Design Frame
The evidence-based, game design case study, analysis, and player & UX advocacy channel.
The channel runs off of people who watch each new big release! I'm so grateful to every viewer and to our subscribers who turn on notifications for the channel. Why? Each release requires 100s of hours from only one person. My aim is to explain the "how" and "why" of game design and assemble often disparate concepts into cohesive analysis, with the goal of providing you a better understanding of game design.
If you find value in the design-driven mission, your contributions on Ko-fi or Memberships (with benefits!) will go toward a more frequent, healthy video release schedule. Thank you so much for the support!
For my policy on React content, reach out.
Design Frame
The holiday channel update!
I paused the streams to expedite the next case study. The goal was to release it in time for the Game Awards, but predictably, I can't release videos quickly when they require more time than you realize. A huge thank you to the channel Members and Ko-fi monthly supporters for funding this next big production.
What's the next big production?
CLAIR OBSCUR: EXPEDITION 33!
One of my goals for the channel has always been to push past the mainstream noise, and that is incredibly relevant for this game.
Clair Obscur in January. Yeah, sooner than expected, ay? Then Silent Hill f in March. That should also be quite an interesting video if you know my opinions of the game after the streams...
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all!
3 weeks ago | [YT] | 83
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Design Frame
Are you a dog lover? Let Baron be with you every step of the way in this Heartbound game design case study! No drama! No violence! Nothing bad hap—
IS THAT A TALKING ANIMAL?!
Watch here: https://youtu.be/IHMdh5TkVUU
The next case study might be on the Game of the Year and is deep in development ⌨🤏👁👁
1 month ago | [YT] | 124
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Design Frame
THE NEXT VIDEO RELEASES THIS WEEKEND~
Prepare yourselves for a hashtag No Drama version of a popular Early Access title. The game sucks, though.
Which game design case study would you like to see next?
2 months ago | [YT] | 33
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Design Frame
THE CHANNEL HAS HIT 30K SUBS! THANK YOU ALL FOR THE INCREDIBLE LOVE AND SUPPORT! 🙏
Streaming with y'all has been such a great time talking about different games! Everyone seems to be having fun on the streams, so I'm happy to keep the train rolling. This week we're finishing FNaF Secret of the Mimic, Heartbound, and a Party stream 🎉🎉🎉 Soon we'll have the beloved co-host play Amnesia: The Bunker. That game may or may not be referenced in a future case study. Stay tuned 👀
I'm finding that OBS utilizes too much of my GPU, even when I change settings around or downscale resolution, so I'll be setting up a streaming PC. The question I'm wondering... who appreciates the 2K (QHD) resolution I stream in?
5 months ago | [YT] | 86
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Design Frame
The reception for my new FNaF Ruin case study has been INCREDIBLE! Thank you all so much! ❤ The comments and donation messages have been so kind and thoughtful 🙏
In the Live tab, I already have FNaF Into the Pit, Blue Prince, and FNaF Secret of the Mimic scheduled.
I'm also thinking Deltarune in the near future. Maybe other mascot horror stuff. FNaF fan games with a tier list would be fun as well. I think in general managing genre tier lists could be fun across streams, even though the spreadsheet already exists. Blue Prince won the poll, but I may also stream Metroid Dread. I wish I could add more than four options to polls 🙃
I have many future case study plans. Stay tuned 😉
I'm streaming FNaF Into the Pit tonight! I hope to see you there!
5 months ago | [YT] | 380
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Design Frame
The Five Nights at Freddy's RUIN game design case study is COMPLETE!
The case study will be available first to Members of this channel ad-free tomorrow.
Subtitles will be available, as long as YouTube plays nice with the long subtitle file. YouTube refused to process the subtitles for the last video, and I had to painstakingly work around it.
To celebrate, I'll be streaming often in the upcoming weeks, including a Goose Goose Duck party, and finally checking out Secret of the Mimic live on stream with my first impressions. I know nothing about the game, so it'll be a fun community journey!
Now that I'm almost finished with Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, the next Design Longplay is up for grabs. Feel free to vote below.
5 months ago | [YT] | 83
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Design Frame
With the new, big FNaF release, Secret of the Mimic, when would you like to see my new signature (though experimental) "live review" playthrough of it streamed on this channel?
7 months ago | [YT] | 34
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Design Frame
BIG CHANNEL ANNOUNCEMENT! If you're a fan of this channel and indie games, there may be something here that interests you!
Summary: New indie consulting service. New game design videos on another channel. Experimenting with a new, hopefully fun and unique "group review" streaming set-up. Upcoming demo stream(s) + more.
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1. As announced in the Steel Wool video, though in my excitement I announced it too much and too early 😅, my new consulting service is now up and running! designframe.gg/
It includes a Newsletter and free resources. One of my goals is to help new devs as well, so I've written a "how to get started" guide, including my thoughts on fan games, how to not get stuck in tutorials, and a guest writing about "types of game developers" from Games Over Coffee. I'm hoping to expand this guide over time. I'll also likely be an affiliate of a couple learning services that I personally like, so you'll see that in future videos. You may use them if you'd find them helpful, and it'd support this channel as a bonus.
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2. Some time back, I collaborated with Games Over Coffee and released two indie consulting videos on the Games Over Coffee Consulting channel. If you enjoy the content on this channel, I think you'll like these videos as well. I have a separate playlist set-up for them. You can find it in the Playlists tab or on the Home tab.
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3. I'm beginning to experiment with streaming. I'm trying a "group review" format where I fill out a Google Doc with positives and negatives as we play, and I'm experimenting with how to track it on-screen as well.
My hope is that the community can talk about what seems to work or not while playing, and in a casual format. We then add the resultant "review score" to a shared spreadsheet. The review score is currently simple math given the positives and negatives of the "gameplay" and "story." I spent much time figuring out a more involved formula but couldn't figure out something that I was happy with. I'd like to develop this further, but again, this is just supposed to be what I hope is a casual, unique, and fun way to handle streams. It's a brand new thing that I'm messing with (there's currently only one game in the spreadsheet), so I hope the potential is there for future streams and we can have fun with it. I also have donations set up so that they can be (currently manually) allocated to a game that you'd like to see played on stream. I'm also trying to add more value to YouTube Members.
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Speaking of streams, I'll be streaming some of the LudoNarraCon demos tomorrow! I'd love to see you in chat talking about the demos and which ones you'd like to see played. Here's a poll with a few demos that look interesting to me (I would include several more, but polls are very limited).
Which most interest you?
8 months ago | [YT] | 33
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Design Frame
Puppy wants you to watch 👁👄👁
https://youtu.be/N6vtxLtJDP4
8 months ago | [YT] | 92
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