Brooke Maggs (@Brooke_Maggs on Twitter), one of the narrative designers on Remedy’s CONTROL (2019)
At PAX West 2019, the RE:BIND team sat down in person with Brooke Maggs of the Remedy Team to chat about the inspirations and stories behind their newest game, CONTROL. We’re thrilled to have had the opportunity to sit down with her and talk about her experiences coming into the project and hashing out the finer details of what makes Remedy’s narrative style so refreshing.
In a world offering plenty of showy marketing and instant gratification, it takes a certain sort of individual to take on the weight of a project that reveals itself drip-by-drip. To make a game that so thoroughly obscures itself that it’s hard to see that it’s a game is a feat that, on the face of it, may easily stymy its initiator. However, New Zealand-based developer Marc Loths (@OldLoths) has gone above and beyond in creating something equal parts mystifying and enrapturing: This, Too, Shall Pass (@afleetingworld).
Presented in the form of a Twitter bot sharing snippets of a world much like our own, TTSP is a fascinating project to watch unfold. With each screenshot of its landscapes, new mysteries dot the vistas, prompting viewers to wonder, “what in the hell is happening here?”. It’s been a pleasure to watch it take shape over the last few months, and I was lucky enough to sit down with Marc to discuss the project, its development, and where it’s going from here.
This image of a kitty scratching an itch is public-domain, but it’s honestly funnier if you imagine a Shutterstock watermark over it,
Sometimes it just feels like the right time to stick a bucket under the waterfall that is itch.io, trying to collect something that catches your attention, makes you think, or just makes you pleased that someone out there is taking a particular direction. Without further ado…
VR screenshots are square, so it’s hard to get something both representative and sensibly-proportioned. This, we think, gives a good first impression.
A Piece of the Universe, which will henceforth referred to as APOTU for brevity, is a VR diorama developed by naam, wherein the player explores, as the title suggests, a little piece of the universe, learning about its absent resident and discovering the strange reality contained within. It spoke to a number of us, affirming that VR can produce something truly special and heretofore impossible. We had the good fortune to sit down with naam on video call and conduct an interview, and it’s our pleasure to share a transcript, full of insights about APOTU and beyond.
Eye of the Templeby Rune Skovbo Johansen is an in-development VR game in which the player traverses a massive temple and solves puzzles, all while neither teleporting nor exceeding boundaries in the real world. Following is a transcript of a video interview, initially recorded to accompany a demo session.
Ken George develops The Technician, “a VR action puzzle game about hacking your way through security systems”, wherein the player must rewire logic circuits and, if the wrong wire is tripped, defend against hostile armed guards. After a brilliantly fun demo, with live developer commentary to boot, we sat down with Ken to discuss the game and its development.
Heather Flowers is an indie developer originally from the deep south, focusing on unconventional storytelling thru visual novels, adventure games and hybrid genre pieces. We sat down with her at GDC for a few minutes to discuss her past projects, and current works!
DUSK, perhaps you’ve heard of it? Maybe you’ve read Parts I & II of this interview series. If that’s the case then welcome friend, we saved the best for dessert.
So get cozy, hydrate, and put on some tea or coffee because David of @DUSKDev fame has a lot to say about legacy shooter design.
We’ll be discussing some of the finer points of the production process, (@DuskDev) David’s unusual favorite genres, and then following it up the next day with an exhaustive overview of his favorite video game levels in Part III.
New Blood’s DUSK is a bit of a perplexingly pleasant paradox, often read as an effort to remake the shooters of yore. Quake, Blood, and numerous other influences have been attributed to it’s lineage since release, but despite familiar low-poly trappings and iterations of fondly remembered design, DUSK both stands out and holds its own as something entirely new.
There are numerous publications out there that can tell you the ways in which DUSK is spectacularly incredible, and it’s most definitely deserving of such high praise, however, REBIND is here to show you a peek behind the curtain, to give you a glimpse into the unspeakable cosmic terror responsible for the game that is currently disguised as the cheerful flesh vessel named David Szymanski: