🔄 Reconnect Recap for w/e 15th December '24

Connecting you to even more great games writing

As I’m writing this I’m watching the game awards surrounded by presents I’ve poorly wrapped.

It’s a fun time to be part of the gaming community, and a bad time to receive a gift by me. You’d think with over thirty years on this earth i’d know how to wrap a present, but alas I don’t.

So let’s get started with another weekly, Reconnect Recap, the poorly wrapped gift version of Reconnect, the games writing discovery platform.

Let’s dig in shall we.

If you’re on Bluesky, I’ve made a starter pack so that you can follow all the Reconnect writers in one spot. Not 100% complete yet but I’ll keep adding to it.

Interested in chatting with some of the writers of the Reconnect community? Join our discord..

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The Recap

I’ve got a handful of ‘good vibes’ articles to share today, really put me in a nicer mood!

Over on Retro Dodo, we have a story about an artist who made a game boy original game to honor their late grandmother.

EA is doing something nice for once, and pledging to make over twenty accessibility patents open source (GamingOnLinux).

SuperJump Magazine reminds us that some games are here to relax us and not all of them require a single cent to be invested to play.

Time Extension walks us through a new fan-made Star Wars game for the Commodore Amiga that has been released.

Game developer Raph Koster humorously explains how a mistake in his new game, caused an entire city to flood and destroyed roads and basements and Thinky Games recounts their experience with a group of players who make escape rooms inside Square Enix’s MMO, FFXIV.

Some positive news, given the decline of the industry this year,

GameDev Reports

gives us the cold hard facts that show that millions of people in the US are playing games for more than 42 hours a week.

Finally, rounding out todays recap, we have a story from artist and game designer, Natalie Lawhead, on her efforts to shine a light on AI trash assets flooding the Itch.io platform amongst their own accidental outage caused by Funko Pop this week.

Catch you all next week!

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Something Extra

I’m a sucker for a good physical book, which is surprising given I’ve been an ebook reader way before it got cool. I mean that, I used to read ebooks on my Palm Tree, yes I’m that old.

Jesper Juul over at the Ludologist, has a new book all about digging deep into two key mysteries surrounding the Commodore 64. Follow the link to check it out and see how you can get your hands on a copy.

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Writer Recap

How do I describe

Thomas Cole Simmonds

….. I would say they are a bit silly, a bit quirky, a bit of an outside thinker. Well that’s the impression I get from their writing.

Tom writes some really silly and wonderful pieces about gaming dispersed with some non gaming writing also. But I genuinely enjoy seeing the all caps title TYPEDBYTOM arrive in my inbox and I quickly read the article because I feel like I’m being yelled at.

I think you’ll definitely enjoy Toms substack, so, as always I recommend you check them out and subscribe.

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