Games: Godot, Where Birds Go to Sleep, and More

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Nov 03, 2022

• Godot Engine now has its own dedicated Foundation for funding

  Previously they teamed up with the Software Freedom Conservancy charity, who handled the donations and ensured it was used correctly but as they've constantly grown, they feel the need to run it themselves now. In a blog post from founder Juan Linietsky, they noted having their own organization gives them the "opportunity to explore broader funding sources" while mentioning crowdfunding like Blender and Krita do.

• Narrative adventure Where Birds Go to Sleep has a demo up

  Do you love text-based narrative adventures that look a bit insane? Where Birds Go to Sleep is releasing next year and they now have a demo available. The game will also have Native Linux support, and the demo already does.

• PixelJunk Scrappers Deluxe is Steam Deck Verified before release with a demo

  PixelJunk Scrappers Deluxe is the next Steam release coming from Q-Games and they've managed to get it Steam Deck Verified ahead of release. Originally released on Apple Arcade, it's getting a full Steam release at some point but there's no exact date on that yet.

• Fun Steam Deck Verified & Playable games from October 2022

  Recently the Steam Deck hit over 6,000 games marked as Playable and Verified together, so I took a little look at some of the entries across October to point out some fun picks.

• Dungeons & Dragons is Apparently Banned in Federal Prisons

  The Washington Post's FOIA guru, Nate Jones, alerted me to this 2018 FOIA request on MuckRock, which indicates that the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) bans D&D and other roleplaying games from being purchased for inmates: [...]

  Any rationale for the ban, if given, is buried under redactions, but D&D and other roleplaying games are widely banned in state prison systems under the dubious rationale that they present a security threat or encourage gang behavior. As I noted in a 2017 Reason feature on D&D's resurgence, this has resulted in some unusual case law: [...]

• Escape Simulator recently had a big update with a free Graveyard level

  Probably one of the most popular games of its kind on Steam, the co-op escape room puzzler Escape Simulator recently had a nice update.

• Void Scrappers blends Vampire Survivors mechanics with a space shoot 'em up

  Void Scrappers recently released with Native Linux support and it is Steam Deck Verified. A pretty great game if you love the mechanics of Vampire Survivors but want something different. I previously took a look at their Prologue but the full game is out now.

• Transport Tycoon Deluxe inspired game OpenTTD has a new release coming

  OpenTTD is a free and open source sim based on the classic Transport Tycoon Deluxe, and the team have announced a new release is coming with a first Beta. While based on TTD, OpenTTD had a wide array of improvements including bigger maps, better multiplayer, dedicated servers, better AI and so much more.

• How Price Tourism Propelled A Switch Game To Nintendo Switch Fame

  While we’ve had a lot of conversations about how some forward-thinking content creators have managed to look at understandably frustrating things like copyright infringement as opportunities rather than threats. There’s a lot of ways that can happen: looking at infringement as free marketing research, looking at it as an avenue for exposure, looking at infringers as under-served customers, etc.