Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - Gone Homecast: How Steve Gaynor Became a Dev, Changed an Industry - Kinda Funny Gamescast Special

Episode Date: January 12, 2016

With Gone Home finally coming to consoles, Greg sits down with Fullbright's Steve Gaynor to talk about his journey from majoring in sculpting to BioShock to rocking everyone's face with the Greenbriar family's story. (Released 01.12.16) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, view, Rander, listener. It's me, Greg Miller. And at the start of this podcast, I say, there's going to be some gone home spoilers. And then I don't spoil Gone Home for an hour and 15 minutes. So no matter what, you can listen to this for an hour and 15. What's up, everybody? I'm Greg Miller. This is Portillo. And this is Steve Gaynor. Hey, how are you? Sorry, I wasn't, you threw me with the hay. I was just, I mean, I didn't jump on into me. I'm engaged in this conversation. Oh, I was going to say, no, you're married. I mean, I'm all. I'm married. Yeah, yeah, okay.

Polygamy not. I was going to say, is that something that's going on in Not legal in Oregon. Yet. We will win that fight as well. I mean, we got weed. Yeah, congratulations. It's one more step from there to play. I guess.

They're kind of in the same boat, I guess. Look down upon some places, other places not look down upon. That's right. Everybody doesn't in the privacy theater. Ladies and gentlemen, this is the kind of funny gone home cast. That's right.

An entire podcast here about gone home. Why are we talking about this ancient, old as hell game? I'll tell you why. Because it's out on PlayStation 4 on Xbox 1 this very week. We're posting this the Tuesday, the 12th of January, when it comes out to PlayStation 4, if the PSN's working, and then it'll be on Xbox 1

the next day of the 13th. So we've come in here. I would say, you and I were friends. Yeah. We haven't talked about what we're going to talk about on this podcast. I can't guarantee that, but I can't read your mind either. We're not that good at first. I would assume that if you haven't ever beaten Gone Home,

put this one aside until you go beat gone home. Yes. And I'm going to, this isn't This isn't gonna, this is not from him. Because again, it's Steve. I can insult them. I can do whatever I want to them. I don't care. I could rough him up.

I'm telling you, if you've never played Gone Home to go play Gone Home, so pause the podcast, stop the podcast. Go buy it on your PlayStation 4, Xbox 1. And I think it, a long time ago came to a PC. Yeah, PC near you. PC, Mac Linux, we got that.

As you all out there know, PC is hard. When PC jumps the generation, sometimes the games don't work on the other ones. So maybe it's working, I don't know. If it's backwards compatible on your MacBook. Oh, wow. Then, you know.

Yeah, there you go. So this is your chance to get out of there. The way I see this one going, Steve, is I want to talk about gone home. But I want to talk about your life before gone home, leading up to gone home, after gone home, everything there. So we're going to talk about gone home. Well, I don't want to know right now is... But in the context of a life. In context of your life.

I want to know where does it start for you? When do you know you are going to make video games? That's a really good question. That is more of the before than I was expecting. Oh, where do you think I was going to be? I don't know. Bioshock 2-ish. Yeah, maybe right before that.

No, I like this. I like this. Sure. I don't want to do one of these bullshit podcasts you've been doing all week. This is why I'm here. Ryan McCaffrey's like, well, how is I going to play

with an Xbox controller? You're like, all right, get out of here. No, I'm here to tell Greg Miller about my childhood. This is what we're here for. Show me on the portillo where they touched you. Right on the snow. Yeah, no, I grew up,

so I was really lucky growing up with games because I kind of, walk the line between PC gaming and console gaming just all throughout my youth. When I grew up there was a Commodore 64 computer in my house before I can remember.

So like I grew up playing like Sesame Street games and like a Godzilla game and stuff like on my Commodore 64 when I was like, right, like it was I don't remember before I had So is that because of a big brother, big sister or your parents were in a game? I'm an only child. So my dad

yeah, was a guy that thought it was important to have a computer in the house. Yeah, it was the early 80s. It was kind of like kids going to have to know how to use a computer. Yeah, that's still ahead of the time, though. I remember, like, in their early 90s, my parents finally getting a computer.

It was a knock-off Windows machine that had knock-off windows and couldn't run anything. I'd cry because I couldn't make a fake version of Windows? Oh, yeah, of course there were. Oh, my God, this thing was terrible. I don't know what the hell it was doing. But they were into consoles, so I understood consoles. Yeah, yeah.

So I grew up playing kids games on Commodore 64, but also I had a next-door neighbor who was a few years older than me and he was kind of like he was kind of like my nerd Sherpa He was like a very like archetypal 80s nerd

Just into like He had the Star Wars bedchets Laterally And this, you know This is after the original Sure, this wasn't this new Everybody's wearing Star Wars T-shirts now

Yeah you don't remember what it was like for us growing up When people, there were no Star Wars stuff Kevin But like And he like, I don't know, Monty Python and Dungeons and Dragons. Sure. Oh, wow. Okay, wow. He's really bringing him into the neutral.

He was doing all of it. And so, like, he had an NES, you know, before anybody else, I went over to his house and ex-door neighbor's house and played Nintendo. Yeah. And, like, my grandmother was generous enough to buy me a subscription to Nintendo Power every year for Christmas or whatever. So I had, like, you know, Nintendo Power coming on my house every day. Or every day. I had a daily subscription. No, every month.

And so I was really lucky when I was growing up. I was in the Midwest. Where in the Midwest? Missouri, like west of St. Louis. Oh, wow, okay. How close are we at? We're not to Kingdom City yet, are we? Uh-uh.

No, no, no. Are we... It's like Ellisville, Missouri. Okay, okay, okay. Yeah, like... Like Chesterfield, Missouri. Right. Give me Wentzville is my location there.

So I moved away from Missouri. My family would... I struck out on my own when I was... I escaped Missouri. When I was nine years old. No, my family moved away from Missouri when I was still in grade school, so I don't really know. I don't remember a lot about...

I thought we're going to bond a little bit over our Missouri knowledge thing. Were you excited? Were you on Missouri kid? No. I mean, where do you think I went to the college here? Look at this. Look at these things, huh? Best journalism in school in the country, ladies gentlemen.

That's where the good question's from. Got the journalism degree? Didn't get the racism. Win, win. Yeah, I got out before it got bad. Um... But, uh, so, so I, you know, when I was growing up, I was in, we lived in this little subdivision.

Yeah. That, you know, I was a kid growing up and our houses in the subdivision like one direction, like 10 minutes down the street was the elementary school I went to. I could walk to that. The other side of it,

there was this little strip mall that had, you know, a video store in it and a bank and whatever. And they actually kept a good stock of NES games in their rental section. And so, like, I had this perfect setup of being a kid where it's like, you get Nintendo Power Magazine,

they say this game's actually supposed to be good and like Nintendo Power then I mean it's not around anymore I only read it when I was that age but like I remember when I was a kid I think back to it and I'm impressed because like they really did highlight games that were good regardless of whether they were Nintendo first party or like and so you know there'd be a game that was supposed to be

cool and I could just like walk down to the video store and pay a dollar to rent it for two nights or whatever so you know I was really lucky to grow up being able to actually play a lot of stuff on different platforms. So just as I was growing up, I kind of went back and forth between being like, you know, I went from SNES to then mostly being like a PC gaming kid in like the early 90s when I got back on board for the PS1. Yeah, you did. I rented a, I rented a PS1 from Blockbuster for my 15th

or now probably 14th birthday. Yeah. Brought it home with a copy of Resident Evil 1 and a copy of Loaded. Oh, well, I know which one you played more of. I mean, it was extreme. Let's be honest. So, you know, yeah, I was lucky to basically, because I had a similar situation with like PC Gamer magazine.

Like around that time when I got back into PC gaming, you know, had a computer, you know, my family had a computer at the house still. And I remember I was just in a, I was in like a, whatever, Barnes & Noble or something. I saw a PC Gamer on the racks. And I was like, I play a computer. I know PCs, yeah.

Like, let's see what's up. And so I remember I picked up an issue, and they're like, Game of the Month, they gave like a 94 or whatever, was Crusader No Remorse, which was an origin, like, isometric shooter game. And I was like, okay, this sounds cool. They really liked it.

I'm going to get this game. And if I agree that they were right, then that means this magazine is probably pretty good. I should like keep it. And I love that game, and I still love that game. So then, like, PC Gamer was kind of, my Nintendo power for PC gaming from that point forward. Like, this game's awesome.

You should check it out. So I'm grateful to, like, the editors of those publications for helping me actually find good games. I mean, I... Because obviously you've been in PC Gamer nowadays. Yeah, and I mean, from that time, I have met, like, Gary Whittah. Oh, yeah. You know?

Sorry. Sorry, that's the one you had to meet. Gary? I still have a spotted dick out there. That's not. me. That's great. No, I'm speaking on behalf of everybody. Let's just say abomination isn't used just to describe

his books. Are you saying it? He's an abomination. His movies. He's only, no, no, no. I just meant him. Okay. I was trying to turn his book abomination on him. Well, but he also were some screenplays, so you could be a dick about those. Book of Eli, come on now. Okay. I'm not going to argue about that. But I mean, I'm just

I'm just trying to help you. Gary would have a fan friend of the show, everything else. Like I said, Kevin could go out right now and get his spotted dick if you It's in the lazy, go get this spotted dick. Go get Gary Wooda's spotted dick. It's out in the lazy Susan. We'll put it right here next to your games. Yeah, give us a second and I'll show you Gary Wooda's spotted dick. Thank you. Give us two seconds and we'll show you Gary Wooda's spotted dick. So anyway.

So you're going and your story sounds just like mine, just like a lot of kids out there, I'm sure. Just like this spotted dick straight from, straight from England. Portie's looking it. He lost, now it's going to take him about 10 seconds to realize he doesn't have his owl and he's going to be very upset. Oh, there it is. I'm just trying to help people get good screenshots. I was making sure that there's something that screengrabble. No, you touch it too. Then we'll hold for it, and then you can all tweet,

hey, Gary Whittah, Steve and Greg are holding your spotted dick. All right, nailed it. Yeah, so you were trying. So you have a story that's just like, I think, me, probably most of our listeners, right? A lot of, yeah, yeah. Or if you're younger, you had your website of choice. Sure, sure, sure, sure. the shit you should be paying attention. Right, right, right. So where does it go from being,

I love this hobby, I love playing games to, I want to create these, I want to make games. I think that, well, so I mean, I, I messed around with, with making game stuff a little bit, like, as I was growing up, just kind of off and on. Like, I remember. But what does that mean? Because that's the thing, for me, it was like, I looked at this stuff and I'm like, man, I want to write about, I want to write the magazine. And you're like, I want to make the games that are in it. You know what I mean? Like, well, when I was growing up, I always, I always, made, like, comics and wrote and drew comics,

and I did, like, a lot of illustration and stuff when I was growing up. And so I think, you know, I had this idea that I wanted to do something creative. You know, I thought I was like, okay, I'm going to do, like, art stuff as living. And, you know, I did that all through, you know, high school and everything and into college.

And then at some point when I was in college, I was getting kind of deeper into, like, alternative comics and stuff like that. and I was making my own stuff and kind of getting more serious about it but I just sort of at some point I had this realization that I was sort of like

A I don't have like as I'm doing this stuff I don't have like this visceral love of actually like making the stuff you know like sitting down at a drawing board for a really long time it's like hard

and you can either be energized by it or it can just be it's not what you're built for and also I was kind of getting you know familiar with comics creators like Daniel Klaus or Chris Ware or Arkram who

Like they're They are deeply obsessed With the medium And it's history and everything about it Like comics are what is inside of them right? And I was like I'm not really I'm also not really that guy I'm not like oh I have to like know everything about the entire

The medium I'm so obsessed with like Charles Schultz's early work You know like that and and and but at the same time, I had a notebook that I kept with me that I was, that, that I had for writing, like story ideas for comics, you know, like, oh, and I just kind of noticed, I was like, these are all kind of, this is just sort of turning into game ideas and, like, games for, ideas for, like, game mechanics and, like, what if you could do this in a game or whatever? And, and it was around that time that I was like, I was like, actually, now that I think of it, like, games are the medium that I am obsessed with, and that has been the kind of

entertainment that has connected the most with me throughout my life. So I think back, I'm like, I always want to be playing games. Like I'm thinking about, like, clearly based on like what's coming out of my yoga. Even right now, you'd rather be playing games. I'm not right now. No, no, because I'd rather. Okay, well, okay. But, you know, and so I just kind of had that realization. I was sort of like, I think I'm just, I'm, myself is trying to tell myself, like, this is what you actually should be involved with if you're going to do something creative, right? And so, um, I kind of thought back to, yeah, when I was growing up, you know, I made Duke Nukem 3D levels with the level editor that shipped with Duke Nukem 3D.

I made some games in like QBASIC or whatever, you know, just kind of like off and on. I played with like the Quake 1 level editor. And I just kind of thought back to that and I was like, I think, you know, from what I understand, if you can make levels for games and you can do it well enough to like have a portfolio, you can get into making games that way. And so like from that kind of realization point, I started taking that seriously and being like, I need to figure out how to build these things and build a portfolio and get it out in front of people and like figure out how to be a part of making this stuff. So then this comes to you in college?

Yeah. Do you have the panic near the end of college that you've wasted these years you've done this wrong or da-da-da-da-da? I was just sort of wasting college all the way. I mean, it wasn't the kind of thing where I had gone all the way through college and like I was about to like get my degree in biology or something. Sure, sure, sure, sure. Like when I was going through college, it really wasn't a waste in terms of what I got out of it. But I was never like, I'm training to be an accountant. Getting my like criminal, you know, science degree or something, right?

As I was going through college, I took a lot of film courses and I took a lot of art courses. You know, like because I was doing visual arts. So I, you know, took a lot of life drawing. And I ended up getting my degree in sculpture and my minor was art history. And so, like, as I was going through what I was, everything I was doing in college, it all added up to exposing me to a lot of context for, like, making stuff and the history of art and how things are made. And just like, I went into kind of around the time that I realized that, like, drawing and illustration wasn't really what I was going to end up doing. Yeah. I also had to pick my concentration for college. And I was like, I've never done any sculptural. but I'm gonna make sculpture my concentration so that I can learn about working in 3D space

smart because I because I when am I gonna get to do that again you know and I had a professor at Portland State who was really supportive of like he was like what do you want to do for like you want to go be a sculptor and I was like no he's like what do you want to actually want to do and I was like well I want to make video games make video game levels and I think that you know learning how to work in 3D is like a applicable that's part of it for sure yeah and and he was like well okay then your final concentration project for your degree is just like don't come to any of your classes for a week just stay home and just build a level and see if and see if just like spending the full-time job amount

of time like actually doing that work is actually like if by the end of that you actually liked doing it because it's the thing that I kind of said about like drawing comics you kind of realize you're doing the work you don't actually like the work and say it's like if you think this is what you want to do you should probably Like, go do it and see if you actually like the act of doing it. And then bring me the results of that and explain your process and what you built and everything. And, you know, I did it and I came out of it and I was like, that was, I want to keep doing that. That's awesome.

So, you know, having supportive people in college, even though it wasn't like a real clear path. It wasn't the traditional, I'm going to be a sculptor into video games. Right. So, yeah, it was a, it was a kind of abstract path, regardless of what it ended up at, you know. But I'm really glad that I have that background. I'm really glad that I did a bunch of, like, film history courses and just kind of got that foundation in what people have done, you know, in entertainment and in art, like, in this century, just sort of like being able to think back, like, oh, yeah, like, there's this thing that that is kind of the, like, you see, you know, because, you see, you know, you. You see a lot of stuff now. You watch a TV or a movie or whatever.

I do see things a lot. I know that you're always looking at things. But, like, it's just really interesting when you can think back. You're like, oh, that came from, you know, this movie from the 50s or something that maybe I probably never would have watched on my own. You know, having someone to point you towards kind of a starter's guide for, like, here's some stuff that it's good to be aware of. And to give you that insight is really cool.

Yeah, that's a cool mix. Because Colin and I were talking on last week's piece, I Love You X-X-O, X-X-O, in the way of one of our listeners wrote in and was asking, you know, he was making the argument is, I think he's 61, that we are currently in the good old days of games, right? Good old days of games weren't when you think they were back in the NES and da-a-b-b-bye. Yeah. We sat there and talked about this for a while, and that's what we were talking about is, you know, games being our passion, right? That's what we know about, is why did you grab the spotted dick first? I thought you grab your coffee first, but then you grab... I just didn't want to be off... You put

Gary Wood a spotted dick on your crotch. I just didn't want to be off balance. We just built me as something for the lap. Oh, okay. I was thinking about composition. Sure, do you want, you got Christmas duck if you want, we put Christmas ducking going on. I like the dick. He's got spotted dick. You have a weeder dog. Thank you, Kevin. Dynamite dropping. I'm in the frame. There it is. There it is. Kevin, are you ready for you?

That's what I work with every day around here. And I love it. Don't get me wrong. I'm envious. Thank you. Thank you very much. We all need a Kevin. We all do need a Kevin. I'm lucky. I'm lucky we're we're talking about the fact that yeah, for us, you know, like being a video game fan and it being our lives and our passion, right, is the fact that we know that so well. We know how to go back and find all that stuff and know the history of it. Stop watching yourself

with a spotted dick. Turn off the monitor. It's balanced. Okay, all right. But then, like, that was the thing, is like, we both... Fine, don't just put it away. If I can't look at it, I don't want it to be there. No, turn on the spotted dick cam. Jesus. Were you saying something? No, it doesn't matter. Just saying that, like, history, we...

Colin and I both like movies, but we can't go back and tell you, like, oh, well, this pulled from this, and this is how Tarantino found this vision. Sure, right, right, right. Not that that's a deficiency for us, but in terms of critiquing film or knowing film the way we know games, that's the problem. Do you feel like you haven't watched a lot of film from before 1980? Oh, yeah, for sure, for sure. Yeah, yeah.

I think I'm a contemporary, I know contemporary movies decently enough. But even that, like, that's my big thing where, you know, Nick out there, right, he's Mr. Movie guy. He likes writing scripts. He wants to make films and stuff like that still. And I hope we can grow kind of funny at that point so that he can do that here. And I don't have to just fire him one day. Right. But we'll sit around.

He always gets so angry at me because movies will come out. out and I'm like just make him day and date digital and he's like no you have to go you have to get the experience and then I end up watching every film he recommends on Virgin America screens on the back of the thing and he gets even more mad at me right but like yeah that's the thing is like there's only so many hours in the day and I feel like if I'm not I watch TV and consume uh inactive entertainment when I'm eating right having dinner or something I want to watch something and then I'm off to go play something or interact on the internet and stuff like that yeah so just differences like that yeah have you seen no I could do that no it is cool when you get a

hook into older film and you can start to make those connections. There's some stuff. My favorite thing about watching film from the, yeah, 30s, 40s, 50s is how surprisingly modern some of it is. Oh, yeah. You know, because you're just like, whoa, I didn't think people would talk about that. You know, and a lot of it was like based on like, you know, that there was stuff that they couldn't be explicit about in the film. But seeing how they tackle issues and allude to things. So they couldn't just be out right. Exactly. Really fascinating.

Anyway. That's always the most, my favorite thing is to go back and watch movies. I remember watching as a kid that were ahead of my time. Right. And then you watch when you pick up on all these things. Like, oh my God, I didn't even, like Ghostbusters, right? Like I watched Ghostbusters a many time. Yeah, as I as a kid, I'm freaking out.

It's my favorite movie. You're like, why is Zana Aykroyd's belt coming off? Exactly. You had no idea this ghost has given him a blowjob. You're just watching. And I remember watching that movie and then having to, now I'll make it symmetrical again. Okay, thank you.

Having to go in and ask my mom if I could say words from it. Right. Like, can I say mother Puss Bucket? He's like, yeah, I guess. I'm like, I'm kind of thanks. Because I got in trouble, you see, with bastard. Me and my dad were playing in the front yard. And I pinned myself in a mystery, and he was trying to fake trying to find me.

And I turned out of year, like, bastards from back to the future. Yeah. And he's like, stop. Can't say that. Not a school. Back to you, though, not my childhood traumas. So you graduate. I mean, if you want to talk about you crying as a child more, I mean.

Trust me. That's every game over a show. There's a hundred and ten of them up right now. I'm kind of funny.com for you. You graduate. graduate degree in sculpting, like, what's, how do you then take the one level you've made and like, how do you turn that into a career? I moved down here. Right after college, I moved down to San Francisco.

Actually, we moved down here because my now wife, like we weren't married at the time, but... Living in sin. Yes. In San Francisco. This is the Sin City? Is this the one or is this one? This is the one. Okay, this is Sin City, Brotherly Love, Wendy, Seen.

city. Oh, it's the windy city? Where every city. Nice, nice. I love Frisco. That it goes over everyone's head. So, yeah, so we moved down here. No job, or do you have a job in here? I didn't have a job, but we moved down here for my wife's grad school

because she was going into her grad school stuff. What was she going into? Biomedical sciences. Okay. I'm married to a doctor. Okay, very nice. Now we know how these games are getting made. Who's paying the bills? Not a medical doctor. Now we don't know anything. So, yeah, we came down here for her grad school stuff.

And, you know, she made that decision in part because she knew that, like, there was game stuff here. And that's what I wanted to get into as far as where she decided to go. We came down here. Yeah, it was a different time in San Francisco. We moved here. What are we looking at? Year-wise. Yeah, 2005.

Okay. So we moved here. We moved into a two-bedroom apartment with another couple. And it was two grad students, somebody that worked at a nonprofit. and an unemployed person. Wow. And they rented us an apartment. Yeah.

Right at the top of Hayes Valley. Damn. So, yeah. So, so, very lucky, very nice landlords. Yeah.

No complaints. And, and, and so I got here and I just, like, started. Cold tall, knock on the door.

Well, just, I was like, I guess I'm just going to try to get in as a tester, you know, like, because I had no marketable skills.

Like, you know, I had the beginning of like a level design portfolio, sure, but it's not like somebody was going to hire me

take a chance. For that. Right. Basically, I needed to keep working on it, you know. But I wanted to be in the industry and doing something that would, like, apply to a resume. Yeah. While I was working on my level design portfolio, you know. And so, my first job in the industry was I was a certification tester at Sony in San Mateo.

Yeah. So, I was a tester on PS2 and PSP games. Hell yeah, PSP games. Did you play that pad upon? Did you ever play that pat upon? No, you don't get to choose what you play. Well, I know, but I'm sure something. I played the Daxter.

I figured it was Daxter. I tested the Daxter spinoff. Yeah, yeah. I shot golf, Luminas. I'm throwing stuff at you that'll be out there in that time. No, it wasn't those. But I did, so, there's actually a lot of interesting stuff about working at Sony at that time.

They know me. I'm sure Shoehaye walked in every day, said, hey, what's up? We were both. Yeah, we were bros. No, so you generally, yeah, you didn't get to choose what you played. So, like, well, A, it was an interesting, just like interview process. Because like you show up, like I want to be

a game tester. And they're like, okay, well, let's find out if you can do that. I mean, it's as noted. You don't have to have a lot of experience. So they're kind of like trying to filter by like, does it seem like you'll actually like be able to like find things? So the way that at that time,

the job interviews, they talk to you and they're like, what's your background and like, why do you want to take this job and all the normal kind of stuff? But then the test was they had a V-A-Row. THS tape of bugs that testers had recorded and you had to watch the tape and then tell them what the bug was that was in it So some of them were really easy where it would be like what's the bug? Well the guy fell through the floor Yeah, you know or whatever that kind of thing. What's the bug? Oh, that one enemy wasn't animating or you know or like that kind of pose or whatever right. It's like oh he's kind of off in the corner of the screen. Maybe you would miss it or whatever

The bug I was most proud of that I got was it was a clip of a four-player split-screen racing game. And it shows the go across the finish line, finish, and then end. And they were like, what's the bug? And I was like, I think the guy who got first place had a longer time of the guy who got second? And they were like, yeah, that's right. I was really glad. I was like, I noticed that the second place guy actually had the shortest time. So it was stuff like that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, are you going to catch this stuff? Could you rewatch it or was it just the one shot? It might have been twice. Okay, okay, okay, okay. I think it might have been if you didn't, if the first time you were just like, I don't know, can I see it again? I don't really, but, you know, it was something like that.

So anyway, I was working there and, yeah, they would just give you games. And it was a really good education. Like, it was a really good education in game design because when we play games as players, as gamers, we are totally self-selecting. You know, we're like, I think I'll like this. I'm going to buy it on purpose. My friend told me this is good. I'm going to try it.

Sure. At Sony, you know, they were just like, okay, spend two weeks doing nothing but playing this. And you're like, uh... But I hate this kind of genre. Like, we don't care. Yeah, they're like, it's not the point, right? And so, like, I spent, like, a week playing, like, one of the Ice Age tie-in, like, kids games, you know? I spent like a couple weeks playing Mark Echoes getting up content under pressure

Wow You know and the Baxter game and like a bunch of stuff where it's sort of like okay We're just gonna make you not only play a bunch of stuff you would you wouldn't have gone out and bought yourself But also become Incredibly familiar with it Like play it for like 80 hours you know like you're on hour 80 of mark echoes getting up content's under pressure. Like, that's not even,

that you know way more about the game than somebody who just plays it doesn't end usually, right? Sure, of course, of course. And so it's really interesting having to play these games and having to really get familiar with them and getting to the point where you understand

why they don't work or why they're okay but not that great. Like you end up playing a lot of stuff that's sort of like it's sort of the off brand of something that you have played intentionally and you're like, oh, I see why it worked in the version that I decided to play and what's missing here

and that kind of comparison, or just playing weird, weird, like there was a game that I played, there was a PS2 game that it was a, I don't think it was turn-based, it was just really slow-paced, like World War II ship combat. It was a Japanese game. It was World War II ship combat,

but an alternate World War II where you could upgrade your ships with like plasma cannons and stuff. Okay, cool. I'm in. And it's just like, okay, so I'm, like, one of the PSP games we played was like one of the armored core PSP games.

So I have a lot of hours logged of like head to head one V1 armored core PSP against other testers. So, you know, it's just like you just don't have any choice. You just have to like get your head around these games and understand them and understand how to play them in such a way that you might find weird stuff that players won't normally find it. And that's like what, running different corner. that normally would go to trying to...

Well, that's one of the other interesting things that you learn is like, you start out playing it, you just do a play-through, just to familiarize yourself. Then you keep playing it, and you keep playing it, and you find some bugs or whatever. And then you're like, all right, I don't even... What else do it? How do I even play this more?

And you get bored and you're just like, ugh, and that's when you start doing weird stuff. Sure. And that's when you find the bugs. Because you're like, maybe I'll do some weird thing. and then you're like, oh, that's something that people don't normally do. That's what hasn't been banged on already.

I'm trying to play all the way through with only using knives or something goofy like that. Yeah, yeah, exactly. My load out will only be this kind of thing or I'll mix in this thing. Or just like weird stuff like, oh, I guess I'll just try to go all the way back to the beginning of the game. I don't know. Yeah. And then you're like, oh, when you go back towards through this like load gate, sometimes it crashes, you know, or like whatever, right? So it's been really interesting.

It's interesting just to remember that there's like that boredom point is good. That point of like too much familiarity because you get to the point where you're just, just like, if you think you've exhausted everything in it, that's the point where you'll actually find the really interesting stuff. And that's useful as a developer, too. If you're like, I'm so familiar with my game, it's got to, there can't be any problems with it, obviously. Keep playing it.

And you'll find something. And a lot of times when you're a developer, that'll lead to not just like bug fixes or whatever, but it'll lead to you being able to like put something cool in when the player does that weird thing because you're like, oh, what if I tried this? weird thing. Oh yeah, we don't do anything if you do that. You put something there, that'd be cool. You know, and that's one of those kinds of things that can make a good game great, you know.

So are you taking what you're learning, you're doing all these different things, finding things with that, and you're going home, I'm assuming that and making more levels building on a portfolio that way? Yeah. My level design portfolio was I made levels for a game called Fear. You remember Fear? The first person shooter, yeah, it's a monolith game. I really like that game.

I made levels for it because, A, I was a big fan of it, and it was sort of like, I need to be making levels for something I actually want to play. So now, real quick, for me and for the listeners and viewers, you're making levels for fear, you're just making them in your own free time. Yeah, as I like this, are you using Maya? I don't remember, did fear have some kind of... So that was part of why I chose it, because they shipped their entire development SDK.

Yeah, okay, okay. So basically, they shipped all the tools so you could make anything in the game that they had made theoretically. Yeah, yeah. You could do any of the scripting, et cetera. And, you know, I knew that I wanted to make, like, a... story-based, like, you know, like a kind of single-player, like, narrative-based or narrative-focused kind of game like that, right? And so, like, Fear released the tools so that you could

make a single-player level, put enemies in it, make new, like, radio messages, and do the story-scripted stuff and make your own version of that kind of experience, which is the kind of thing I wanted to do, you know? So I was like, I'm glad that I did it this way. Because, like, I think even and, you know, now, you can be very engine driven. You can be like, what's the engine that the most people are, that the most companies are using or whatever? You can be like, I should make a game for Unreal because everybody uses Unreal or whatever. But if you do that to the detriment of actually, like, making something that you want to play,

then it's going to be really hard for you to make something that, like, shines as, like, oh, somebody really, like, cared about this and did an awesome job with it, you know? So two things that were good about making levels for fear was one, I was a big fan and just wanted to make more of that game. But two, I was making those levels, and there was somebody I knew online who worked at this small game studio in Texas that had made an expansion pack for fear.

And they were making another expansion pack for fear, and they needed a level designer, and he knew that I was making levels for fear. So he was like, you should apply at this studio that I work at. And you just drop like 30 levels on them. I think it'll be all right, guys. I mean, the cool thing was, it was like,

I never would have thought to apply there. Otherwise, right? But the fact that I was like making levels in the engine that they were making an expansion pack with and I could just show up

and be like, I've made some levels, you don't have to like teach me the tools. Yeah, good point. And they're like, cool, we have to ship this thing in six months, jump in, get rolling.

You know, I could just like, show up, start knocking stuff out. If I had been making levels in Unreal or whatever, that I wouldn't have gotten that job, you know? So sometimes doing weird, obscure.

stuff works out because somebody needs somebody who knows how to do that weird obscure thing already, right? So that's how I got into my first design job, which was at TimeGate Studios down in in Sugarland, Texas. Did you have to move out there? I did. I lived in Texas for six months. Okay. In a suburb outside of Houston from March until September of 2007. Never a better time to go to Texas than a sweltering summer. And I didn't own a car. God damn. My apartment had air conditioning. Kevin is Kevin and I can't deal with heat No, he's terrified just hearing this Yeah

It wasn't, it was not good To be living in a suburb Of Houston with no car In the middle of the sun Yeah, what did you do? How did you get the work? I had very gracious co-workers That would give me a ride

But on the weekends I either had to just sit around In my apartment or walk to the mall It was 10 minutes away Yeah, yeah, so I was being killed But yeah, so I lived there For six months, we shipped that expansion part expansion pork

It's getting worse I spiked your coffee when you weren't looking Cool Ship that expansion pack The Perseus mandate And And move back to San Francisco

Okay And so then what was the next time You have experience now You have a credit That was Beating down your door not to work with you, right? Yeah You seen the meta-credit

For a Perseus mandate But every review Was like the level design's cool There was that one So the stuff that I did, that was, I mean, that was a cool thing about it. So the stuff I did on that project was, you know, I came on late. They already built, like, the campaign, but they had these instant action maps that were, like, you just jump in and they were more like arena. Shoot stuff here.

Yeah. Arena based or, like, time trial based or whatever. So I made a couple of those instant action maps. And then my other job was at some point, they just had me do a pass through the single player campaign and basically do like a scare pass. Like there weren't enough scary scripted things in it. So they were just like play through the campaign, find places where you could put some kind of crazy, scary, like, ghost scripted moment in,

pitch them, put them in, right? So like, I didn't get to build a level in the single player campaign. Right. But I kind of got to do the two sides of it. Like I built a couple of levels that were just purely like gameplay, mechanics, replayability,

and then also do a bunch of like scripted stuff in the single player experience. So it was a really good kind of, of like six months of crash course and just like making, making geo, making gameplay, making scripted stuff. And so I worked remotely for them for a little while. And then at GDC in 2008, I started talking to the folks that two came around.

Because they were starting that up to make Bioshock too. And they're like, wait, you're the guy who did the fear at L.C. Get out of the folks. Get all these people. Expansion packs. So that leads you to do. 2K Marin, which is thankfully close here. So you didn't have to leave your wife this time. Right.

You're able to see her on a daily basis. Yes. But you go up to 2K and what are they initially... Are you going up there to work on Bioshock too? And that's the deal. That's the whole thing. Yeah. And like what's your title, I guess? Level designer.

Okay, okay, okay. Basically, you know, yeah, I shipped Perseus mandate. I was working on kind of like a project that they were trying to get greenlit at Timegate. Was it a DC Comics game? I don't care about it. Was it in a new IP? Is that why you love gone home so much?

Because it's just got super girls all over. It reminds me a lot of things. Yeah, there's a lot of things that pull out. I'm like, this could be happening to DCU. We don't know. I mean, yeah, Batman could be on the roof. What? So, yeah, I started talking to them at GDC that year.

And, you know, they, it was a good time for them to take a chance on somebody. You know what I mean? Because, like, it was really early in the development of Bioshock too, like, super early. And they could bring somebody on who didn't have a ton of experience, you know. Yeah. But at the same time, as I had been writing my, like, game design blog for years, it was called Fulbright. Yeah. My game design blog is called Fulbright.

It's still online. I maintained it from, like, 2005 to 2010, I guess. And I had been getting, like, some articles from it. it republished on like game industry websites and stuff because editors that like gama sutra had noticed it and republished some of it and so like I was kind of you know gaining a little bit of visibility from that and so I had the advantage of some of the the people at two cameron were like familiar with my writing stuff that they had read some of the articles I had written and so I came up to them and they at least had heard of me before we started talking

and I could be like, I'm a level designer, I shipped these levels, here's some video of it. Also, you guys kind of know what my like design thought process is. And so it was a really good time for them to be like, well, this guy's shift one expansion pack. He's not like, you know, a 10-year veteran of the industry or anything. But, you know, we like how he thinks we're interested in what he would do. He has some practical experience.

We're right at the beginning of the project. He can learn a lot about how to implement. stuff like over the course of dev. I would not have been hired in the last six months of that project. But I was hired in like the first, you know, six months. Our other level designer at Fulbright now working on Tacoma is Tynne in Wales. And he and I were the first two level designers that they hired on Bioshock too. He started the same week as me.

And he had never worked on first person games at all. He was like an indie game developer from like before indie game. are really a thing. He won an IGF award in like 2004. It was like, you know, kind of like pre-Braid, pre-World of goo, sure, sure, sure. But he had worked with Mark LeBlanc and other people that were like X looking glass, you know, like people that had gone on to make their own small studio. So he kind of like had that connection to that kind of way of thinking about design and he had made his own games and stuff like that. So similarly, they're kind of like, well, you never, you never, you never, been an FPS designer before, but you

make cool stuff, you have an interesting background, we think that we, you know, we connect with your outlook, we're going to give you a chance on this, right? So are you guys shitting bricks? You talk to him and he's like, I've made in a game, I don't really know what I'm doing either. You're like, oh, that's okay, we're just working on BioShack 2.

The follow-up to this game that everyone lost their mind for, and guess what? We're not the guys who made that game. That was the thing. Like, I mean, I almost didn't even consider applying for that job. Yeah. You know, like, I knew people in the industry. So, you know, Greg Kushevin, who now works at Super Giant,

and was the writer of Bastion and Transistor. I'm going to talk about Transistor, just Bastion. PlayStation Vita's best game. Now, I'm just a huge Bastion fan. Okay, I mean, as am I. But I'm not a hater. Oh, I'm not a hater either. For like literally, for four years, every time I saw him,

I had to be like, when's it coming to PlayStation? It finally came to PlayStation, but when's it's coming to Vita? You know what I mean? We were just finally, I'm speaking in terms of, again me and Greg. Yeah, well, we'll get there. Yeah. And so he was still at, no, he wasn't at GameStop at the,

or GameSpot, sorry. I do it all the time too. He wasn't still a GameSpot, but I knew him from when he had been at GameSpot, and we kind of had, we had emailed each other and stuff like that, and he was working in the industry at that point, like as a producer slash designer, and he

had been talking to the two Cameroen guys at some point, and I met him in person for the first time at GDC that year. And he really encouraged me. He was like, hey, are you, like, thinking of trying to find something in town? Because I really think that you'd be a good match for two cameron. I was like, they made Bioshock. Like, I shipped an expansion.

I shipped, like, the second expansion pack for a good game. You know, but it's like, and like, why would they want to talk to me? You know what I mean? I was like, they made Bioshock. Why would they want to talk to me? He was like, you should at least go talk to them, right? And then, like, Chris Rimo, who ended up doing the music for Gone Home and he's, doing the music for Firewatch and the founder of idle thumbs.

It's a good podcast. It's kind of funny. Don't do that. That's when my lawyer, Kevin Coelho gets involved. Give me a straight face. Thank you. So he was still in journalism at the time. He was working at Shaq News.

And he had an appointment at the 2K booth to interview Ken Levine. And he was like, oh, I'm going to the 2K booth. Like, you should just come with me. And I was like, hey. And so I went over there and some of the two came around guys were there. I just started talking to them. I was like, hey, you know, I'm Steve. And they were like, oh, Steve, you wrote that article?

You know, I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I was thinking the same thing, right? But like, people that I knew basically were like, dude, just like, just talk to them. Because maybe, right? What's the worst that can happen? Yeah, exactly. And so, you know, I was, I had one of the most stressful weeks of my life when, like, I went in. No, I hadn't gone in for the interview yet, but I, or had I, anyway, I don't remember the order of operations, but, like, I sent in my, like, design test for, like, a written design test for the thing, for the, for the potential level design.

And what's that, that's you describing the level you would build for this kind of game? Yeah, they, they had an, they, they're kind of interesting design test for that, where they, had you take part of a level from Biocococ one and just, say, imagine stripping all of the, like, gameplay. out of this and I was like that sounds like a great idea but they're like take all of the like security and enemies and scripting and stuff out mentally and then just like pitch us

if you just had that space what you would like describe the gameplay that you would put into this like they basically gave me like a different pitch for what would happen there and they were like what how would you build this pitch for this part of the game so you just wrote it out

and since I had you know since I had done art in up to that point I like did a little hand-drawn illustrations of like splicers and stuff I think I pitched yeah I pitched that there was there that there had been a party going on in the ball in one of the

in the fighting McDonough's bar in Neptune's Pride in no Neptune's bounty Neptune's Pride is a different game in Byershack 1 and and and I pitched a drunk party splicer that had a party hat on yeah yeah anyway So I drew my like drunk party splice.

He was like, oh. And I assume they found that cute. Because, yeah, I sent it in. And then I just remember, like, I was just like, dying of stress so much, just like wondering if it was going to get a callback. I was just like, check my email and then just like go stress out. And then check my email.

But, like, yeah, luckily they were like, okay, we'll bring you in for an interview. You know what I mean? So, yeah, no, I ended up kind of being the right fit for that stage in the studio's life. And, yeah, it's still, like, even now, half of our studio is X2K Marin. And our programmer, Tynan, no, sorry, our programmer, Leon, started on the same day as me. And our level designer, Tynan, started on the same week as me. So, like, we were, like, right in there.

2K must hate you. You just came in, you took all these people out with you. I've always said this. That was after 2K her in. Most of those people. Fine. I guess they don't hate you then. I don't think they do.

Okay. Do you think they do? Kevin, did they hate them? Does 2K. hate, Steve? I don't think companies get mad about that. I've always said, yeah. You don't think companies have feelings? Yeah, no.

I don't think companies are real people. Yeah. Okay. I mean, if you work at a company and you leave and you take a whole bunch of those people, I think that company generally doesn't care. That's what you did. Chop. Joke.

So yeah, level designer, Bioshock 2. So how long do you stay on at 2K Marin? Because you do Bioshock 2, but then you go and you work on this thing called Minerva's Den. Yeah. So I was on, yeah,

Bioshock 2 from pretty early in development in that game, I think, the game actually had a pretty tight development scale. That game was like less than two years, I think. I think it was like 18, 19 months. I can't remember exactly. But it was like a year in eight months or something. But so I was on for,

from pretty early. And, yeah, you know, I had been, I built, let's see, I built Poppers Drop, which was the fourth level of the game. And then I went back and built the first level of the game. Like, because a lot of times you kind of build the first level last so you know what you're setting up. And so I was the guy that caught having to do the intro level. No big deal.

Yeah. No person. And so, you know, to your point, that means that on some level they'd, like, built trust in me over the course of development up to that point to think that I could take the first level. And I did that and worked out fine. And so, you know, at that point, they were, there was internally, they were kind of like, okay, we're not even going to talk about DLC until the main game is locked because we have, because like, the main game has to get out. We can't be splitting our attention, whatever. but I had been thinking about DLC ideas and basically as soon as the game was locked

I started I was kind of like pitching I was like hey I know we're gonna do DLC I was thinking you know story DLC like maybe something like this would be cool or whatever you know and I think there were a lot of people at the studio who were kind of excited to get onto something new you know because we've been working on

Bioshock stuff for like a long time right and that's a big problem for game developers right I mean that's what I always hear especially when you're on something that is like you've been in forever and like you know the the excom fbs was like a wasn't a new IP it was still excom but it was like a totally new creation so I think a lot of people were excited to get onto that but you know I was sort of like I'm down from barrageau can we do some more barrage shop yeah and so you know between between

those two aspects the lead designer of the game Zach McClendon just put a lot of trust in me and pulled me aside one day and we went into a meeting room and he was like, all right, so you know, you've been pitching DLC, did a good job on the main game, you're going to be the lead designer of the DLC, you can write it. And I was like, okay. Because I had helped with writing stuff on the main game as well. Like during the main game, at some point they had been like looking for a contract writer to write like some audio diaries and like some splicer barks and stuff like that. Barks being what, say when they're attacking you and stuff like that.

You know, there's a lot of like reloading, et cetera, in games. But like in Bioshok, it's cool because they're all like crazy splicers, so they get to say weird stuff, which is fun. So they were looking for a contract writer for stuff like that and at some point I was like, hey, I wrote comics and I write this blog and I like to help. I can string two words together. Yeah, exactly. It's like if you need some help and they're kind of like, we'll let you know. And then, like, sometime near the end of development, they were like, we still need more writing. Didn't you say you would do an extra job for the same pay? Okay. So, you know, I wrote, I think most of the splicer barks in Bioshock 2 and some, like, audio diaries and stuff.

So, you know, I could kind of, like, get the tone of Rapture and all that kind of stuff. So they, yeah, they let me write the script and all the, all the, all the, the written content for Minerva's Den. So, yeah, then really going out on a limb and saying, like, here's your first, you know, lead gig. Like, go for it. It's a small team. It's a short turnaround. You don't get to, like, expand the scope or, like, miss your date or anything.

Just, like, make something that we can actually ship and make it good. It was huge. And it was really a really good first experience to be in charge of a small team within a big organization that can help support you and working on like DLC for a sequel to a shipped game It's just like a very stable base With a lot of like Lego pieces to work with So we were just kind of able to just like

Execute you know Real quick aside How abnormal is your story It feels like I don't hear You seem like I'm not saying you skip rungs on the ladder But it seems like a meteoric rise to me Is am I right or wrong about that I mean you put in the work don't get me wrong

I'm not saying like just that or the other But it's like I'm a sculptor Maybe he'll make games I got this chip. No, I'm doing this Bioshock thing on my own. I mean, I'm certainly very fortunate. Sure.

Right? You know, like I've had a lot of lucky opportunities, and I've been, I've been, stars have aligned. And it's one of those things, I mean, you know, it's one of those, it's not luck, obviously, it's talent, right? Talent, it leads to luck sometimes.

It's lucky to be given the opportunity. Sure, sure. It's lucky to even, like, be in the situation where something like that might happen. Right. You know what I mean? And I'm lucky that I had some of the right things to actually take advantage of those opportunities

when I was lucky enough to have them, right? And so, like, you know, you do have to work really hard to hopefully be able to do the thing you want to do if you're given the opportunity to do it. But yeah, you know, it's all about like, it's right place, right time, committing yourself to actually, like, do, taking the job seriously when you're,

when you get a crack at it and having a ton of support from from people that believe in you and it can help you do a better job. You know, like I mean at on so Carla and I, Carla Zamangea is my creative partner at Fulbright. We started working together

on Bioshok 2 at 2K Marin. She was kind of like a script supervisor like VO production person was one of the hats she wore on the main game. And so we started working together when I was writing splicer barks for the main game and writing audio diaries and stuff. And I would submit my scripts and her job was to like, you know, format them and everything.

But she also, like, gave me feedback on the writing while I was doing it. And we kind of developed a back and forth of her making my writing better and being like, do you really want to say this or whatever? And so on Minerva's Den, we continued that. And she was one of the full-time members of that team. And so she was like my story editor for all of the writing stuff. the story of the audio diary is the actual plot etc.

On Minerva's Den and she's also a 2D artist so she had done like a bunch of posters and 2D art in the main game and that she did all of that for Minerva's Den and so going forward you know working on Gone Home that was like why we made the game that we did basically because it was I know but I'm just saying your stories here I'm just saying I think that you know it's easy to say like I

X Y Z you know but it's sort of like I think part of, I guess what I'm trying to say is, part of getting to a place you're able to do stuff like that is recognizing how you can work with other people to make you more able to do good stuff. Sure. As opposed to just saying like, I'm so awesome, I'm going to nail it. You know, it's more like, well, if I worked with them and they could get us to a really good place, then we could do something great together. Right. You know, so it's really, you know, it's like even just, like I mentioned about, you know, like my, my professor in college or like my wife being, taking into account that I wanted to get into games or when she decided to go to school where she went, you know, just like all that kind of stuff. It's sort of like, you have a good team.

It's the, yeah, it's the ability to know how to kind of like rely on people, I think, to, to, they get somewhere together. No, well said. So. Games. Games. Nervis Den comes out. Yeah. And multiple people, not just Marty, say it's the best DLC of all time.

Does that earn you sneers in the office? Because you've come out, you out, you outclassed everybody else already. You're this young kid nobody believed in. There you go. Kevin's nodding in agreement. Yeah, well, he's pissed. Yeah, Kevin. No, Kevin was like, yeah, you mother.

No, Kevin was like, yeah, you mother, fuck. You stealing bread off their table. long. Yeah, everybody hated me. No, it was, I think it was, I think it was, I think it was something that everybody who got to work on it felt really lucky to be a part of. Because it was sort of like, there is so much overhead. There is so much, there's so many big challenges when you're trying to make a game

like the main game of Byershock. Sure. Because, like, they were trying to build a team and a game at the same time, you know, and there had to be multiplayer and there had to be like, you know, there was all this, there were all of these, these dependencies, all these things pulling it in different directions. There was like, we have to figure out how to make a game together as a team. We have to figure out how to make a, a game that feels like Bioshock, but also feels like it's, like expanded in interesting ways. You know, we, there was just all these kind of like these different layers of what had to be accomplished. All right. all at once. Right. And so Minerva's Den was basically our opportunity to say like, now we know how to do all that stuff. We can just make this thing. But focus.

Yeah. A focus. A singular single player, let's get on there. And so, you know, I think if anything, it was cool to be able to say like, it was a long road, but we got to make something that was sort of like unfettered by most other overhead except just like make some really good bioshock. You know what I mean? Sure.

Sure. But, you know, it was also the last thing that I did at 2KMor-in. I was going to say, clearly the success went right to your head and you quit. Yeah, that's pretty much what it was. That's the way I understand it. You walked in there and you said, I'm out. Well, I mean, some of it was... These were the keys of the studio, by the way.

Because I had you throwing something saying you're out. Okay. I just wanted you know, it was the key. They gave you the key to the studio. They're like, you're so in charge. I thought maybe it was just like a coffee monger. No, why would you do that? That's rude.

Kevin. Kevin, why? Can you believe? We let this heathen into the house. Protect all the coffee mugs. This not the spotted dick. I mean, it was kind of, it was one of those things where I was sort of like, I did sign on it two cameron. Because I was a huge fan of Bioshock.

I was a huge fan of System Shock 2. You know, I love those kinds of games, and I loved what Irrational did. And we made Bioshock 2, made the DLC for Bioshock 2. weren't making any more Bioshock of that studio and God, I remember so I was working on Minerva's Den

and while I was working on Minerva's Den they Rational released their first pre-rendered trailer for Bioshock Infinite and that's the one where it starts you see the bottom of the sea

you see the rocky etc there's a little like rapture city and then you zoom out and it's like a little aquarium and then a big giant foot like stomps on and smashes it

and I was working on whenever it was then set in rapture et cetera yeah yeah I see that teaser I'm like guys I'm still using that and I was like I just went off I drove down the highway in and out burger I had a sadness burger all by myself

and I got back to work I mean the joke was on them it was still like they announced it like we weren't put out in five years I'm just like what Why are you even telling me about this game? But, you know, that was in my mind that it was sort of like, we finished Minerva's Den, and the team that made Bioshock is making a new Bioshock.

And I just knew it was something that I wanted to try to be a part of, you know? So after Minerva's Den came out, it was pretty much like my, unbeknownst to me, it ended up being kind of like my application. It was sort of like, hey, look, I made a bunch of Bioshock people say it's good. Do you guys like it? Yeah. I want to do level design for you guys if you've got a spot for me.

You know, so that was the transition for me that I wanted to continue working in that space and exploring like what you can do with that property, you know. And work at Irrational with people that I had made, that I had idolized that made games that I had been a fan of, you know, for years, years and years and years. Yeah. So you go out there. Yeah. And that's all the way out on the East Coast, right?

Yeah, it's up in Boston. Do you leave the wife out here again? No, she came. She came that time. Yeah. We had done enough long distance. I mean, speaking of skipping ahead to gone home. Yeah, my wife and I have been together since high school, and we were in a long-distance

relationship when we were in high school. Really? Uh-huh. How'd that happen? We met each other online. In EverQuest, I assume. On an IRC channel. Oh, my God, really?

Yeah. You're such a nerd. I love it. I know. And so, yeah, we had done a couple of years of long days since then we did it again when I moved out to Texas. And then we're like, that's not happening anymore. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We weren't married when I moved out to Texas.

So it was like additionally hard. So we were kind of like, there's no more of that. Yeah, yeah. So she came, she had finished her grad school. We went out to Boston together. And, yeah, I started working irrational. Okay. And so what happens?

How long you get irrational? Because you don't stay on to ship, Bioshchok. No. Me and Kenny hung out for like a year. Okay. And you realize this guy is the emperor with no clothes. I'm getting out of here. This Ken Levine's duped in industry.

Well, I mean, he did walk around the studio naked sometimes. Speaking of a... No. I was there for a year. Okay. And what, I mean, what happened? I mean, so I was a level designer on Bioshock Infinite as well. I was a senior level.

So I was mostly responsible while I was there for kind of pitching levels. right so Ken had a general outline for the flow of the game like this happens in the beginning here's a specific scene I have in mind gotcha here's kind of the story moment that happens to this next level and what the whole idea of it is and like you know that and then so a lot of my job was to go through and like and also take into account like the shotgun's going to be introduced here and this plazvin needs to be part of the quest or whatever and and basically write up level design documents and bring them to Ken and the other leads and say like here's what

here's a pitch for the specifics of like what happens to the player over the course of the level and then kick it back and forth and be like well that's not really like this thing that I'm thinking of it doesn't really work with that or whatever

and then you know once we got to the point where a level pitch was like solid enough I worked with a level artist to do like the first like gray block like you know prototype for it so I did the level docs and first gray block of a lot of the levels like some of the levels

a fair amount of things in kind of like the first half two-thirds of the game the level that I was the most responsible for that kind of like I got for this before I left was Finkton, the factory town where you're like jumping back and forth between dimensions to try to like start the revolution etc. So it was

really cool It was like, I'm 100% aware and grateful for the fact that, like, I kind of had the job that you would want if you were a designer. Sure. Where it's like, my job is to sit around with Ken and be like, here's what I think would be cool if he was in the game, Dad. And he's like, well, I don't know about that. I don't know, son. Yeah. And so, you know, because a lot of the, on the one hand, a lot of the job was.

like come up with ideas, come up with concrete pitches for like, here's the flow, et cetera. Bring them to Ken and see what he thinks. And like, that's great. That's like, that's a great learning experience for someone to be like, this guy who's made stuff that I'm such a fan of. Here's how he thinks and how he would react to my first version of like X, Y, Z, etc. It's also a really hard job for your job description to be, come up with ideas that some other guy is going to think are cool. Yeah. You know? Because it's like you aren't going to bat a thousand on that. You're going to think something's awesome. And he's going to be like, that's not really how I was picturing it.

And that's fine. That's the whole point. But like you're just going to get shot down a lot no matter what, right? So but like all of that aside, the biggest thing for for me was, you know, I worked there for a year. And by the end of the year, I just realized I had gone from working on a pretty big team, on a big project on Bioshop 2 was like 80 something people on site there to on the Nervis Den. to on my nerves then it was nine full-time developers for like nine months

and then going back to a rational and it being like a hundred plus people on a project that had already been going for like two or three years before I got there right and despite all of the really positive things about like getting to work on a really ambitious project with people who have been doing amazing stuff for decades

learning a ton from them being able contribute, I just realized it's like, I don't, I don't think that I want to work on games this big anymore, you know? Because like, when you're on a game that huge, I think no matter who you are, you just can't see the whole thing at once. Oh, sure. You just can't, you just don't know, it's, it's too big to, like, fit in your vision. You know, it's just like, and so, I think, you know, even if you're, even if you're, even if you're Ken, your job is to kind of, like, hold the vision of all of it, but, like, it's just so much of it, right? And, and, and, and, something that was wonderful about working on

Minervis Den and then later working on Gone Home is you can have the entire team that's making the thing sit around together in one room and you can kind of be like, hey I think we should try this. Could we do that? And the programmer can be like

I'll give it a shot and maybe if we do it this other way and then half an hour later like I got that thing on screen. It's like let's do the second one. You were actually and then it's in the game right? And just that and it's small enough that you can be like,

I actually know everything that's in this game. There's nothing that I'm like, oh, that's in our game. You know, it's like, no, I mean, the game, like, it all fits, right? And, and, and that difference in scope and just kind of like,

your relationship to the project, I think was, um, was just really stark for me, you know? And so, so I had been there for a year and it was one of those things where, I was at that point where you needed to commit to shipping the game or I needed to get out before I was just fucking other people over.

Because if you leave right in the middle of like the crunchiest crunch, somebody else is just screwed. Right. Like everybody's already doing too much work. Now other people have to pick up all the work that you're not, there's not time to replace you, there's not time to train somebody. Yeah, exactly. You can't bring somebody up to speed on what you're doing.

Right. And so I was sort of like, okay, I've been here for a year. I either need to stay through this thing being out the door or I just need to say like I'm really sorry guys but like I have to do the right thing and like break off now if your heart's not in it right that's a completely yeah yeah you're gonna be miserable but sure you're gonna make people miserable around you the work or suffer yeah and frankly we we just

my wife and I just wanted to get back to Portland as well like she's from Portland I went to college in Portland I lived in Oregon for like I think four years before we moved down to San Francisco yeah it was where it was what I thought of as home. It was like my adoptive home, you know, and it's where my wife is from. So we're just sort of like, if we're going to do it, we just need to like get off of the treadmill of like, well, it's not treadmill, but like off of the track of like chasing jobs around the country going where the thing is, whatever. If we just, if we just decided we're at that point where we need to like go to where we want to be and then figure out how we can make that work, we just need to do it.

Right? So we moved back to Portland and, um, and just had to figure it out from there, you know. What was that? I was to figure it out from there. I mean, you're blowing, you're just going to figure it out. I'm going to do you. What, so you blow it up? I mean, does your wife have a job in Portland? I blow it up. You blow it up. You blow it up. You blow up your life in Boston. I'm using the Wiley Coyote.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're going to move back to Portland, honey. Does she have a job? Do you know you're going there to found a video game studio and make things? Not really. I mean, I started talking to Carla. and Yoneman, the co-founders of the Fulberry company, pretty, you know, around when I decided to... Were they still at 2K? Yeah, they were still at 2K here in San Francisco. Sure.

But all I knew was we were going to move back to Portland. And I did, like, some contracting work. I did, like, some remote contracting work in the meantime. Okay. Kind of between getting here and starting working on gone home. But it was the kind of thing where it was like, well, you know, I can do, like, contracting, consulting, whatever kind of stuff and just try to kind of make it work.

but if I want to keep making the kind of games that I know how to make and that I want to be working on in a kind of like tangible way in that like visceral way of like this is the kind of stuff I want to be making then I just have to figure out how to how to start something up ourselves you know because because especially at that time and still now Portland isn't a town where you're can just like apply for a level design job somewhere. There's our studios like that there. And so it was sort of like, it was also at the time where like Dear Esther and amnesia and, yeah, it was post-braid and Limbo and Bastion. And there was sort of... There was sort of that feeling of like,

oh, you can do this now. Like you can have a small team and make something that's really cool that is unique and people haven't played before and you can get it out there and make that a success. And so it was sort of the synthesis of those two things to say, like, if I'm going to be in Portland and want to do something like what I know how to do, I have to figure out how to start something up. And if you can get a small team together and figure out how to make something that stands out,

you can actually make a go of it. Right. And so that was what was really a motivator for saying, like, if I can get a couple of people that we've all worked together, that we have a skill set that can, like, add up to a game, have them come up to Portland where it's way cheaper than the Bay Area, etc, et cetera, et cetera, like maybe we can make something happen, you know? So was it a hard sell to do that with these folks down here that are living in Marin?

The Good Life at 2K, where they're throwing darts at your face every day on a boy, and this guy left us. I don't, I mean, I don't want to speak for them, but I don't really think so. I mean, I think that they were both at a point where they were interested in kind of like getting out of like the big AAA space. And, I mean, it's one of the things about, like, starting a thing like that is some of it is just down to being lucky that the people that you know

who have skills also have the availability to take a risk like this, right? Like none of us had kids. You know, my other two co-founders weren't married. You know, like they could just sort of say, like, we've got savings. Nobody's going to be let down if I just pick up and move and take a risk on this thing.

Let's go for it. You know, it was, it was just a time and place and situation kind of thing, right? And so, you know, because, like, I think a lot of people just don't have the option. They're like, well, I've got kids and I've got a mortgage and I've got student loans and it's just like, you know, I need a salary. I need, I can't, like, I can't just, like, live without a salary for long enough to do something like this or I can't uproot my family to do this or whatever, right? So, like, as far as luck and opportunity goes, it was just sort of, like, right people, right time, right situation, to actually, like, run with it.

Because, I mean, we talk about all the time, you know, like when we left, right, and we always talk about, oh, we left the sure thing to come do this. Like, we had, you know, money coming in right away. Yeah. You know what I mean? When you guys leave and you're going to go find a studio and stuff, it's going to be years until you put out a product, right?

So this is a spotted dick sponge pudding? Yeah, it's a British thing, and that's why I was saying, it says microwavable. Yeah, you, yeah. You take it out of the can first. Yeah, I was going to say, you shouldn't put, like, you shouldn't assume that the audience for Spotted Dick knows enough about microwave technology. Technology to not just put that. You shouldn't put that on the can.

But see, this is very... That implies the can is microwavable to me. This is very similar to burritos here in San Francisco, stick to me. In the way that, I think Spotted Dick is such a staple over there in Mary Old England that they, they've grown up on it. Everybody knows, you don't put the can in the thing. They're like, you take it out of the can, Guvina? Exactly, Govna, Oi, Govna, take it out of the can, don't you?

But it's the same way here, when... Yours was worse than mine, somehow. No, mine was a spot on, actually. Spotted. Dick on. Okay. The same thing here now, in San Francisco, how many times I watch people get a burrito

and they start to unwrap the top of me? You're like, whoa, what are you doing? That's not how you do it. From the time. Yeah, and they're like, so I do it in Texas, right? Well, Texas is fucked up.

Don't do that. One of the worst things. Exactly, of course. I don't remember what you're talking. We're talking about, we're building up to gone home. When you're talking about you got everybody out Everybody's doing it

Everybody's coming up They're getting ready to Okay Taking chances Yes How do you get them to come up there with no money? Oh right You're just like leave your big company job

That has benefits and all this other stuff And it's all amazing And come up here and maybe in a year and a half Off of some money that we can give you Yeah Is that I mean here's the thing about it It's like you know again like

You guys are all artists and stuff And you're smoking your cigarettes And little berets on the side there And your little striped shirts you're all excited to be is it really just that love of the art and the belief of the project and so then when you're pitching them

of like hey guys I got this radical idea I fucked up my life and moved to Portland why don't you come up here too and then unfuck my life because I'll be it if you come up here and unfuck mine and then we get to make games together did you have you have I just punch Bertil

did you already have the idea for gone home did you have a pitch to give them or were you just pitching them on coming up and let's make something I think it was somewhere in between so like we had the advantage of we had worked together before. They had seen me lead a project that came out and was good, you know. And I had a pitch.

The pitch I started with was more complex than the one we ended up with. It was just like, it would have been too much stuff to build. But it started from a pitch of like a non-combat first person game that had a few more moving parts to it, but I was sort of like, I think we could do this, blah, blah, blah. And then as they, you know, as everybody got on board, we kind of refined it and pushed it and said, like, uh, if we focused it down even more, if we just said, like, what if it's just exploring the space, finding the story of what happened there, finding the evidence of these people's lives, notes, and environmental storytelling and hearing the story in these characters'

own words, that that can be like the whole experience, right? And speaking, of my like blog and everything it was sort of the culmination of a bunch of design ideas that I had been working towards kind of like in what I was writing about and what I was thinking about for a lot of years you know I don't think that was really a factor in in them deciding what whether a do thing or not but it was sort of like the idea didn't come out of nowhere it was sort of like for me I think it was like well this is the time where all that stuff I've been thinking about can actually be like the solution to the problem of like is that this is something we could make. You know, this is something I've thought about how this could be

the heart of an experience if we could invest in and make a game that was small enough to like be all about that and et cetera. Right. So before they actually got to Portland and like got on site and we started. Bags are walking up to your front door. Yeah. We had we had come up with the idea of gone home and we had like basic like design documents for gone home and we you know we're starting to try some stuff out in unity and everything um so you know by the time that that they were there we could really say like we know what project we're working on and we can start putting it on screen you know so time out now is when the spoilers will start okay for gone home i'm gonna do a whole i'm in my head i've designed the fact that we

talk for an hour of 15 minutes about in the gone home cast not about gone home yeah that i want to do a thing in the front where i'm gonna say hey i mentioned the very beginning spoilers you got a long time So just hang on if you want to find out about how he became a man-go. Stick around to the 115 mark. Yeah. And everybody's like, yeah, of course, where am I going to go? So you talked about, you just said, you know, you had this stuff, you'd been kicking around and all these different things to make this part. Does it start with the story?

Does it start with the mechanics? Was it that you wanted to tell the story or was that you wanted to have first-person non-combat exploration? It definitely starts with the mechanics. Okay. Is that something, I mean, is that like during Minerv's Den, Bioshock, you're like, this is fun. It would be cool to walk around and not. have any gun and not have anything. Well, I mean, that is how Minerva's Den ends.

Right. That's the last, like, ten minutes of Minerva's Den. That was our opportunity to say, like, you've beaten the boss. You're past the point of, like, combat being relevant. Like, you've gotten past, like, the story climax, you know? So all that's left here is just to, like,

tail out the story and just let you kind of sit with it. And so we took that kind of, it was, you know, a little bit of a risk. or just sort of unorthodox to be like, okay, you're going to beat the last boss, and you go down this elevator, and then we're just going to,

not call it out, but we're just going to put your hands down and the rest of the thing it's just like listen to an audio diary, explore this space, get to the end, finish it up, have closure in that way, right? And so gone home was an extension,

you know, was like a continued exploration of that. But I just think it's really important to, always start first from what is the player doing. You know what I mean? And that's what led to all of our creative decisions. So for us, it was like you start from the point of, or we started from the point of,

I think it would be really interesting if the player was just able to explore a space really deeply interactively, open all of the cabinets and drawers and dig through and find things behind, you know, something that fell behind the dresser and just a little scrap of paper and a note and put all these pieces together

into the story that happened here. And if, you know, because that's like, that's a relatively small part of a lot of bigger games. You know, that's an important aspect, like a sub part of like Bioshock or whatever. And he's kind of chicken an egg where because it's not the thing the game is about, it's not like the most robustly kind of supported part of the experience.

And because it's not super, robustly supported, you can't really go into deep detail into that stuff, right? And so our thinking was, you know, if you can, yeah, open all the drawers and you can look under the bed and you can zoom in on things and you can read multiple pages of every document, et cetera, then that robustness and that level of detail to just the experience of just like be in a place, investigate it, be a detective, find out, you know, what the story of this place, how it led to the state that it's in now, that that could be, you know, the whole game. And so that's the starting point.

And going from there to then like, okay, well, that's true. You could apply that to whatever. You could apply it to a fantasy setting. You could apply it to an ancient time setting or, let's say, a far future space station. Sure. But, you know, we were sort of like, you could apply this just like a family's house.

Because part of it was like we're a small team We can't build a city You know we can't build a What you know If we want to make A game where It's contingent upon Every space being really dense with stuff to find

That's meaningful It's kind of like well we could build a family's house Every square foot of a family's house tells me something about Who the people are that live here right And so then that leads to like Okay well so who are the people that live in the house and what did happen to them and when did it take place you know like and and where is this house and you know what kind of house is all that kind of stuff right yeah um but it definitely didn't start from

we want to tell this story about these girls in the 90s how do we do that sure yeah it was more like we want to we want to have this experience that has all these requirements of like what would make it interesting what can best express those mechanics and that that kind of like interactive paradigm in a way that we can actually build it you know that we don't need a team of 100 people to build it. So then you're kicking this round, you have the idea that folks move up, and you all live in a house together, right? Yeah, that's the deal.

Yep. That's awesome. Yeah, we rented a house together. I never heard of anybody else that did anything like that. No, never. There's never been a bunch of people who live in the same house and make much stuff. Don't look at my castle walls, clearly. My San Francisco home studio.

Yeah, yeah, we rented a house together in Portland, the three of us, and then our 3D artist, Kate lives up in Canada, so she worked normally and came end of visit sometimes. Gotcha. Yeah. And so we're saying that, you know, it doesn't start with these, we're going to tell a story about two girls in the 90s or whatever. When does that enter the equation? That's fairly soon after.

Yeah. You know, I think that from a writing perspective, you know, our point of view was takes place in a family's house. The whole game is going to take place inside the house. So like, this has to be about drama between the family members to live here. Right? It can't be about, I mean, there's events. in the game that take place outside of the house, but it can't be about, like, inherently, stuff

that isn't about, like, drama between the family members. And so, you know, we were like, what are some examples of that? What are some, like, classic kind of reasons that there can be these, like, irreconcilable differences between family members, between generations, you know, between parents and kids or whatever, right? And so we were like, well, you know, one classic example is like Romeo and Juliet. Sure. Right? Because we're like, okay, if we want, like, kind of the protagonist or the

center of the story that you're following to be a teenager, it's like, teenage love, that's like a, you know, that's something that, you know, can be very volatile, right? That can lead to an interesting story. And so Romeo and Juliet maybe not like, monogues and Capulets are like super

relevant to like, you know, a game that takes place in the 90s, but we're like, okay, but, you know, the kid falls in love with somebody that their family doesn't approve of a modern version of that is like a gay love story she falls in love with another girl

her parents don't approve society doesn't approve like how does she has an individual deal with that like what and and how does it lead to they're not being anybody in the house at the end because it was sort of like a pitch for the mechanics of the game it's just you and the environment

there isn't anybody else around so where did everybody go is like the question you have to answer and so we were like okay if it's about Sam and it's about who she falls in love with and it's about why they're not here anymore what are the events of a story

and what are the details of the characters and the setting and everything else that leads to that and so you know it's like it's really useful you know it's you talk about how constraints lead to creativity

and necessity is a mother of invention and you know like a lot of lame astorisms. No, they're not lame. And so, like, those are, like, the mechanical and scope restrictions.

Those are, like, good constraints that lead to you not just having, like, a blank page in front of you and being, like, what story are we going to tell? I don't know, but being, like, we have these, like, practical problems in front of us for, like, what we can do with this game. Sure. And what the player can do

in the game. And so, like, how does our fiction answer those questions? Not just like, what do we want to write about today? You know what I mean? Oh, interesting, interesting. So we wouldn't have written the story that we wrote if it wasn't for saying, like, here's what you can do in the game. One person in the house and we only have a house.

Right, yeah. It's just the player, a house, here's the stuff you can do. Okay, you know, what's an interesting thing to find out in what supports that? You know what I mean? So, like, how, I guess for this brainstorming and for how this is happening, how long is that process? Is that every day before we sit off to do something?

Because for me, like the thing about it, and this is something I've been talking about a lot, I'm kind of funny with, Emily's Away. Did you play that yet? I've played some of it.

I think I played like an early version of it. What I talk about with Emily's Away, right, is the fact that all it is is this text adventure right through AIM or whatever, but in reality, for me, it's a time machine. Right. Because I play it and I'm back at my desk at Missou in 2001 when I left, you know,

went away to college. Yeah. It was doing it. You've got your, you've got your Lincoln Park Yeah, totally Yeah, my little Blink 182 one on there And that's the thing, same way with Gone Home

Where playing it And I mean, you know, my story's tired And everybody's heard it before But I knew nothing about it. I just knew that I needed to play it. Everyone, like Marty put up the review, I scrolled to the score and I was like, okay, great.

And then I remember Justin McElroy was saying the same thing. Just go play this, don't read anything about it, da-da-da. And so I went and did it that one weekend and I wasn't prepared to go back to my childhood home, right? Which is like, and like, again, and I always talk about it, and Emily is away, it makes me nostalgic

for things I didn't even know I missed. Right. And this is the same way of opening a drawer and I'm like, this is my mom's junk drawer. I remember this where it was just pads and pens and papers and all this other junk and rubber bands and those little clips. You're like, awesome. And then it's everywhere you turn in that house,

you're like, this isn't my house, but it's my house. You know what I mean? Like, those building blocks are so crazy because I can't imagine building something like that because, again, I wouldn't know what I was missing, I feel like. Sure. Well, and that's a big part of why... So again, the mechanical constraints

are why we chose the time period and the setting which is to say like... Oh, sure. You know, we were like, we don't want there to be email. We don't want there to be... Where is everybody? Let me call any of them who are constantly dialed into everything.

Oh, like, because you know, part of the premise for the game ends up being that or ended up being that the player character you're playing as, Katie, has been away in Europe for a year. And her only contact with the family has been like postcards.

Yeah. Nowadays, you be on Facebook with them every day. She knows exactly what's going on, right? And so, you know, we were like, okay, well, mid-90s is because we wanted to rewind the clock as little as possible, but to the point where you're still finding sticky notes and hearing answering machine messages and seeing, like, physical TV guide, you know, clippings. Trapper keepers and S&S cartridges. Well, I mean, so that's, but that's kind of the other side of it, though, right?

Because our reason for saying it's 1995 Is so there would be newspaper clippings And so there would be Like handwritten letters that mom's friend Had sent to her in the mail That you can find in a drawer Because of what we need to do is say like mechanically The game is

Explore every inch of this house And just find bits and pieces of the story everywhere So there's a letter in this drawer And there's a note from school in Sam's backpack And there's a you know And in this scene it would all just be Facebook posts and emails and text messages.

Sure. And so then the other side of that is once we're like, okay, so it's 1995, all right, we remember the advantage of setting it in a time that you've lived through is you can just remember whether it feels like it's right or not. You can be in the living room

and you can be like, I remember my dad used to record a lot of movies of HBO and just they were hand labeled on VHS tapes. We should put that in. You know, like we need the binder from, we need the trapper keeper from school. We need the magic eyes, you know?

So did you guys go and look like through your old photo albums and stuff like that? Yeah, yeah. I mean, some of the photos in the game are, like, paintovers of photos of my wife's family. Yeah. Because she and her siblings grew up at the right time and had the right distribution of, like, brothers and sisters. And mom and dad, we, like, painted a mustache on my wife's dad. And it was very much. Like, yeah, let's go back and look through it.

Let's, like, think back to, yeah, what was in my room when I was growing up. I was a little goofy, like, plastic basketball hoop on the back of the door. You know, like... And if it felt authentic to us, because we were like, oh, I remember this, this should be here, other people are going to have that same ping of like, oh, man, I remember when you did get TV guide in the mail, and you had to look at it to see when shows were going to be on TV. You know, I remember having a high school textbook that looked like a...

It had a cover like this, you know? And... You remember your dad sending you really disapproving letters. tearing them up, throwing them away. And so, you know, yeah, so hopefully that, that, that, from both directions, it just makes it feel like authentic. You're like, it's like you said, I remember a place like this. I feel like I could have been here. Yeah, the living room with the big TV and the couch and the pillow for it.

I'm like, that's my boy in the basement. I remember that. You know what I mean? Like, that's how I feel. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So how long do you work on gone home the first time, not this console idea you're putting out now? It was about a year and a half. Oh, wow, okay.

Yeah. When do you know you're onto something? Like you're working on this thing, it's cool, this is great. I don't know, but I imagine for you, I mean, people are like, Mnerva's done is the best. Are you like, can I do that again? Am I overthinking this?

I think it was more a question of like, we were kind of off on our own. So it was sort of like, can we make a game that we just start from a fresh install of unity and like get it out in front of people? Yeah. Like we had savings from when we were working in AAA. It's like, can we actually get this done in the amount of time

before we're broke? Before we broke. Yeah. You know, and all that kind of. kind of stuff. And yeah, there was just the question of like, can we make, can we make a game that's just this stuff and do a good enough job with that, that it supports the whole experience, right? We were encouraged, I think, all the way through.

We did a lot of playtesting. You know, we sent the game to other developers that we knew that we either worked with before or that we were fans of their games and kind of knew them through like conferences or whatever. And, you know, I remember very early on, I had, like, the earliest, earliest version of the game. It was just, like, gray block, temp, everything. And I let somebody who we used to work with the two-gamer-in and play it.

And I was like, would you want to play more of this? You know, like, and he was like, yeah, I want to keep going. I want to find more stuff. And I'm like, okay. And kind of as we kept going and sent playtests out, You know, we were just encouraged that, that some things that I learned about playtesting from working in, at like, 2K was, you know, the most important questions are like,

was there any time that you felt confused or frustrated or bored or you just wanted to quit? Yeah. And when we made our IGF demo, which was the whole game up until you opened Sam's locker in her room, basically, we were sending out Playtos with kind of that question and you know when we made that demo and and showed it to other developers that we knew it was really consistently like people saying like I didn't want to stop playing like there's not more like I have to like I have to know what happens after this part or like you know we took that build down to San Francisco because we lived in Portland at the we'd moved

you know we were based in Portland by that time we brought it back down here and showed her to a bunch of press and we were like okay we'll take the build we'll give you like half an hour to just play it sure and then we can talk to you about or whatever and a bunch of you know people that that played it were like can I play it for like just another like 10 minutes like 15 minutes I just I haven't finished it yet you know we're sort of like dude if you know if these people like don't want to stop playing this thing that we're still you know I've only been working out for like six eight months whatever then hopefully we're on a good path you know what I mean like hopefully we we maintain and like follow

that threw it to the end and it's like a thing because all you can ask out of people is that they actually just like want to keep playing your game until they're done with it. There's so many games that it's just so easy to just be like, oh yeah, I just kind of stopped playing it. Oh yeah, this got slow and I stopped to watch TV and then

I found another game and never came back in. And that's easier when your game is like two or three hours long, you know? But that was the whole focus of it was to say like we want to give players a game that you can play it in one long evening or in two evenings, you know, a couple days in a row, and feel like you were really immersed in it,

you were fully invested in it, and it ended before you got tired of it, and you got to have that closure of saying, like, wow, I just experienced something complete. And I remember it, and I can take that with me, and that was cool. And it didn't test my patience. It didn't, like, overstay its welcome. It was what it was trying to be. No, I understand exactly. I'm saying, because, like, that's the, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to beat my own drum here. but I've been on the gone home train for a while. Oh yeah. I talk about it quite a bit.

And I appreciate it. Oh, no problem. Thank you. Well, I appreciate you making it, so don't worry about it. The thing about it, though, right, is that I've beaten Gone Home once. And then you and I, at IGN, did it like a commentary where you, I think you played and showed stuff and we walked over it and stuff. But that I couldn't hear anything. I don't know what's, you know what I mean?

Like, I've beaten gone home. You don't really paying attention. You didn't care. Well, I'm trying to think of the next thing to say. And I got, I mean, Mariggins is across the street here. I got to go get a sandwich. No, it's the fact that I've beaten Gone Home once, and I can tell you so much about that in those characters and Sam and Lonnie, and to the point where I'm emailing fan artists and asking you if I can print them off and you're sending me this,

and I'm begging you for Christmas duck and stuff like that. You talk about the impact of a game, right, and how games can, you know, affect us, and that's it for me in the way that, like, I know Sam and Lonnie, you know what I mean? And, like, I can sit there and draw, you can be talking about anything else a week from now, and we can start talking about that game and I'm right there. And why I'm so excited for today, when it comes out on PSN, and it's not today, today's not today. When it comes out on PSN though, because I'm so excited to get it, download it and then go into the room, shut the door,

put on headphones and just play it again. You know what I mean? And just go through and be back in that world in that house, the Green Breyer residence. Yeah. You know, like that, the analog to that, I guess, right, is Last of Us, whereas, like, I had beaten Last of Us once and it was awesome and amazing,

and I had such a great time with it. and I was getting the Jones to play it again I always said I wouldn't play it again because that was my experience right the ending I thought was really well done and came out of nowhere from me but then it came on PS4 I was like you know what I want to play

this is the time and I put it back in and I made it to about the damn and I was like it's not the same you know what I mean and it's like I still love this game and I still love these characters but I know that this is a bit slow and I just fell out of it like that and you know where it's going

yeah exactly exactly whereas this one I feel like the minutia of it right because it's such a dense game of like, what, you know, I want to read, like you brought up

the mom's friend's letter. I want to read that again because I remember the time not having the full context of the forestry department and everything. You know what I mean? Like, now I'd go back and do that

and read that and find that again. Yeah, I think, I mean, I am heartened by the fact that, you know, that we didn't, we never wanted to do anything

that was like randomization or like, you know, things are actually like different when you replay it or anything. But a lot of people have kind of, you know,

pulled us that, when they play through it and they pick it back up and play through it again because they're just like oh you know like either they want to just look like look for one thing and go back and find it and remind themselves about it or they just kind of wanted to run through it again that it seems like a lot of people

you kind of can't help finding stuff that you missed the first time and hopefully it's additionally interesting because you have the context of kind of knowing what all that stuff's gonna mean because maybe you did see it the first time and it just didn't mean anything you forgot you had seen you're like, oh, that's like going to be about when, etc., you know.

And that was what we always hoped was that even though the game is totally set, you know, like everything is where it is. When you come back, the photo of Lonnie will still be in that one drawer. Not if it's going to actually change, but hopefully your individual experience of it feels unique and specific to you because you know your experience was what you found in what order

and only what you might have missed some stuff. Oh yeah. And even that missing information just colors like what your interpretation, basically. And that's the thing. And like, you know, like I'm talking about, you know, why I expressed everybody not to watch this until they'd beaten it, right? And the fact of like when I went in, I'll never forget playing that game and thinking it was survival horror.

Right. Waiting for the ghost. Where is the creepy thing? Where is the jump scare going to be? And like when I heard, when you hear, like for me, you know, I come in the door, I went left immediately to the end table, pull that out. And then I think I immediately went to the answer. machine underneath the big photo of the family and played that in the messages.

And you get the Lonnie message where she's crying and banging Sam to pick up the phone or whatever, you know what I mean? And I was like, totally horror movie. And it wasn't until, it wasn't until like it was all ramping up at the end where I was like, oh, she was crying. You know what I mean? When it all comes together, you're like, fuck, yes. Yeah, I was really happy that that stuff all stayed under wraps, basically, like through release you know because I I know that I talked to people who played it on release you know who went in not really knowing much of anything and in fact I'm thinking of somebody that that I know who who is queer herself and played it and didn't know anything because if you go around in a house

oh sure sure sure and she was playing it and she was starting to go through and she found the Lonnie photo and then she found like I think it was the first audio diary where Sam is talking about like noticing Lonnie and how she has a big gold star around her and she had to find out who she was or whatever and she told me at that point she was like that was the point where I was like wait is this a problem and like the fact that

people could go in and really have that legitimate sense of like discovering what the actual heart of the game is without it being on the box as it were like I was really grateful that you know we did that whole preview run that ends with

their first kiss audio diary. So that was out there with all the journalists that played it if they got to that point. You know, we sent it to reviewers. So many of the reviews were basically just like

stop reading this review and go play this for yourself. And all we ever said to reviewers was just like, we don't have any specific stuff we're going to ask you. Just please don't spoil anything you wouldn't have wanted

to have spoiled for yourself. And I feel like it's a testament to the degree to which it connected. with people that they were like, oh, I wouldn't want any of this spoil. I'm just not going to mention it. And it was, it didn't go out there.

It still doesn't. That's the thing that I still find so awesome about it is the fact that, every so often, if there's some guy who's going to say some shoddy comment about homosexuals, that's what he wants to make or whatever and be a dick on the internet. But like, for the most part, you never see it. And there was even like, there was one time,

and I'm talking like in the last six months, where it was like, the hashtag was like, like, simplify a game in a sentence. And the one I put out was, so it turns out she's gay and she's not home. Or she ran away.

And like, there was like, even that I was like questionable about because I talked so much about going home that I didn't want people to draw that conclusion. Right, right, right, right. But even then it was like, there was like maybe one kid was like, this is what I think it is, you ruin it from me.

I'm going to motherfucker, the game has been out a while. Right. You know what I mean? Like, but. Well, and I, I mean, on some level, like, that was a thing. When we were making it, I was really,

um, in my own head, I was really adamant that I did not want Sam being gay to be like the twist. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you know what I mean? Can this also be a Star Wars spoiler cast? Yeah, I think everybody's seen The Force Awakens. If you haven't seen The Force Awakens, we're going to do the... I won't really do it. No, do it, because here's what we do. We're going to do the tap.

So I tap my head, that means the spoiler starts, and when I tap my head again, that means the spoiler has finished and you can come back. So mute right now. so people talk about Force Awakens, spoilers, and they're talking about how Han Solo dies, right? Yeah.

I don't really think that's even a spoiler. Yeah. Like, that's not like a, I'm gonna spoil, uh, we can't do a tap within a tap. I'm spoiling Empire Strikes back. Okay, fuck on. You don't get to not have seen it.

That's not, oh, Luke, I am your father, spoiler. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, it's not that level of, the movie is, the twist is ruined if you know this. You can tap your head now. Um, you're back, welcome. Yeah, we're, that's no more, no more.

I feel you on that. I feel you. And so I feel like I always wanted to be the same way with just Sam being gay, with there being like a lesbian love story

in this game is that like I never, I never, it just always felt like it would be, feel really cheap to me. Yeah.

If you're like, and the twist is. Yeah, yeah. You know, and so like, from my own point of view, I don't even consider it a spoiler or like, you know,

a detriment to the game. Sure. If you know, oh, gone home is, is, it's about, a lesbian love story. It's about your sister runs away from home. Yeah. And she's gay. Okay. I mean, that, like, you can go in knowing that. Yeah. And, like, what matters about the experience of the game is finding out who these characters are and how those facts affected them and how they got to that point. Yeah, why you got here to this point. And, and so, you know, like, of course, there's value to just going in blind and being like, I'm just going to open this box and I have no idea what's going to be inside it. But I think it, my hope is that it's gone home, even if you know

X, Y, and Z are in this game that you get in, you start playing, and hopefully those thoughts kind of leave your mind and what you're concentrating on is like, wait, but like, how did that happen? Who are these people? Why was it this way? So, you know, I never wanted to make a game that was spoilable in like a Bioshocky. way, you know, just like a twist twist. I think it's great to like kind of shield yourself from knowing too much, but, you know,

if you can still get into the experience and kind of immerse yourself in all the details of what the thing is really about, then hopefully it still works. No, totally. For me, yeah, this is totally not selfish. This is totally just on me, right, for me and my lens

of playing it, right? For me, the twist was when I let myself for a second believe, maybe this is, maybe there isn't horrible thing. You know what I mean? Maybe this is just about them because that was the thing of like, you know, there was always the creep level. And then I was like, oh, this is a neat little story and I'm interested in. I'm like, oh, no, I remember then the first time when it was like, I got to get

the next room to find out about this. And then I got that and I was like, wait, am I playing a game about this girl falling in love? And then like the light blew up or something. I'm like, nope, back to being a horror game. This is a horror game. And then it was like back and forth, back and forth until it gets to that like ramp up moment of running up the stairs and pulling down the attic. And I'm like, she's going to be, she's going to have hanged herself. I'm going to walk in here. She's going to be dead. I was like, oh, thank God.

Well, and that's a crazy thing, too. Like, it is, that's one of those things where it's, it's sort of like there's the death of the author. There's the whole, like, the author's intent doesn't matter. And you can, like, one as the author can be caught by surprise by that. Because although, until the game came out, I never even considered people thinking that she might have killed herself in the attic. And then people, like, it was really common for people to be like, I was so scared. She was just going to be, like, hanging up there.

I had to go up there, but I didn't want to go up because I was afraid of what I was going to see. And I was like, and then I replayed the game through that lens. Right. And I was like, I can totally see how it seems like we're very intentionally setting that up. You're doing all the Satan stuff, and you got candles.

And there was kind of a, the, like, the main thing. thing, it's just weird. So like there was kind of like we played with it a little bit because there was like the map that leads you to the secret room that has the pentagram in it under the stairs

like says just there's a note that just says like where we'll do it with an arrow and then it's like preparations are complete and so like I get it that it's sort of like oh you could think like that's where they're going to kill themselves so they don't have to be apart or something you know but like I hadn't really thought of it that way. I hadn't thought of like, like,

the audio diary that you get when you're going up to the attic. Yeah. Like, there's a weird thing. So, like, in that audio diary, she talked to some of the dialogue is like, Lonnie's gone and the sunset light in this house is the saddest thing I've ever seen. I just want to sleep and I think may go up to the attic and wait.

And, like, weirdly, totally naively, from my own experience, when I get really stressed out or really, like, depressed, I just want to sleep a lot. Yeah. Like, I think, I think it's just like, I get stressed out with my brain is just like, why don't we just not be awake for a lot?

And that was, but then I'm like, I could sound like she's like saying, like, I just want to kill the, right? And so, like, that's one of those things where it's so weird as a creator because you're like, oh my God, I hope that people don't feel like we're like trivializing, you know,

suicide to like get around. out of people. Like, oh, we're going to make you think she killed herself and it'll be, ah, you know. And, and, but the opposite side of it is like, when people started saying that, I looked at it, and I'm like, that's a totally legitimate interpretation of, like, because when you're making the thing, you see it in the order that you're putting it into the game. You never get to see it out of order. I found this. And this is what the player. And so, like, you already know what's going to happen. You know what the stuff you're putting is going to add up to. And until you see the reaction

of the player who only saw the stuff in the order that they encountered it without having any foreknowledge it can be really hard to say like oh if I only knew this in this order it totally could add up to something different than where I know it's going but I knew where it's going so I wasn't thinking about

what else you know and so anyway so so seeing how people how people got so invested in what was going to happen to Sam as a person because they felt like they knew her and they cared about her as like someone that they felt close to over the course of this experience like I hate to think that that it that we were that we were like

that they could come off as being manipulative that we're like because I don't because I hate stuff where it's like we're going to make you love this character and then we're going to kill him so you're sad you know and but I think it is a testament to the fact that the the experience connects with people that they were so worried and I think it's going to like change it like that because it's going to destroy the world or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But just because they're like, I don't want something bad to happen to her. And I'm not reading like, you know, your feedback inbox or anything.

But even when I thought, oh my God, she's going to be dead up there and I got up there, I was so relieved. Right. And then you figure out when it's all, when you have that breath and like, that's what this meant and that's what. It was never like I thought you were building to red herring me. Right. It's just the, again, it's what's so great about it is that I interpret it totally in a different way. You know what I mean?

Just like I interpreted the lightning strikes, queuing ghosts and stuff. You know what I mean? Yeah. No, I mean, but that's one of those things where you can just get lucky, because it could land on the opposite side where you're just like, oh, we put this thing out here. Everybody thinks it means this one thing and we didn't even consider that. And, you know, if the, if the coin, you know, falls the other way, it can be bad. So, like, I'm, I'm just glad that it kind of, it ended up walking that line, you know, to feel, to feel legit in that way, you know. So gone home comes out. Yep. You take a deep sigh, I imagine, putting it out. But then. What's it like in the house slash office as everyone starts to lose their mind for this? Is it a slow build? Because, like, I was turned on to it after reviews posted.

So, I mean, is it like a trickle of a few weeks of it just getting to be bigger and bigger? It was a really big launch day. Yeah. Because it was, like, a crazy launch day. Because it was like we started seeing the reviews. Yeah. You know, because we had sent out review code far enough ahead of time. We requested an embargo time, so they would all go up after.

the game was available on Steam, et cetera. And so reviews started going up, you know, in quick succession over the course of that day. And it was like, we finished the game internally. We all played through the game, you know, and we all, you know, having said, this is content locked, this is what's going out, we should just play through it

because this is what people are going to be playing. Yeah. We're all kind of like, you know, we think this is good, you know? Like we think if we played this, we would like it. Sure. We think we did a good job. Cool.

So I think that we'll have, you know, some people that really like it and it'll be their jam. And so hopefully that means it'll, the game will do well. You know what I mean? And I was not expecting the first review that we saw get posted to be a 10 out of 10. I wasn't expecting for there to be like a 9.5 from IGN, you know, and a 9 from GameSpot. And, you know, on and on. On and on, right? It's like, okay, we thought we did a good job, but the degree to which this is connecting

with people, and they're like, this is a 9.5, this is a 10 out of 10, was like, we, you know, it was sort of like that, we thought people would like it. We did not see that coming. And it really did kind of snowball to like, whoa, this game, you know, I think the public perception was like, whoa, this game is like getting all of these like really high reviews compared to it's just like a small $20 PC only game, I should check it out. And then the thing that happened over the course of weeks was that it didn't go away. You know what I mean?

Because there were the reviews. And then there were just weeks of like essays and like think pieces and long form, you know, interpretive kind of writing on it of like people talking like a, you know, Rock Paper Shotgun talking about Alec from Rockfavor Shotgun identifying with like the dad of the in the game or like people writing long form kind of like confessional stuff about how they saw themselves in the game and this is what they remember from when they went through this or

Austin Walker doing a really good blog post about how he finished the game and he felt like there was still something in it and he went back and really dug out Uncle Oscar's story and put all those pieces together and and so there was the first you know spike of like wow this is really critically well regarded to a degree we weren't expecting followed by and people are just like continuing to talk about it and play it and it and there's a discussion that is just like going bigger than game forward you know what I mean so it's it's it's you know it's uh you know It's all you can really ask for as far as the reaction to a game to be like,

we made it on our own terms. It was really well reviewed. People are buying it and people are just like continuing to talk about it. People care about it. You know what I mean? Like that's the, like, I think you pour however much of your life into making something. All you can ask for is for people to care about it. You know, because there's so many, there's so much stuff that people like work and work and

work and they put it out. And, you know, nobody's, nobody really like, you know. Could come or go. And so just knowing that we had made this thing that we thought we were proud of, and then that people really could see themselves in it and could really feel like it was worth expending their time and energy and thought, talking about what that was and what it meant to them. You know, that was really surprising and really, really gratifying, you know. Does, so we've built you up here.

This game's amazing. Everybody's awesome. We love you. There's think pieces. Everything's fantastic. All that said... Games, games, games, games. Games.

All that said, do you take it hard or as an insult when people are like, this isn't a game? It's a walking simulator. This isn't a video game. This shouldn't be game of the year. There's no gameplay. I mean, no. As far as like taking it personally or something? Yeah, yeah.

No. No, I mean, I have always felt confident in what is like interactively valuable. about the game, you know. And it's, you know, it's backlash, right? Where it's like, I think that the flip side of a game that is non-traditional and small and doesn't have a lot of the things that a lot of games traditionally have being very well received and kind of like propped up and, you know, made like this paragon of like, look at this game, you know, is really, really good.

Yeah. People that don't connect with it don't just say, well, that's not really for me. They're also like, and here's why all these people that are saying this is really good or wrong, because it's not even a game. You know, or whatever. And I think that's just really an expression of just like, this isn't something that resonates with me. Sure. It's not for everybody, right? And, like, I don't see the personal value in expressing this isn't something that I care about in, like, really negative terms.

You know, like, there's a lot of things that aren't for me and that I'm just not the audience for it. But you understand you have Twitter. You can just say that. You can just find stuff you don't like and tell people all the time. Yeah, tell the people who made it. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Go right to them. Go to the source.

Why'd you even do this? I don't enjoy it. So, you know, I think that it's shorthand for, this isn't the kind of experience that I care about. And, you know, like, there's a whole wide world of different kinds of things that I think count as games. or that are exploring different aspects of what being a game means or what an experience being interactive means or why you should even bother playing a role in this experience instead of just watching it or whatever.

And I think if we are able to help expand the territory of what is inside that realm of like, and here's something else that you can do with games, then it's worth the flip side of people saying, well, that doesn't fit inside of my definition of games, so it's not even a game. Sure. You know, like, so it goes, right?

Yeah, exactly. Sweet and sour. No, that's just a delicious sauce. Well, I'm just saying you have to take the sweet and sour. Yeah, you don't just want... You get so much praise. You're going to be... Well, and you just don't want sour sauce.

No, you don't. I'll take my... I'll take my chicken rice with just a bunch of sour sauce. Put all the sour on there. Can I get sour? Anyway, yeah. For the record, too, I told you he would destroy a toy for your approval. Oh, my God.

You've moved to this stage. You've impressed him so much that where Tillo is destroying his... Look what you're doing. Oh, my God, you're powerful. So Gone Home comes out. All these awards, all this stuff starts happening. Tens, all these nines. Are your phones immediately blowing up?

Is this, you know, is this everyone in the industry now wanting you to make them a game and to work with you kind of thing? I think the most... I think of the stuff that we heard the most was, like, just people... Just players emailing us and send... And kind of sharing their personal experience with the game. Like a lot of, we were very fortunate for a lot of people to write to us and just be like, I played this game and it reminded me of when I was growing up.

Or I played this game and it reminded me of what my sister went through in high school. And I feel like I understand that better now in a way. Or, you know, like, whatever, that kind of thing. Here's what the game meant to me. Thank you for making it. And that was the stuff that was like hard to keep up with. because in that initial push, it was just like so many people were sharing

their connection with the game with us, and that was really cool. I think that as far as, like, other stuff like that goes, I was lucky to get invited to, like, speak at a lot of conferences and stuff. We started working on patching the game to fix some stuff, and we also added the commentary mode to it, so, like, we kept busy, kind of. You know, we recorded our own commentary tracks, and we also got commentary from Chris Remo, who did the music, and Sarah Grayson, who did the voice of Sam, and Corinne Tucker, who's the singer of Hedons to Betsy, which music is in the game, and later was the singer of Slater Kinney.

And so we were kind of, like, you know, being like, how can we add to the game, make it better, fix some stuff, et cetera. And, yeah, then, you know, did some traveling. we were able to actually afford to have our own places of residence instead of sharing one. We're looking forward to that one day. Yeah. Enjoy it while you can. It's good while at last.

So, you know, there was, there were things to distract us during the like, the kind of, because you finish a game and you've had something to work on every day for however long. Sure. And then you don't anymore. And it's a weird, it's a weird, like. I feel like I should be doing something. Yeah. It's just a strange, like, adjustment period.

Like, I mean, think if you finished kind of funny. If tomorrow, it was like, okay, we shipped it, we're done. No more calling right off. You don't have to record any more stuff. Yeah, yeah. Tomorrow you'd probably be psyched because you get a day off. Yeah, yeah. A couple days later, you'd probably be like, so what am I supposed to be doing?

What am I doing? You know? So it's good to be able to say, like, okay, well, I got to write a talk. I got to go to this place. Sure. We got to get this patch together, et cetera, et cetera. And then, you know, after all that dust settled, took a little bit more of a break, and then it was kind of like, well, what are we going to do now?

How do we start making something that builds on what we've done, but that we don't just repeat ourselves? Exactly. Yeah. And that's Tacoma. It is. Gone home in space. Yes. There you go.

Because what is a space station, if not a space house? I'm very excited to see if when I go into the space station and I open the drawers, if I'm like, this is like my space station. I remember growing up in this space station. Flowing upside down, looking at the moon, obviously. So hashtag relatable. So I know we've gone incredibly long here. What time do you have in your watch there?

You have a pretty watch. I don't want to pull out my phone. That's really. It is 4.16 p.m. Oh, shit. We got to talk Tacoma on the Kind of Funny Gamescast. We're going to do it on the Gamescast. We've got to get moving if we're going to do a games cast.

So Tacoma, check out the Kind of Funny Gamescast. Because I want to know, like I was talking about, how they deal with Microsoft comes together. Not financials of it. But like, do they approach you? Do you approach them? Yeah. How does that kind of thing work?

Well, I'll show you the balance sheet. Oh, thank you very much. We kept your seats. So the final thing for the gone home cast, I guess, then, is it's finally coming to consoles. Yep. Took you long enough. Yep. I've been beaten down your door for a year.

I know. When you've gone home come out anymore? I don't even remember the original year anymore. August 2013. Jesus Christ, Steve. Yeah. Almost three years later. Yeah.

Well, not almost three years. Two and a half years later. Yeah, yes. August isn't that far. It better be. We got another game to make. I'm going E3. I need as much time between now and August as I can get.

No, it's been a while. We took some time off. Started working with a publisher. Got things a ways with them. I think some like internal structure kind of stuff. There's some shuffling behind the scenes there. The game was, you know, the development of the port was on hiatus for a while. And that was cool because we were focusing on getting to come off the ground.

and then there became a point where it made sense for us to pick development of the console versions back up so late last year yeah we picked it back up and we took the port in-house and we built the console versions

of Gone Home at the office, make it the thing that we want it to be, add some Chivas, add some troffalo's no platinum trophy this is the one thing on the call Why do you like them? Because it's awesome. Platinum trophies. Well, trophies are great, but platinum

here's the problem. You shot yourself in the foot on this one. Platinum trophies signify real game. Well, we know that it's not. You're just a walking simulator. I don't know what's game. Oh, Jesus, wow. You answered your own question. And also it would have an easy platinum. I love an easy platinum. I would have been in and out in like four hours. I had the platinum. I'd be like, one of my favorite games of all time, I'd have a platinum trophy in it. Now I'm going to have what? Are you doing one of these things where it's a bunch of silvers and bronzes and I get one gold for beating it? There's a few golds.

Okay, they better be. You got a handful of golds. Okay. You got a handful of gold the balloons. Okay. No, they're gone home. You know nothing of the PlayStation. Gold.

You can tell you testing games before trophies existed. They will mail you gold coins in the mail. Scott Rody himself. If you play your PlayStation enough. Mm-hmm. It's not true. No, not at all. Trust me, they know.

My audience knows what happens to PlayStation games. I'll let it slide. So yeah. Thank you. No problem. I appreciate that. You're welcome. But yeah, no, it's on its way.

So, you know, we're really glad to finally be able to do it because, you know, we're, again, we're really fortunate that people are still talking about the game. Yeah, brand new audience, too. I think, I don't know what your expectations are, but I expect this to do really, really well. Good, good. Just based on the fact of, like, yeah, I think people love it.

That's good to hear. No problem. I mean, I think in hope is the kind of thing where if you haven't played it yet because you're not a PC gamer, Yeah. Maybe you have a friend who has told you like, oh, you should play that. And you're like, well, I don't play PC games.

Now you get a chance, right? Or, you know, if you're somebody you played it on PC two plus years ago, you're into playing stuff on your console now. Hopefully it might be a good excuse to do that, you know, replay that you, you know, like you've talked about. So, you know, it's not the kind of thing where we, you know, the game has been out for a long time, right? Like, it's a known thing.

hope that if it's able to expand the audience and basically just give more people a chance to play it, then that'll be really cool. I'm looking forward to more people being able to have the experience, you know? Me too. I'm looking forward to talking about more about gone home, because I love talking about gone home. So it's been, I mean, as evidence by the length of this. Two hour one-on-one gone home cats. I make, I make long podcasts. I don't want to mention any other outlets. I don't want to mention any other outlets that you might have used. I don't want to mention any other outlets that you might have used to have worked at. IGM.

But yesterday, I was at IGN, and I think I somehow caused both of the IGN podcast I was on to be the longest of those episodes that they've had. Well, that's the thing of like, and that's just like, you know, the best thing about kind of funny is similar to what you're talking about with, you know, why you left a rational and did small team stuff. It's like, we loved IGN. We, you know, don't get me wrong. But I do love the ability to sit down and do this because this is like, you know,

the up at noon interviews. on steroids where it's like okay one on one great and let's actually have a conversation you know what I mean I want to know and like the views this video will do will be nothing remotely compared to what those even the short up at noon interview we did did right because it's like some people are like a two hour podcast see you know what I mean whereas others are like that's what I want that's what I want you got two hours to kill we got to go make that yeah what are you doing you wait in the DMV right now you're driving your van full of nuns what's up are you in line at a drive-thru right now are you waiting to have some chicken nuggets right now?

A lot of people listen to us while they work out, which is always... Are you getting ripped right now? Are you getting rips right now? You can tell we don't work out. I don't think... No one says I'm getting ripped right now. They say it, but they don't mean it that they're at the gym. A listener, are you smoking a bong right now?

There you go. That's better. Are you doing weed right now? I'm just trying to find... I'm just trying to find as many people as I can to make them feel weird because... Are you walking your dog right now? Are you on your way to the... bank right now. Excuse me, sir. Are you currently listening to us while you put values into an

Excel spreadsheet at a job you don't like that much? There you go. That's the real one. That's the real one. That's the one a lot of people fall into. Hey, Nick. Put it in C1. All right. So we're talking about C1. I think that means we're talking. No, yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, gone home, console edition is out Tuesday, January 12th on PlayStation 4, Wednesday, January 13th on Xbox 1. This is Steve Gainer. He made it all by himself. and a very talented whole bunch of amazing people at Fulbright today

thank you as always you're coming by absolutely I love you you're a great too seeing the new spot make sure of me over me no anytime

ladies and gentlemen until next time it's been our pleasure to serve you