Topics

Your nice hosts have covered hundreds of topics over the years, so we've categorized them here! Select a category, or browse the whole list. You can sort by topic name, episode name, or episode number.
Topic Category Host or Guest # Episode Starts at
"Bad" Game Design Game Design Stephen McGregor 81 "A thousand monies." 0:02:48
"So, you made a game engine?" Hardware, Programming Mark LaCroix 223 "So, you made a game engine?" n/a
100th Episode Special (revisit) IRL, Meta Mark LaCroix 200 "A Spark Plug." 200th Episode Special 0:11:42
100th Episode Special  Meta 100 "100 times nice." 100th Episode Special 0:00:27
2024 "Nicest" Games Gaming, Nicest 378 Nicest of 2024 n/a
2024 Accomplishments IRL 378 Nicest of 2024 n/a
2024 Gamedev Resolutions IRL Mark LaCroix, Stephen McGregor, Ellen Burns-Johnson 336 Nicest of 2023 1:16:13
2025 Most Anticipated Games Gaming 378 Nicest of 2024 n/a
2025 Resolutions IRL 378 Nicest of 2024 n/a
4X Games Game Design, Gaming Martha Megarry, Stephen McGregor 205 "Mindworm husbandry." 0:05:08
90s Consoles Hardware Mark LaCroix 108 "All that and a bag of chips." 0:06:35
Accessibility Accessibility, Game Design Martha Megarry 121 "I definitely thought of that ahead of time." 0:46:30
Accessibility Accessibility, Game Design Dave McKee 360 Accessibility n/a
Achievements Game Design, Gaming Stephen McGregor 72 "Idea! Idea! Idea! Idea!" 0:08:10
Actionable Gamification by Yu-kai Chou Game Design, Tools Ellen Burns-Johnson 205 "Mindworm husbandry." 0:40:44
Adventurer, Please Game Design, Tabletop 250 Game Dev London does Nice Games Jam 0:41:19
Adventures in Conference Scheduling Events Mark LaCroix 17 GDC 2017 Special (Part 1) 0:52:35
Agile Development Production Eric Johnson 155 Agile Development n/a
An Evil Introduction IRL Dale LaCroix 33 Evil Games Club! 0:01:44
Animation Art, Programming Mark LaCroix 178 "A place where people live." 0:27:00
Arcades Gaming, IRL Stephen McGregor 170 "Stephen, his arms wide!" 0:50:39
Art Direction Art Stephen McGregor 26 "The Stevechievement." 0:33:38
Art Direction Art Mark LaCroix 262 "Start fresh, in a certain way." 0:42:00
Asynchronous and Asymmetric Gameplay Game Design Mark LaCroix 185 "Empty the bucket." 0:46:39
Audio Basics Audio Mark LaCroix 118 "It's Black History Month, y'all!" 0:05:32
Audio Middleware Audio, Production Mark LaCroix 365 "It's hard how my mind works." 0:17:06
Bad Gamedev Habits IRL Dale LaCroix 47 Evil Games Club 2! 0:52:39
Bethesda at E3 2019 News 135 E3 2019 Special 0:22:49
Board Game Design Game Design, Tabletop David R. Megarry 150 Board Game Design n/a
Board Games Tabletop Martha Megarry 10 "Try it once." 0:29:27
Bonus Content Gaming, Production Mark LaCroix 229 "The random bobblehead." 0:12:16
Boss Battles Game Design Martha Megarry 126 “Three-headed monster.” 0:35:12
Bots! Bots! Bots! Game Design Mark LaCroix 21 "Mutual butt-kicking." 0:19:44
Branding & Iconography Marketing Mark LaCroix 284 "Shiny rocks get me every time." 0:10:10
Bringing Other Media into Games Art, Game Design Stephen McGregor 280 "Two bits of goop." 0:54:36
Broken games Game Design Mark LaCroix 276 "Always be the banker." 0:24:00
Bug Tracking and Triage Production, Programming Ellen Burns-Johnson 286 "I realize you were making a more point thing?" 0:31:52
Building a PC Hardware Martha Megarry 34 "My computer vapes." 0:05:08
Building Assets and Plugins Programming, Tools Mark LaCroix 253 "Source code is viewable." 0:05:33
Building Blocks of Design Art, Game Design, IRL, Tabletop, Tools Osama Dorias 211 Building Blocks of Design n/a
Building Substance Art, Production, Tools Sébastien Deguy, Jérémie Noguer 174 Building Substance n/a
Burnout IRL Stephen McGregor 185 "Empty the bucket." 0:06:43
Business Speak Events, IRL, Marketing Tiffany Otto 202 Business Speak n/a
Calendar Math (Production Schedules) Production Mark LaCroix 159 "Calendar math!" 0:07:41
Calendar Math (Real Time in Games) Game Design, IRL Martha Megarry 159 "Calendar math!" 0:43:23
Cameras Game Design, Programming Stephen McGregor 286 "I realize you were making a more point thing?" 0:09:27
Case Study (Mutazione & Later Alligator) Game Design, Gaming Martha Megarry 163 "Please cheat, I don't care." 0:39:26
Changing Your Mind Game Design Lane Davis 29 "I am a Juice Journeyman!" 0:14:57
Character Design Art, Narrative Martha Megarry 81 "A thousand monies." 0:32:52
Character Dialogue Game Design, Production Felix Foster 67 Character Dialogue n/a
Character Roleplaying Gaming, Narrative Mark LaCroix 58 "Shaniqua Shepard sounds cool." 0:40:09
Characterization in Pet Management Games Art, Game Design, Gaming Sarah Yu, Beth 290 Characterization in Pet Management Games n/a
Cheating Game Design, Gaming Dale LaCroix 213 Evil Games Club 6! 0:34:48
Cheating, Part 1 Gaming Ellen Burns-Johnson 310 "What's a little grand larceny?" 0:36:22
Cheating, Part 2 Game Design, Gaming Ellen Burns-Johnson 316 Cheating, Part 2 0:16:58
Cheating, Part 3 Gaming, IRL, Programming Ellen Burns-Johnson 318 "Sad or fascinating?" 0:12:26
Co-Op Games Game Design Stephen McGregor 244 "Maximum Whooo!" 53:10.0
Co-op Games Gaming Stephen McGregor 36 "Maybe a Zeldo." 0:29:40
Co-op Studios IRL, Production Reese Valentine, Mackenzie Denker 221 Co-op Studios n/a
Code Libraries Programming Mark LaCroix 90 "Press A to jump." 0:17:29
Code Libraries Production, Programming, Tools Mark LaCroix 353 "The super-powerful beam or whatever." 0:07:41
Coding Syles Programming Mark LaCroix 41 "Proper ones and twos." 0:36:49
Color Theory Art Mark LaCroix 127 “When two colors of paint really love each other…” 0:32:58
Combat Design Art, Game Design Timothy Staton-Davis 369 Combat Design n/a
Comedy in Games Game Design, Narrative Mark LaCroix 199 "Random hilarious nonsense." 0:44:16
Commitment Game Design Stephen McGregor 239 "Oh is that Rugrats?" 0:35:00
Communicating Difficulty Game Design Ellen Burns-Johnson 368 “That’s way too many pawns.” 0:21:44
Community Development Game Design, Marketing, Production Christine Marten 184 Community Development n/a
Community Managment Marketing Holly Harrison 40 Community Managment n/a
Companion Characters Game Design, Gaming Stephen McGregor 312 "Ask your friends." 0:46:22
Competition Gaming Stephen McGregor 24 "I trolled myself." 0:43:20
Completionism Gaming Holly Harrison 323 "Sweet, sweet Toronto sounds." 0:09:09
Composition over Inheritance Programming Mark LaCroix 326 "The opposing metric of jank." 0:07:41
Conferences / Gaming Events (revisited) Events, Gaming Mark LaCroix 57 "This misinformation vortex." One year of Nice Games Club! 0:14:20
Consensus Pick (2016) Nicest Mark LaCroix, Martha Megarry, Stephen McGregor 9 Nicest of 2016 n/a