Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

LightNews

Jon, from Videogames

@desplesda.net

340 followers 150 following 69 posts

words in trees, cats in phones, doctorate in jerks online; 🧶 @YarnSpinner.dev, 😿 Night in the Woods, 🚀 I Feel Fine, 🎨 Leonardo, 💼 @SecretLab.games.

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Reposted by Jon, from Videogames

Dr Paris Buttfield-Addison @hey.paris · 19h

Had a wonderful time doing a panel about narrative games and @yarnspinner.dev at #PAXAus at 10PM (!!) last night! Awesome audience and questions. Thanks to @firkraags.bsky.social for joining @desplesda.net, @mcjones.bsky.social, and I!

Three white people, a lady, a man with long hair, another man with long hair and a beanie, and a man with a black cap on, smiling on a panel about interactive storytelling!

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 2d

Also: if you’re at @paxaus.bsky.social, come see us hooting and hollering about interactive narrative at 10PM Friday at the Dropbear Theatre!! aus.paxsite.com/en-us/schedu...

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

People keep coming up to me and see me wearing my @yarnspinner.dev branded clothes, and saying “hey we use Yarn Spinner and it rules!!” #NZGDC

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

Awesome shout-out from @balancingmonkeygames.com about how they’re using Yarn Spinner in their upcoming title Beyond These Stars ❤️ #NZGDC

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

(This is legit a good talk about some of the earliest writing about planning for achieving an emotional effect in your audience!)

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

I mean everyone already working in the industry already knows the answer is “nevermore”, ho ho ho ho #NZGDC

A man sits at a lectern, preparing to deliver a talk. The first slide is visible on the projector: “What Edgar Allan Poe Can Teach You About Game Design”

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

A cool idea: to test the dialogue apart from the rest of the narrative elements, @osaurusstudios.bsky.social did a table read of the interactive dialogue to ensure that it wasn’t too dense and that it was stylistically natural. (They’re just all playing through the game’s script in Inky together!)

A woman presents a slide, which contains a photo of a group of people at a coffee shop, all looking at a number of laptops. The slide has the title “Isolate the Script: Table Read”

The same woman stands and presents a different slide, containing a screenshot of the Inky dialogue editor. The slide shows Ink script on the left, and dialogue on the right.

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

In which @osaurusstudios.bsky.social pulls a bait-and-switch half way through her talk, “How Do You Playtest Stories”, where it turns out that in order to understand how players react to stories, we need to realise we’re actually playtesting feelings.

A woman stands at a lectern and presents a title slide: “How do you playtest FEELINGS”?

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

“Loot structures are useful for figuring out how to make a lot of items. In this example, we can use a table like this to figure out what we need to now make because we let players decide what their characters were going to be. Gosh, wasn’t that a mistake.”

Carl de Visser stands in front of a projected slide showing a table describing lootable armour, organised by character class and by tier, some of which are empty and ready to be filled in.

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

“This is an example of real-world late-game loot. This is not a museum. This is someone’s house in Wales.” Carl de Visser talking about loot design.

A man stands in front of a projected slide showing an opulent collection of looted artefacts from India. The caption reads “Loot - early 19th century (as a verb), from Hindi lūt, from Sanskrit luņțh- ‘rob’”

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

Checked out KUU by @interactivetragedy.com, a game with an absolutely gorgeous and stark aesthetic and amazing storytelling. Go take a look!

A photo of a video game called KUU, showing a highly stylised black-and-white illustration of a pyramid against a field of stars.

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 14d

It’s the last day of #NZGDC! Track me down (or book a meeting via yarnspinner.dev/nzgdc) and learn about how @yarnspinner.dev can help make your game’s narrative sing!

A man wearing a black beanie, a yellow shirt and a black mask kneels by a sign that reads “NZGDC 2025”

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 15d

#NZGDC, home of “we literally have Taika Waititi at home”

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 15d

On Summerfall doing 4 day weeks: David was uncertain and thought it was a 20% loss of productivity, so they tested it on an upcoming DLC, planned for 80% capacity, and shipped 10% earlier than planned - so while they did lose productivity, it was less than expected. Worth it for the side effects.

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 15d

“I have done narrative design in a certain way for a while.” - @davidgaider.bsky.social
“A thousand years.” - @liamesler.bsky.social
“Twenty years.” - David

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 15d

“A former boss of mine said that ‘culture is a year 3 problem - focus on success, and then you can fix the culture later.’ Nothing has so succinctly explained the games industry to me as that attitude.” - @liamesler.bsky.social and @davidgaider.bsky.social at NZGDC

Two men stand on a dais at a conference, presenting to a large room of seated people. A projector shows their current slide: “Lesson 1: Your team’s culture is YOUR problem”

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 15d

Hey, #NZGDC! This is TODAY! Come see me yell about DREDGE and Yarn Spinner, at 2:25 in Tāwhirimātea E!!

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 17d

Come see me talk about DREDGE and Yarn Spinner at #NZGDC on Friday! Learn about the wild tricks that @blacksaltgames.com did in the dialogue system we make!

NZGDC: Weaving the Net: DREDGE and Yarn Spinner. Fri 26th Sept 2:25pm, Tawhirimãtea E (Level 2). Learn how the indie hit DREDGE used Yarn Spinner, the friendly tool for interactive dialogue!

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 16d

Hey, #NZGDC! This is tomorrow!! Come see me yell about the neat things that DREDGE did with @yarnspinner.dev!

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 17d

Come see me talk about DREDGE and Yarn Spinner at #NZGDC on Friday! Learn about the wild tricks that @blacksaltgames.com did in the dialogue system we make!

NZGDC: Weaving the Net: DREDGE and Yarn Spinner. Fri 26th Sept 2:25pm, Tawhirimãtea E (Level 2). Learn how the indie hit DREDGE used Yarn Spinner, the friendly tool for interactive dialogue!

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 17d

Team @yarnspinner.dev (well, this bit of it, anyway) is off to #NZGDC!

A man with long brown hair wearing a black beanie and a black hoodie sits on a plane. He wears a black face mask. A small white and silver Yarn Spinner pin is attached to his chest.

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 17d

Come see me talk about DREDGE and Yarn Spinner at #NZGDC on Friday! Learn about the wild tricks that @blacksaltgames.com did in the dialogue system we make!

NZGDC: Weaving the Net: DREDGE and Yarn Spinner. Fri 26th Sept 2:25pm, Tawhirimãtea E (Level 2). Learn how the indie hit DREDGE used Yarn Spinner, the friendly tool for interactive dialogue!

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · 17d

I'm at #NZGDC from tomorrow, where I'm talking about how Yarn Spinner was used in a tiny little indie game called DREDGE! I'm also keen to chat to people about Yarn Spinner - you should book a time with me to talk dialogue systems! Yes, you! fantastical.app/desplesda/ya...

Reposted by Jon, from Videogames

Yarn Spinner @yarnspinner.dev · 24d

This week was Yarn Spinner’s 10th anniversary of our first public release but we were too busy to post because we were making a game (and props and all sorts) for our museum installation 🎉🎉🎉 Opening @ ACMI tonight!

Yarn Spinner @yarnspinner.dev · 24d

Three of us are off to Melbourne to attend the launch of the @acmimuseum.bsky.social Game Worlds exhibition, for which we built “Hint Line ‘93”, a game about a fictional console’s hint line, exploring a lost bit of game culture….

Check it out! www.acmi.net.au/about/media/...

Three Caucasian men sitting next each other on a plane. They all wear black masks, one has large headphones, one has glasses and one has a hat. They are wearing collared shirts and making a surprised face at the camera.

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · Aug 27

Ticket sales for /dev/world and XWorld close TODAY! Come along to the best little developer and admin conferences in Australia! devworld.au

/dev/world/2025

/dev/world/2025 is Australia's longest running conference for macOS and iOS developers and designers.

Reposted by Jon, from Videogames

Yarn Spinner @yarnspinner.dev · Aug 21

The new Prince of Persia game made by Dead Cells devs at @evilempirestudio.bsky.social just shadow-dropped 1.0 yesterday onto a bunch of platforms and the mix of this franchise with their flair has made something really special.

Congrats on the release, mates! 🎉 youtu.be/MMyp3-wKykQ?...

The Rogue Prince of Persia 1.0 Launch Trailer

YouTube video by Evil Empire

Jon, from Videogames @desplesda.net · Aug 15

We got commissioned to make a thing for ACMI, the screen museum! So we’re (@secretlab.games and @yarnspinner.dev) making Hint Line ‘93, a little game about being a game hint line worker! It’ll be on the museum floor from 18 Sep later this year! Learn more from ACMI: www.acmi.net.au/about/media/...

The words "Hint Line 93" appear in a garish pink font, over a garish 90s Memphis design pattern. Below, eight people stand holding retro cabled phones, with a mixture of expressions: angry, confused, happy, smug. emi doi looks relieved and wears denim overalls on a pink T-shirt; Emesha Rudolf looks exasperated and wears a blue cap sideways over pink, white and black striped jacket; Mick Davies yells into a phone while wearing a plain white T-shirt; Oli Potter looks smug with a hand on his hip, wearing a knitted grey jumper; Harris Sari looks confused and wears a red and black checkered flannel jacket; PJ Madam wears a tartan flannel shirt and looks like she's demanding to speak to your manager; Bryce Tollard-Williams wears a backwards baseball cap and a brightly coloured shirt and is yelling into the air; Scott Lleonart wears circular tinted glasses, a headband and a blue denim jacket, and looks up at the sky, evidently pleased.