Shows / Furidashi Game Design Academy
Furidashi Game Design Academy
A podcast on gaming and video game design from both practical and academic perspectives.
Episodes
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
*UNLOCKED* 31. Misogyny Makes Games Worse
Lauryn and Nicholas look at specific examples of how the masculine assumptions embedded in how creative decisions regarding games get made make for experiences…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
30. How To Be a Gamedev Ally
Lauryn and Nicholas begin from the recent suit against Activision Blizzard and go on to discuss the rampant issues surrounding harassment in the video games…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
29. The Liminal Space Between Indie and AAA (Teaser)
Once Lauryn dreamed of making her sleeper hit UnderBlind, but now she languishes in the deep, dark halls of AAA development despair. Also on the docket: the…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
28. Of Oreos and Call of Duty
Lauryn and Nicholas explain why AAA game studios operate the way they do and why the market as a whole causes them to gravitate toward producing franchises and…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 10 - No Such Thing As Indie Games? (Teaser)
Nicholas wonders whether, given the way the market works now, if it even makes sense to make a distinction between indie developers and major studios. Unlock…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
AggressiveRant - Stadia Ruins Game Design
Normally, we go off on our little tangents to some relaxing beats, but this week Lauryn really had to get something off her chest. On the docket: why Google…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
27. Creative Direction and Auteur Theory (Teaser)
Lauryn and Nicholas try to explain the how's and why's of video game production in terms of auteur theory, where, despite being made by an army of gamedevs…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
26. Many Roads to Gamedev w/ Masao Kobayashi
We brought Masao Kobayashi on for a more industry focused episode, diving into the differences between the video games industry in the US, Canada, and Japan…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
25. We [Don't] Hate Final Fantasy X-2
Lauryn and Nicholas have a perfectly civil argument about what makes Final Fantasy X-2 so awful and/or amazing. Unlock the full episode for $5 a month on…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
24. Centering Writing in Final Fantasy 14
What started out as an easy recording about our mutual love of Final Fantasy XIV turned into an extensive meditation on narrative wrapped systems and the…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
23. Level Design II - Revealing Mechanics (Teaser)
Lauryn and Nicholas go in depth with some of their favorite levels, past and present, to explore how level design can be used as a tool to show you the…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
22. Level Design I - Foundations
We invite Lauryn on as a special guest to talk about the fundamentals of level design, in particular, the "why" underlying a particular map or zone. Also…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
21. Game as Platform (Teaser)
Lauryn and Nicholas discuss how the distinction between game and platform is not a hard and fast one with particular reference to Skyrim, Minecraft, and…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
20. What Constitutes a Game?
In light of the recent Epic vs. Apple case, Lauryn and Nicholas talk about the right and wrong ways to ask the question, "what is a game?" Link to…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
19. Camera, Character, Controls (Teaser)
Lauryn explains the "three C's" of game design. For more on this topic and to unlock our other Patreon episodes, go to https://www.patreon.com/furidashi…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
18. Video Game Logic
Lauryn and Nicholas talk about the concept of "video game logic" as it appears in Sakurazaka Hiroshi's All You Need is Kill and the 2014 film Edge of Tomorrow…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 8 - Procedurally Generated Suffering
Nicholas coming back from hiatus with a solo pod on Iris and the Giant and how it uses procedurally generated levels as an allegory for personal suffering…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
17. Dungeons and Railroads
Lauryn and Nicholas take a look at being a game master/DM and what lessons it holds for how to understand a game designer's relationship between what they do…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
16. Call of Duty: Breaking Dawn
Lauren explains why the theory of characterization underlying Call of Duty is the same as the Twilight novels, and Nicholas explains why it's hard to remain…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 7 - Takeshi & Hiroshi
Nicholas takes an uneasy walk through his own feels to discuss Oink Games' Takeshi and Hiroshi. Also on the docket: how games can improve players, so players…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
15. Persona 5 Animus
Lauryn and Nicholas take a deep dive into Persona 5 Strikers and discuss what happens as games branch out from their original designs and the problems that…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
14. Franchise Philosophy
Lauryn and Nicholas follow-up on Assassin's Creed and talk about why the Mario franchise succeeds in making wildly different kinds of games fall under one…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
13. Rewarding Game Design
Lauryn and Nicholas follow up their gamification episode with a deep dive into how games evolved into doing loot grinds and the games that give some hope that…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
12. Gamification Doesn't Work
Lauryn and Nicholas discuss gamification, why people think it works but in the long run ends up either being dissatisfying or luring players into tedious…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
11. Controls, Controls! You Must Learn Controls!
Lauryn and Nicholas talk about the question of accessibility in games and how our physical nature (and the variance therein) contributes to our preconceptions…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
10. Free to Role Play
Lauryn and Nicholas talk about how life maps onto role playing games and how, perversely, role playing games map onto life. Also starring: Japanese web dramas…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 6 - No More Assassin's Creed
Lauryn questions whether a series can maintain its identity if, over time, the games themselves change so much. Even if it's a great game, why keep calling it…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
9. You're Not a Paper Doll
Lauryn and Nicholas continue their conversation about character choice in RPGs and why total freedom of character choice can often feel unsatisfying.
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
8. There's No Such Thing as a JRPG
Lauryn and Nicholas look at the early history of RPGs and role-playing game design to talk about why the distinction between "Western" and "Japanese" RPGs is…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
7. YulePunk 2077
In this special Christmas episode, Lauryn and Nicholas talk Cyberpunk 2077 and the importance or oddness of the holiday season when it comes to video game…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 5 - The Cult of Immersion
No solo rant this week--Lauryn joins Nicholas to talk about the person the games industry made her and how that conflicts with the person the games industry…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
6. Hell is Other Games
This week Lauryn and Nicholas hand in the first draft of their MA thesis on Super Giant's Hades. Is the game anti-immersion? Or does it, by maintaining the…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 4 - Free Indirect Camera
Relax to some chill beats, while Nicholas regales you with how Jane Austen's Persuasion is just like Silent Hill 2 and why Baldur's Gate 3 seems to be two…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
5. Third Person Pluralism
Lauryn and Nicholas have a long think about what makes the 3rd person camera not quite work in Baldur's Gate 3, why it does work in Hades, and third person…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 3 - Gripes of Tsushima
Nicholas puts on his Japanese scholar's bonnet for a chill half hour of wondering why you'd set a game in a particular time and place but then not use any of…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
4. Crunchy Roles
With the recent news of Cyberpunk 2077 being delayed yet again, Lauryn and Nicholas talk crunch, burnout, and how to begin to deal with the chronic labor…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 2 - Camera Aesthetics, or Final Fantasy 7 Remolded
Nicholas opines on Final Fantasy 7 and how the feel of the original seems to be missing from the recent remake. Also discussed: third person camera, the…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
3. Gaming Player Psychology
In this continuation episode from their previous discussion on MMO history and design, Lauryn and Nicholas delve into applications of player psychology…
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
Chillrant 1 - Granularity
Nicholas waxes nostalgic over the X-wing and TIE Fighter games as a way to get into the question of granularity in gameplay.
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
2. The MMO Social Club
Lauryn and Nicholas wax melancholic while talking about MMOs and the accidental invention of seemingly undefinable social relationships in online gaming.
- Furidashi Game Design Academy
1. Avoiding the Apocalypse
In this first episode Lauryn and Nicholas discuss 2007's Bioshock, ludonarrative dissonance, and what it means to make choices in games with real moral…