Workshop notes / ten games, oldest first
How we made it
Every game on the floor began with a problem: an old idea that needed a new rule, or a limit that had to become part of the fun. These notes take ten of our originals and explain the problem, the rule that solved it, and what we left out on purpose.
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Vector Volley
The oldest bat-and-ball games gave the world one idea: a ball, two bars and a score.
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Tether Drift
A ship that keeps drifting after you stop pushing is the oldest trick in the vector room.
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Brickwork Bandit
The cleanest promise an arcade game can make is the run you could have won.
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Pogo Pilgrim
One button and a spring is not much of a control scheme.
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Packet Patrol
The best web games of the dial-up years let the limit of the medium become the rule of the game.
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Hotlink Typist
Typing games taught a generation to type without anyone noticing.
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Ink Courier
Draw-your-own-bridge puzzles were one of the Flash years’ quiet masterpieces, because anyone could understand the goal in one second.
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Pendulum Pop
A one-tap game has a whole design space and only one control to fill it with.
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Coil Arena
The browser arena games of the mid-2010s showed that a crowd makes its own stories.
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Ember Horde
One of the newest genres in the museum takes away the trigger.
How these notes were written
Each note is built from what the game itself records: its rules, its How to play card, the maker’s note on its page and the hall paragraph that explains the idea it borrows. We have not added stories about late nights or lucky accidents, because we would be guessing. The games were made by a small team using modern tools, including AI, as the colophon explains.