Monthly Archives: June 2016

Ossuary in Steam Summer Sale 2016

Our 2013 game Ossuary is currently on sale for $7.49 on Steam!

Blog Summer Sale 2016 Offer

I wrote all of Ossuary and released it with my partner as the first project of Future Proof Games. It’s a little game that’s pixelly and funny and strange. You’re a newcomer to a macabre philosophical underworld, and to escape you have to solve conversation-based puzzles and use sins as inventory items. I used it to explore a lot of Discordian concepts and perspectives, so in a sense it’s a religious work for me.

It’s weird looking back on Ossuary. I’m really proud of how it turned out, although it’s never had real financial success. We’ve sold maybe a couple thousand copies. For now it’s paying Future Proof’s monthly expenses for servers and such, but it’s certainly not making enough to provide us with paychecks. Each sale on Steam helps a bit, though, so if you haven’t picked up the game, check it out! It’s cheap! (And hey, if you know someone you think will like Ossuary, you can always get it for them as a gift!)

And a final request: if you have played Ossuary, please do leave a Steam review. Our 17 reviews are 94% positive, but Steam won’t list them as “Very Positive” or “Overwhelmingly Positive” until we have enough of them. Anecdotal evidence strongly suggests that these categories make folks more likely to check out an otherwise-unknown game.

Thank you for reading!

A Stillness of Mind, Skill Honed Sharp – Hyper Light Drifter

Screenshot of Hyper Light Drifter from Steam user 芊一.
Screenshot of Hyper Light Drifter from Steam user 芊一.
Hyper Light Drifter, from Heart Machine1, is an inscrutable game: one which presents you with various mysteries and challenges, inviting you to overcome them, but doesn’t bother guiding you along that path. It’s part of a new trend in so-called “retro-inspired” games that recontextualizes the challenge and low fidelity of console game from the 1980s as intentional, stylistic choices. Because of these choices, it has limited accessibility but provides a specific mood and emotional journey that would be difficult to evoke in a more populist game.

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  1. A company with whom I feel a sort of kinship, as their logo has some strong similarities with that of my company, Future Proof Games.

Family and Communication – Atlanta Poly Weekend 2016

I’m polyamorous, and for the past four years I’ve attended Atlanta Poly Weekend, a great education and activism conference all about ethical nonmonogamy. I’ve seen an interesting transition in my relationship to the conference over the years, one that I think is completely natural. In earlier years, I found the most value in the things I learned; in later years, I’ve found more and more value in the things I’ve taught.
Continue reading Family and Communication – Atlanta Poly Weekend 2016