Exilian

Starting very soon with our Friday evening workshop session! Looking forward to an exciting weekend with everyone :)

Very excited for this: @unormal.bsky.social and I will be on a panel at Coding Medieval Worlds 6, a workshop bringing historians and game devs together

all virtual, Feb 21st and 22nd

Looking forward to everyone's presentations and to chairing the panel on Communication and Information next weekend ☺️

Also apologies to Stevan Anastasoff, whose name got a wrongful "e" in this - our bad!

Next weekend, I`ll be having some fun with a bunch of other game devs and historians!

Happy Cyril & Methodius Day!

As on every Feb 14, it's an excellent day to tell the linguists in your life that you appreciate them, to learn a language, read a book, recommend one to a friend, invent an alphabet, or more things besides. :)

exilian.co.uk/forum/index....

Coding Medieval Worlds 6 A workshop for historians and game developers, 20-22 February 2026 Key Talks & Panels Saturday 21st February 14:00 Coding Medieval Worlds Keynote by CMW convenor James Baillie. 18:30 Mechanics & Medievalisms Panel with Vinicius Marino Carvalho & Steven Anastasoff. Chaired by Tess Watterson. Sunday 22nd February 14:00 Research for Medieval Games Panel with James Holloway, Rob Houghton & Maxime Durand. Chaired by Kjelda Glimmerveen. 18:00 Communication and Information Panel with Lu Yahuai, Brian Bucklew & Jason Grinblat. Chaired by Mariana Lopez.

Along the way, as well as lots of space for open-format discussion on key problems in medievalist game dev, we'll be hearing from @jubalbarca.bsky.social, @jfg.land, @gonzohistory.bsky.social, @robehoughton.bsky.social, and @vinicius-marino.bsky.social among other excellent speakers :)

"Coding Medieval Worlds 6: Manuscripts and Mechanics" banner.

Looking forward to Coding Medieval Worlds 6, now one week away! We've got a great array of panels and discussions on this year's theme, including on research for #GameDev, history as mechanics, and getting information across to players!

Find out about these events at: exilian.co.uk/codingworlds/

If you're a voting member of Exilian, please go to the voting area of the forum sometime in the coming week and vote, this year's committee election has now begun!

If you're not a voting member and want to know about it or about how we run, do give us a shout and we're happy to answer questions :)

Anyone got thoughts or ideas on small pots of money a mostly-online creatives' org could apply for to support running costs? @exilianofficial.bsky.social runs on about three people's small donations and rising costs are swamping that at the moment.

Boosts welcome!

#nonProfit #creatives #organising

🌟 Spotlight: @exilianofficial.bsky.social

We're extending the deadline for places for CODING MEDIEVAL WORLDS 6, a free workshop and discussion forum for historians and game developer...

👉 https://bsky.app/profile/exilianofficial.bsky.social/post/3mbalm5vzs22y

#IndieSpotlight

Only limitations:
- We don't repeat projects that were in our last two newsletters
- We don't promote genAI work (e.g. if used for producing ideas, writing, art or code).

All you need to do is drop a post about your work on our forums (exilian.co.uk/forum/index....) in the next few days :)

Let people know about your work!

In the next few days we'll be writing the next Exilian newsletter and if you have an indie game, book, music, comic, or other thing to tell people about, we can help you tell people about it!

#WritingCommunity #GameDev #IndieDev #AmWriting #Comics #MastoArt

exilian.co.uk/codingworlds... for plaintext version of the above.

We're extending the deadline for places for CODING MEDIEVAL WORLDS 6, a free workshop and discussion forum for historians and game developers taking place on February 21-22!

You now have until Jan 25th to ask to join :)

#Medieval #GameDev #IndieDev #Gaming #History

New article! We have a book review of Predators, Reapers, and Deadlier Creatures, a fantasy-realism tragicomic tale set amidst the horrors of the wars in Afghanistan, and an interview the author, poet and war veteran Matthew James Jones.

You can read the piece here:
exilian.co.uk/article.php?...

You can find out more about the workshop series, and get videos of the key talks and panels from previous workshops, at the CMW website which we host at exilian.co.uk/codingworlds/

Coding Medieval Worlds 6: Manuscripts and Mechanics Call For Participants A workshop for historians & game developers: 20-22 Feb, 2026 A core challenge of making more interesting medieval worlds in game formats is sharing and building the different processes needed to create them. Historians and game developers have different ways of representing, exploring and constructing the material we get from medieval sources. How, then, should we approach this, and how can we share and synthesise our different methods? How do we take the particular affordances of games and engines and how do we develop mechanics and systems to best present historically inspired material in them? Coding Medieval Worlds 6 is a workshop and discussion forum for sharing developers’ and historians’ perspectives and finding solutions to these shared problems! When: Main Sessions 21th-22nd Feb 2026, 1pm — 8pm CET Evening Events 20th, 21st, 22nd Feb 8:30pm-10pm CET Where: Wherever you can connect to a video call! How to participate: Email exilian@exilian.co.uk or james.baillie@oeaw.ac.at by December 31st with your name and a sentence or two on your background and interest. We have a limit of around 40 people, half spaces for developers and half for academics (independent scholars, early career researchers, and hobbyist & indie developers are all welcome). We examine all applications and ensure places are available for scholars & developers from diverse & marginalised backgrounds. Do get in touch with any enquiries at the above email addresses. This workshop is a collaboration between Exilian and the Austrian Academy of Sciences.

Announcing CODING MEDIEVAL WORLDS 6, our next workshop for historians and game developers! It'll be 20th-22nd February next year, and if you're an interested historian or dev we'd like to see you there!

Please share widely to friends, all questions welcome :)

#GameDev #Medieval

One of our members, indiekid, has a maths/game balancing puzzle he'd like help with. Any ideas on this? Boosts very appreciated!

exilian.co.uk/forum/index....

Looking for a creative community online beyond social media? Check out Exilian!

Our latest newsletter is out! We have several new little TTRPGs to report, more new free music and images for your projects, and new writing and music from our community too!

Check all that out here:
exilian.co.uk/forum/index....

The exilian.co.uk homepage, in its new look, with a bookmark-like banner on the left, a cross-bar across the top of the page, and a layout of dark boxes with content across the middle of the page. The latest article shown is one of the site's Updates from the Forge newsletters: the colour scheme is different shades of blue, dark grey, cyan and navy.

We've updated the look of our exilian.co.uk homepage for the first time in somewhat over a decade! There's also a new look for exilian.co.uk/articles.php with the same new theme. We hope you like the new look!

Thanks to SOTK for helping get this sorted :)

This issue's projects include a magical girl labyrinth and a euro-folkloric JRPG, and includes creators like @innkeep.bsky.social, @bigosaur.bsky.social and @jubalbarca.bsky.social with everything from basketball deckbuilding to conniving tavernkeepers to poems about seashells. Do take a look :)

Updates from the Forge 58 is now out! You can discover new #GameDev and creative writing projects and resources in each issue of these community newsletters. And if you'd like your project featured for autumn, just drop by and post it on Exilian sometime :)

Read on:
exilian.co.uk/forum/index....

In the coming days we'll be writing our next quarterly newsletter! If you have a creative project or resource that you'd like to be included, just drop in and post about it over the course of this weekend.

Questions welcome :)

exilian.co.uk/forum/index....

#GameDev #TTRPG #AmWriting

Very happy to once again be sponsoring and web-hosting this great event - looking forward to many great papers in the coming days! :)

Sounds like an amazing newsletter! ✨ I love discovering new indie gems and supporting creative communities. Keep up the fantastic work! 🌟 #SFF #IndieGames #Creativity

Our latest Updates from the Forge newsletter is out! Discover new SFF fiction, indie games, art, and more besides from the wonderful creative folk of the Exilian community :)

exilian.co.uk/forum/index....

Learning that the game 'Strange Sickness' (strangesickness.com) was partially inspired by that chaotic Handforth zoom council meeting (www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCjM...) is DELIGHTFUL. #CMW2025 // @exilianofficial.bsky.social

I’ve been thinking about self promotion and how doing it worries some folks.

Here’s my thinking from 25 yrs, for what it’s worth.

Do you think what you’re making is worthy of someone’s attention?

We could even reduce that down to worthy of the attention of someone who might like it?

1/looooong