Yes Indie'd Pod Thomas M
-
- Arts
-
Do I like game design? Yes, indie'd! A podcast of bitesize interviews with indie tabletop roleplaying game creators about their work and game design theory & practice. Releases every two weeks.
-
Making a TTRPG Career (w/ Sebastian Yue)
Support the show!
On today's show, we're talking ship with Sebastian Yue, a game designer, writer, and editor. Apart from their own self-published games and DMs Guild modules, They work full-time at Hit Point Press which is best known for various very succesful third party D&D 5e products like Heckna and Humblewood. They've also contributed as a designer to some wonderful projects like Apocalypse Keys, Cloud Empress, ennie-award winning Uncaged Goddesses anthology, and the currently in-progress official Tomb Raider RPG.
Show Notes
04:18 Getting started with game design
15:18 Working full-time at Hitpoint Press
22:10 Being in both the D&D and indie game communities
24:15 All about editing: style guides & more
29:50 Future plans
34:07 Advice for aspiring game designers
36:56 Infectious Enthusiasm: Ingkit by Pukepeku Games
38:15 Tyranny of Numbers: Annual earnings
42:15 RePlay
43:43 All Advice is Advice for Myself
The Indie RPG Newsletter -
Getting Weirder Than Lovecraft (w/ Graham Walmsley)
Support the show!
Today, we're talking to Graham Walmsley, the celebrated game designer behind tabletop RPGs like Cthulhu Dark and A Taste for Murder, larps like Will That Be All, and lovecraftian scenarios for games like Trail of Cthulhu. He's also the author of two non-fiction books called Stealing Cthulhu about telling lovecraftian stories and Play Unsafe about techniques for being a better player of tabletop games. This year, he's got two new games out, Cosmic Dark, a sequel to Cthulhu Dark about corporate employees in space, and Darkenwood, a GM-less game about a nightmarish forest.
Show Notes:
01:41 Introducing Graham
03:07 Starting with Lovecraft
12:08 What is weird fiction?
16:55 All the cool stuff in Cosmic Dark
26:24 Rules, advice, setting
39:22 Infectious Enthusiasm: Lumberjills by Moira Turkington
41:50 Tyranny of Numbers
43:44 RePlay
46:25 All Advice is Advice for Myself
The Indie RPG Newsletter -
The Awards (w/ Nico MacDougall and Tan Shao Han)
Support this show!
This week, we're talking to Nico MacDougall and returning guest Tan Shao Han about The Awards, an alternative tabletop RPG awards project.
Show Notes:
03:56 Introductions
13:31 Being a judge
16:09 The process of picking a winner
21:30 Who should be a judge?
25:36 Infectious Enthusiasm
27:59 Tyranny of Numbers: Breaking down submissions to the Awards
31:02 All Advice is Advice for Myself -
Reading The F**king Manual (w/ Max Lander & Aaron King)
Support this show!
Today we're talking to Max and Aaron from RTFM. Maxwell Lander is a game designer, photographer, visual artist, and also musician with an album of dungeon synth. Aaron King is a game designer whose works including Patchwork World Sixth Edition. They are both the co-hosts of RTFM, an RPG book club podcast.
Show Notes:
[00:02:49] Why start an RPG bookclub podcast?
[00:14:43] What each person brings to the table
[00:28:47] Critiquing RPGs as an artform
[00:41:24] Infectious Enthusiasm: Sagas of the Icelanders, Bloodfeud
[00:45:03] Tyranny of Numbers
[00:50:08] RePlay
[00:53:13] All Advice is Advice For Myself: Prep more, be less?
Other Links:
It's up to you really, an all vtuber actual play of Patchwork World -
Meeting Games Where They're At [w/ Quinns]
Support the show!
Today, we're talking to Quintin Smith aka Quinns, who has been reviewing boardgames for more than a decade with the iconic show, Shut Up and Sit Down. Then about 3 years ago, Quintin joined People Make Games to cover everything from Roblox's relationship to child labour to the battle for ownership and control of Disco Elysium, from the revival of kabaddi in India to phenomenon that is jubensha in china. Now, he's gone and started Quinns Quest, a new youtube channel to review tabletop roleplaying games that feels like a lot like that one weird show where William Riker from Star Trek looked at the camera and asked us if we believed in ghosts. Don't worry, listeners, we're going to ask the question on everyone's mind: why?
Show Notes:
[00:02:00] What makes a good review?
[00:08:02] Horror versus Tension: one of the challenges of reviewing RPGs
[00:16:12] Would you ever do a bad review?
[00:23:22] Why playing games are vital for reviews
[00:40:44] Infectious Enthusiasm: World Wide Wrestling by Nathan Paoletta
[00:43:26] Tyranny of Numbers: Youtube drop-off
[00:45:12] Replay
[00:50:31] All Advice is Advice For Myself: Use your hands?
Other references:
I mentioned an article by Quinn Murphy which talks about promises, consistency and economy, you can find that here
If you liked this podcast, you'll probably love the Indie RPG Newsletter -
Games That Make You Cry In A Panera (w/ Hannah Shaffer and Evan Rowland)
Support the show!
On this episode, we have Hannah Schaffer and Evan Rowland, the two creators behind indie game design outfit, turtlebun. They've published games like Questlandia, Noirlandia, Damn the man save the music, Mud: a golem memoir, and many more. You can find more about those games at turtlebun.com.
Evan and Hannah also co-host a podcast called Design Doc , which is in their own words, about "trying to make a living as people putting things out in the world". If you read any reviews of that show, you'll hear it being described with words like honest, vulnerable, caring, friendly. It's one of my favourite podcasts in the world and you should listen to it. Then, you can too get vulnerable insights into the daily practice of being a game designer and you can also learn that Carrie Fisher once overtweezed Hannah's mom eyebrows at a workshop.
Follow them on Instagram
Show Notes:
02:46 Getting started (Evan reinvents microtransactions)
09:07 Going from making big things to making medium-small things
11:30 Getting deep with Design Doc
25:00 What is collaboration and how do you even do it?
36:25 Infections Enthusiasm: The Beast and Usagi Yojimbo
39:40 Tyranny of Numbers
43:46 RePlay
45:33 All Advice Is Advice For Myself
Some of my personal greatest hits from Design Doc :
Burnout
A Cat in the Lap and Other Good Things
The Work of Games is Not Just Making Games
The Games You Want To Make The Life You Want To Live
Customer Reviews
Should You Listen to This? YES, Indi'ed you should!
This show is an awesome little window to the world of tabletop design. I love how approachable the host and guests sound. It's like having a quiet moment while at a game convention sharing a coffee with people passionate about gaming.
Should you listen to it? Yes, Indie'd...