Wolfgang Westdorp

So small lie, I have been working on stuff during my self imposed vacation. Nothing to do directly with my on going projects, more learning new tools and finishing old projects that got lost in the weeds with my focus turned to Goon Game. For instance, this essay was going to be a blog post originally, but once it got to the sixth page and I started citing books I decided to run with it as a full paper rather then just something I get off my chest. Then, recently, it turned i

Keeping this one short for a number of reasons. First and foremost, really feels like I’ve reached a place where all that’s left to do is tweak numbers and wording, something that’s less mentally taxing than coming up with systems from whole cloth. Most of what was brought up from the last testing session has been addressed: faction components have been more evenly spread out across units, spells, and whatnot; bloat spells have been cut; automatons have been reworked, and Thr

Everything’s on fire again. There’s a reason I paint minis and cook: cause it’s nice to have something creative to do that gets done in an afternoon. Game Design and writing don’t get done in four hours; not unless you're especially cracked. I am not that cracked - yet. So as I watch the last month and a half of work go up in flames before my eyes, I can’t deny the frustration I feel, knowing that there is still a long way to go. But I also know in that moment how everything

Been a minute, hasn’t it? Apologies for the wait, but this last build update took up all the attention I had not already devoted to keeping food on the table — and then some. Now that I’ve been let go of that particular leviathan, I can shift focus from the game to the show around the game. In brief, the last month or so has been centered around one thing: fixing the Creatures of Havoc. As a reminder from last time we spoke on the subject, the Creatures were my most anticip

Sorry about missing the deadline; however, rest assured, I only spent a small amount of that time frivolously. Overall, play testing went well. Put the game into another state of flux, but I’d be more concerned if it didn’t at this stage in development, if I’m being honest. Due to that flux state, I don’t have a comprehensive change log like last time, as things are still getting figured out at the time of writing. What I do have is a refined Creatures of Havoc play style, a

As explained last time, the Big Idea for Goon Game is to create a system that encourages player expression within a given play style. To...

Much has changed since the last update, and I want to talk through all of it to some degree — mainly so it’s out in the open and I can move on to new pastures. Something this post was going to cover in its entirety, that was, until I hit the two-thousand-word mark with only one talking point. So with respect for you, the reader's time, and not losing myself to the show, what follows is that first talking point. In the weeks to come, the others, more focused on the project its

As of my last posting, the prototype had begun to morph into an early form of its final release. It is still far from done, but the bones...

Back in 2022, when Elden Ring and God of War: Ragnarök were revealed to have both been nominated for that year's Best Narrative in Games...

On August 16 th , 2025, I held my second testing session for Goon Game. However, with the testers being the same as before, I wanted to...

Still waiting for testing data to percolate some more; however, that doesn’t get the goblins off my back, so here we are.       From the...

The first testing session, for the boiled-down ruleset of Goon Game, was held July 29, 2025. Although the data set is still too small to...

No one showed up last Saturday. Planning another in-person test as of writing and working on moving the ruleset onto Tabletopia to play...

The prototype is now printed, and a testing date is being set. As of writing, the goal is this Saturday; whether that will be reality is...

Hey. How’s it going? Update time: strap in, cause all this is coming out of me like a fire hose. The new prototype is complete; all...

Ominous as those three words may sound – doubly so when on their own line – change is not always an ill omen of dark days to come. I have...

On January 30th, 2024, Yager Studio’s Spec-ops: The Line was delisted from digital retailers due to music licenses within the game...

I was given a book a while back called Steal Like an Artist  that detailed the author’s creative process as a novelist and cartoonist,...

There was this controversial update in the early access days of Darkest Dungeon, the Lovecraftian dungeon crawler gem released back in...

There is a good chance that my explaining what kind of game Elden Ring  is would be redundant, as it has been the talk around town since...