Nearly a week ago, Steve Gaynor, co-founder of the influential indie studio Fullbright, posted a tweet asking developers to post their “most embarrassing game dev crimes.” No, he wasn’t talking about stealing office supplies or abusing the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. He was talking about the kind of foundational misunderstandings or professional inadequacies that crop up when you’re trying to get a game finished and out the door.
In video games, just as in most professions, there’s more than one way to skin a cat. Some just require a little more brute force than others. Meanwhile, some workarounds are simply hilarious.
To start the conversation, Gaynor offered his own wacky faux pas about scripting the logic in video games. The technical aspects of the tweet aren’t important. What is important is the fact that even the best in the business are learning new solutions to problems all the time.
Five days and more than 4,900 retweets later, the thread has begun to truly blossom. Secretive as the games industry is, developers are always sharing with each other. This week, they’ve been sharing laughs. Here’s a selection of the choicest bits.
From Raph Koster, lead designer of Ultima Online:
From Jake Rodkin, whose work includes the Monkey Island series, Sam and Max, and Telltale’s The Walking Dead:
From Scott Benson, co-creator of Night In The Woods, his very first video game:
From BioWare’s Mark Darrah, executive producer on the Dragon Age series and the upcoming Anthem:
From video editor and artist Duncan Robson:
From Jason Scott, who now works for the Internet Archive:
Finally, my personal favorite comes from Jim Hejl, a veteran of the Madden series who currently works at Electronic Arts: