Displaying all 7 Episode of Unwritten Earths Symposium with the tag “game design”.
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The Constraints Episode
December 17th, 2025 | Season 2 | 1 hr 4 mins
game design, train of thought
In this episode, Eppy brings a discussion of where the "technological" creative constraints in game design come from. We talk about what this means in the context of tabletop, how constraints surface through the design, and how we handle them as designers. This builds a little on our conversation about design surfaces, and is ultimately another part of a long-term conversation about, well, game design! We also do our final homework for 2025, bringing some holidays from different projects in our back catalogue to celebrate the season.
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The Surfaces Episode
November 19th, 2025 | Season 2 | 1 hr 21 secs
game design, pet crimes, season two
In this episode, Nathan and Eppy report back on their recent work on PET CRIMES, centering on making digital tools for play. This leads into a discussion of the concept of designing the "surfaces" of your game - what are the things (physical, relational, temporal) that you need to design in order to enable someone to play? This is just the start of this conversation, but it feels like a useful framework as we continue to make games in this season of the podcast!
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The Card Concepts Episode
November 5th, 2025 | Season 2 | 1 hr 3 mins
game design, homework
In this all-homework episode, we each bring an initial sketch of the cards that could drive each of our card-based game concepts. Nathan's "Big Lore" game explores using card decks to reveal things about the game world and guide character progression, while Eppy's "Exploration Legacy" game uses cards to map out geography as well as encounter types for a game that becomes more unique the more its played. This is early-stage concept stuff, so listen in to hear how the vegan sausage is made!
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The Season Two Premiere Episode
October 22nd, 2025 | Season 2 | 45 mins
game design, season two
We're moving into the next season of our podcast! In this one, Nathan and Eppy talk about how we're turning from the scholarly side of our project to the instructional side, and how our show homework is changing to match. What this means for our listeners is that you'll be hearing more about new game designs and works in progress, and less research and hunting out arcane gems from other games. Thanks for listening, Scholars!
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The Episode Without Master
October 8th, 2025 | Season 2 | 59 mins 20 secs
game design, swords without master
The Season of Swords is upon us! Nathan and Eppy talk about Eppy's sword & sorcery classic Swords Without Master, how it came to be, how it works, and what's next for the game: a full standalone release, coming early 2026!
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The Sailing Episode
July 30th, 2025 | Season 1 | 55 mins 2 secs
game design
In this episode we talk about handling multiple ongoing projects as full-time working creative people, and then Nathan brings a game idea for discussion: a game that creates or invokes the simultaneous closed-in-ness and open-ness of sailing. We have some fun ideas for creating slow-burn drama with constrained resources. Have we.... made a game yet?
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The White Whale Episode
May 28th, 2025 | Season 1 | 50 mins 41 secs
game design
In this episode we talk about our "white whale" game design projects, both those we're currently in pursuit of and those we managed, at long last, to catch.