The Short Game

It's been a weird year, but we're ready to round up the best Short Games of 2025! We're also awarding our other highly prized honors like Dirtbag of the Year and Most "Little Guy who Goes Around."This might be the last episode of 2025, but it's also the first episode of The Short Game Season 2. We figured 444 episodes was enough for Season 1, and we are changing up our format slightly. We're looking forward to a great new year! (00:00) - Short Game Game of the Year 2025 (10:08) - Dirtbag of the Year (15:37) - Most Little Guy Who Goes Around (22:54) - Best Galerius (33:25) - Best Mario (38:26) - Late to the Party (44:35) - Best game that nearly killed the podcast (48:37) - Gaming Moment of the Year (58:04) - Best Rerelease (01:01:22) - Shout out to games ineligible for GOTY (01:02:40) - Game of the Year 2025 (01:08:31) - Wrap-up

After a somewhat unplanned summer break, the Short Game crew is returning to talk about the fourth chapter of Deltarune! (00:00) - 444: Deltarune Chapter 4 (03:17) - Surprise! Structure is Different! (10:32) - Picking up right after Chapter 3 (11:19) - Going to Church! (19:29) - Noelle's House (30:30) - You'll Never Make Me Play The Dark Route (35:56) - Back to the Church (49:23) - Climbing is Fun! (53:20) - Now we're going to spoil Nate (01:15:21) - Outro (01:17:17) - Outro

The Steam Deck is the number one console(ish) platform for playing ILLEGAL GAMES that Nintendo doesn’t want you to play! This week we’re talking about games that STEAL intellectual property from the RICH FAT CATS at Nintendo and their cronies and remix it into FREE GAMES for the PEOPLE. (00:00) - 443: Fan Games on Steam Deck (03:42) - What Counts as a Fan Game? (06:20) - Explaining Steam Deck Desktop Mode (16:38) - Where do you find fan games? (24:34) - The (Fan) Games (25:26) - Celeste: Strawberry Jam (33:42) - Other Fan Games of Indies (36:06) - Sonic Fan Games (38:36) - Sonic Robo Blast 2 (41:24) - Sonic and the Fallen Star (44:14) - Sonic Triple Trouble 16-Bit (50:33) - Link's Awakening DX HD (01:09:16) - Streets of Rage Remake (01:21:37) - Lightning Round (01:22:24) - Zelda3 (01:24:01) - Dungeons of Infinity (01:24:55) - ZIIAOL (01:26:11) - Decomps - Ship of Harkinian (01:27:38) - AM2R & Metroid Planets (01:28:51) - Wrap-up

Toby Fox is back, and it’s TV TIME! Previously: Episode 320 – Chapter 1 Episode 324 – Chapter 2 Episode 65 – Undertale Episode 66 – Undertale Spoilers (00:00) - 422: Deltarune Chapter 3 (14:37) - Remembering Chapters 1 and 2 (26:50) - Spoiler Break - Chapter 3 Story Spoilers! (54:40) - Wrap Up

From the depths of Steam and YouTube comes ENA, a strange polygonal girl in a surreal hypercapitalist dreamscape. Your hosts were left wondering what the hell this was all about, and why is it so incredibly beautifully animated? (00:00) - ENA: Dream BBQ (33:21) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (33:26) - Shane: Getting Into 3D Printing (41:16) - Raygan - New NAS Goofin' (46:55) - Laura: The Clock (1945) (53:10) - Outro

Indie game royalty Blendo aka Brendan Chung, creator of Thirty Flights of Loving and Quadrilateral Cowboy among others has come out of his cicada-like 7 year dev cycle with another instant classic. Skin Deep is an immersive sim about popping the detachable heads off of space pirates and flushing them down space toilets in order to save a bunch of talking space cats. It’s an easily the funniest and probably one of the best immersive sims ever made. (00:00) - 440: Skin Deep (47:07) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? - Fantasy Novel Edition (01:00:36) - Outro

A video game memoir by Ecuadorian indie developers Julián Cordero and Sebastian Valbuena, and published by Panic, Despelote takes you back to a childhood in 2001 Ecuador, and the magical grip soccer held over the entire country during the lead-up to the 2002 World Cup. This is something we have never seen in video games before. (00:00) - 439: Despelote (01:00) - Soccer Memories (08:07) - Despelote (14:05) - A long aside about Great Wolf Lodge (16:43) - Despelote! (21:52) - Another digression about child endangerment (24:08) - Despelote!!! (41:36) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (41:52) - Nate: A Sandworm's Dream (44:26) - Shane: Moms & Myst (47:17) - Laura: Jet Lag: The Game (52:11) - Outro

We’re talking about Many Nights a Whisper, a short, meditative archery (kinda!) game from Red Strings Club developer Deconstructeam and Selkie Harbour. The Dreamer has prepared their entire life for one impossible shot that will define a generation. Hear the wishes of your people, and prepare for your one chance to make them come true in this interactive essay on the flight of wishes and the pressure of expectations. In “What’s Making Us Happy”, Nate is playing the classic Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, and Raygan recommends an app. An app! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_Mario:_The_Thousand-Year_Doorhttps://www.suppermariobroth.comhttps://reederapp.com/ (00:00) - Many Nights a Whisper (31:29) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (31:36) - Nate: Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (42:23) - Raygan: Reeder (53:03) - Outro

We spent this week playing a bit more of Inkle’s follow up to Overboard!, and made some shocking discoveries! (00:00) - Expelled! Spoilers! (05:42) - Big Surprises (30:51) - The Content Warnings! (32:38) - Getting Away With It (47:35) - Loose Threads (56:19) - Resetting your Evil Meter (59:24) - Wrap-up

This week, Laura and Nate dive into Trash the Planet, a free, browser-based resource-management game that subverts clicker mechanics to serve its narrative. You play as a group of raccoons who start out collecting trash and, through a rapid evolution of society, end up ruling the planet—manipulating the stock market with absolutely no consequences. Stick around for the return of What’s Making Us Happy This Week. (00:00) - Trash the Planet (36:26) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (36:45) - Nate: Paper Mario: The 1000 Year Inter-Library Loan (40:24) - Laura: Crossed Skis (44:28) - Outro

Shane and Nate were buzzing about FlyKnight, a $5 indie dungeon crawler that surprised us with its humor and depth. In this episode, we break down what makes this tiny first-person RPG so fun, from its retro aesthetic and first person Souls-like combat to its great co-op potential. Should you bug your buddies to play it? Let’s find out! (00:00) - Intro (01:20) - FlyKnight (01:02:16) - Outro

Expelled! is the latest game from all-star narrative design studio Inkle. It’s a follow up to our 2021 Game of the Year winner Overboard!, and it builds on that game’s strengths in every conceivable area. A School Prefect has been pushed out of a window, and everyone says YOU did it! Now you have one day to clear your name. Can you uncover the culprit — or find someone else to take the fall? (00:00) - Intro (01:49) - A Sequel(ish!) to Overboard! (06:59) - Welcome to Miss Mulligatawney's School for Promising Girls (09:34) - The Bad Girl Meter (13:47) - I Didn't Do It, Dad! (15:48) - Optimized for Replay (19:09) - Sparkling Dialogue (21:05) - Verity's Day (32:46) - Filth Book (38:11) - Bringing it all together (44:27) - There's some wild stuff in here (49:49) - Wrap Up

Steam Next Fest just concluded and the Short Game team searched through the mountain of demos to discuss some of the most exciting games with short game energy coming out this year. 00:00 Intro04:09 WYRMHALL: Brush and Banter09:12 Wheel World18:19 Despelote25:08 Creepy Redneck Dinosaur Mansion 333:33 Haste: Broken Worlds39:50 Is This Seat Taken?46:54  Art of Reflection51:01 Bambas!52:56 Run TavernQuest54:45 Nitro Express58:06 Lightning Round and Outro (00:00) - Intro (04:09) - WYRMHALL: Brush and Banter (09:12) - Wheel World (18:19) - Despelote (25:08) - Creepy Redneck Dinosaur Mansion 3 (33:33) - Haste: Broken Worlds (39:50) - Is This Seat Taken? (46:54) -  Art of Reflection (51:01) - Bambas! (52:56) - Run TavernQuest (54:45) - Nitro Express (58:06) - Lightning Round and Outro

All four co-hosts are present and accounted for as we talk about ultra-short platformer, Sheepy: A Short Adventure. It’s right there in the name! Sheepy is a FREE game on Steam and itch.io, and it’ll take you about an hour. It’s surprisingly polished for a free release, with charming animations and very good music, plus some incomprehensible lore! We also go into some tech tips for those playing on Steam Deck, since the game is completely playable but technically “unsupported”. (00:00) - Intro (01:47) - Mysterious Production (06:21) - Cool Game (06:33) - A last minute update! (08:29) - Back to the Episode (11:07) - It's A Platformer (15:06) - Mobility (22:11) - Animation (25:08) - Aww (31:18) - Steam Deck Issues (37:14) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (37:17) - Laura: NBA (41:42) - Raygan: TRMNL (48:57) - Nate: Garmin Forrunner 165 (57:36) - Shane: Bike Lane Win (01:02:01) - Outro

Rats with Knives! It’s time to finally talk about Fight’N Rage! This has been on the back burner for a while; it was first suggested to us nearly 4 years ago as a modern, mechanically interesting beat ’em up in the vein of Streets of Rage 4. “Easy to play, hard to master” is a bit of a cliche, but it feels very apt here. Fight’N Rage channels the golden age of arcade brawlers with deep, satisfying combos, chunky pixel art cheesecake, and a branching structure that gives you lots of options. It pays homage to classics like Final Fight while advancing the genre in interesting and distinct ways. (00:00) - 431: Fight'n Rage (12:26) - Raygan's Retro Corner (16:05) - More Fight'n Rage (46:19) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (46:29) - Shane: Weed Rats (48:03) - Raygan: Not Getting Picked (50:47) - Nate: Free from Star Trek Discovery (53:57) - Outro

This week we are welcoming long time friend of the show Jason McIntosh (aka Jmac, aka Halstrick) who’s joining us to talk about the Valve Steam Deck. It’s been about three years since the Steam Deck launched, and it’s had a profound effect on the way all of us play games. Also, Laura just got one! We had a long chat about the how we’ve used the Deck and what it’s meant in our gaming lives for these last few years. Jason has a great short-form podcast/audio-zine all about the Steam Deck called Venthuffer. Check it out! New episodes coming in 2025! (00:00) - 430: Steam Deck Chat (03:17) - Valve Hardware (05:50) - What do you play on your Steam Deck? (09:00) - Suspend & Resume (12:57) - Playing Docked (15:36) - Touch Pads: Using Them ? (20:34) - Do The Normies Know? (21:40) - Traveling with the Steam Deck (26:10) - Doing Computer-y Stuff (44:23) - The Steam Deck's Effect on PC Gaming (52:59) - Hail Corporate! (58:20) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (58:31) - Jason: Notebooks & Stickers (01:01:52) - Laura: Lord of the Rings Marathon Party (01:06:52) - Raygan: Travel Tech (01:11:59) - Shane: Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman (01:15:47) - Outro

How has it taken us ten years to get around to covering a Sokpop game? The venerable but very weird indie collective has put out a fascinating perfectly normal gardening game.  Ahem. OK fine, Grunn is a short take in the non-linear, first-person, time-loopy, exploration, Outer Wild-like genre, which we are resolutely not calling “metroidbranias”. Hope you like skeletons and garden gnomes! Find it for $12.99 on Steam and itch.io. (00:00) - 428: Grunn (00:06) - Grunn (41:24) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (41:30) - Shane: Cat Quandary (46:13) - Nate: Revisiting Overcooked 2 (49:20) - Raygan: Scary Mouse (51:50) - Laura: Fancy Chocolate (56:48) - Outro

I’M ON ANOTHER… ON ANOTHER LEVEL This week we are talking about the retro-inspired, Ska-infused rally car racer Parking Garage Rally Circuit. Race through the most iconic parking structures of the US! It’s a really great little game to welcome the show back to 2025. Stick around after for our first What’s Making Us Happy of the year! (00:00) - 428: Parking Garage Rally Circuit (45:53) - What's Making Us Happy This Week? (46:05) - Nate: Dave the Diver (50:54) - Raygan: Mechanism Gaming Pillow (53:39) - Laura: British Crime Classics (57:51) - Shane:  The Fortunate Fall

It’s Game of the Year time again! This week we’re looking back at 2024 to pick the best short video game of the year, and recognize some other great games as well. 00:00 Intro04:52 Game of the Year12:00 Short Short Game of the Year – For Rules Lawyers!15:51 1000 Hour Short Game23:47 Most Unfairly Overlooked Game of 202430:32 Dirtbag of the Year35:00 Galerius of the Year40:06 Most Little Guy Who Goes Around43:11 Best Short Game in a Not Short Genre49:46 Late to the Party54:44 Honorable Mentions01:06:58 Outro (00:00) - Intro (04:52) - Game of the Year (12:00) - *Short* Short Game of the Year - For Rules Lawyers! (15:51) - 1000 Hour Short Game h (23:47) - Most Unfairly Overlooked Game of 2024 (30:32) - Dirtbag of the Year (35:00) - Galerius of the Year (40:06) - Most Little Guy Who Goes Around (43:11) - Best Short Game in a Not Short Genre (49:46) - Late to the Party (54:44) - Honorable Mentions (01:06:58) - Outro

This Thanksgiving week the hosts gathered to play a bit of a game, trying to match short games to randomly chosen genres and adjectives. What’s a David Lynchian Platformer, or an “I Want To Go To There” Card Game? What on Earth is Snacks ‘n Jaxson? All will be revealed. Happy Holidays!