6 ms·

I was an experienced game designer and producer (mostly RTS and narrative RPG). Some years ago, my career was derailed by major health developments. Since then,

by ksaun 2mo ago

I was an experienced game designer and producer (mostly RTS and narrative RPG). Some years ago, my career was derailed by major health developments. Since then, I haven't been able to work as I once did. I didn't expect I'd be able to meaningfully contribute to a game again. Earlier this year, a colleague encouraged me to experiment with Claude Code. So now I have a little game project. :) Being unfamiliar with genAI, I chose something modest so that I'd more likely be able to push it to a fairly polished state. Tentatively called Vestiges, it's a single player 2D roguelite strategy game with meta progression, some narrative, and a card minigame (the latter inspired by work I did on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II). It's set in the near future. You are using software (the game) to navigate a person's digitized mind, reading their memories. I hope to have a playable demo within the next month or so.

FunHearing3443 2mo ago
I'd be interested in the demo!!
ttrashh 2mo ago
I'd love to try it out too.
guiambros 2mo ago
Big fan of SW:KOTOR series. Would love to test Vestiges when ready. You should consider creating the game on Steam, so you can start building your audience.
- ksaun 2mo ago
  Thanks! I've been hesitant about Steam because of the strong anti-genAI sentiments there. (And the initial fee to set-up a game's page.) You are right, though, and I probably should just push past my reservations. (When I began this effort, I was just enjoying feeling productive again and didn't have any real plan to release. But I've been pleased enough with how it's been coming along that I've started seriously thinking about it.)
  - cdnsteve 2mo ago
    Where can I subscribe for updates?
  - mh- 2mo ago
    The anti-AI crowd on Steam only really seems to care about it being used for art, from what I've seen in reviews.
    - ksaun 2mo ago
      That's useful context, thanks. I might be in a grey area on that front. Vestiges has no genAI-created images, textures, etc. Pretty much all of the (non-text) visuals are generated at runtime using Godot's 2D vector drawing capabilities. (I've considered trying to find an artist to work with to have professional 2D art.)
    - ogig 2mo ago
      I'd also include the UI in things they seem to care about. If it looks "web style" or has the common tells (dashes, //) it will be most likely be called out.
      - ksaun 2mo ago
        (Early on, one requirement I gave it was not to use em-dashes for anything player-facing. It's kind of amusing (and a bit sad) at how often I see in its session self-talk something like "No em-dashes!" alongside much more important comments. It's really taken that constraint to heart! :) (Alas, I liked to use em-dashes myself, too; I'm resisting giving up semi-colons and parentheses, though!) Fortunately, I personally enjoy writing. Currently, I wouldn't be able to claim that Claude didn't contribute to the writing, but nothing in Vestiges should sound like genAI. (Which is actually a little funny to me since one of the characters is an AI. But the genAI writing style grates on many, including myself, and I'd imagine that 20+ years into the future, such issues will have been solved.)
spariev 2mo ago
That’s just pure pazaak! Would totally like to see this game
- ksaun 2mo ago
  Yes, the minigame is like Pazaak. I've prototyped two more radical variants that might also make the cut.
phaser 2mo ago
For all the bad rap that AI gets in game development, stories like this should be heard more. I occasionally get tendinitis and I can't code for the entire day like when I was young. I get some relief dictating to the AI when I need to rest my hands. I can imagine it's a much bigger help for someone who is struggling with worse.
marknutter 2mo ago
This an inspirational comment, thanks for posting it! I love that more and more people are being enabled (or re-enabled in your case) as software developers thanks to ai.
zandermax 2mo ago
I am also interested in trying this game out! And I'm really glad to hear how agentic coding got you back in the game (literally)!
fuckyah 2mo ago
[dead]
selimthegrim 2mo ago
I would like to play this demo when it comes out.
zahlman 2mo ago
Glad to hear. I could say I'm in a similar position actually, but my setbacks have been more psychological.
andai 2mo ago
I'd like to hear more about your experience using AI for game development. I've had a strangely asymmetric experience where frontier models are failing apparently basic tasks like making changes to a Pong clone without breaking it, while the same models are successfully designing and implementing multiplayer servers with rollback netcode! I think it has to do with what they can and cannot verify (i.e. they can't actually play pong to see if they broke it), but I'm not sure. (Also happy to hear anyone else's experiences on this matter!)
- arsenide 2mo ago
  I've been having a bunch of fun working on a couple games on a new platform - everything (platform and games) developed with AI. quackwave.com Hasn't really been stress tested yet (this is the first time I'm mentioning it publicly), but it's been fun playing with friends & family and iterating. Party game platform, think "jackbox but no host screen" - just need a web browser open on phone/tablet/PC. Your comment matches my experience: it has to do what can and cannot be verified. As an example, it was much easier to have AI write a large e2e test using Playwright (then add test cases and expand) than to assume it'll correctly fix bugs without guidelines like this. Also, the human loop is still important in things like screenshot verification - but the frontier models are getting even better here so I'm not sure for how much longer this will be true. The ratio of test code to production code is a bit over 2:1 right now.
  - andai 2mo ago
    I have an amusing update to report, I've checked one of the major new features that was added a few days ago. It turns out it was implemented backwards, and in a way which defeats the entire purpose. Nevertheless, several thousand lines of test code were added, and all tests pass! I found this particularly amusing because, I've been obsessed with correctness and verification lately, thinking about rewriting the game in Rust, and adding formal verification to the game. What I realized here is that, this wouldn't have helped at all. The AI would have just written the wrong code in Rust, and then written a mathematical proof that the wrong code is correct...
I4cTime 2mo ago
I've always wanted to make a game but never chased that down as I took a different career path. I seen unreal is coming out with an mcp type thing which got me thinking about looking into trying. I liked the old Thief games and would like to make something along those lines but with a different flavor. Sounds like a fun game. Keep us Posted :)
n8n_and_coffee 2mo ago
I certainly would love to see the demo. Star Wars nut here.
k_dev 2mo ago
May the force be with you. In all seriousness, can you document your journey? I always wanted to get into building games, that is what got me into software engineering but never took the time to build any game apart from few projects back in my uni days
- ksaun 2mo ago
  Thank you! And also with you. I have been documenting my journey privately. I will think about making it public. (It would require some editing first and, as much as I shamelessly have Claude implement my game, my written communication remains my words alone.) (Ironically: I had an almost-entirely unused blogging account with ghost.org from when I pledged to their Kickstarter in 2013. After paying them $10/month for over 12 years, I finally accepted I'd never write a blog and canceled my account in February. And now I have a use for it! :) )

by ksaun 2mo ago

FunHearing3443 2mo ago

I'd be interested in the demo!!

ttrashh 2mo ago

I'd love to try it out too.

guiambros 2mo ago

Big fan of SW:KOTOR series. Would love to test Vestiges when ready. You should consider creating the game on Steam, so you can start building your audience.

ksaun 2mo ago
Thanks! I've been hesitant about Steam because of the strong anti-genAI sentiments there. (And the initial fee to set-up a game's page.) You are right, though, and I probably should just push past my reservations. (When I began this effort, I was just enjoying feeling productive again and didn't have any real plan to release. But I've been pleased enough with how it's been coming along that I've started seriously thinking about it.)
- cdnsteve 2mo ago
  Where can I subscribe for updates?
- mh- 2mo ago
  The anti-AI crowd on Steam only really seems to care about it being used for art, from what I've seen in reviews.
  - ksaun 2mo ago
    That's useful context, thanks. I might be in a grey area on that front. Vestiges has no genAI-created images, textures, etc. Pretty much all of the (non-text) visuals are generated at runtime using Godot's 2D vector drawing capabilities. (I've considered trying to find an artist to work with to have professional 2D art.)
  - ogig 2mo ago
    I'd also include the UI in things they seem to care about. If it looks "web style" or has the common tells (dashes, //) it will be most likely be called out.
    - ksaun 2mo ago
      (Early on, one requirement I gave it was not to use em-dashes for anything player-facing. It's kind of amusing (and a bit sad) at how often I see in its session self-talk something like "No em-dashes!" alongside much more important comments. It's really taken that constraint to heart! :) (Alas, I liked to use em-dashes myself, too; I'm resisting giving up semi-colons and parentheses, though!) Fortunately, I personally enjoy writing. Currently, I wouldn't be able to claim that Claude didn't contribute to the writing, but nothing in Vestiges should sound like genAI. (Which is actually a little funny to me since one of the characters is an AI. But the genAI writing style grates on many, including myself, and I'd imagine that 20+ years into the future, such issues will have been solved.)

spariev 2mo ago

That’s just pure pazaak! Would totally like to see this game

ksaun 2mo ago
Yes, the minigame is like Pazaak. I've prototyped two more radical variants that might also make the cut.

phaser 2mo ago

For all the bad rap that AI gets in game development, stories like this should be heard more. I occasionally get tendinitis and I can't code for the entire day like when I was young. I get some relief dictating to the AI when I need to rest my hands. I can imagine it's a much bigger help for someone who is struggling with worse.

marknutter 2mo ago

This an inspirational comment, thanks for posting it! I love that more and more people are being enabled (or re-enabled in your case) as software developers thanks to ai.

zandermax 2mo ago

I am also interested in trying this game out! And I'm really glad to hear how agentic coding got you back in the game (literally)!

fuckyah 2mo ago

[dead]

selimthegrim 2mo ago

I would like to play this demo when it comes out.

zahlman 2mo ago

Glad to hear. I could say I'm in a similar position actually, but my setbacks have been more psychological.

andai 2mo ago

I'd like to hear more about your experience using AI for game development. I've had a strangely asymmetric experience where frontier models are failing apparently basic tasks like making changes to a Pong clone without breaking it, while the same models are successfully designing and implementing multiplayer servers with rollback netcode! I think it has to do with what they can and cannot verify (i.e. they can't actually play pong to see if they broke it), but I'm not sure. (Also happy to hear anyone else's experiences on this matter!)

arsenide 2mo ago
I've been having a bunch of fun working on a couple games on a new platform - everything (platform and games) developed with AI. quackwave.com Hasn't really been stress tested yet (this is the first time I'm mentioning it publicly), but it's been fun playing with friends & family and iterating. Party game platform, think "jackbox but no host screen" - just need a web browser open on phone/tablet/PC. Your comment matches my experience: it has to do what can and cannot be verified. As an example, it was much easier to have AI write a large e2e test using Playwright (then add test cases and expand) than to assume it'll correctly fix bugs without guidelines like this. Also, the human loop is still important in things like screenshot verification - but the frontier models are getting even better here so I'm not sure for how much longer this will be true. The ratio of test code to production code is a bit over 2:1 right now.
- andai 2mo ago
  I have an amusing update to report, I've checked one of the major new features that was added a few days ago. It turns out it was implemented backwards, and in a way which defeats the entire purpose. Nevertheless, several thousand lines of test code were added, and all tests pass! I found this particularly amusing because, I've been obsessed with correctness and verification lately, thinking about rewriting the game in Rust, and adding formal verification to the game. What I realized here is that, this wouldn't have helped at all. The AI would have just written the wrong code in Rust, and then written a mathematical proof that the wrong code is correct...

I4cTime 2mo ago

I've always wanted to make a game but never chased that down as I took a different career path. I seen unreal is coming out with an mcp type thing which got me thinking about looking into trying. I liked the old Thief games and would like to make something along those lines but with a different flavor. Sounds like a fun game. Keep us Posted :)

n8n_and_coffee 2mo ago

I certainly would love to see the demo. Star Wars nut here.

k_dev 2mo ago

May the force be with you. In all seriousness, can you document your journey? I always wanted to get into building games, that is what got me into software engineering but never took the time to build any game apart from few projects back in my uni days

ksaun 2mo ago
Thank you! And also with you. I have been documenting my journey privately. I will think about making it public. (It would require some editing first and, as much as I shamelessly have Claude implement my game, my written communication remains my words alone.) (Ironically: I had an almost-entirely unused blogging account with ghost.org from when I pledged to their Kickstarter in 2013. After paying them $10/month for over 12 years, I finally accepted I'd never write a blog and canceled my account in February. And now I have a use for it! :) )