Let a billion videogames bloom

Hello, everyone! December starts with fewer news than usual (though we've had worse), so I'll try to compensate by talking about them more.

• PC Gamer announces: Canceled Fallout RPG from 2003 is being resurrected. Yes, that means Van Buren. And as a fan work, no less! What can I say? Never played either of the first two games much, they're not my style at all. But this is great news for people who couldn't get into the newer installments. And it's pretty amazing that enough of the game was already done that it can be meaningfully picked up and finished. Not to mention, without the resources of a big game studio.
• Over on Lemmy.ml, people are discussing ideas about a federated game store. Naturally, itch.io comes up a lot in conversation. What I don't see mentioned is how they propose to handle payments. In fact, hardly anyone outside of the OP even brought it up at all. And that's by far the hardest part. Not technically, either. Take it from a web developer who worked with e-commerce software and sites for years.
• Last but not least, Vice Magazine writes about the flipside to the Ion Storm debacle: how kindness saved the cult hit Anachronox. Which is a breath of fresh air; I didn't think there was anything left to add about this story. That said: ever wondered why it's always young people with no experience working in this kind of studio, on this kind of project? It's because anyone older will know better, and run away screaming.

That's all I have today. Sorry. Hopefully the final two newsletters will be richer, and then we can wrap up nicely with one last post right before New Year. Then maybe next year I'll get around to making a game again, or for that matter working on the site some more. Couldn't say right now.

Meanwhile, thanks for sticking around. See you mid-month with more!

---