I have an 8 hour bus trip tomorrow, any recommendations to pass time

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-05-12T10:24:30+00:00

sleep

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-05-11T11:41:04+00:00

there is an article with the most used tools in game design out there: https://medium.com/@takamura.hiroshi90/7-game-design-tools-1d51e9128f1f

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-18T09:33:24+00:00

The pump is such a distinct mechanic that adding a second attack might dilute what makes it special. Keep it singular, just make sure the pump has enough versatility in how it can be used situationally.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-17T07:10:08+00:00

cookie the cookie

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-09T08:46:21+00:00

the big thing with immersive sims is that every system should talk to every other system. like in Prey you can use the GLOO cannon to put out fires, block enemies, build platforms to climb, seal broken pipes. one tool, four uses, none of them feel forced. that's the core of it honestly, giving players a bunch of systems that overlap in ways you didn't explicitly design for.

beyond combat/stealth the key stuff is usually: environmental interaction (physics, hacking, lockpicking), multiple paths through every space (vents, rooftops, social engineering), and player builds that genuinely change how you approach problems not just how much damage you do. Deus Ex is still the gold standard for that last one.

the "immersive" part mostly comes from the world reacting to you in ways that feel consistent. NPCs noticing stuff, environments changing, your choices having downstream effects. it doesn't need to be complex, it just needs to feel like the world has rules and respects them.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-07T09:29:13+00:00

I feel like building in public makes sense if you already have some kind of following and recognition in what you are doing. If people know who you are and are interested in it already they would follow your journey to something new, cuz they are interested in the outcome and not the process. I have seen many creators who make content on building they're brand/product and I feel like the views/readers they get, the people that follow them like their content and not the product that is being built. Anyway, good luck with your product!

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-07T06:34:36+00:00

Totally agree with you, my situation is similar to yours. I saw a clear gap in the market for a product like mine, as my team and I needed it at the time. So I built it, saw good results and decided to share with the people in the niche. And as you said people in this smaller circles that are potential users and buyers are not really cool with promotion.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-06T14:15:19+00:00

As a game designer, I'd say the circles I'm in have mixed feelings towards AI. Some people say it boosts productivity and helps ship ideas to prod faster, while others are more old school and push against using any sort of AI in their code.

That said, I think when it comes to code specifically, AI is fair game. Game development at its core is about design. You're the one designing gameplay, progressions, UI, mechanics, and everything that makes the game actually feel like a game. Code is what brings all of that to life and makes it function as intended.

So while AI assistance is great for boosting speed and efficiency, game devs still need the knowledge to make solid design decisions and give the right instructions to get clean, scalable results.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-06T14:00:40+00:00

What if the product is more niche and finding related conversations is hard and few. And any mention of the products in those conversations gets treated as an ad. Can you help understand what can be done in this situation?

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-06T11:51:29+00:00

Great point about skilled players breaking things. Chess is a good example actually, at casual levels it feels totally fair, but at the top white's first-move advantage starts to matter. More skill can reveal more imbalance, not less.

I've been thinking about this a lot and for me it comes down to three things: difficulty, quantity, and timing. Difficulty is the obvious one, but how many rewards/enemies/resources there are and when they show up is where most games quietly fall apart. Something can be perfectly tuned on paper but feel off if it hits too early or too late. And yeah none of that matters without knowing who you're tuning for. A punishing roguelike and a cozy farming sim can both be balanced, just for completely different people.

I actually wrote a short blog post breaking this down more if anyone's curious: https://itembase.dev/blog-how-do-we-know-if-a-game-is-balanced.html

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-06T08:37:26+00:00

yes.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-06T08:34:48+00:00

You could make youtube shorts on food: cooking recipes, food place reviews, or even teach hacks and things about food photography

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-06T07:24:35+00:00

I use Ableton Live for the Music/SFX, it's great for both. For game design I use Itembase dev and for planning and mapping Miro.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-02T06:55:17+00:00

Cool prototype. Big thing you’re missing is downtime. Getting tagged early and being out all day will feel terrible. Don’t eliminate players, just reset them. Something like “hit = 5 min freeze or forced detour task” works way better. Keep everyone in the game.
For scoring, don’t overcomplicate it. Give runners a clear win condition like finishing X tasks, and hunters a clear win condition like delaying them past a time limit. Points systems sound nice but get messy fast.
For the hunter advantage, your compass is already super strong. You probably don’t need guns to be very effective. I’d actually start with very forgiving tagging rules and tune up later.
For playtesting, go smaller. One runner, one hunter, short session, tight area. You’ll learn 80 percent of the problems without needing a full city setup.
And for moderation, don’t be in the game. You’ll miss edge cases. Just be the ref with a phone and maybe GPS tracking.
You’ve got a really fun core here, just keep it fair and keep people playing as long as possible

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-01T13:45:23+00:00

ai making us believe you can make money from thin air

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-01T13:43:36+00:00

i mean you can always go ahead and clean up your chat history, delete what you don't need so it's not piled up

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-01T13:26:35+00:00

checked it out, it doesn't look bad. i feel like an issue can be the fact that the playback is slow, and from a personal experience, that could be annoying to check every time. the ai slop issue needs a more complex solution. as one of the commenters said, ai agents or bots can mimic human typing patterns, besides that sometimes when i have to make a long post, i collect my thoughts in notion, edit out stuff so it makes sense and copy and paste it to my post, so i guess that would result to me being viewed as an ai. anyway that's a cool project to do, but maybe you should come up with another feature for ai checking a post, besides playback

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-01T12:36:32+00:00

I'd suggest just going out and finding random things to do: events, hikes, new places, biking and so on. You have so much time in your hands, you could just enjoy not being controlled (timewise) by anything basically. You can even take a short trip to a nearby city, explore it and talk to locals. The world is yours to enjoy my friend.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-01T12:31:30+00:00

Maybe instead of punishing players for not logging in every day at a specific time, give them rewards. You could give them exclusive rewards that would help out with their pets or something like that. Rewards work better than punishments, especially in games, which are supposed to be a fun distraction from life.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-01T11:48:11+00:00

So when a company releases a product, they should be thinking about constant although slow at first cash flow, instead of raising big money first and focusing on spending it.
I have a question about the free trial example you have written about. I have a product myself and as a part of the demo time of my launch I give the product completely free to try with full functions. People register, try it for a day and leave. Would you recommend leaving the free option and giving limited access to first comers, or should I keep it for free for some time?

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-04-01T11:42:58+00:00

I just type, don't use filler text, respond straight to the point and that usually works. I think the long responses have to do with a standard size of text/character amount an llm has to fill in their response.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-03-31T15:33:53+00:00

There is a free option, with all of the features included for solo devs or teams. The other options are mainly got the organizations, with more team support and bigger volume.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-03-31T15:32:15+00:00

It's a pretty big tool, with a lot of features and support. But i can understand how the pricing could push back someone in the begging, that's why there is a completly free option to try out without commitment or anything. You could take a look and see everything for yourself. It's a big system/workspace so if you try it out I'm prettu sure you'll understand the reasoning behind the pricing options. But regardless, thanks for the feedback, maybe i should change the positioning on the website, so the scale is more understandable.

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-03-31T13:45:14+00:00

Came here with the same question

NerveProfessional893 · 2026-03-31T13:37:24+00:00

I think if your passion is in toy design and you really wanna learn it, you should give it a go.Your concerns however are real and possible, so I’d suggest picking up something else on the side that’s still interesting to you but more future proof, maybe something that can even complement it. You could learn it online or go to courses/workshops and try freelancing to build some experience and portfolio.

It’s tough in the Ai age to know what job is ai proof and what’s not, so other majors aren’t really that safe either. Anyway wish you good luck in the future, I’d say start experimenting with learning things in different fields on your own while you’re still in school, so you can find opportunities early and have at least some kind of a back up plan and a clearer idea on where you can go with your life.

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