The leading minds in video games confer on past visual design choices, how bad minigames happen, and the Shenmue MMO, ShenMMO. Hosted by Alex Jaffe, with Frank Cifaldi, Tim Rogers, and Brandon Sheffield. Edited by Esper Quinn, original music by Kurt Feldman.
What have you closed the door on in video games, both recreationally and professionally? (21:50)
If you had to wear the same video game t-shirt every day and get complimented on it or you’d die, what would it be? (27:30)
Insert Credit Quick Break: Legendary Puns (35:18)
Chopemon asks: What video game “booms” have there been? (37:36)
What is the getting to the bus stop at the exact same time as your bus of video games? (44:04)
Pretty bold decision to include an eight-minute recording of Brandon Sheffield being savagely and mercilessly beaten up by the other panelists. Please send him my regards when he gets out of the hospital.
I especially like both the question and answer by Frank for number three. I’ve made peace on my backlog by realising I’ll never play them all so when I do finish one I enjoy it more. Feels more selective in a good way.
And that magazine cover, loved it. I’d have bought that album ears unheard had it been used for that purpose. Reminded me of Bruth Force by The Algorithm.
I have a somewhat similar Banjo Kazooie story. When I was 17 and was at home for a weekend after getting my wisdom teeth removed, my brother came over to the house and announced that it was time for us to finally finish and 100% Banjo Kazooie. We’d played it as kids, and I remembered liking it, but I hadn’t really thought about it in 10 years. My brother on the other hand seemed to have had Banjo-Kazooie looming over him all that time, which caused him endless psychological distress.
After takes turns playing the first few worlds, by about the halfway mark it turned into his own solitary endeavor – though I was still required to watch him play. The constant pain from the holes in my gums combined with staring at a television screen for, like, 20 hours straight definitely soured me on the game. I remember my brother looking so satisfied when he finally finished the last boss fight and watched some stupid cutscene where banjo and kazooie are drinking margaritas on the beach. It’s one of those games best left as vague childhood memories of the first three or four levels.
Every time I see him he’s like “remember when we 100%ed Banjo Kazooie? It was only true fraternal devotion that made that possible.”
do you have any idea how hard it is to just upload a png somewhere and present the url to somebody without some garbage web service wrapped around it? imgur is useless, nowhere allows hot linking, the web is dead and mastodon is the future
Sorry Brandon but I gotta be counter-counter-counter-counter culture here and say that that cover does kinda suck, even if it had some creative gumption behind it
To be clear, like I said in the episode - I didn’t design the cover! And with it being 13 years ago I can’t say I remember much about that cover specifically. Also I don’t personally care if people like it or don’t. Everyone’s entitled to their feelings about it but one needn’t address me specifically when voicing them.
The next year we got rid of the strikethroughs (for the most part - art director loved them and kept going back) and went for something cleaner, but 2011 was an interesting weird year. in 2012 it started looking more like a normal game magazine again, which was fine, but less interesting. I don’t think we’d be talking about game developer covers in 2024 if not for the experiments in 2011!
listen, i would bet money every visual designer goes through a phase of “what if I tried something Sandman-y here” and i think we should celebrate that, regardless of execution
also this crop makes me laugh a bunch for some reason, might set it as my icon
