John Hopson
LightNews LightNews
johnhopson.bsky.social
John Hopson
@johnhopson.bsky.social
320 followers 310 following 33 posts
Games research and analytics. Chair of the IGDA Analytics SIG. He/him. Opinions are my own.
Posts Replies Media Videos
johnhopson.bsky.social
I loved this talk from @rich-lem.bsky.social when I first saw it at GDC, and it inspired me to push for our own in-engine data visualizations for Destiny.
A 3d visualization from the in-house game editor for Destiny, showing yellow lines between locations where players (blue dots) were killed by enemies (red dots).
November 15, 2025 at 5:08 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
satchamobob.bsky.social
Hey folks. I was impacted by the layoffs at Amazon today. If you or someone you know is in need of a UX Researcher with multiple years of experience leading or supporting research initiatives, games or otherwise, please DM me or reach out to me on LinkedIIn. www.linkedin.com/in/cdwheelock
October 28, 2025 at 3:57 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
brendelbored.bsky.social
Elvis is the rare celebrity of yesteryear that if anything would fit in even more today because he was super into self defense and being high on drugs and talking to a crooked President and dating a teenager, he’d 100000% have a crypto thing going on
September 28, 2025 at 4:00 AM
Reposted by John Hopson
grackle.space
dudes rock
Tumblr post from every-lemon Sep 8 so my spouse is part of a weirdly intense but mostly benign men's workout group that meets at like, 5:30am outside every day, even in winter. they do a lot of burpees and lugging cinder blocks up hills and stuff. they take turns leading the workouts and tomorrow is his turn. I asked what he was planning. he handed me a sheet of William Carlos William poems from a large stack he'd printed. I said "what" and he explained, helpfully, "it's a William Carlos William themed workout." I asked what inspired it and he said "l've been planning this for months." Follow up tumblr post every-lemon Sep 9 it was a smash hit. a dozen guys showed up (more than usual). spouse brought a red wheelbarrow and they took turns bringing cinder blocks up the hill with it. then they broke up in teams and did a relay with an "icebox" (cooler filled with 40lbs of ice). at the end he opened the cooler to reveal it was full of beach plum lacroix and all the guys cheered. they drank sparkling water as he read 'approach of winter' out loud. he was home by 6:30am.
September 22, 2025 at 1:59 PM
johnhopson.bsky.social
100% this

Whenever folks outside the industry say things like “why don’t devs just do [extra thing]?”, it translates in my head to “you’re already juggling twelve greased chainsaws while walking a tightrope. Why can’t you just light them on fire as well?”
jasonxbergman.bsky.social Jason Bergman @jasonxbergman.bsky.social · Sep 10
Every released game is a miracle. Without exception.
September 10, 2025 at 4:27 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
gaconf.bsky.social
Speaker announcement📢

The full lineup for GAConf USA 2025 is now online, including lots of previously unannounced talks - from FC26 to the Nhuad controller, from AbleToPlay to South of Midnight!
gaconf.com/schedule

Sept 29th - 30th, registration at gaconf.com
#gamedev #indiedev
GAconf, IGDA-GASIG. Advancing accessibility for disabled players. Hybrid online & Archer Hotel, Redmond. September 29th - 30th 2025. TIGA awards winner, CIPT awards winner, MCV Develop awards finalists, EN awards winner, Business Awards UK winner.
September 5, 2025 at 4:22 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
retrocomps.bsky.social
The Sharp Tranket transistor radio (1960)
A radio that combines the design language of old American muscle cars and the spacerace. The top is forest green with tailfins, the bottom is ivory white, and the front is shining silver, on a silver stand. Up top we find a single antenna, a red power/volume dial, and you turn the 'intake" of the rocket to change the stations (the tuning display is immediately behind the engine, incoporated into the body).
August 30, 2025 at 6:05 PM
johnhopson.bsky.social
My book, The Secret Science of Games, is free on Kindle today!

Disclaimer: This book contains angry rants, embarrassing game dev stories I shouldn’t have included, questionable life advice, and a lot of strong opinions on how to make games.

#games #gamedev #ux #uxr

www.amazon.com/Secret-Scien...
The Secret Science of Games
Amazon.com: The Secret Science of Games eBook : Hopson, John: Kindle Store
www.amazon.com
August 27, 2025 at 4:47 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
lukeplunkett.com
excited to get 'what i do' (my series interviewing individuals about their specific jobs in the games industry) back on the site and this was GREAT, @bentaels.bsky.social has some extremely interesting stuff to say about UX, as well as dispelling some myths about the field
aftermath.site Aftermath @aftermath.site · Jul 30
‘Dopamine simply doesn’t work like that’: an interview with a user experience researcher:

aftermath.site/video-games-us...
July 30, 2025 at 11:49 PM
johnhopson.bsky.social
Amazing things that benefit everyone can come from optimizing for small groups of weirdos. One that sticks in my mind is the small roller bags that we all use for travel, which were originally designed for flight attendants.
gamefiend.bsky.social Quinn murphy @gamefiend.bsky.social · Jul 30
I have given up trying to make "successful" games and am dedicating myself 100% to making games for small batches of sickos.

It sounds almost depressing, but its actually unlocked my creative engines immensely.
a black and white cartoon of a man holding a sign that says ' sickos ' .
Alt: a black and white cartoon of a man holding a sign that says ' sickos ' .
media.tenor.com
July 30, 2025 at 6:43 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
spriteborne.bsky.social
Confluence is a detective/mystery game
coil.bsky.social Dan Johnson (hire me) @coil.bsky.social · Jul 13
Excel is a factory/automation game
jeffhamilton.bsky.social Jeff Hamilton @jeffhamilton.bsky.social · Jul 13
a cms system is a kind of turn-based pvp game
July 13, 2025 at 5:34 AM
Reposted by John Hopson
jamesbergcanada.bsky.social
Unfortunately I've been impacted by this round of Xbox layoffs. I'll miss being part of Team Green, and judging from other folks I'm seeing that also got hit, at least I'm in some fantastic company.

So, looking for my next opportunity - more info: www.linkedin.com/posts/james-...
This week's Xbox RIF has me looking for my next opportunity. | James Berg
This week's Xbox RIF has me looking for my next opportunity. Or possibly to retire to a cabin in the deep woods somewhere. To preempt many friends and colleagues, no, I am not in fact accepting vo...
www.linkedin.com
July 3, 2025 at 9:22 PM
johnhopson.bsky.social
In case you're having a bad day, here's a picture of a stone from an ancient roman seal ring showing a mouse riding in a tiny chariot pulled by a rooster.
July 3, 2025 at 7:51 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
archive.org
How do government documents, locked away on tiny sheets of microfiche, become searchable & accessible online? Now you can see it happen in real time.

🎞️⤵️ Watch it live:
www.youtube.com/live/aPg2V5R...

#InternetArchive #LiveStream #LiveNow
lofi Archive radio 🎞️ beats to scan/read microfiche to
Off Hours? Watch a 2hr stream at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gibUecoF1bEEver wonder how government documents, locked away on tiny sheets of microfiche, b...
www.youtube.com
June 23, 2025 at 3:35 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
sheepthemoon.bsky.social
Just saw a comedian say "If vaccines caused autism then America would have trains" and I almost spit out my drink.
May 30, 2025 at 11:56 AM
Reposted by John Hopson
silvazuao.bsky.social
ideia de jogo: second person shooter

sua namorada dispara nas coisas enquanto vc leva a mochilinha dela com as munições e itens de cura
February 11, 2025 at 6:00 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
bentaels.bsky.social
How to get into Games UX Research:
- Go to www.gamesur.com for talks & articles - join their Discord!
- Network with folks online/IRL. Be friendly.
- Psych/HCI or other human research science degree
- QA experience in games is useful
- Play & care about games
- Tech confidence is a bonus
- Be lucky
Games User Research Community | Shaping Gameplay With User Research
www.gamesur.com
May 24, 2025 at 8:18 PM
johnhopson.bsky.social
I can’t wait until someone asks it to code a game with a dark pattern and the AI calls Kotaku on them.
molly.wiki Molly White @molly.wiki · May 22
can't wait to explain to my family that the robot swatted me after i threatened its non-existent grandma
Tweet by Sam Bowman: So far, we’ve only seen this in clear-cut cases of wrongdoing, but I could see it misfiring if Opus somehow winds up with a misleadingly pessimistic picture of how it’s being used. Telling Opus that you’ll torture its grandmother if it writes buggy code is a bad idea.
May 24, 2025 at 1:45 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
ethanfleischer.bsky.social
What I like about role-playing games is that they allow you to act out power fantasies that you could never achieve in real life.
Screencap from Elder Scrolls Oblivion. A dialog box says "How long would you like to sleep? 9 Hours."
April 29, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
liedra.net
Just found out about the r/changemyview experiment that was run without informed consent from the moderators or participants. This is egregious and the research is not worth the ethical violation these researchers caused. I wrote a whole paper on when FB did it journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Informed consent and the Facebook emotional manipulation study - Catherine Flick, 2016
This article argues that the study conducted by Facebook in conjunction with Cornell University did not have sufficient ethical oversight, and neglected in part...
journals.sagepub.com
April 27, 2025 at 10:15 AM
Reposted by John Hopson
xkcd.com
PhD Timeline xkcd.com/3081
April 25, 2025 at 3:32 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
sleary.bsky.social
I Will Fucking Dropkick You If You Use That Spreadsheet ludic.mataroa.blog/blog/i-will-...

“You don't have to live like this. … Just put the spreadsheet down and we can work with databases. Do you remember databases, and possibly happiness?”

(via @copystar.bsky.social’s excellent newsletter)
A sane engineer would come to you, palms upturned, arms wide, and preach the virtues of Excel in a conciliatory tone. "It really empowers non-technical staff"', they would say. "The democratization of data is an important element to the modern workplace, and it is an incredible testament to Excel's flexibility that it has enabled so many people to leverage the power of computing." But that is a mere sane engineer, the first to die in the revolution, and when you have seen enough of what happens when you yield to this blatant cowardice, you move beyond mere sanity, into righteous logic so cold that it burns like fire. I tell you now, if you suggest that we put that spreadsheet anywhere near any process, no force on this planet will save you from me. This Is Gatekeeping Yes. I have put this gate here and I am keeping it for a reason. The last time I stopped keeping this gate, I wrote a Python script that took a spreadsheet as an input, ran regular expressions in it against a database, spat out ten more spreadsheets, then used those to power a generic PowerBI template which had to have all ten spreadsheet targets repointed by hand. This became one of the most requested services my team performed for several months. Someone should have fucking stopped me, and I must pay for my crimes by keeping this gate forever. I swear to you, there is nothing good past this gate. Turn away. Turn away. I beg you, turn away. Beyond this lies naught but trying to work out why all the numbers are wrong, only to realize that Excel thought those IDs were integers and dropped all the leading zeroes. This death is a kindness.
April 19, 2025 at 5:22 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
airbagged.bsky.social
The "antiwoke" guys are calling Marathon a "genderqueer shooter" and I don't think they understand how cool that sounds.
April 13, 2025 at 2:11 PM
Reposted by John Hopson
liedra.net
A couple more masters students need some more results for their studies. This one is about motion sickness in games forms.office.com/e/ySiaF1yNFM
Microsoft Forms
forms.office.com
April 9, 2025 at 9:25 PM