Nate "Naetoid" Hermanson
@naetoid.bsky.social
🇵🇭 Founder and Editor-in-Chief of @videogamesaregood.bsky.social. Used to do community management/marketing for indies and events centers. Looking to do it again. Suffering sports fan. Streamin' at twitch.tv/Naetoid. Contact: nate@videogamesgood.com
If there's anything we eat up at VGG, it's a metanarrative about game development that secretly houses a deep deduction game, all wrapped up in a nostalgic wrapping of '90s RPG goodies. And that's exactly what the ambitious TROTEOTGRPGOAT is. Blame @lucasimmanuel.bsky.social for the name.
REVIEW: The Remake of the End of the Greatest RPG of All Time is a meta mouthful in many senses of the word
Someday we'll be able to say this game title without stumbling.
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recent criticism of microsoft has mostly focused on layoffs ravaging beloved game studios, but I’ve been told that internal product teams were also hit hard, with some who worked on the original xbox and xbox 360 losing their jobs
![Current employees speaking to Aftermath on the condition of anonymity, as they were not authorized to speak publicly, noted that internal Xbox product teams were also hit hard by last week’s layoffs, with some losing 30-40 percent of their staff. This includes, one current employee said, “people who were responsible for the original Xbox and Xbox 360.”
“Xbox in general had a lot of incredible people who stuck around for a very long time,” the current employee told Aftermath. “It’s the only way that we’ve been able to ship consoles which work well despite us always being on a shoestring budget. Tons of institutional knowledge, people stretched thin, and not enough time to properly document things, and Asha and her new leadership team have no trust in or respect [for] the value those people brought to the business. While they correctly diagnosed a shitshow, they don’t know or care to learn about why it’s so bad, and so they’re wildly blowing everything up since they’re too lazy or uncurious to actually listen to the teams who have struggled under the previous incompetent leadership teams.”](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:5gdejlhcswjbzraadoltdpps/bafkreig34yv3e74ti7sjxie5mrnabunwg2duidvwnhsgkqaf7ig5pjpbbi)
Aftermath@aftermath.site · 3w agoFans rail against Xbox layoffs, which also did a number on teams responsible for the platform aftermath.site/xbox-layoffs-p...
This week's video game releases include the likes of D-topia, The Incident at Galley House, The Mermaid Mask, Desktop Explorer, and more (puzzles galore 👀). Our curated July games calendar is live on Patreon and free as always.
33 games releasing for Nate's 33rd birthday?! 😼 July 2026 Calendar | video games are good
It's July! The month we celebrate our founder's birthday — everyone share some birthday wishes with Nate! ☺ — and prepare for the busiest se
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I really hope more folk play Lost Records four riot grrrl teenage punks get possessed by witchcraft and burn the world it’s so intimately human and heartfelt, and the last act has one of the most righteous acts of retribution I’ve ever experienced
With @naetoid.bsky.social and @fernfolk.bsky.social having played 100+ demos (so far 😱) between Summer Game Fest Week and Steam Next Fest, here are 4 of our favorites — all featured during the 2026 PC Gaming Show, and all still available to play now!
Summer Game Fest 2026: Four indie gems from PC Gaming Show with demos you can try now
Yeah, you're gonna want to play these.
videogamesgood.com
people claim to want "indie games with worse graphics made by people paid more to work less" right up until said indie game costs more than $20
when I got laid off from Vice, I later found out that members of the c-suite had awarded themselves bonuses that were higher than my annual salary. I hope that answers your question.
JESSE FADEN LIKER@necrofantasia.bsky.social · 2mo agoi realize this is objectively true but it feels like... how? how is an industry that brings in this much money crashing? where the fuck did the money go?
Just going to leave this excerpt here from our interview with Naoki Hamaguchi, FFVII Rebirth and Revelation Director.
AFNarratives@afnarratives.blacksky.app · 2mo agoi think what saddens me the most about all these studios closing is looking at Silksong and Mina the Hollower the real magic happens when a team stays together for years and you can grow your skills and evolve instead of destroying the medium for shareholder yacht #3847
at the indie emporium event it was very heartening to see people's beaming faces once i told them Truth Scrapper was about toxic lesbians. a while back i was told it might not be the selling point i thought it was and im glad i didn't listen! the world yearns for toxic lesbians!!!
Look. Indie dev to Indie dev: doubling down with "you don't UNDERSTAAND we're just a little GUY we NEEEED to use claude" is the reason people are mad. People aren't mad at You. They are mad at Your Actions! You have the power to change this, right here and right now. Take it!!
🌙 CamronJK 🐰 • Enby Bnuuy Vtuber • 🏳️⚧️@camronjk.com · 2mo agoThis leaves a bad taste in my mouth as well... I also should note almost all of these recent posts are in a Discord thread and the initial post today is in a hidden news channel that doesn't show until you activate it manually.
Microsoft buying these studios that make wonderful prestige titles always felt off because Xbox lacks a sense of identity that lasts longer than 3 fiscal years. This contradiction was made even worse by their unwillingness to respond to the BDS Boycott in even a perfunctory way.
“I break my bones, I rend my skin, bricks turn to dust and rage floods in”
I want to see Microsoft itself collapse while the studios it essentially holds at gunpoint are able to get away (relatively) unscathed. I would rather have a games industry with Double Fine, Ninja Theory and Compulsion in it than ever see an Xbox again
This I think people really ignore how bad covid affected the industry and now we pretend games are now made in a week - AI! - so let’s throw long term planning out the door. What do we have this week?
Jeff Gerstmann@jeffgerstmann.com · 2mo agoShutting down Compulsion Games just says to me they don't care about managing a portfolio, they just want hits as fast as possible. I'm no studio head, but that sure seems like a bad way to actually make "hits." Especially as a platform holder with a content-devouring subscription service.
Working at a AAA studio can come with some cool perks, but it’s not “an honor” it’s not something you “get” to do. As game devs of all stripes we have professional skill sets that we are paid for, that’s it. The studio needs us as a labor force more than we need it.
The value proposition of working at an AAA studio was that you were trading independence and agency for stability, and that if the game did well, you would keep your job, and if the game did badly, you might lose it. Obviously it wasn’t that cut and dry, but you get it. Now? You just lose your job.
Here's an easter egg in the new Lego Batman that I think all of you will REALLY appreciate. It's so good, I had to make a video.
legacy games media bravely trying to keep doing xbox coverage in spite of it all
josh (oldfriend99)@oldfriend99.bsky.social · last yr.This mask always makes me laugh. i don't like to look at the other one..
Will definitely be keeping tabs on Patience Is A Virtue! It has so much character already with its early demo.
Video Games are Good@videogamesaregood.bsky.social · 2mo agoFern awarded their Best of Show prize to Patience Is A Virtue, praising @teaisfortoby.bsky.social's mystery puzzle game/VN with an interesting "choose your words" communication mechanic and representation of chronic illness. Includes footage of the game's charming-then-chilling demo!
Exceedingly cool to see just how much Fern GETS IT youtu.be/KXwbA-oHqNo?...
VGG x Summer Game Fest 2026: Day 3 Recap and Highlights
YouTube video by Naetoid
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Video Games are Good@videogamesaregood.bsky.social · 2mo agoDay 3's solo PC Gaming Show was packed with the good stuff! Nate gravitated to the nostalgic horror of Pipes.exe from @cr-games.bsky.social. Fern chose the alluring vampire dispatcher Red Kiss from @wispfire.com. And Fish was eyeballing the deception of Another Door from @nomorerobots.io.
"We already live in a world where you walk outside and there are billboards and signs that are obvious AI slop. That’s become part of our visual reality. To me, generative AI feels less like innovation than a symptom of a broader cultural and economic rot." King. 🙏
Deadline@deadline.com · 2mo agoWith a record-breaking A24 directorial debut under his belt at age 20, Kane Parsons doesn't see a place for AI in Hollywood's future.