GMTK Reading List (September 2023)

Starfield! Rat AI! Triangle Jumps! Smurf Pores!

Hey all!

September was the month of exploring space (turns out it's mostly just procedurally generated deserts), getting mad at Unity, and seeing how many remakes Nintendo could fit into a single announcement.

Here's a bunch of articles and videos I enjoyed this month.

It's Full of Stars

[Watch | CC | 9 mins] The Bethesda Intro Problem Is Getting Worse With Starfield - "It's typical now that the slow, restrictive intros to Bethesda RPGs fail to convey the spirit of grand, open-ended adventure inherent to their massive worlds. With Starfield, it would seem this intro problem is getting worse, not better".

[Read] Starfield makes space travel feel way too safe - "The best sci-fi stories about space exploration emphasize those stakes — how even in societies where space exploration has become accessible and even normalized, it’s still extraordinarily dangerous."

[Read] Starfield is the death of videogames as we know them - "Starfield is a sweeping, exploration-filled RPG from Bethesda, true to the Skyrim and Fallout model, but there’s nowhere else to go with this kind of videogame."

[Read] The True Joy of Sandbox Games Is Breaking Them - "Starfield could be an unrivaled space game—if the developers let players violate the natural laws of the game world".

[Watch | CC | 12 mins] Starfield - The World's Edge - 2kliksphilip pushes at the boundaries of Starfield, so see what happens when you go beyond Bethesda's limits.