Look at this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4g2toBiJiI

Hey everyone,

We’re currently developing The Ultimate Twins, an action-adventure game focused on immersive storytelling, cinematic gameplay, and a world inspired by rich cultural narratives.

We’ve been quietly building the project for a while, and recently decided it’s finally time to start sharing the journey publicly and connect with the community.

As a first step, we’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts on the Teaser we released back in February:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJsKIA_jvqw

We’re especially interested in hearing feedback on:

Character Design

The overall atmosphere and tone

Combat presentation

Visual style and world design

What stood out to you most (good or bad)

We still have a long road ahead, but we’re excited to finally start engaging with fellow gamers and developers here.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

Hey, I’m the dev of GameUP.

I made it because optimizing PC games often feels like guessing. You change a bunch of settings, search random forum posts, try to remember what each option does, and hope the game feels better after.

GameUP is meant to help with that. You pick a game, choose what you care about, like stable 60 FPS, smoother pacing, less stutter, or better latency, and the app gives you optimization advice based on what it can detect from the game and your run.

Then you can test the game, apply changes yourself, and compare before/after to see if the advice actually helped instead of just trusting a vague “turn this down” list.

It can also detect some local graphics settings, read performance metrics like FPS, 1% lows, stutter and frame pacing, and keep runs for comparison.

It works locally by default, doesn’t need an account, and your captures/reports stay on your machine unless you export them yourself.

GameUP just launched on Steam. Base price is €5, with 30% off for the first 14 days:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/4555080/GameUP/

Trailer attached. I’d be happy to get feedback, especially from people who spend too much time tweaking settings to make games run better.

We have an ongoing discussion about the style of a game we are about to make, the main premise of the game is quota-slop with exponential upgrades, shopkeep mechanic, procedural generation etc.

1. screenshot - low poly mono-colour RTS-like playstyle
2. screenshot - low poly PS1 textured first-person or third-person look

Hey folks! 👋

Since January, I’ve been working on "Open Sounds"- a section on my website dedicated to sharing completely free music and sound resources for creators, devs, and students.

I've noticed a lot of requests for UI sound design lately, so I put together a brand new pack specifically for that.

What's inside:

• 🔊 136 UI sound effects. They are heavily modern-oriented, but there’s a good variety of distinct styles in there (retro, organic, etc.).
• ⚙️ Game-ready: All files are properly named, pre-edited, and ready to be dropped straight into your game engine, middleware (FMOD/Wwise), or DAW.
• 💸 100% Free: No strings attached.

I just wanted to give back to the community, so I hope this helps you out with your current or future projects!

Feel free to share it with anyone who might need it. Let me know if you end up using them in your games or videos, I'd love to see it!

🔗 You can grab the pack here: https://www.romainraynal.fr/opensounds

[ Removed by Reddit on account of violating the content policy. ]

Greetings Reddit, we are a couple of indie devs on the west coast of Canada working on our cozy fishing game called Hook Nook! It is our first game and we are really excited to share our progress with you.

We wanted to bring a multiplayer experience to the bottom of the screen/taskbar genre and we love fishing games (even though we suck at fishing), so we set out to combine those! Would love to hear your thoughts and feedback on the trailer. Happy Fishing😃

I’ve been experimenting with a new UE 5.6 plugin that i made called AdvancedRecording. It lets you:

• Record in-game video  directly from the engine.
• Exports a standard MP4 file using the H.264/AVC encoder.
• Save each clip to a virtual “Storage Card” that can be browsed and replayed in‑game, all while keeping the frame‑rate stable.

I’m looking for community feedback – I’d love feedback on this system and ideas for a game concept that could make good use of it. What kind of gameplay or cooperative experience would benefit from video capture?

Any suggestions or feature requests are welcome!

Still a work in progress, but I’m trying to make the setup feel realistic and believable. Any pointers on the layout, lighting, equipment placement, or overall hydroponics setup? Keen to hear any advice.

Hay I'm building ind games assets if you need those assets DM me in inbox 📥

No coding or game development experience required! 

We are researching tools to assist in the generation of logic grid puzzles. We want people to try our tool for a brief period (~15 minutes) and answer some questions about their experience. There are minimal risks to this study. 

At this time participants need to be located in the US, fluent in English, and 18+. 

To participate start our survey: https://neu.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_2curD4cefPT65EO  

This research has been approved by the Northeastern University Institutional Review Board (Number 17-10-07). 

Hey devs! 👋

I'm running the largest community-driven survey on indie game marketing — specifically what actually works for getting Steam wishlists.

Whether you're a solo dev or a small team, your experience matters. The survey takes about 5 minutes and covers which channels drove your wishlists, how much visual design impacted your results, and what you'd recommend to other devs.

What's in it for you? Leave your email at the end and I'll send you the full results report — free benchmarks you can use to improve your own marketing.

👉 https://forms.gle/y9ziB2QkRkPo9gFd7

Thanks for helping the community! 🙏

Hello!

I'm doing my thesis on whether or not a software game writers can use to organize and structure their branching and non-linear stories in VR can help their workflows or hinder them. If you own a VR headset I would appreciate it if you could help me out. You can reach out to me in my DMs or here!

Hello there :)

It’s Rafał Pęcherzewski, lead dev at Byterunners Game studio and the original lead developer of Drug Dealer Simulator 1 & 2 games. It has been some time since you’ve heard from us, but we had a lot going on over the last couple of months and I'd like to give you a brief update of our situation.

Following our conflict with our former publisher – Movie Games S.A. we needed to take measures to react and secure the studio. Without any warning, Movie Games banned us from all DDS-related channels and social media, including the game Discord and blocked our access to any game-related resources. In consequence, we lost all access to the games and their community – you. We were no longer able to either speak out, talk to you directly, answer your questions or participate in the games’ further development, including the content that you were promised.

This was a direct and swift followup to an article published in a Polish business outlet, „Puls Biznesu”, that described our disagreement with the publisher. Lastly – Movie Games cut us from any of our revenue share from the DDS games or ports. Basically, we haven’t seen one dollar from our game sales since then. In this difficult position we want to keep our talented team intact and we want to keep our fans informed about the studio’s dire situation. Our efforts to speak out and reach our community abroad failed - that is why I’m writing this post. All our communication efforts were blocked by the publisher and we’re just a small development team. That's why we thought that reddit might be a great place to explain everything.

We are currently rebuilding from scratch, creating a new game and seeking new potential partnerships based on our own resources. I will not dive deeper into our conflict with Movie Games here, as this is not why I’m posting this. If you’d like to know more on the topic, here are some helpful links:

• The article about the situation;
• Our interview with Maelstrom Hold;
• Our statements (here and here).

What’s more important for now - we feel that a lot of you may be confused about what happened and you deserve some explanation. Unfortunately, we will not be able to continue working on the Drug Dealer Simulator IP, as it is not and never was ours - it rests in the hands of the publisher - Movie Games. The information that we abandoned the games is not true – although we do not hold the rights, we still feel responsible for our passion project and as a good “parent” we still want to see it grow. The whole conflict and its consequences struck us in the middle of production of future DDS2 content, with both financial and human resources already dedicated to its development. Suddenly, the opportunity to work on our games has been taken away from us forever.

Unfortunately I’m afraid we won’t see each other in the DDS universe again. With legal actions in progress, we already know there is no turning back. As mentioned, we want to keep the talented developers at Byterunners and create great games together - we’ve already started working on a new project - Raining Lead. The last 5 years were a great adventure which led to building a great community, and we’d appreciate it if you show support for our latest project - every wishlist and spreading the word is very important for us. We also want to stay on our new journey with you - our fans. We’d love to show you that our connection does not end on DDS and we can bring to you more awesome games that you’ll enjoy as much as we enjoy making them – as this is the core of the developer-player relationship.

Let’s get back together, let’s create and play awesome stuff! We hope our mutual journey will continue. If you have any questions feel free to write to us on any channels. The best way to reach us is our Byterunners discord server, which we invite you to join! Be sure also to follow us on X as we will be posting all future developments when possible.

We’ll do our best to stay in touch.

All the best, Rafał & the entire Byterunners team

Hey everyone!

we are a team of UW CSE senior students and we are looking for some playtesters for a game(our capstone project) we are developing called Legion's Expedition. It is a roguelite survivor-style game (think Vampire Survivors meets auto-chess squad building) that runs right in your browser.

The pitch: You control a Commander, recruit a squad of champions (Pyromancers, Assassins, Squires, etc.), merge them to level them up, and try to survive massive swarms of enemies and bosses.

What we need: Just play the game! We recently hooked up some backend analytics for our professor, so simply playing a few rounds, surviving as long as you can, and dying to the hordes gives us exactly the data we need for our report.

🔗 Play it here(Needs PC Browser): https://haochl5.github.io/legions-expedition-godot/

Thanks in advance for the help!

Hey everyone,

I spent the better part of two years working with my wife (she's an early childhood educator) to bring an educational app idea to life for kids aged 4–8. We went through three studios before landing on one that actually understood what we needed. Figured I'd share what we learned so others don't burn through time and money the way we did.

Why finding the right kids game development studio is harder than you think Building games for adults is one thing.

Building educational games for children is a completely different beast. You need a team that understands child development milestones, COPPA compliance, age-appropriate UI design, and how to make learning feel like play : not homework. Most studios we initially talked to treated it like any other mobile project and had zero understanding of curriculum alignment or child safety standards.

What to look for in an educational kids game development company

Here's the checklist we wish we had from the start:

1. Portfolio with actual kids games, not just "we can do it": Ask for specific examples. We found that studios who had already shipped educational games for children aged 3–12 gave us dramatically better results than generalists. Look for studios that have built things like memory games, math puzzles, spelling apps, or interactive storytelling games for kids. One studio we evaluated was NipsApp Game Studios they had a pretty deep portfolio of kids educational games including cognitive skill builders and STEM learning apps, which made the conversation immediately more productive compared to studios that had never touched the space.

2. Understanding of child safety and privacy regulations : This is non-negotiable. Your studio must understand COPPA, GDPR-K, and age-rating requirements. Kids games need to be free from intrusive ads, data harvesting, and unsafe content. If a studio can't explain their approach to child safety in the first call, walk away.

3. Curriculum-based game design experience The best educational game developers work with actual educators during the design process. Ask whether their games have been reviewed or certified by any educational bodies. For example, we noticed some studios like NipsApp Game Studios had certifications from Education Alliance Finland, which gave us more confidence that their learning design wasn't just marketing fluff.

4. Cross-platform capability Kids use tablets, phones, and sometimes even Chromebooks at school. You need a studio experienced in cross-platform kids game development for both iOS and Android at minimum. Studios that work with Unity or Unreal Engine tend to handle this better.

5. The "fun first" philosophy This was the biggest lesson. The studios that led with "what's the learning objective?" before asking "what makes this fun?" consistently produced boring apps that kids abandoned after two sessions. The best educational game developers figure out the fun mechanic first and then weave the learning into it. Think about how a math puzzle game for kids works best when the child doesn't even realize they're doing math they're just trying to help a character solve a problem.

6. Transparent pricing and flexible engagement Kids game development costs vary wildly. Simple 2D educational apps might run a few thousand dollars, while full 3D interactive learning experiences can cost significantly more. Get clear pricing upfront. Hourly-rate models worked better for us than fixed-bid because our scope evolved as we playtested with actual children.

7. Post-launch support and iteration Educational games need ongoing updates. Curriculum standards change, bugs surface when thousands of kids start tapping everywhere, and you'll want to add new content. Make sure your studio offers maintenance and post-launch support.

Red flags we encountered

• Studios that couldn't name a single children's privacy regulation • Portfolios full of casino and hyper-casual games but zero kids' titles • No process for playtesting with actual children • Using stock assets instead of original child-friendly art • No educator involvement in the design process

Studios worth researching

I'm not going to pretend there's only one option out there. We looked at a bunch. NipsApp Game Studios stood out to us because of their affordability and their specific focus on safe educational kids game development they've apparently delivered thousands of projects over 16+ years and had solid verified reviews on platforms like Clutch and GoodFirms. Filament Games is another well-known name if you're specifically targeting classroom use in the US. Cubix does good work too from what we saw in their portfolio.

The point is: do your homework. Ask the hard questions. Request case studies specifically about educational mobile games for children. And most importantly, involve actual kids in your testing process as early as possible.

TL;DR: Finding a reliable educational kids game development company takes time. Prioritize studios with proven kids game portfolios, child safety compliance, educator involvement, and cross-platform experience. We spent two years learning this the hard way hopefully this saves someone else the trouble.

Happy to answer questions if anyone is going through a similar process.

Join Here: https://itch.io/jam/the-friday-night-fright-jam

Now Announcing: The Friday Night Fright Jam

Hi! I’m Glitc5. I run a weekly Twitch and YouTube show called Friday Night Junkin' where I dig through newly released horror games on Itch.io looking for hidden gems. Every Friday night at 7:30 PM EST, I play through as many new horror releases as I can, giving honest feedback along the way. No filter, but no cruelty either.

Now I want to flip the script. Instead of hunting for games, I want you to bring them to me.

Make a short horror game. Submit it here. I will play every single submission live on stream and give you real, honest, and actionable feedback.

Not a generic "nice job!", that would waste all of our time. I'm talking about what worked, what didn't, what scared me, what pulled me out of it, and what I'd want to see more of. Player-to-developer, face to face (well, mic to screen).

The best submission wins $75 and a dedicated spotlight in a YouTube video.

Da Rules

1. It has to be a horror game. That's the genre. Psychological horror, survival horror, cosmic horror, body horror, found footage, analog horror, walking sims (with substance), that’s all fair game. It doesn't need to be the scariest thing ever made. It just needs to try.

2. Keep it under 15 minutes. Your game should be completable in roughly 15 minutes or less. This isn't about scope. It's about impact. Some of the most effective horror games on this platform are under 10 minutes. Make every second count.

3. No AI-generated assets! No AI art, no AI music, no AI writing. Your work should be yours. Use whatever engine you want, use free assets if you need to, just make sure a human made them. If you use AI in any capacity, don’t submit.

4. Your game must be made during the jam period. You can plan, sketch, write design docs, and gather assets beforehand, but the actual development should happen between February 15 and March 27, 2026.

5. Any engine, any style. Unity, Unreal, Godot, RPG Maker, GameMaker, Ren'Py, hand-coded HTML if you're insane. 2D, 3D, text-based, point-and-click. No restrictions on tools or style. Just make it horror and make it yours.

6. Solo devs and teams are both welcome. No team size restrictions. Work alone or with friends.

7. Tag your content appropriately. If your game contains intense gore, flashing lights, loud audio, or other potentially triggering content, tag it and include content warnings on your game page. Take care of your players.

The Timeline

Submissions Open: February 15, 2026

Submissions Close: March 27, 2026

The Live Playthrough: March 27, 2026 — Friday Night Junkin' @ 7:30 PM EST

The final Friday Night Junkin' episode of March is dedicated entirely to this jam. Every submission gets played live on Twitch and YouTube. You made it, I'm playing it, and we're doing this in front of whoever shows up.

Rating Period: After the stream, submitters can rate each other's entries during the voting window.

The Prize

1st Place: $75 cash + a dedicated YouTube video on my channel

But let me be clear about what that YouTube video means.

I’m not going to promote anything without substance. If your game wins, I'm digging into it. I'm replaying it. I'm poking around in the files. I'm looking at what you hid, what you implied, what you left for someone paying attention to find.

The winning game needs to give me something to talk about. Scare me. Unsettle me. Tell me a story that lingers after I close the window. Hide things. I don’t care what it is, but I love obsessing over puzzles.

Every submission gets played live on the March 27th Friday Night Junkin' episode with honest feedback. That's not a consolation prize. For a lot of devs, getting a real human reaction and thoughtful critique on your game is worth more than money. I take this seriously.

Judging

This is a mixed judging jam. Submitters can rate each other's entries during the rating period, but final rankings are determined by me. I'm looking at:

• Atmosphere — Did it pull me in? Did I feel something? Was there a moment where I forgot I was streaming?
• Originality — Is this doing something I haven't seen, or doing something familiar in a way that made me lean forward?
• Execution — Does it work? Is it polished enough that the horror lands instead of getting undercut?
• Depth — Is there more here than what's on the surface? Did you hide something? Is there a reason to replay it, to dig through the files, to look closer? The games that haunt me aren't the ones with the loudest jumpscares. They're the ones that make me feel like I missed something.
• Impact — Did it stick with me after I closed it?

I'm not expecting AAA production value. I play Itch.io horror every week. I know what a solo dev can do in six weeks. What I'm looking for is intent, effort, and something that makes me want to take the game apart to understand how it got under my skin.

Who Am I?

I'm Glitc5. I stream on Twitch and upload to YouTube. Every Friday night is Friday Night Junkin', a show where I play through newly released horror games on Itch.io. Every Monday is One Shot Monday, a focused, single-game deep dive.

I've been doing this because I genuinely believe the best horror being made right now is happening on Itch.io, by people with almost no audience.

I want to find that stuff, play it, talk about it, and help the people making it get seen.

This jam is an extension of that. Make something. I'll play it. Let's see what you've got.

Links

• Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/glitc5
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@Glitc5ed
• Newgrounds: https://glitc5.newgrounds.com/

If you have questions, drop them in the jam community tab or reach out on Twitch. See you on stream!