Latest articles by Austin Wood
Half-Life devs worried Gabe Newell "promised things that they couldn't possibly deliver" for the iconic FPS, but "they just didn't know" that they'd be able to do it yet
News The game was awarded 'Best Action Game' at E3 1998
Helldivers 2 boss says "death and rebirth" is a natural part of the games industry, but it's "unnecessarily brutal" right now "because we don't diversify enough"
News "A lot of publishers try to play it safe by taking safe bets, but one thing that's guaranteed is those safe bets are a death sentence for the studios that try to make it."
Helldivers 2 players "became obsessed" with Malevolon Creek, but it was Gabe Newell who really kicked off one of Super Earth's bloodiest battles
news The rally we didn't know we needed
Former Valve exec recounts the meeting where Half-Life's publisher almost killed the iconic FPS: "Half-Life would quietly die. I was stunned"
News Half-Life might have just been an underappreciated gem if ex-CMO Monica Harrington hadn't put her foot down
Palworld devs tried, but the "certain franchise plus guns" brand in the West "has stuck with us to this very day despite our best efforts to shake that off"
News Things changed quickly for little Palworld
"Valve would never ship another game": Former exec forced Half-Life publisher's hand by saying Gabe Newell and the team would pivot away from game dev
News "I knew Gabe had interesting ideas that had nothing to do with games"
Helldivers 2 boss outlines the single design trick that eventually led to his breakout success: "This works, I think we're gonna be rich someday"
News "This 'it could happen' approach to design is super powerful"
Valve literally gives Half-Life away now, but 27 years ago it was carefully crushing its angry pirates: "None of them had actually bought the game"
News The launch of Half-Life, straight from Valve's founding CMO
"Don't tell Valve I told you this": Industry expert warns devs that Steam "is an engine that turns magic into money," and you can't break into "Real Steam" until you have the magic
News Chris Zukowski loves Real Steam
Helldivers 2 director says "balance is a myth," and devs shouldn't spend more than 5% of their time on it: "If you balance out all the chaos, you've made an uninteresting game"
News Arrowhead's Johan Pilestedt says if you spend all of your time on game balance, "you're an idiot"
Helldivers 2 boss told launch players not to buy until servers calmed down, and it "took 5 minutes until I got a call from the friendly people over at PlayStation asking what the f*** I was smoking"
News "'Don't recommend that people do not buy your games' - it's incredibly conventional wisdom"
Steam expert says devs need 250 reviews "in the first month" after launch or else it's probably "not gonna happen," but admits one ingenious factory game defied the odds: "They somehow pulled it off"
News Beltmatic managed to gain success months after launch
"Valve knows it, I know it, and you need to know it": Steam expert tells indie devs to "give away" demos, because actually playing a game beats all other marketing
News It's not until you get your demo that you get your visibility. So get that demo playable."
Kingdom Come: Deliverance had to add complex pathfinding for just 2 NPCs that owned horses: "If you want to do this feature, you have to support it"
News Worth it
Palworld community manager admits the survival game is "ripe for toxicity" and has a simple solution: "You just call 'em losers and you kick 'em"
News "And then they post on Twitter saying, 'Bucky called me a loser,' and I'm like, 'yeah, you're a loser, dude'"
Palworld dev revisits "totally not real, or maybe real" dating sim Pocketpair teased last year, fully aware of furry fandom: "There is a very large and very vocal community of passionate individuals"
News It's like Hatoful Boyfriend with guns
"We hit this disgusting number that makes me feel sick": Palworld devs don't know why their survival game was so successful - "If we knew how to do it, we'd do it again"
News "Again, why did we get this many players? I don't know, please don't ask me"
Nintendo's Palworld lawsuit "came as a shock" to Pocketpair because patent infringement was "something that no one even considered"
News "Pretty much everyone at Pocketpair is a huge fan"
Palworld dev reckons "very few companies could survive" a launch like theirs: "A lot of companies might crumble under the threats, under the pressure, under the negativity"
News "Pocketpair really is a very, very friendly place"
"Staying MTX and advertisement free is absolutely key": Almost 20 years later, RuneScape fan turns his MMO love into an old-school RPG where fitness is the grind
News Walkscape wants to get fans of MMOs or games like Pokemon Go to get moving
"Success beyond expectations, earning over $100,000": This weird job sim made in a year would be torture for me, but it's changed its developer's life after "bitter failure"
News Cabin Crew Life Simulator brings job sims to the sky
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 3 is in development following the explosive success of Space Marine 2, and it's promising even bigger battles
News "This new edition promises an even more immersive experience, staying true to the Warhammer 40,000 universe"
Jennifer Hale says she didn't see a single line as Mass Effect's Commander Shepard until it was time to record: "It was all cold reading on the spot"
news Video game voice actors are often thrown right into it
