Load ’em up and aim down below as we discuss the concept of “Shooting Yourself in the Foot”, or ruining the fun in games. Listen in as we talk about stories where we ruined our own fun and how you can stop players from doing the same in your game!

Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/house-of-games/message

Chapters

00:00 Episode Intro

00:55 Introducing the Theme for the Episode: Shooting Yourself in the Foot

03:02 Open-World Games and Collectibles

13:41 How Developers Are Shooting Themselves in the Foot

14:28 Open-World Games (in Space) Are Overhyped and Over-Promised

17:32 Sunset Moon Update

19:48 Shooting Yourself in the Foot With Trophies

25:29 Achievements in KnifeBoy

29:45 The Antidote

42:33 Why Open World Space Games Are Boring, Continued

47:53 Points of No Return in Games

52:23 Problems and Solutions for Card Games Inside Video Games

58:00 How Developing Games Replaces Playing Games

01:03:15 Episode Outro

Your Hosts and Their Games

• https://store.steampowered.com/app/2436180/Sunset_Moon/ — Wishlist Sunset Moon on Steam!
• https://www.play-asia.com/red-colony-trilogy/13/70fmjh — Buy the Red Colony trilogy on Switch!
• https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/24596/Red_Colony_Uncensored_Threesome_Bundle/ — Buy the Red Colony trilogy on Steam!
• https://www.nintendo.com/store/products/knifeboy-rebooted-switch/ — Buy KnifeBoy on Switch!
• https://store.steampowered.com/app/889130/KnifeBoy_Rebooted/ — Buy KnifeBoy on Steam!
• https://ottowretling.medium.com/list/game-development-427e99aefd01 — Read Otto’s blog about game development!
• https://discord.gg/mYM72SQ9CP — The discord server for Game Hub Umeå.
• https://youtu.be/drUKDVWgeTo?si=6CRqqX1Rzn3VQbyK — Credits to Miketendo64 for the KnifeBoy gameplay background footage.

Games

• https://ashorthike.com/ — The homepage for A Short Hike.
• https://www.blasphemous2game.com/ — The homepage for Blasphemous 2.
• https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/bloodborne/ — The homepage for Bloodborne.
• https://zelda.nintendo.com/breath-of-the-wild/ — The homepage for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.
• https://eldenring.com/ — The homepage for Elden Ring.
• https://www.rockstargames.com/games/sanandreas — The homepage for Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
• https://www.rockstargames.com/games/IV — The homepage for Grand Theft Auto IV.
• https://www.half-life.com/en/halflife25 — The homepage for the 25th anniversary editon of Half-Life.
• https://mariokart8.nintendo.com/ — The homepage for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe.
• https://www.nomanssky.com/ — The homepage for No Man’s Sky.
• https://www.residentevil.com/5/ — The homepage for Resident Evil 5.
• https://bethesda.net/en/game/starfield — The homepage for Starfield.
• https://www.stardewvalley.net/ — The homepage for Stardew Valley.
• https://supermariobroswonder.nintendo.com/ — The homepage for Super Mario Bros. Wonder.
• https://www.ubisoft.com/en-gb/game/assassins-creed/ — The homepage for the Assassin’s Creed franchise.
• https://fallout.bethesda.net/en — The homepage for the Fallout franchise.
• https://finalfantasy.com/ — The homepage for the Final Fantasy franchise.
• https://www.playstation.com/en-us/horizon/ — The homepage for the Horizon franchise.
• https://pikmin.nintendo.com/ — The homepage for the Pikmin franchise.
• https://elderscrolls.bethesda.net/ — The homepage for The Elder Scrolls Franchise.
• https://www.thewitcher.com/ — The homepage for The Witcher franchise.
• https://www.playstation.com/en-us/uncharted/ — The homepage for the Uncharted franchise.
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black*%2526_White*(video_game) — The Wikipedia page for Black & White.
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fable_(video_game_series) — The Wikipedia page for the Fable franchise.
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-Life:_Decay — The Wikipedia page for Half-Life: Decay.

Other Links

• https://youtu.be/f7AqWngkfdI?si=WbdziyOCiS5_awpU&t=480 — “Gametrailers LIVE at E3 2015”, discussing how No Man’s Sky doesn’t have infinite possibilities (at 8 minutes).
• https://youtu.be/TbZ3HzvFEto?si=ti5Ej5aDov2bkvFu — Half-Life: 25th Anniversary Documentary.

Get all the links and the transcript for this episode right here: ⁠https://medium.com/@ottowretling/house-of-games-61-shooting-yourself-in-the-foot-6d38587bc684