James "Care Level Zero" Henley

Fresh intro time! I'm a #gamedev with 20+ years of design experience. Current: Senior Game Designer on Darkest Dungeon 2 Past: Jade Empire, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Star Wars: The Old Republic, and a few others Frequent #Twitch & #YouTube streamer & occasional drawer of cute girls & emotes.

“Forward now, into oblivion's inky embrace.” Darkest Dungeon II is available now on Nintendo Switch 2! Get the Nintendo Switch 2 upgrade for improved frame rates, Joy-Con 2™ Mouse support, plus combat and driving speed settings.

Now with scanlines! This is some good stuff.

My co-host and I, both being former BioWare, spent a lot of last night's show reminiscing & talking about what BW meant to us. In both of our cases, it launched 20+ year careers in #gamedev and became foundational to our identity as designers. What was BioWare to you? #RememberBioWare #N7verForget

SHOWTIME! On tonight's Virtual Couch, two game devs continue to unravel the intricacies (and weirdness) of interconnected stories in 428: SHIBUYA SCRAMBLE! Second last VC before hiatus? #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HCr... #GoLive #428 #VN

Copy Cats is releasing on 29th! Work together with your copies and help the real kitty reach the goal portal! Try out the free demo on Steam Next Fest! 👉 store.steampowered.com/app/4700300/... #gamedev #indiedev #pixelart #ドット絵 #puzzlegame

With that, the studio that gave me my start in this industry 22 years ago is roundly murdered after years of abuse and mismanagement at the hands of EA.

This week's #Twitch & #YouTube #Schedule! Obviously I'm back on Fridays only so we're going to focus on 428: Shibuya Scramble until I have to go on hiatus to support the move and that hiatus is coming pretty soon, I suspect. Scarcely 6 weeks until we're wheels up. See you Friday to chill!

📣 INDIE GAMES DEVS! 📣 If you have a demo in Steam Next Fest and do not use gen AI, drop it in the comments below. I will repost! Let's create a thread where players can actually find our games! (Image courtesy of @kanaratron.bsky.social)

About 11 hours left to pick this up

I had good luck with my older Genesis / Sega CD hardware still working along with almost all games but I decided to push it a step further and involve a Retrotink unit. Here's Shining Force 2 clean & upscaled! I haven't had a chance to mess with the scanline emulation yet but this is great. #Retro

SHOWTIME! On tonight's Virtual Couch, two game devs try to recall what they were doing as we get back to the best game we never finished! Timelines collide & mysteries abound in 428: SHIBUYA SCRAMBLE! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVnY... #GoLive #428 #VN

Thus begins the incredibly difficult process of re-homing our cats.

This week's #Twitch and #YouTube #Schedule! Despite everything going on, we're still good for some Virtual Couch and we're finally getting back onto 428: Shibuya Scramble with an eye towards finishing it at a brisk pace! The backlog looms.

昔描いた、らしく無いドット絵。 #ドット絵

Our visas have been issued so it's now official: we're moving to Japan!! \o/ Friday Virtual Couch on #Twitch & #YouTube will continue until the move interrupts it and will reconvene on the other side after some settling; that show already runs on JST-appropriate time. ;)

SHOWTIME! On tonight's Virtual Couch, two game devs commit crimes against fashion one more time as we return for a night of Dressmaker! Yes, really. Again. #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=az30... #GoLive #Dressmaker

IT'S DONEEEEE!! 🎉✨ Ryne-Arca is finally complete!! Now it's all about polishing, squashing those last little bugs, and pushing the quality even higher! Going full focus so I can release it around next month! #RyneArca #indiegame #gamedev

'Cosmic Dog' is hiring a Level Designer to join their team in United States #leveldesign #gamedev #gamedevjobs #gamedevelopment #hiring #indiedev

With Zero Company wrapped up, my temporary return to a normal schedule comes to a close so that I can focus on dealing with the upcoming move. Friday Night VC will continue relatively unabated; just Mon/Wed done for now. Thank you for a really fun past 2 months, all! <3 #Twitch #YouTube

SHOWTIME! Skittles Squad antics reach their finale in Zero Company Hard // Permadeath // Honor Beskar Ep 12! Also: some surprise Quadrant! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Is3m... #GoLive #StarWarsZeroCompany

This week's #Twitch and #YouTube #Schedule! We're going to wrap up our ridiculous Zero Company playthrough and then I'm back under my rock to prepare, given recent news. That said, Friday night Virtual Couch will continue and we'll be giving Dressmaker a second look this week!

SHOWTIME! On tonight's Virtual Couch, two game devs commit crimes against fashion as we turn Daimeow into the prettiest princess in DRESSMAKER! Yes, really. #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QNr... #GoLive #Dressmaker

your response to “I was raped” should not be “I was right”

This is one of those days where I open social media and get the distinct impression that I have missed some very vile, very recent game industry news.

I am altering the #schedule. Pray I do not alter it further. I decided to wrap Zero Company up Monday so that we can stick to the normal time slot for the finale. To cap two months of weird one-shots, Virtual Couch will instead be committing crimes against fashion in Dressmaker! #Twitch #YouTube

SHOWTIME! Skittles Squad antics continue in Zero Company Hard // Permadeath // Honor Beskar Ep 11! Starting early and going long as we gun towards the end! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mi_E... #GoLive #StarWarsZeroCompany

Odd schedule this week as we race to wrap the remainder of Zero Company before I vanish into a hole to pack for the move! I have a rare day off & missed Monday so we're starting at an EU-friendly time today and gunning an extra couple of hours to make up. See you soon! #Twitch #YouTube #Schedule

We're hiring! We're looking for a Writer and Narrative Designer to join the Fallen London team at a senior or mid level. This position is permanent, remote, and full time, which for us means 35 hours a week. #GamesJobs

Yes, you can parry with a gun in our game #gamedev #pixelart

Red Hook Studios is #hiring We are currently looking for a Gameplay Engineer to join our team in #Vancouver. Apply here: redhookgames.bamboohr.com/careers/41 #gamedev #yvr

I'm not going to have time to post the usual schedule stuff today but please not that there is NO SHOW TONIGHT. I got the info I needed for the consulate trip so I have to take care of some things tonight. We'll get back on ZCOM ASAP.

SHOWTIME! Skittles Squad antics continue in Zero Company Hard // Permadeath // Honor Beskar Ep 10! Time to make some serious bank on the "last" mission! Like we believe that. #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqEp... #GoLive #StarWarsZeroCompany

SHOWTIME! Skittles Squad antics continue in Zero Company Hard // Permadeath // Honor Beskar Ep 9! Doogie Howitzer continues mainlining mayhem as we get back to our mission-in-progress! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDSE... #GoLive #StarWarsZeroCompany

Come work with me!

Looks like we're good to fit tonight's show in, so no sudden cancellations yet!

SHOWTIME! Skittles Squad antics continue in Zero Company Hard // Permadeath // Honor Beskar! We'll keep making progress and see this one through before recent news shadow retires me! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0eP... #GoLive #StarWarsZeroCompany

This week's very tentative #Twitch and #YouTube #Schedule! Daimeow's unavailable so I'm taking over Friday at an earlier time. We're going to keep pushing through ZCom with the Skittles Squad where I can, given recent news. Cancellations may come suddenly; nature of the beast right now!

SHOWTIME! Tonight's Virtual Couch features DRAMATIC ROAD as, in very VC fashion, we cover an unknown SRPG instead of the expected! The Quadrant unveils tonight! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=XE3W... #GoLive #DramaticRoad #SRPG

Shame I'm not actually running a show tonight after all.

Who's got two thumbs and a COE for a Japanese visa? It's been a long road but we're one step closer to fulfilling a 30 year dream.

Crunch is embarrassing.

SHOWTIME! Skittles Squad returns for more skullduggery in Zero Company on Hard // Permadeath // Honor Beskar! Also: I'll be taking a break mid-show to discuss something very important. #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=la7D... #GoLive #StarWarsZeroCompany

SHOWTIME! The bubblegum explosion and the Skittles Squad return for more skullduggery in Zero Company on Hard // Permadeath // Bronzeman (AKA honor-system Beskar; nobody trusts autosave)! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVgY... #GoLive #StarWarsZeroCompany

Yesterday marked 22 years as a #gamedev. I've been a designer for literally half my life now despite how often the industry has tried to kill me. <_<; I tried to think of an appropriate celebratory image but, really, it's mostly felt like this One Step From Eden GIF!

sluuuurp

A little day-shuffling on this week's #Twitch and #YouTube #Schedule as our fully loaded September continues with more Skittles Squad action in Zero Company on Hard // Permadeath // Bronzeman (AKA Honor Beskar)! Friday night we'll be featuring an SRPG but not the big one releasing this week! ;)

SHOWTIME! Tonight's Virtual Couch features EX SANGUIS, spiritual successor to gothic rogue-lite TRPG Othercide, as it enters Early Access! #Twitch: www.twitch.tv/carelevelzero #YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlcN... Devs: @lightbulbcrew.bsky.social #GoLive #ExSanguis