The Flipside of Gaming
This is part 3 of my (Josh Bycer’s) favorite demos from Steam Next Fest, June 2025 edition.
00:00 Intro
00:16 Ratatan
3:24 Tormented Souls 2
5:35 Morsels
7:43 Meganaut
9:01 Okko the Exiled
10:44 Samurai Blitz EX
Owner of Game Wisdom with more than a decade of experience writing and talking about game design and the industry. I’m also the author of the “Game Design Deep Dive” series and “20 Essential Games to Study”
This is part 2 of my (Josh Bycer’s) favorite demos from the June 2025 Steam Next Fest event.
00:00 Intro
00:18 Baby Steps
1:58 Ball X Pit
4:12 Sands of Hope
5:28 Blaze of Storm
6:24 Chico’s Rebound
Owner of Game Wisdom with more than a decade of experience writing and talking about game design and the industry. I’m also the author of the “Game Design Deep Dive” series and “20 Essential Games to Study”
Our own Josh Bycer isn’t the only source of indie recap videos out there. Nintendo themselves released a new Indie World video yesterday with a number of new games listed, as well as an upcoming free update to one of my favorites, Little Kitty Big City. (I interviewed its creators for Game Developer some months ago!) Here’s the video (15 minutes):
The biggest surprise is, at the end, the news that both Caves of Qud and UFO 50 are coming to the Switch platforms at last! UFO 50 is out now! Please forgive my breach of decorum when I say, yippie, and besides that, wahoo. Thank you. (sips tea)
Founder of Digital Eel and friend of the blog Rich Carlson sent word that they’ve released a number of albums collecting their music on Bandcamp! I’m not much of a music-knower, admittedly, but the songs on their games always stuck in my ear, and I think there’s a good chance they’ll stick in yours too!
The Midway Sessions: I’m fondly recalling MIDI, the dawn of digital audio, the Macintosh, Windows for Workgroups, the Pentium, DAT, Mark of the Unicorn, Windows 95, the Proteus, Sound Canvas, Cakewalk, the Roland D-50, the Kurzweil K2000, the Roland RAP-10…. It was an astonishing, revved-up and magical era in music; we were spoiled with innovations. And this was when, at a modest studio in an industrial park in Midway near St. Paul, Minnesota, the music-making period that I call the Midway Sessions occurred.
The Midway Sessions: Short Stack EP: These three tunes were recorded at the same time and place, and were rescued, last minute, just after the Midway Sessions compilation was released. Note that most of the music on the Midway Sessions album as well this EP was created for commercial purposes but, for one reason or another, were never used.
Hidden Cookies: This final installment of the “Midway Sessions” features a mix of newly uncovered tracks and original versions, rescued from the vault, dusted off and revived using old tyme tools and methods.
Sea of Stars: The Symphonic Score (Evelyn Sykes): In 2015, indie game makers Digital Eel (including yours truly) decided they (we) wanted fancy theme music, like the Star Trek TOS theme, for their (our) third space game, Infinite Space III: Sea of Stars. Enter UK composer, Evelyn Sykes, an instrumentalist, recordist and creator of music for radio dramas, videos, films, and live performances.
The Weird Musical World of Digital Eel: This compilation offers a wholly unique and eclectic mix of musical and music-like material from nearly 15 years of Digital Eel games. […] These “suites” feature a diverse collection of sounds and mayhem from Plasmaworm, Dr. Blob’s Organism, Big Box of Blox, Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space, Brainpipe: A Plunge to Unhumanity, Data Jammers: FastForward, and Infinite Space III: Sea of Stars.
Plasmaworm: This album contains the level music from the 2001 Cheapass Games/Digital Eel computer game, Plasmaworm. […] Out of context (and in, for that matter) many of these pieces–extended loops really–are rather hypnotic and trancy, so get comfy and enjoy!
Midnight Moonlight (First Flight)
This is the first part of my (Josh Bycer’s) coverage of Steam Next Fest June 2025 edition.
00:00 Intro
00:21 Mina the Hollower
2:48 Moonlighter 2 The Endless Vault
6:11 Multiplanetary
7:12 Ninja Gaiden Ragebound
9:34 Undermine 2
11:04 Trainatic
12:41 Idle Boss Rush
Owner of Game Wisdom with more than a decade of experience writing and talking about game design and the industry. I’m also the author of the “Game Design Deep Dive” series and “20 Essential Games to Study”
This is kind of self-promotion, but it’s not just self-promotion as you can get tons of books by other people this way, including 10 volumes of Game Dev Stories from David Craddock, twelve books from Hardcore Gaming 101, four from Andrea Contato, and a couple from Dean Takahashi, as well as several other people, including, well, moi. It’s $35 for 66 books! I even threw in the two volumes of Someone Set Up Us The Rom as an extra, even though I don’t get anything out of it. I care that much about this bundle’s success.
No one gets rich from these bundles. The days when you could offer a ton of content at a steep discount and get thousands of purchases are long gone. But cash-strapped readers looking for a lot of info, if they can scrape up just $35, can get an amazing deal that will keep them occupied for a long time. I really think you’ll want to jump on this one, if you’re able.
I’ve been involved with these bundles for around a decade now. Some of the books I’ve contributed I’ve put up for sale on itch.io, but some I haven’t. The original version of We Love Mystery Dungeon is in it, which I’ve just taken down from itch.io due to its forthcoming expanded print edition through Limited Run, which is one of those sad but necessary things that has to be done when you sign a publishing contract, so this will probably be the last place you can buy the original version. By the way, I hope you’ll consider the new edition: it’s got added material on last year’s Shiren 6, a.k.a. The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island, and a whole lot on the whole Pokemon Mystery Dungeon series.
I know I’ve made a few of these self-promotional posts lately, mostly over the Loadstar collection and related topics. I’ve always been anxious about spreading the word about my projects, paid or otherwise. I’ve seen so many people who seem shameless about tooting their respective horns, but it’s kind of necessary, I guess, to be seen through the crowd.
Well there it is. There’s 15 days left in the bundle, so you have a bit of time left to make your decision. Please have a look.
The Greatest Hits Game Bundle 2 (storybundle.com)
This is part 1 of my (Josh Bycer’s) coverage of Turn-Based Thursday Fest from June 2025. This part features the games I received press keys to cover, the following parts will be demos.
00:00 Intro
00:21 None Shall Intrude
2:43 Lost for Swords
4:58 Pyrene
7:30 Arc Seed
9:25 Zet Zillions
11:50 Rogue Voltage
Owner of Game Wisdom with more than a decade of experience writing and talking about game design and the industry. I’m also the author of the “Game Design Deep Dive” series and “20 Essential Games to Study”
This is a showcase looking at my (Josh Bycer’s) favorite demos from Cerebral Puzzle Showcase June 2025 Edition.
00:00 Intro
00:20 Öoo
1:50 Node: The Last Favor of the Antarii
3:56 Puzzle Depot
5:37 The Button Effect
07:17 Trackastrophe
8:40 Glowkeeper
10:15 Looking for Fael
12:05 Miss Paint
13:37 Chipwits
I’d like to point out that Chipwits is a game we’ve covered here before!
In other news… itch.io has come under a firestorm over the past couple of days over their delisting a whole bunch of games that covered adult subjects because of pressure from their payment processors. As it turns out, those processors themselves have been targeted by a campaign from right-wing “Christian” organization Collective Shout. I have tried to prioritize links to itch.io, and even distribute software and books through that site, but now I’m going to have to think hard about alternatives. PCGamer has a good overview of the situation.
Owner of Game Wisdom with more than a decade of experience writing and talking about game design and the industry. I’m also the author of the “Game Design Deep Dive” series and “20 Essential Games to Study”
Balatro is still a thing, and a major update with lots of new jokers is due soon, but until then you might tide yourself over with an online multiplayer mod, available here for PC players.
Each player plays their own independent game of Balatro with the same seed, but when you reach a boss blind after the first one, you don’t play against one of Balatro’s many built-in bosses, but instead you try to beat the other player’s score at that same round. You’re told what their score is in the boss battle (if they’re playing it or have already finished it), but aren’t given other information like which jokers they have or their deck composition. Instead of the usual instant-lose scenario you get a limited number of lives. If you lose but still have a life left, you get some consolation money and get to keep playing. The last player remaining wins.
Beans Hambone made a video explaining how it’s played and offering some tips (10 minutes):
There are a few other changes, such as a handful of removed jokers, but also some new ones that take special advantage of the format. One unique aspect to multiplayer is, if you’re both in the Boss Blind and your opponent finishes their round and you already have a higher score, you immediately win the round at that point and don’t play your remaining hands. This can be bad (you might not get to use some money-earning jokers, scaling jokers don’t trigger and seals don’t get the chance to work) or good (you get all the money from the hands that round, and you might save glass cards from being broken).
If you’d like to see it in action, here’s popular Balatro Youtuber Roffle Lite playing some multiplayer matches (47 minutes):
Balatro Multiplayer Mod (balatromp.com)
My (Josh Bycer’s) latest review is up for Zexion and how it is one of the best metroidvanias of 2025, provided you are in the mood for a challenging game.
Owner of Game Wisdom with more than a decade of experience writing and talking about game design and the industry. I’m also the author of the “Game Design Deep Dive” series and “20 Essential Games to Study”
Some days I write explanations of Kirby Air Ride City Trial netplay. Some days I write guides to new web media sites. And some days, I found a silly shooter on Youtube that I feel you have to know about. Guess which today is, boing!
I honestly never got into Touhou-style games, even though I know they’re popular and influential. Maybe I’d like them if I gave them a shot, but there’s so many other things to explore out there, I just haven’t found the time.
That Touhou style, and their tremendous Japaneseness is part of what The Girl From Gunma Kai has going for it. According to its instruction screens, it’s a spinoff from a light novel from 2014, and a sequel to a short tie-in game to that novel. It’s on Steam for $10, which may seem a bit much for a relatively short game that purposely chases the MSX aesthetic, with backgrounds that don’t move smoothly but lurch along character block grid, and with large characters that overwrite the background they appear in front of. But that’s just the kind of thing it is.
It’s certainly got tons of personality. While you control a flying anime girl who blasts animals, daruma and steam locomotives(?), a large distracting version of that girl resides in the border, dancing to the music. The “dancing” mostly means being horizontally mirrored to the beat, meaning the feathers in her hair swap sides every frame. In the upper-right corner appear descriptions (and English translations) of the various enemies the girl attacks, giving you helpful information on them, like that this one is made of two different-colored sprites, and that one happens to be delicious to eat.
It’s still an entertaining game to watch. Here’s a one-credit playthrough, although it doesn’t earn all the letters in NEPTUNE (a reference to the Neptunia games) so doesn’t get to go on to the secret end stages. It’s 31 minutes long, but if you don’t have an affection for this kind of fare you probably won’t watch it all. A few minutes will give you the idea. (I did watch the whole thing, mind you.)
At the end of the instructions, it says: The game includes a strong homage to the MSX which (creator) HUGA dearly loves, particularly aiming for the cheap rough-around-the-edges vibe of CASIO-made games. Back in the day, there were tons of these unpolished games, and we think there’s room for at least one today. We hope this game sparks a wave of cheap, carefree and delightfully crude games flooding the world—games you can play without overthinking it.
HUGA, you and me both. I love both your style and your affection for that era. May The Girl From Gunma Kai take over the world!
The indie showcases highlight the many games we check out on the channel. Games shown are either demos, press keys, or from my own collection.
00:00 Intro
00:14 Withering Rooms
2:08 Encounters: Music Stories
2:57 Deck of Souls
4:15 Kingsgrave
6:46 Dungeons of Hinterberg
9:19 Into the Restless Ruins
Owner of Game Wisdom with more than a decade of experience writing and talking about game design and the industry. I’m also the author of the “Game Design Deep Dive” series and “20 Essential Games to Study”
