Problem Machine

Problem Machine

@problemmachine.bsky.social

Artist, game developer, writer, overthinker, etc. Current project is Bound City, a game about a strange dying place that might be a metaphor for something. (He/They)

71 followers146 following79 posts

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

This is getting a bit of attention so I'd like to expand on it a bit. What the compiler offers to the programmer is a way to a) describe their mental model and b) reify it into a behavior for the executing machine. The process of programming is the process of unambiguously describing this model.

Problem Machine@problemmachine.bsky.social

Quoting myself from a day ago - "The problem is thinking that the product of a programmer is code. It isn't, really, the code is just the final stage. The actual valuable thing the programmer produces is the underlying mental model. Without that, the code is just tech debt"

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Once the model is exhaustively and correctly described, this is the program. It is complete. This is why I personally see relatively little utility for LLMs in programming: If I can describe the model accurately, I've basically programmed it, and if I can't then I still have work to do.

Problem Machine reposted

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Almost all of my music writing for the past 5 years or so has been for the game I'm making, so I decided I wanted to spend some time writing a piece for its own sake. Pretty happy with how it turned out! soundcloud.com/problem-mach...

soundcloud.comThe Incomprehensible and Deadly Love Poetry of StarsIt's been a while since I've written any music not intended as soundtrack for my game project. Quite happy with how this one turned out, some fruitful experimentation with frequency band splitting eff
Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Almost all of my music writing for the past 5 years or so has been for the game I'm making, so I decided I wanted to spend some time writing a piece for its own sake. Pretty happy with how it turned out! soundcloud.com/problem-mach...

soundcloud.comThe Incomprehensible and Deadly Love Poetry of StarsIt's been a while since I've written any music not intended as soundtrack for my game project. Quite happy with how this one turned out, some fruitful experimentation with frequency band splitting eff
Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

9games.pages.dev/s/dhkfnkv7

9games.pages.devもっと広めたいSteamゲーム9選 / 9 Steam Games I Want to Spread同時に自分に合ったゲームも見つかる / Find games that suit you, too.
Kars@karoshimyriad.bsky.social

"Urban Myth Dissolution Center" developer MOCHIKIN created a website that lets you share 9 Steam games that you would like to see more widely known. The website will also provide recommendations to similar games based on your picks. 9games.pages.dev

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

I've been playing a lot of banger games recently but I finished Look Outside a few days ago and am still thinking about it. Highly recommended, though be aware it is a somewhat brutally idiosyncratic survival-horror JRPG. store.steampowered.com/app/3373660/...

store.steampowered.comLook Outside on SteamLook Outside is a survival horror RPG set in a single apartment building. A mysterious event turns anyone who looks out the window into grotesque monsters, leaving the world in absolute chaos. Scaveng...

Problem Machine reposted

maura quint
@mauraquint.bsky.social

My whole life, advocating war has been fed to me as “the adult position,” akin to drinking your coffee black or reading the business section of the newspaper. Let’s be very clear — war is the childish nonsense of impulsive destructive idiots playing baby-brained video games with real human lives.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Occasionally I see an artist frustrated and saying that they'll never be as good as they want to be, so why bother, and, like... No one is ever as good as they want to be? The more one improves as an artist, or as much of anything, the more the scope of what they know is possible expands.

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Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

This is incidentally why AI generations are not a useful medium. Skipping over this process means you will never develop the eye, the ear, the skill of knowing what is or isn't working and why. Even if you already have these skills, bypassing the process leads to a sterile output.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Some people talk about this as it's missing "soul" or whatever, but I don't like that sort of mysticism. What it's missing is the unexpected texture generated in the process of creation, the fingerprint, the happy accident. It can only ever be exactly as expected and never more.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Occasionally I see an artist frustrated and saying that they'll never be as good as they want to be, so why bother, and, like... No one is ever as good as they want to be? The more one improves as an artist, or as much of anything, the more the scope of what they know is possible expands.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Also. Fucking up the thing you imagined is often the first step in discovering something much cooler than you imagined. Creating exactly the thing you wanted might not actually lead to the best outcome. I think far more talent comes from learning how to harness these moments than how to avoid them.

Problem Machine reposted

Aura
@aurahack.ca

i am begging game developers and musicians who are not putting your soundtracks on bandcamp/ampwall to just... do that... please... i will not be streaming your music off A Music Service. let me actually give you money.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

It's time to face that books simply aren't a good medium for storytelling. Such a dry and linear medium has no way to convey systems or relationships outside of tiny snapshots to the player, or so-called "reader." This will be true until they innovate by adding LED screens and buttons to the books.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

An obsession with form over function -- except that's not right, is it? A belief that form IS function, and once you learn to mimic the form well enough that's the same thing as creating a functional replica. Which maybe works fine until there's literally any change of context.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

A fake it 'til you make it approach to teaching reading. It might work, if we never needed to read anything besides picture books. But at that point you're not really using the text at all, are you? It's the opposite of learning to read.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

Not specifically game design, but I think my primary principle for art in general: Find the tension, then emphasize it. Some people like to resolve it too. That part is optional though.

Kate Gray@hownottodraw.bsky.social

What's your number one personal game design principle? And even better - does it have a cool name?

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

I have made a public demo for my game Bound City available! About an hour long, containing one zone and bits of others. Please check it out, wishlist, tell everyone you've ever met, fraudulently inflate my numbers, etc. Every little bit helps. store.steampowered.com/app/3871260/...

store.steampowered.comBound City on SteamAn action-packed and bittersweet adventure in a city of endless night. Explore the dying city and try to find your way to the tower that seems to be at the heart of it all. Nothing is quite as it appe...

Problem Machine reposted

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

I need to get in the habit of doing this... um, habitually. Here's my game's store page! It won't be out for a long while yet but wish lists and spreading the word will help that happen! Thank you! store.steampowered.com/app/3871260/...

store.steampowered.comBound City on SteamAn action-packed and bittersweet adventure in a city of endless night. Explore the dying city and try to find your way to the tower that seems to be at the heart of it all. Nothing is quite as it appe...
Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

I need to get in the habit of doing this... um, habitually. Here's my game's store page! It won't be out for a long while yet but wish lists and spreading the word will help that happen! Thank you! store.steampowered.com/app/3871260/...

store.steampowered.comBound City on SteamAn action-packed and bittersweet adventure in a city of endless night. Explore the dying city and try to find your way to the tower that seems to be at the heart of it all. Nothing is quite as it appe...

Problem Machine reposted

hypoderanged anchoress
@lugubriouscreature.bsky.social

i played an alpha build a year or two ago, and this game is going to be great.

Problem Machine@problemmachine.bsky.social

After a few years in the cooker (and a few left to go), I've finally taken the big step of getting a Steam store page set up for Bound City! store.steampowered.com/app/3871260/...

store.steampowered.comBound City on SteamAn action-packed and bittersweet adventure in a city of endless night. Explore the dying city and try to find your way to the tower that seems to be at the heart of it all. Nothing is quite as it appe...
Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

This year I: Worked on Bound City. That is all. It's a lot of work! I had hoped to have chapter 2 done by April, and it's now looking likely...ish that I can finish it next month. Currently: 5 boss fights (3 new this year) 28 enemy types (16 new) 30-40k words (Lots new, hard to count)

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

After replaying Silent Hill 2 and watching most of a playthrough of the remake, I have to say that while it seems like a pretty good game, and maybe even a pretty good Silent Hill game, it doesn't seem like a very good adaptation of the things that were most interesting about Silent Hill 2

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Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

And while I think the combat did need to be reworked in some way (the Eddie beat in particular falls pretty flat in the original due to the silliness of trading shots at point blank range), the particular direction they took it in, and emphasis they put on it, is itself destructive to the tone

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

The real bummer is all of that stuff that makes it not great as a SH2 adaptation would have been outstanding if it was an adaptation of the first or third games, which are much less reserved in their imagery. But SH2 is the one that got made because it was the most prestigious.

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

After replaying Silent Hill 2 and watching most of a playthrough of the remake, I have to say that while it seems like a pretty good game, and maybe even a pretty good Silent Hill game, it doesn't seem like a very good adaptation of the things that were most interesting about Silent Hill 2

Problem Machine
@problemmachine.bsky.social

The style of SH2 is one of minimalism and overwhelming despair, conveyed by architecture that slowly warps and corrodes over time, and what I see in the remake is a kind of bombastic degradation that seems at odds with that

Problem Machine reposted

Rami Ismail (رامي)
@ramiismail.com

Instead of on Twitter - let's try this here & see if it works by now. If you're developing a game, or released one: reply with the title, description, screenshots, and/or a link. Doesn't matter what stage of development you're in. Then repost this, and let's see what cool stuff we're all making.

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