Infamous vending machines of Akihabara

Infamous vending machines of Akihabara

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I come to these vending machines every time I get to Tokyo and buy at least one thing from them.

In the past, I have gotten a written story (in Japanese and I still need help translating it), a wind up giant stag beetle, and numerous other trinkets I keep on my desk to remind me of better days of travel.

Here’s are two pretty good write-ups on what to experience if you decide to go yourself. But do be aware of the uncharacteristic graphic warning signs posted there.

If these items aren’t your fare, maybe find some of the exclusive vending machines that sell one of a kind and delicious, products.

Favorite Scary Stories for Fall

Favorite Scary Stories for Fall

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One of my favorite pastimes is reading and listening to classic spooky stories. There’s no better time for curling up with a spooky story than a cold, fall evening in front of the fire.

Here’s a collection of my all-time favorite scary stories:

Plays/Dramatizations

Good general scary classics channels on YouTube:

Tengami and foldable geometry

Tengami and foldable geometry

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Whenever I have free time and am looking for some inspiration, I love going over to the GDC Vault and watching the countless amazing presentations. Back in the day, one had to pay hundreds of dollars to see videos in the vault, but now they have their own free youtube channel.

In doing some research into visual styles, I ran the game Tengami from Nyamyam. I then found Jennifer Schneidereit’s GDC presentation describing how she created a engine that uses geometry to mimic the mechanical folding of pop-up books.

Rob Humble’s ‘The Marriage’ game

Rob Humble’s ‘The Marriage’ game

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Rob Humble was fooling around with the idea of games as art – a continually argued topic in the game development community. In experimenting, he came up with the idea for this art piece/game called The Marriage.

It uses very simple controls and boxes to explore the ideas of relationship.

“The Marriage “came out of a long weekend I took with my wife down to Carmel. It was created that evening on my laptop as I listened to the waves of the pacific below. All the game mechanics were completed that evening although I spent weeks afterwards tuning and polishing. The game was also made “in process” as it were. I simply could not design this game on paper before hand. It had to be done by exploring, discarding and balancing game elements during creation.

You can play it in-browser here, or read more and download the original Windows version (as well as get instructions) here.