Shownotes

When one of the creators of Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture makes a Firewatch-inspired game about running a metal detector over the British countryside, we pay attention. Unfortunately, despite some very good ideas, this game’s writing was a bit of a misfire. It’s a very interesting failure, though!

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

Overboard! is the latest game from Inkle, creators of Short Game favorites 80 Days and Heaven’s Vault. Developed in just over three months during the Covid-19 pandemic, Overboard is a deeply repayable detective game where you’re the one whodunnit. Designed to be played in under an hour, but with numerous routes and endings and an advanced narrative design allowing for enormous amounts of player choice, this brief, finely tuned narrative puzzle box is one of our easiest recommendations in years. Stick around after the spoiler break for in depth discussion of characters and secrets.

Overboard! is available for iOS, Nintendo Switch, and PC. Expect each play-through to take about 30-45 minutes. Most players will want to complete multiple play-throughs.

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

Mundaun is a pleasant mountain hike gone dreadfully, dreadfully wrong. First person protagonist Curdin returns to his grandfather’s home in Mundaun, a secluded village in the Swiss Alps, to find his grandfather dead in mysterious circumstances and the mountain haunted by a dark presence. This folk-horror-adventure game’s unique art style was achieved by hand-penciling all of the textures for a moody sketchbook appearance. Impressive gameplay variety and an intriguing central mystery kept us climbing up the mountain for the game’s entire ~8-10 hour run time.

Stick around for Shane’s impressions on Resident Evil Village!

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane

Who would have thought we could talk for nearly an hour about Peggle, a game that according to Nate doesn’t even exist in his home timeline.

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl

This overlooked open-world kitchen sink game might be Apple Arcade’s best exclusive. Sneaky Sasquatch looks on its surface like a light stealth game aimed at children, but get past its first minutes and you’ll. discover a game that is eager at every moment to show you one more fun thing.

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

In IFComp 2017, we were excited by the possibilities Filip Hráček showed in his comp game Insignificant Little Vermin, built with his bespoke choice-based system Egamebook. Now Hráček has released the first commercial Egamebook game for iOS and Android. Knights of San Francisco is a 90 minute mobile RPG with simulated combat and a text based presentation. It’s a story about a young necromancer climbing the Transamerica Pyramid in the ruins of far-future San Francisco, with a really impressive UI and set to a dope playlist.

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

This week we are re-releasing our episode on Severed, a game from Guacamelee developer Drinkbox Studios that originally released on Vita and has since been ported to just about everything including iOS and Switch. It’s long been one of our favorite games, and Drinkbox has a new game coming out later this year so we thought it might be worth revisiting. If you haven’t ever played this fantastic touch-and-gamepad based action dungeon crawler, give it a try!

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

This week we are renewing our Apple Arcade subscriptions and talking about some of the games we’ve checked out since the debut of the service.

00:01:57: Wonderbox
00:07:42: Hitchhiker
00:14:40: A Monster’s Expedition
00:21:40: Sneaky Sasquatch
00:31:11: Clap Hanz Golf
00:41:05: Assorted App Store Greats, Music Games, Etc.
00:51:59: Sp!ng & lumen.
00:55:52: Listener Recommendations and Other Games We Are Looking Forward To Trying

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

Before Your Eyes is a short narrative game that uses your real life blinks (monitored via your PC’s webcam) as your primary interaction. It’s also an extremely moving story, well written and performed, about what makes a life valuable. You play as Benjamin Brynn, a deceased soul reviewing the moments of his life, but each time you blink, each moment is lost.

Shane and Raygan both found this 1.5 hour experience extremely effecting and emotional, and we strongly recommend it. It’s available on Steam and the Epic Game Store for Windows.

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane

Better late than never! This week we are looping back to our promised IFComp 2020 wrap-up, and discussing the four games in the top 10 that we didn’t cover during our colossal four-part coverage last fall. This was a truly colossal comp, and all of the top games are worth your time. This year’s top 10 included two mathematically unlikely ties (!) and included games in a variety of genres and styles from both new and returning authors!

00:04:48: 1st Place (tie): The Impossible Bottle by Linus Åkesson
00:39:10: Places 3 -7
00:44:49: 8th Place (tie): A Murder In Fairyland by Abigail Corfman
00:56:47: 8th Place (tie): Stuff of Legend by Lance Campbell
01:08:05: 10th Place: Sense of Harmony by Scenario World
01:17:44: What’s Making Us Happy This Week

The Short Game is supported directly by our listeners on Patreon! Supporters at any level get access to our Discord, where we discuss games, plan episodes, and talk about what we are playing in real time. You can also support us by writing a review on Apple Podcasts!

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash