Happy Monday, #GameDev crew! Nestled on my bookshelf is this treasure from #Spelunky dev Derek Yu ( @mossmouth.bsky.social ), published in 2016 by Boss Fight Books ( @bossfightbooks.com ). A short thread 🧵 about why I love this book and reference it often: - ThreadSky

thefargo.bsky.social • 201 days ago

Happy Monday, #GameDev crew! Nestled on my bookshelf is this treasure from #Spelunky dev Derek Yu ( @mossmouth.bsky.social ), published in 2016 by Boss Fight Books ( @bossfightbooks.com ). A short thread 🧵 about why I love this book and reference it often:

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unparalleleddev.bsky.social•200 days ago

this book is so amazing it's banned. ❌

i get as far as page 63 then all i can think about is turning my game Unparalleled into a roguelike.

can't wait to come back to the book once i ship the game. 🧐

thegammelier.bsky.social•200 days ago

I honestly don’t remember how I learned about the original Spelunky (I think an RPS article?) but I fell in love straight from the off

elhector.bsky.social•200 days ago

This is awesome. I've been eyeing that book for quite a while now. And @bossfightbooks.com has an amazing sale going on right now at humble bundle!

Thanks for that link to https://tinysubversions.com/spelunkyGen/
Makes me smile to see how these things are made.

mossmouth.bsky.social•200 days ago

Wow, thanks so much, Dave! I'm glad you enjoyed it. :D

thefargo.bsky.social•200 days ago

Thank YOU! When I was doing Quest Design on World of Warcraft we had a list of Spelunky scores on the whiteboard and the competition got REAL serious. 😅Thanks for all the good times!

eastpixel.de•194 days ago

Thanks for this thread. The game and the book is a goldmine for developers. 😍

thefargo.bsky.social•201 days ago

In the book Yu covers everything from his inspirations and the tools he used, all the way to working with publishers, handling feedback, and more. His “15 tips on finishing a game” are brilliant, starting with this gem that every #IndieDev should take to heart:

thefargo.bsky.social•201 days ago

One interesting section talks about the magic of the early #Zelda games, how they rewarded exploration and discovery in the early titles, but more and more turned into guided theme-park experiences and linear lock-and-key puzzles as the series went on.

thefargo.bsky.social•201 days ago

For me, the most illuminating section was about the development of the game’s immersive random levels. They’re created by piecing together dynamic little “bricks” of rooms, each of which can itself have little procedurally-generated chunks. This is my gold-standard for #ProcGen levels!

thefargo.bsky.social•201 days ago

If you want to learn about this and play around with the level generator in action, Darius Kazemi ( @tinysubversions.bsky.social ) created a wonderful interactive tool to learn from and play with! Note that it only works in Chrome. Play with it here:
https://tinysubversions.com/spelunkyGen/

thefargo.bsky.social•201 days ago

It was also a delight to read about the creation of the shopkeeper AI, buried in a section about creating dynamic events to challenge players who seek out high risk / high reward scenarios. It’s delightfully simple but I won’t spoil it. Read the book! Support your local library! Etc. etc.

thefargo.bsky.social•201 days ago

I intended this to be a short thread, but I could continue bleating for another dozen or so posts! Just writing this has inspired a re-read. Anyways, congrats to Derek Yu for creating such a seminal game title, and a huge thanks for sharing so much of his process. Happy Spelunking!

bossfightbooks.com•200 days ago

What a great thread, Dave! It’s been cool to see the quality of UFO 50 bringing folks back to the book lately

sach-indie.bsky.social•199 days ago

I was gifted this book a while back and couldn't agree more! This book and the OG prince of persia journals are a must read for game devs!

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