Writer & presenter on games. See me on Quinns Quest, People Make Games and Shut Up & Sit Down. quinns
@peoplemakegames
.com / quinnsquest.quintinsdomain
@gmail
.com
I GOT NEWS.
Today I'm starting a new YouTube channel. Quinns Quest is here to offer reviews of tabletop roleplaying games that match the blinding quality of today's TTRPG scene.
It’s also set in 1989. Don’t think too hard about it.
Between the eras of "Games are for geeks" and "Games are for everyone" we had a split-second of "Games are counter-culture" and emotionally I never left
When I purchased Avatar Legends, I got the whole collector's edition thingy on Kickstarter with the beautiful obsidian dice and everything.
One of my players yesterday made a roll (+passion!) and one of the dice fell on the ground and literally shattered 😭
This RPG had a stock market where, if you thought you could predict where the plot was going, you could divest from companies you figured were about to get fucked
In love with Steambot Chronicles. PS2 era Irem was magical. Just trundling about with a pal in my trotmobile after watching her sing in a den of thieves and then we fought a huge mech that emerged out of the desert sands.
Okay, remember our video on how Roblox is exploiting a generation of game developers?
After it released, Roblox users reached out to us to blow the whistle on *so* many disturbing aspects of the platform. Today, we're hugely proud to release part 2:
Been working on this for a while. Hoo boy:
Today, Roblox is the most popular game in North America and Europe. It's time you knew about how it's using a generation of young, vulnerable game developers.
So, People Make Games accidentally made a *movie-sized* video, and it releases today.
Presenting our new investigation: Who’s Telling the Truth about Disco Elysium?
Hmmm. I just had a bizarre experience, involving a global news organisation and a trillion dollar corporation. (I got caught in the middle, so... owch.)
It’s not the sort of experience the people involved usually talk about in public… so I think I’ll talk about it in public.
🧵
We've released a new video on People Make Games, and there's not a shadow of a doubt in my mind that it's the biggest story in game design that no-one's talking about.
Jubensha is a brand-new kind of game coming out of China. We wanna tell you about it.
New PMG video just dropped. It's.. a big one.
Government wargaming is on the rise again, like it's never been before. Today we break down why that should scare you, why the commercial games industry is already involved, and why we need to wake up. ()
If you're a journalist, I'd implore you to pick up our reporting. I don't think it's an understatement to say how this company is allowed to operate is, in part, going to define the future of games, game development and children's entertainment.
Between these two videos coming out, Roblox released another stratospheric earnings report and their stock price surged once again.
They are now a bigger company than Nintendo.
I recently did a Covid test and had to send the bill to my mother in law's house.
Just found out my autocorrect changed the first line of her address to "MILF DOME"
This feels like an underreported aspect of streaming services not wanting to release viewing stats: most prestige shows will be revealed as significantly less popular than YouTubers reviewing chicken sandwiches from their car
At a house party with non-gamers & told some people I was pivoting my career towards role-playing.
Frowns all round. Someone asks "But it's... not sexual?"
Heard myself say "No! I mean, maybe. I mean, who knows?" Then the doorbell went and the conversation just moved on. 😞
Apropos of nothing, when Fantasy Flight acquired the Netrunner license in 2012 they reimagined the original game's setting for the 21st century.
Their new Android: Netrunner was forward-looking in its depiction of race, gender and corporations. It made cyberpunk relevant to now.
We just released a big, big new video from People Make Games.
Valve isn't just one of the most influential companies in gaming, it's also one of the most secretive. Under condition of anonymity, we spoke to Valve staff about how the company really works.
Now that Blaseball's finished, I want to thank
@thegameband
for the work of being The Anchor, their in-universe recap broadcaster.
They gave me the opportunity to do the most unhinged work I've ever done, and I'll always love them for that.
Big day! PMG just released part 1 of a series on gaming giant Valve.
Today, we want to tell you about the casino industry that plugs into Steam's API and preys on Valve's customers. Why won't Valve shut it down?
For one thing, they're profiting from it.
Broke my leg kickboxing ha ha ha ahhh. We were filming our sparring so below is a frame of the exact moment it happened.
Prognosis isn't great, so I'm afraid this is gonna disrupt both Quinns Quest and PMG
Phew! I've been working on this for a while...
Polygon called Blaseball “a strong contender to be the game of 2020," but what is it? And why are people getting obsessed?
Two months into being a TTRPG critic and it is *so* professionally rewarding being part of a space that's so amorphous and undecided.
I was expecting the hobby to be more established, but it's not- designers prevaricate and doubt themselves in my interviews. I love it ✨
Enough time has passed that a few Quinns Quest viewers have now bought The Wildsea, started campaigns of The Wildsea, and shown up to inform me they dislike The Wildsea. Looking forward to this poison trickle continuing for my foreseeable career 🥲
New Quinns Quest review, baby!
Heart is a psychadelic game where pain is a reward, the dark only wants to make you happy, and there's (almost) no getting out alive. I think there's a strong case that it's the best dungeon ever made.
I used Mausritter as a visual reference in my latest Patreon video and now I desperately want to try a campaign of it, but I have no time. Is this how you guys feel all the time? This is terrible
Jesus. "The company is struggling to explain why its employees, who signed up to create tools that empower game makers, are now developing technologies with the stated objectives of fighting wars."
An inside look at Unity's "GovTech" division, a lesser known arm of the popular game engine maker that specifically contracts with governments and militaries. It's prompted heavy ethical and moral questions by its employees. My story:
Six months after John Riccitiello told Unity employees the company "would never knowingly work on a project that trains soldiers in combat", turns out that in 2020 the company... did exactly that.
Been working on this for a while- we've got a new PMG video!
We're all wary of the metaverse future that Facebook is hurrying us towards. But within the anarchy & anime of VRChat, our team found a metaverse future that's worth fighting for.
Couldn't have done this without
@anni_sayers
and
@chrisbratt
, who not only gave me the sense and strength needed when taking on a company this big, but made the piece so much more sensitive and entertaining. Big love to them 💙
Really impressed by the comments on today's wargaming video. I'm not sure I've *ever* seen a comment section so full of different points of view.
It's a relief, honestly. I could never cover everything, so it's nice you can scroll down and get further nuance/complexity
Recently I've been a little more stressed about GMing my RPG nights
Last night I was reading The Joy of Mixology and this advice for bartenders - "10 Minutes of Hush and Wonder" - was EXACTLY what I was missing 🍹
@Quinns108
Chance has abandoned you. The outcome of this action was fated and immovable. GM has to quickly decide what earth shattering plot point happens right now and why its important
To celebrate the ✨2nd anniversary✨of Citizen Sleeper we have something special...
A TTRPG actual play, set in the universe of the upcoming Citizen Sleeper 2!
A collab with
@Quinns108
, and starring
@JumpOvertheAge
, it debuts on Quinn's Quest on the 7th of May. See you there 💫
The problem: Microsoft bought Minecraft, and they're not wild about the idea
The twist: There's not a thing they can do about it
The other twist: It turns out that MS's legal department is so big, it doesn't have to go to court to warp reality
Best comment on the wargaming piece so far, from a Ukrainian:
"I'm trying to listen to the end and I just embarrassed why you carry so much about feelings. Why you so soft and tender?"
After looking for YEARS, I've found a swords & sorcery TTRPG that's properly gotten under my skin. Already can't wait to give it a glowing review in Quinns Quest season 2.
You'll never guess what it is, but I'd love to see you try. 🙊
Forgot to post this chilling Valentine's day gift from my wife.
My friends' unanimous appraisal was that Luigi smells startlingly good, Mario smells like Axe body spray, and that this is probably canon
Statistically speaking, members of this audience are gonna get into NFTs and lose their ass, many more will misguidedly hold onto the token as it depreciates in value. Extremely fucked up behaviour from the Tonight Show
Been sweating over this video for a while:
Tabletop RPGs are in the ascendant. They've never been so good and they're getting better every year. Here's my guide to getting into them:
@ehronlime
Reminds me of that episode of The Genius where they give each contestant dice that secretly can be disassembled and you can swap the faces with other players
Super good thread on Daggerheart & the friction you get when "fiction-first" TTRPG design also wants crunchy combat. The wargaming roots of TTRPGs is like a crunchy bit of chrysalis that this hobby cannot shake off
reading through
#Daggerheart
with my game designer brain and i think this ability is kind of emblematic of a big design deficiency that's a tension at the core of many modern role playing games. this is a core class ability (warrior) that effectively is not a rule - why?
Played the finale of our Wildsea campaign last night and I couldn't narrate the final sentence of the campaign because I was having a little weep. So that's a first
Russian channels are reporting that Ukrainian units have crossed the Dnipro river and fights are ongoing near the destroyed Antonivskyi bridge.
"The enemy has already transferred 3 tanks with the help of a ferry."
But most memorable of all were the new lineup of hackers who took the fight to these corporations. Coming from every possible walk of life, they felt representative of what punk has evolved into in the 21st century.
Update: YouTube started sharing the video outside the PMG audience. The comments are now literally back to back
"This is moral grandstanding, emotional manipulation and unreasonable assumptions"
and
"HOW MUCH DID THE CIA PAY YOU"
Reading the Daggerheart beta quickstart. Y'all were being such curmudgeons that I wasn't ready for the design to be so straightforwardly *fun*.
Loosen up! 🐲🪩
Roblox became the largest video game company in the world by encouraging children to become game-making entrepreneurs - a laudable aim, fraught with dangers. My story in today’s
@ObserverUK
:
Guess who just got to the airport for a trip to the Solmukohta nordic LARP convention that is basically a 3 day party and couldn't get on a plane because since Brexit your passport needs 3 months of validity to go to Europe. Clue: They want to die
Corporations were still the enemy in this re-imagined Netrunner, but they were friendly, PR-softened entities that promised to make your life easier if you'd just sign on the dotted line. Naturally, they were all the more recognisable and frightening for it.
New Quinns Quest video!🎉
In an inexplicable crossover episode,
@JumpOvertheAge
and I turned Citizen Sleeper into a 3 hour TTRPG one-shot. For one night only, this game's creator is a player in *my* game.
Less than a week into Quinns Quest & I know what's going to make me lose my mind as a critic of games that take place in your imagination:
Any problem can be fixed with a squirt of extra imagination.✨
It's possible all TTRPGs are perfect. More on this as I figure it out
Absolutely jazzed that PMG won an
@MCV_DEVELOP
award the other night for "Media Brand of the Year".
That feels like a very grown up way of describing what we do but frankly, I'll take it.
Also, although
@anni_sayers
isn't pictured, she's undoubtedly the real star of the show.
Wild how much less addictive and aggravating Twitter became when I switched back to viewing tweets in a straight timeline. The "home" feature with tweets from people you don't follow is total poison
I don’t want to spoil anything, but in so far as this investigation has a moral, it’s that the abuse of the developers remaining at ZA/UM has to stop. It’s unhinged, unfair and unhelpful.
This story simply can’t be reduced into heroes vs. villains, or artists vs. capitalists.
I am SO excited for this: NEW PMG VIDEO!
We visited the Mojave desert to cover Wasteland Weekend. It's a 5 day-long cross between a post-apocalyptic LARP and an anti-capitalist Disneyland. We tried to "win" it. It didn't go well.
We're really happy to see that this story has been picked up by Wired, Axios, Kotaku, Bloomberg and so many more.
If you'd like to cover this story for the outlet you work at, I'm happy to provide an interview or quote. Drop me a DM!
Been working on this for a while. Hoo boy:
Today, Roblox is the most popular game in North America and Europe. It's time you knew about how it's using a generation of young, vulnerable game developers.
I'm joining the fabulous channel People Make Games! I'll be making videos on games that aren't video games OR board games(!). We'll be taking a thoughtful, silly journey through weird sports and charming hobbies:
This reporting took us over a year. The script was the hardest single thing I've ever had to write.
I never in a million years thought my career would take me into government defence laboratories, but here we are.
This was a huge part of why I stopped being a video games journalist! The finances and prevailing wisdoms were so entrenched that it felt like you were shouting at mountains.
TTRPGs feel like the opposite? Everyone's changing everyone's mind, all the time
🤼 New People Make Games video! 🤼
In my quest to learn about the most cursed games in existence, I entered the world of Excel eSports. Come learn what a spreadsheet battle is, and watch me and
@chrisbratt
take on the *world champion*
Quinns Quest Season 1 continues with a review of VAESEN! The game that asks what we're all thinking: what if you had to arrest a mermaid to pay your mortgage