Pixelated Playgrounds

In this episode Josh and Bryan have a relatively timely (for them) discussion of 2025’s surprise indie hit Blue Prince! Blue Prince puts you in the shoes of Simon P. Jones, a boy who recently willed the Mt. Holly Estate, a mansion owned by his deceased great uncle Herbert S. Sinclair. There’s one catch: Simon must locate a hidden 46th room within the mansion in order to secure his inheritance. In addition to this challenge the estate’s rooms continually reset and re-arrange each day. What starts as a card drafting puzzle asking the player to connect the right rooms to open the way to the 46th room evolves quickly into a nested and broad ranging puzzle to unravel the mysteries of the Mt. Holly Estate and the family that has occupied it. Bryan and Josh very much enjoyed their time unravelling the game’s puzzles, but came away with differing opinions on how it made use of its intricate backstory, mind-bending puzzles, and random generation elements. Overall, both agree that this was a game worth experiencing for the novel ways it combined its gameplay focuses and storytelling methods. So grab your magnifying glass and get ready to investigate the Mt. Holly Hill Estate with Josh and Bryan as they discuss Blue Prince! Three Word Reviews: Bryan - Roguelike Epistemic Crisis Josh - Puzzle Versus Roguelike

In this podcast Josh and Bryan hit the road! … And the road hits back! While crisscrossing the fictional countryside in YCJY Games’ Keep Driving both of our hosts recorded their fair share of stories and this podcast was the perfect opportunity to share them with each other, and with all of you! Borrowing inspiration from Oregon Trail and injecting a healthy dose of 2000’s era coming-of-age nostalgia, Keep Driving generates stories that will inevitably resonate players of a certain vintage. Aside from being a potent ‘interesting-situation’ generator, Keep Driving is also a compelling resource management game as the player strives to keep all the needs of your driver and passengers topped up while battling against the trials and tribulations on the road. Flat Tires, Check Engine Lights, and Low Gas indicators come for us all, but Bryan and Josh did their best to keep moving down the road. So listen in as we recount our stories of life behind the wheel… Three Word Reviews: Bryan - Down Memory Lane Josh - Farewell to Youth Songs Used: Westkust - Swirl Crystal Boys - Gold Crystal Boys - Nightlife Zimmer Grandioso - Hometowns Zimmer Grandioso - Cowboy Pills Westkust - 0700 Fucking Werewolf Asso - The Tito Beltran Massacre Westkust - Drown Westkust - Weekends Holy Now - Wake Up

Bryan and Josh recently took off the gloves and picked up a katana to play Shogun Showdown, a kinetic turn-based tactics game that has you dispatching waves of enemy warriors through careful positioning and timely deployment of combat skills. Sporting roguelike and deckbuilding elements along with a strong Japanese-inspired pixel art aesthetic, Shogun Showdown is surprisingly deep for operating on a 1-dimentional battlefield. Like most of the guys’ favorite roguelikes, the game allows the player a great deal of choice in how you build out your own ninja and each run is always giving the player a new view into how to best take out your samurai and ninja foes. So dodge that incoming ninja star and tune into Bryan and Josh’s discussion on the finer points of ninja tactics as they discuss Shogun Showdown! Three Word Reviews: Bryan - Combat Dancing Poem Josh - One Dimensional Greatness

You're on a path in the woods, and at the end of that path is a cabin. And in the basement of that cabin is a Podcast… I mean Princess. In this episode Bryan, Josh, and Clint steel their nerves and descend the staircase to discuss Slay the Princess. Developed by Black Tabby Games and released for PC in 2024, Slay the Princess was developed as a side project to support the ongoing development of their other game Scarlet Hollow. And what a side project it is! Boasting a dizzying variety of possible outcomes, Slay the Princess is a fascinatingly broad and cerebral visual novel that explores a lot of interesting themes in a very economical approach to storytelling and a stylish black and white hand-drawn aesthetic. However, what starts as merely a provocative 4th wall breaking narrative eventually gives way to something even more surreal and captivating. So grab your dagger… I mean headphones… and listen in as the guys explore the multitude of ways to Slay the Princess! But remember: Its a love story… Show Notes: The Egg by Andy Weir [https://www.galactanet.com/oneoff/theegg.html] Three Word Reviews: Bryan - Personality Uncertainty Principle Josh - Power of Story Clint - What Just Happened

Have you ever wanted to play a turn-based city builder that’s inspired by Luck be a Landlord [https://store.steampowered.com/app/1404850/Luck_be_a_Landlord/] and Islanders [https://store.steampowered.com/app/1046030/ISLANDERS/]? That’s drenched in a stylish cyberpunk aesthetic and boasts intricate tactical depth? One with a dark sense of humor and killer hip-hop inspired soundtrack? Well you’re in luck! Josh’s latest game, Neongarten [https://store.steampowered.com/app/3211750/Neongarten/], is releasing on April 22nd, 2025 on Steam! As is tradition, Bryan and Josh sat down to record a podcast about the game, its inspirations, and the process of creating it. Neongarten was a novel experience for Josh to develop for a variety of reasons, not least of which was working in 3d and a new engine, Godot. This time around Josh also partnered with Goblinz Publishing to take the game to the next level. With the initial prototype finishing up just ahead of the birth of his second child, Neongarten has been a game that’s grown alongside his own family and alongside his own craft as a game developer. So listen in as Bryan interviews Josh about how he riffed, fixed, and remixed his way to creating the game he envisioned those many months ago, and check it out when it releases on April 22nd, 2025! Show Notes: Neongarten Steam Page [https://store.steampowered.com/app/3211750/Neongarten/] Goblinz Publishing [https://store.steampowered.com/publisher/goblinz_publishing/] TinyMass Games [https://tinymassgames.itch.io/] Neongarten’s Composer, Joel Kent, is part of Audimus [https://www.audimus.net/] Dex is the album [https://soundcloud.com/audimus-music/sets/dex-hip-hop-grooves] that helped inspire the game