Category Archives: game design

Dev Diary: Branching Dialog

Posted on April 26, 2018 by Chris

One of the new systems we’ve built for DEAD SECRET CIRCLE is a branching dialog system.  As you explore the world you periodically interview suspects, and depending on your choices the conversation can go many different ways. Branching dialog systems are … Continue reading →

Posted in dead secret, dead secret dev diary, game design | 2 Comments

Stealth Education and Video Game Chautauqua

Posted on May 15, 2016 by Chris

If you signed up for the Dead Secret mailing list or follow us on Twitter, you might have heard of the DEAD SECRET Puzzle Challenge.  Each puzzle is unlocked by a YouTube streamer and anybody can submit an answer during … Continue reading →

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Dead Secret Diary: Locomotion and Space

Posted on July 11, 2015 by Chris

I gave a talk at GDC 2015 about designing our new title, Dead Secret, for mobile VR platforms like the Gear VR.  That seemed to go over well, so I thought I’d write a little bit about the design of the game itself. … Continue reading →

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GDC Talk: Designing for Mobile VR in Dead Secret

Posted on May 9, 2015 by Chris

It’s been a few months since the 2015 Game Developers Conference was held in San Francisco, but we’ve been so busy with Dead Secret that we barely noticed.  I gave a talk about the game, and how we changed it … Continue reading →

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Learning about Free-to-Play from Devil May Cry

Posted on April 3, 2014 by Chris

The first 20 minutes of Devil May Cry are really clever.  What happens is this: you breeze through several rooms, chopping evil marionettes left and right and flicking that silver hair around like you own the world.  After the second or third … Continue reading →

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Playing Wind-up Knight 2 with a Guitar (and why it matters)

Posted on January 30, 2014 by Chris

Yesterday we posted this silly video about playing Wind-up Knight 2 with a variety of funny controllers. Nothing in this video is faked; we used a converter box (like this one) to convert our various console controllers to USB, then … Continue reading →

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Leveling Up the Wind-up Knight Design Process

Posted on December 20, 2013 by Chris

When we built the original Wind-up Knight, Robot Invader was only three people: Casey, our intrepid designer / animator, Mike, our one-man art machine, and me, the code guy.  We hired contractors (the mighty Jordan Fehr for sound design and … Continue reading →

Posted in game design, prototyping, wind-up knight | 3 Comments

Playing the Story

Posted on February 15, 2012 by Chris

Last week David Jaffe, the outspoken designer of tons of games including God of War and Twisted Metal, gave a speech at DICE about how games and stories are incompatible.  The coverage of the talk makes it seem pretty cut and … Continue reading →

Posted in game design, game industry | 8 Comments

Locomotion Smoke and Mirrors

Posted on December 18, 2011 by Chris

If we’ve done our jobs right, Wind-up Knight is a fairly simple game.  There are only four inputs, and only two are ever needed simultaneously.  Sir Sprint, our heroic spring-loaded knight, runs forward automatically, removing the need for a classic … Continue reading →

Posted in game design, game engineering, wind-up knight | 26 Comments

Pay by Numbers

Posted on October 31, 2011 by Chris

Why tear out my heart for all the world to see? Why not paint by numbers Catchy melody Burn it up the charts with sweet simplicity Then do it again — Self, Paint by Numbers If you ask experts in … Continue reading →

Posted in game design, game industry, mobile games, Uncategorized, wind-up knight | 83 Comments