Mike Bithell

@mikebithell.bsky.social

25521 Followers 867 Following

Director of video games. Currently Vampirium: 1997, previously Thomas Was Alone, Subsurface Circular etc etc

Screenshot of a custom Godot editor window for setting up new items. Creates a clean new item based on an existing item, ready for me to finesse the specifics
The king’s office was drenched in shadow. There was a viscosity to it. Hart’s eyes took a moment to adjust from the cold fluorescence of Satō’s outer office. As his vision returned, he saw it. A large, hunched shape in the corner. It shook with spasms of energy, as wet, sharp sounds tore through the room towards where Hart stood. The artist gasped in a breath of thick, warm air.
Keyart for Vampirium: 1997, with the text ‘ten thousand plus steam wishlists in week one’ added.
Image of a couple of people playing the first level of the MGS boardgame.
Start of an email, The Last Portrait: Chapter One. Keyart of a man about to descend into a station, followed by ‘Chapter One’, and then the start of a story, with the line ‘Fuck it was hot.’
Screenshot of an email: Hi there! Thanks so much for signing up to the Bithell Games mailing list. We’re incredibly excited to get rolling talking about our next game! Starting next week, we’ll be releasing a short story, chapter by chapter, titled The Last Portrait. When we release Chapter 4, we’ll be announcing our newest game alongside it. If you’re subscribed here, you’ll be among the first to hear our news. A note: Our next project is darker than our previous games. Coarse language and violence await. If that’s not for you, consider this a warning. For everyone else, see you next week!
Big old view of a big old place.
Keyart for the very cool looking new god of war game, but retitled ‘Thomas was alone: Claire’s Odyssey’
Photo of Sky Team board game. Good, clean, nerdy fun.
A slightly battered paperback, Star Trek: Articles of the Federation.
The scene from inception where Ken Watanabe smugly buys an airline to solve a travel issue
Cover of a book, ‘the bizarre world of fake videogames’ by Super Eyepatch Wolf
A bit of a spaceship
Crowded London street, pissing it down, a sign for Les Miserables, a show I have seen too many times
A corner or a window, showing that I’m running a game at 16x speed
Blurb for Bill Maher show that uses ‘they/them’ pronouns
A broken Yorkshire Tea mug
A banner hanging from a balcony calling on all of us to ‘vote for Martok’, a Klingon general from Star Trek
A graphic showing the progression of the definition of next gen visuals: - everything is shiny - everything is yellow - everything is softly shaded - everything is blue
A nerd sat on a Dillinger Grid Lightcycle
An orchestra tuning up
Slide before a Rian Johnson q&a.. which was a good time
Doodle of a chonky little pistol
Sad news today. Bithell Games, having been unable to secure a new larger scale project, is reducing in size. This means that eleven jobs are being made redundant. This constitutes the majority of our full-time staff. It became clear leading up to the release of our most recent game that we were not immune to the challenges faced by many game development teams seeking funding partners in 2024 and 2025. We’ve fortunately been able to communicate these challenges ahead of time, and work with affected staff to ease departures as much as possible via severance packages. It’s important to state that this was an incredible team of exceptionally talented people. If you’re a developer reading this, and you’re hiring; anyone among those affected would be a great addition to your studio, please reach out if we can help to put you in touch. This news will not impact the availability of our existing self published games and ongoing support for them. We are incredibly grateful for our audience, and hope that your interest in our work follows individual team members as they head into other roles. Bithell Games was always defined and elevated by our people. Today we are less. - Mike Bithell
Photo of a screen showing code. The sentence ‘if not opened and not locked, open’ is satisfyingly displayed
A book, time-saver standards for building types, an architecture text book of recipes for different building types
In a tender celebration of the quiet dignity of a Lego Baryonyx, I demonstrate both my sense of personal space and the important spirit of palaeontology.
Me and my wife Kerry at a Lego Jurassic park exhibit. I am tastefully mimicking the pose of the t-Rex, with a stanislavskian focus on performance through study and research of her inner life
Mount hood in the distance behind beautiful trees and less beautiful suburbia. Orange glow
A deep space nine watch
Heidy, Sonoko, Painter and Luigi, hanging out with some incredibly happy nerd.
An image of a cd, its noticeably gold
Close up of a newton, checking my email
An image of a frankly overjoyed Gillian Anderson playing the X-Files game
The box art for Klingon honor guard. Very red.
Slide: "be unique (there's an idea that only you can come up with, a story only you can tell, an experience only you can provide)" and an image of Way to the Woods.. a game that never released, which adds a bit of melancholy unfortunately. Point stands though.
Slide: "Use assets well (well means well hidden)" Image of mixamo store
Slide: "This was a shit point, so I deleted it, remember, editing (so that's 19 magic tricks, not 20, sorry) - no image
Slide: "Don't call attention to cheap stuff (If it's ugly, don't put it in your trailer, and for the love of god don't have a screen capture watermark on it) - image is a cheap shot at mass effect Andromeda's facial animation
Slide: "Implication is cheap (behind the wall is an amazing thing. No you can't go look at it, but trust me, it's amazing)" - image is of the elevator loading screens from mass effect
Slide: "Photorealism doesn't exist (hyper detail is interesting, as is full on stylisation, play with those margins" - image was of a now outed predatory bloke, so gone.
Slide: "Find a tech trick nobody else has popularised yet (preferably and easy one)" - image is of minecraft
Slide: "Try making games for other people (but do your research and respect the audience" - image is some toothpaste commercial group shot of a diverse group of people looking kinda bored and mildly frustrated by the tokenistic manner in which their faces are being used in a white guy's slide about twee game development tips
Slide: "Steal from something new (yes we're all familiar with star wars, alien and zombie films" - image of the darth himself, Vader
Slide: "Focus where the player focuses (and put your energy where needed)" - Concept art of Adam Jensen from Deus Ex
Slide: "And for the next game..." no image
Slide: "Remember playtesting (with people who don't know you) - image of a kid playing a game in a playtest session