Erik Robson
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Erik Robson
@erikrobson.net
4.5K followers 3K following 9.6K posts
Game/level designer | LFW | Valve (Portal 2, CSGO, DOTA 2, The Lab, Artifact) | Double Fine (Psychonauts, Brutal Legend) | 3DO ()

25+ years making games professionally. On Signal @ ErikRobson.47

Husband, father, PNW, living through Interesting Times
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Erik Robson @erikrobson.net · Nov 19
Oh, great. A puzzle. In the bathroom.
Reposted by Erik Robson
washingtonpost.com
A powerful heat dome — which will become the strongest on the planet Wednesday — will tower 3.7 miles above Tennessee, drawing extreme heat and humidity into the central U.S.

“I don’t even know what to say anymore,” meteorologist Pete Delkus said.
It’s almost fall, but this record heat dome didn’t get the memo
The strongest heat dome on the planet will soon tower 3.7 miles above Tennessee, drawing extreme heat and humidity into the central United States from the Gulf of Mexico.
www.washingtonpost.com
September 16, 2026 at 12:00 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
danielleri.bsky.social
Have some BIG NEWS, and it really is wild that today is also the anniversary of the Fanbyte Apocalypse. But my time at Game Developer is done, and hence, my time as a full-time game journalist has come to an end. 20 years in a career sure is something. www.tumblr.com/danielling/8...
After 20+ years of writing professionally about games, including time at Polygon and Idle Thumbs, launching Waypoint, serving as editor in chief of Fanbyte and finally as EIC at Game Developer, my time is done. I'm officially out at Game Developer. Given the state of game journalism, this obviously means leaving the profession, at least as a full-timer. I'm out, with respect to my colleagues, and a lot of love for the site as it was. We've published work that I'm extremely proud of, particularly our reporting on labor and on how workers are finding things in a miserable, gutting moment in the game industry. I'm proud of the dev-authored features we had for so many years, the resources and knowledge and bits and pieces of know-how that I still use, to this day, in my own game design courses. What's next? Well, I'm not leaving games. I'll always be making and teaching and writing about games, it just can't be my full time gig anymore. I've actually been doing narrative design on a game since 2022, with a team I really believe in, and I can't wait until I can show that off properly. I am also OPEN TO WORK. Anything involving writing or editing words, editing video, teaching (I've been teaching college since 2009), and hey, I'm an EMT and got my phlebotomy cert a couple years back. I'm versatile! For full-time employment, I am eventually going to try my hand at medicine. I've served as an EMT here in NYC since 2016, and I've been taking science courses post-bac since January 2025, usually 2 or more at once concurrently with... the full time job, my part time adjunct job, and volunteering on said ambulance. Exhaustion set in years ago, lol, so I've settled into something beyond that at this point. I feel like I've been climbing a mountain, and trying to make many things work at once. I had a pretty good rhythm going, truth be told, despite all the burnout. I'm proud of myself for that. I'd really like to be a physician assistant one day, or potentially a nurse practitioner. It's a very, very long and hard road to either of those paths, but I'm going to make my way as best as I can. How do I feel? Again, devastated was years ago. We're pretty far past that at this point. What's happened to journalism in America is... a topic for a very depressing, very well-researched book. I hope someone writes that one day. What happened to game journalism... well, it's more of a niche, but I can say only that reporting honestly on layoff after layoff and corporate malfeasance writ large and executives gambling the whole industry down the drain was tough, but somebody had to do it. But it's not something one can do without editorial independence. It's dramatic, but I'm going to mourn this career. Twenty years of my life, at 42, is just about half of my days alive. I put a lot, and I do mean *a lot* of myself into this. I tried at all times to lead with empathy and care for the human beings around me and to be as honest and frankly honorable as possible in my work. I really, really tried to live my values in my work in this career, and the only way I can keep that reputation is the path ahead of me. So there it is. Expect to see me making games, making art, teaching game design, writing about games from time to time @VeeGeeBees. Expect to hear more about my adventures as an EMT, and hopefully, soon as a PA student, and eventually, as an advanced practitioner. I've kept telling myself, in the darkest and worst days of the last few years, that I'll fly again, somehow. It'll just look very different. To sign off, and pull an old favorite out of my pocket: be good, and be good at it.
September 15, 2026 at 10:27 PM
erikrobson.net
I'm going to die without knowing what an ed sheeran is and that's the way I like it.
September 15, 2026 at 8:01 PM
Reposted by Erik Robson
obscuregent.bsky.social
People with handlebar mustaches should be forced to box kangaroos.
February 7, 2025 at 4:56 PM
erikrobson.net
Huh.
September 15, 2026 at 7:57 PM
Reposted by Erik Robson
maidofbeans.bsky.social
[Running with scissors] fuck, this is exhausting.
September 15, 2026 at 4:47 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
adamparkhomenko.bsky.social
y’all are bad
September 15, 2026 at 2:31 PM
Reposted by Erik Robson
bisonrimant.fr
Stamp, japanese style. The sides are hatched with a gouge. Topped by a grumpy frog. Vu de 3/4 Seen from its other profile Seen from behind. Itnhas buttcheeks
September 15, 2026 at 1:11 PM
Reposted by Erik Robson
museum-of-twitter.bsky.social
Mr. Bedtime @InternetHippo I stepped away from my computer for a moment. When I returned, it was building something. I did not ask it to do this. We're not ready for what's coming (picture of windows 3d pipes screen saver)
September 15, 2026 at 1:48 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
volts.wtf
This really gets it. Why aren't they mad?
whstancil.bsky.social Will Stancil @whstancil.bsky.social · 22h
I am driven to distraction by how *not angry* so many of my electeds seem. When they sit around and blab about policy this and policy that and blah blah blah, what I hear is "This is an interesting intellectual exercise for me." You should be barely able to contain yourself in public.
September 15, 2026 at 5:49 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
allantadams.bsky.social
"Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few" - Sir Winston Churchill. Some studies of the supporting arms that assisted The Few, & a Messerschmitt that liked England so much it stayed here rather than go home.

#BattleOfBritainDay
#pencil #drawing
#ArtShare
Pencil drawing of a Hawker Hurricane being refuelled by ground crew. Pencil drawing of a Second World War barrage balloon being deployed by a lorry mounted winch. Pencil drawing of two observer corps volunteers in a dug out tracking an aeroplane flying overhead. Pencil drawing of a soldier holding up his thumbs while sitting in the cockpit of a crash landed aeroplane.
September 15, 2026 at 5:54 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
donni.bsky.social
I respect my haters and share their concerns
September 15, 2026 at 3:00 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
kalapaint.bsky.social
Kala Paint is out!

I'm @olawson.bsky.social , professional artist for 15 years, then game dev, now wrote the painting software I wish I'd been using all this time.

GPU-run creamy brushes, no subscription, no gen AI crap, hand-coded with ideas from artists in our Discord, and more added weekly!
September 1, 2026 at 7:34 PM
Reposted by Erik Robson
mcconnell.bsky.social
Retail Hell - a cool game - is on sale for just 6 bucks rn

store.steampowered.com/app/4174310/...
Save 25% on Retail Hell on Steam
Trapped in an infinite shift, you are the sole clerk of purgatory’s only convenience store. Manage stock, pay your taxes and keep nightmarish creatures at bay as you uncover the secret of why your shi...
store.steampowered.com
September 15, 2026 at 4:16 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
wiscomputerclub.bsky.social
A few photos from Vintage Computer Festival Midwest this last Sunday. What a great show! Can't wait for next year! #VCFMW
An AT&T video phone system running on the ShadyTel phone system, a recreation of an old phone system at Vintage Computer Festival Midwest. Two big old TVs run at Vintage Computer Festival Midwest. A collection of computers at Jon Obst's booth. Two Kaypro machines at Vintage Computer Festival Midwest.
September 15, 2026 at 4:21 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
caleb-draper-games.bsky.social
3 DAYS!!!!!!!
caleb-draper-games.bsky.social Caleb Draper - Slash-Out coming Sept 17th! @caleb-draper-games.bsky.social · Jul 17
It's official! Slash-Out is releasing September 17th.

It's been a long time coming but I'm proud to say the game is releasing in just two months! Here's a snazzy new trailer to show-off just how far the game has come since its original nextfest demo.

#indiegame #gamedev #indiedev
September 15, 2026 at 4:27 AM
erikrobson.net
I don't think I've ever used the phrase "the mainstream media" in a post, but here I go:

It's driving me crazy that the mainstream media is taking GenAI CEOs' word on their calibrated, coordinated "slow down to save humanity, and maybe get the gov't to subsidize us" push.
September 15, 2026 at 2:45 AM
erikrobson.net
If anyone's missing dishes, they're probably in my kids' rooms.
September 14, 2026 at 6:44 PM
erikrobson.net
Sounds like they’re remaking Grim Dawn 😉
ign.com IGN @ign.com · 1d
Blizzard has officially announced Diablo 5 at BlizzCon 2026. Set entirely in a post-apocalyptic future 100 years after Diablo 4, the ARPG will release in 2029.
Diablo 5 Revealed at BlizzCon 2026: Blizzard’s ARPG Jumps 100 Years Into a Post-Apocalyptic Future With a 2029 Release Date
bit.ly
September 14, 2026 at 6:15 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
aerialknight.com
September 13, 2026 at 9:42 PM
Reposted by Erik Robson
popeawesomexiii.bsky.social
Her: I have all my ducks in a row

Me: (trying to impress) I have all my geese in a column
September 14, 2026 at 4:16 AM
erikrobson.net
This is an image I made for one of my earliest Twitter posts. A different time, etc.
John Cusack in the film "1408" sitting in a small bedroom with small furniture. (Not super-small, but like child-small.) There's text over top the image noting that the lighting is inconsistent across identical lamps. Context: This was one of my early Twitter posts.
September 14, 2026 at 1:15 AM
Reposted by Erik Robson
contemprainn.bsky.social
The bird was watching and the reaction was fun 🤣
September 13, 2026 at 8:29 PM
Reposted by Erik Robson
ianmcque.bsky.social
Fell down a Ron Francis rabbit hole after seeing this post earlier. Sublime
Painting by Ron Francis, ‘Hope’ Painting by Ron Francis, ‘Home Fires’ Painting by Ron Francis, ‘Russell Williams’ Tree’ Painting by Ron Francis, ‘Room With a View’
September 10, 2026 at 6:44 PM