Toby Alden is a game designer and DJ based in Los Angeles. Their platformer Love Eternal — released today — is an eight-year collaboration with their brother Sam that grew from an earlier, near-unbeatable freeware game called Love. In this conversation, Toby talks about making music and games in parallel, the surprising amount of work a single animation frame can do, why they let the story operate on dream logic, and what it feels like to hand a creative problem to someone you trust completely.

• (00:00) - Does the Story Have to Connect to the Mechanics?
• (01:55) - Cave Story, Solo Dev, and the Free-to-Play Asterisk
• (05:54) - DJing, Ambient Music, and Scoring Love Eternal with Emily Glass
• (15:17) - From Brutal Freeware to Family Drama: Building Love Eternal
• (22:58) - Making a Game With Your Brother for Eight Years
• (24:16) - Division of Labor and Improvising Scenes Together
• (25:21) - Why the Jump Feels Right: Animation, Physics, and Dream Logic
• (36:21) - Level Design by Instinct, Portland to LA, and Closing

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In 1922, Bronislaw Malinowski’s Argonauts of the Western Pacific changed anthropology forever, introducing the world to "thick description" and the rigors of deep fieldwork. A century later, researcher Michael Hoffman is bringing that text into the future.

In this episode, Jamin Warren sits down with Hoffman—a computer scientist and anthropologist at one of Germany’s premier supercomputing centers—to discuss his creation of the "Anthrogame." By feeding classic ethnographic texts into Large Language Models, Hoffman has built a playable Dungeon Master version of Trobriand society, where players navigate the complex social and economic rituals of the South Pacific.

We explore the intersection of worldbuilding and fieldwork, the frustration of academic reach, and whether AI can turn dense monographs into "appetizers" that make us more curious about the real world. Is anthropology the original worldbuilding discipline? And why haven't game designers tapped into the "thick description" of real cultures?

Host: Jamin Warren
Guest: Michael Hoffman (Leibniz-Rechenzentrum)

• (00:00) - Introduction: The Decline of Reading
• (00:27) - Anthropology and AI: A New Frontier
• (01:27) - Michael Hoffman's Journey
• (02:40) - The Intersection of Anthropology and Game Design
• (28:57) - Cultural Representation in Pedagogy
• (29:33) - Malinowski and the Argonauts of the Western Pacific
• (34:47) - Developing an AI-Powered Text Adventure Game
• (46:22) - Challenges and Future of AI in Anthropology

Subscribe to Killscreen for unlimited access to Jamin's writing and the archive at killscreen.com, member-exclusive newsletters and events. I love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to info@killscreen.com

Please consider supporting independent media! ★ Support this podcast ★

Swedish studio Simogo spent their first five years making seven games—Year Walk, Device 6, Sailor's Dream—then two games over the next decade. Their new Legacy Collection preserves that early mobile work by recreating the iPhone itself inside modern platforms, complete with virtual gestures and motion controls. Simon Flesser talks about the decade-long conversation that led to preservation, the difference between remasters and ports, why doors that don't open are more interesting than the rooms behind them, and the specific Northern European melancholy that Americans mistake for horror. We discuss production constraints as creative fuel, the challenge of staying relevant across decades of game-making, and why no one would start a five-year project if they knew it would take five years.

• (00:00) - Introduction to Digital Preservation
• (00:33) - Samo's Legacy Collection and Preservation Challenges
• (05:25) - The Philosophy Behind Remasters and Ports
• (14:52) - Reflections on Time and Creative Evolution
• (28:09) - Production-Driven Game Development
• (29:16) - Architectural Influence in Game Design
• (35:08) - Intertextuality and Media Inspiration
• (44:23) - Creative Community and Future Plans