Serious Sam 4: Planet Badass (teaser)

In case you haven’t seen it, Croteam have released a teaser for Serious Sam 4: Planet Badass. I’ve been so insanely busy this year (Serious Sam 4, Phoenix Point, The Council of Crows, plus several other games) that I haven’t managed to update this blog at all, but trust me …

The Games Themselves

This is a topic that I’ve written about before, but it continues to be a source of frustration, so I’ll give it another go. Critical/analytical writing about games is almost never about the actual games. That is, despite claiming to be game criticism, it is built on the assumption (sometimes …

Game Texture and Liminal Spaces

Years ago Michael Brough gave a talk in which he used the concept of working with or against a game’s grain. That idea, of thinking about game design in such physical terms – a game’s texture, grain, surface, shape – has fascinated me, particularly given my own thoughts about the …

Omegaland

Omegaland is now available! I wrote this about its history: Omegaland has been a long-term side project for me. I’ve been very lucky to get to work on some big projects like The Talos Principle, Serious Sam 4, and Phoenix Point, but sometimes I missed the strange freedom we had …

Semper Fidelis / The Second Step

Here are two more stories I wrote for Phoenix Point. Semper Fidelis. An ex-marine finds himself reenacting history in Antarctica. The Second Step. A journalist interviews two radical scientists in Moscow while the world teeters on the brink of catastrophe. Someone commented to me on the amount of effort going …

Far Out There

Far Out There is another short story I wrote for Phoenix Point. This one is a bit shorter, but it has a flavour all of its own. (The most important aspect of writing a story, I’ve always felt, is voice. I can’t write a story without having found the right …

The Tomb of the Phoenix

The Tomb of the Phoenix is a Lovecraft-inspired short story I wrote for Phoenix Point. I had a ton of fun writing it and I’m really pleased with the result. Sorry if that sounds smug, it’s just one of those stories that show up in your brain almost complete and …

From X-Com to Phoenix Point

I remember playing the demo for X-Com: Apocalypse. I got it from a CD that came with an issue of now-defunct Greek gaming magazine PC Master. I’d only just recently gotten my own computer; I think the only game I’d bought myself so far was Shadows over Riva. (We weren’t …

2017: The Year Shit Got Finished

I’ve just taken a few days off for the first time since Christmas/New Year, and wow, I really needed it. I have to learn to stop working myself to the point of exhaustion. I always realize I’m totally burned out way too late. Of course, the main reason this keeps …

Omegaland on Greenlight

So, there’s this game I’ve been making for freaking years. I actually started it before Ithaka of the Clouds/The Council of Crows was even an idea, and I’ve been working on it in the background ever since. This was never my main project, only something I switched to when I …