I will definitely admit that it's hard for me to clearly see and separate the jank of Souls games from the overall experience.

And it's because when I'm playing I feel like I'm in a Katsuya Terada Zelda illustration come to life! Not that I find criticism of Souls games untrue, it's that I'm too wrapped up in feeling like I've jumped into the pages of Nintendo Power haha

It isn't just visuals, either - the design also has to be tuned a certain way to evoke the excitement of these drawings in game form.

This topic is tricky to me. Because I definitely believe that options affect all players. In fact, I would say that a big part of game design is choosing which options are available and which ones aren't, for that very reason! (...)

https://twitter.com/Bhaal_Spawn/status/1443697271258980357

For example, I would argue that the option to credit feed arcade games (i.e. use quarters to keep continuing) hurt their reputation with the general public. The best ones really don't shine until you start trying to 1cc them (clear them on a single credit).

I'm a bit concerned that newer indie game devs are getting overwhelmed reading about all the small optimizations they could be making to promote their games. If you can do it all, great, but it's not always worth the added stress. Don't get lost in the weeds. As an indie, it's very likely you're doing promotion on the game you're also making. That is SO MUCH WORK. It's good to acknowledge that. Also, I feel like so much of your fate is decided before you even start promoting. You might be squeezing blood from a stone after a point.

I love studying video game UI and noticing all the little details the designers put into menus and buttons: how they look, react, slide on/off the screen, etc.

Just realized the shape of the Smash Ultimate 2nd-level main menus are designed around the icons! Blew my mind a bit! Fun fact: the lead UI designer for the Smash series (and many Kirby games) is Michiko Sakurai, who is also the wife of Masahiro Sakurai. Husband and wife team FTW!

A fundamental problem with difficulty options in games is that there are many players between obvious skill levels. This means:

1. Players have to immediately make an important decision without adequate knowledge.

2. Players will continue to question that decision during play. Players know that difficulty levels are often tacked on, regardless of the game's budget, exacerbating the anxiety of whether they chose the "right" one.

This breaks immersion pretty hard. Gentle reminders about easier difficulty settings after Game Over don't help.

IMO the hardest step for aspiring (commercial) indie game developers is learning to finish games consistently and efficiently - to move past game jams and prototypes but also avoid getting mired in a single project for years without end. It's a tiny sweet spot that's hard to hit. One piece of advice is to try and avoid falling in love with your development tools over the game you're building them for. You will find time and time again that successful indie games are often built with crude tools and/or messy code. Just enough to get the job done.