for doing the kind of game dev I enjoy (godot, blender, etc.) and huge audiences for games with janky or low-fi visuals. I'm irrationally choosing to hope that there are ways for small teams to be able to work as businesses... somehow.

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5 years ago I was hopeful that the glut of AAA funding might make those companies less risk averse, letting bolder ideas from indie/arts/hobbyist spaces see bigger budgets. That didn't pan out even before the crash... I've learned a lot about how inherently limiting project/team scale is.

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

This post is beautiful and makes me sad. I think you captured a lot of the things that made (and make!) me excited about engineering and design - things that aren't gone from game dev more broadly but certainly threatened by current industry trends and pressures. We're here because we love the work!

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every morning i wake up and open palm slam a vhs into the slot. it's a video of miga falling asleep and right then and there i start doing the moves alongside the main character, miga

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the Mountain Goats @themountaingoats.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

hey people sorry if some of you breeze past this part but it’s Friday. We do AI discourse on Wednesday and Thursday. Friday is for stuff that rocks and is actually fun. It’s in the TOS & the packet you got at orientation. get it together please

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James Wragg @lovelyhellplace.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

𝔉𝔯𝔬𝔪 𝔱𝔥𝔢 𝔪𝔞𝔨𝔢𝔯𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔇𝔯𝔢𝔞𝔡 𝔇𝔢𝔩𝔲𝔰𝔦𝔬𝔫... 𝕰𝖓𝖙𝖗𝖔𝖕𝖞 is OUT NOW in Early Access!!! ⚔️Tactical Combat! 💀Soulslike Mechanics! 💬Narrative Conundrums! 🌎3D World Map! fr, the team have poured their hearts and souls into this one & I'm so proud of what we've achieved❤️ store.steampowered.com/app/3940340/...

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Katie Mack @astrokatie.com · 13/08/2026

I feel like an issue that would connect well with voters would be doing anything at all to slow the current progression toward "absolutely everything now is a scam"

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Senator Ron Wyden @wyden.senate.gov · 10/08/2026

Trump is raiding wildfire prevention funding to pay for his vanity projects while over 2.3 million acres burn in Oregon

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Kendra P @hagofbolding.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

Unclaimed tattoo flash I wanna do! I have August availability (including weekends!) in the Portland, OR area. Custom appointments welcome too Book yourself on kptats.club

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

some (mostly) obvious recs: 1000xRESIST (in case you haven't played it) Roadwarden (I just love the world and characters and narrative tone of this game very much) Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller (also Circe by the same author)

alex @metadept.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

buddy I know a god who's gonna give you so many arms; hold on a sec while I intercede on your behalf

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

definitely recommend Le Cercueil, a very silly bar filled with coffins and skulls and other over the top goth decor

alex @metadept.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

Super curious to see how you explore this in the context of what you're making. I always appreciate you sharing your design/engineering process so openly and eloquently.

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

I feel like the most important questions here are about how players observe and interact with the world. Can they rapidly move between or observe distant areas? Should their actions impact NPC schedules? Do they care about specific shepherds or are shepherds mostly interchangeable?

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

I think my impulse here is to try brute force simulation with some intermediate resolutions to reduce the search space, e.g. a set of entities that are ever in a region, then a set of screens that those entities might be in at various times, then simulate details only when the player is present

alex @metadept.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

in these divisive times we need gentic ai

alex @metadept.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

Personally I prefer to make games with a more collaborative approach and sacrifice scope/fidelity in order to keep more work within the core team. I hope there's enough quality advantage in that to make it viable as a business model in whatever kind of future the industry is heading towards.

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

I wonder if this is partly a consequence of their development model (small core team, lots of outsourcing). There are a lot of pieces of the game that feel like they're missing deeper integration but maybe that separation is either upstream or downstream of the need to hand off development.

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Cat Manning @catacalypto.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

this is an incredibly important archaeological site for so much. please leave a comment opposing this.

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

everything they've done with that ecosystem since moving away from the dedicated Mojang accounts has made it more of a tangled fractured mess, it's disappointing to see them mess up the one clear area for improvement over classic MC (simplifying the process of getting into a game)

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alex @metadept.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

Junie loves getting brushed but no matter how slowly or gently I go, she gets more and more rowdy and wiggly and needs a cooldown period. Not smart or helpful or articulate but we love her anyway.

alex @metadept.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

yep it's definitely a "zoom way in and try to pretend I know what I'm looking for" kind of experience

alex @metadept.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

unfortunately have to jump in here and recommend yet another option, my current favorite anthropeum.com I've been enjoying having a little daily challenge that also feels more connected to broader humanity and pushes me to learn some tidbits of art and history

anthropeum.com

Anthropeum

A daily game that challenges our understanding of human cultures. Ten objects. 5,000 years of human history. Guess where and when each artifact was made. See how you rank.

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Mike Bithell @mikebithell.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

Proud to announce the next game Vampirium: 1997 Dracula is king of the United British Empire. Kill his enemies and find your own path through a minimalist immersive sim sandbox. Wishlists and retweets massively appreciated (and, you know, massively helpful) store.steampowered.com/app/4035190/...

store.steampowered.com

Vampirium: 1997 on Steam

1997. Dracula is King of England. At his command, master your dark gifts to assassinate his enemies and secure his vampiric empire. Infiltrate locked-down locations, adapt and survive in living enviro...

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Roguelites are a good example of what I mean by "unbounded" - it's not that players want LONGER games, specifically, but I think a lot of folks are looking for experiences without clear endpoints. Also not true for everyone obviously!

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players want games of unbounded length with more intentional graphics made by people who are paid sustainably to work consistently over a long time

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economics aside I also think the first half of this is generally not true, even for a lot of the folks saying it. there's an intuition that playing more short, punchy, perhaps artsy games would be a healthier pattern but I'm skeptical that it's what players actually WANT and they aren't doing it now

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dudes love to explain seriously how they're scared to go into the city because of all the violent radical leftists before driving a goofy $150k tank covered in punisher skulls through a big garden full of children playing