📰 2023 June-July Zine Issue and Wrap-Up!
2023年 6月 30日The peak of the rainy season has come and gone, making way for the brutal Kanto summer. Here's hoping that the 2023 June-July issue of インディー通信 Indie Tsushin can help cool you down, somehow!
Get the 2023 June-July zine on itch!
This digital issue is available to read in browser, or downloaded as PDF, ePub, and MOBI files. It is also PWYW so anyone can read it!
You may have already heard, but this has been a rough month for me health-wise. Thank you so much for your patience as articles went up a lot later than anticipated, and MAJOR HUGE THANKS to Daikon for basically carrying the entire issue this month. We will be taking things slower for July. We do have a couple of blog entries planned to go up in July, but those will get released in zine form in the August issue, since there won't be a July issue. I hope to use that time to recover my strength and come back better than ever. Thank you so much for all of your kind support, it has meant the world to us!
And without further ado, let's see what's inside!
2023 June-July issue
🎮 El Panadero
Daikon wrote about El Panadero by Sketchy Ceviche, an upcoming side-scrolling beat-'em-up starring a baker fighting to protect the Earth from invading veggie aliens!
🎮 TANITANI WIZARD
Daikon wrote about TANITANI WIZARD, a fantasy-themed bullet hell by SparkWing featuring adorable tanishi snail partners!
🎮 Invercity
Daikon wrote about Invercity, a puzzle platformer by Marudice about flipping your perspective on the world!
🎮 BATTING CARDGAME
Daikon wrote about BATTING CARDGAME, an analog and also digital hybrid game by Studio Shimazu about psyching out your opponent in the last inning of baseball!
🎮 HER TREES
Personal ruminations while talking about HER TREES, a slightly unusual escape room game by stone!
🎤 Interview with Sketchy Ceviche
We had the pleasure of speaking with Sketchy Ceviche about working on the bakery-based brawler, El Panadero!
🎤 Interview with SparkWing
We had the pleasure of speaking with SparkWing about working on game jam titles and the fantasy-themed bullet hell, TANITANI WIZARD!
🎤 Interview with Marudice
We had the pleasure of speaking with Marudice about working on the topsy-turvy puzzle platformer, Invercity!
🎤 Interview with Studio Shimazu
We had the pleasure of speaking with Shimazu Studios about teaching online classes in Unity, collaborating with others in an online environment, and making the tense 1v1 BATTING CARDGAME!
Other announcements
🏖️ Summer Vacation
With the release of this issue, Daikon and I will be taking a bit of a summer break! We have a few articles that we want to upload to the site during July, but they'll be released in zine form with the August issue.
📨 Indie Tsushin monthly e-mail digest
Indie Tsushin now has a monthly e-mail newsletter digest through TinyLetter! Sign up to get a recap of that month's blog entries and zine issue! You can also click View Letter Archive to see previous newsletters as a sample of what you can expect.
☕ Ko-Fi subscription tiers
We've added a ¥300/month tier to our Ko-Fi! There is no special reward for this tier, but it is a simple and easy way to show your support for our work and give us a great motivational boost! And really, isn't that the best reward of all?
🎪 Nice Gear Games at Tokyo Game Dungeon 3 AND Yokohama Game Dungeon!
That's right, we applied to both Tokyo Game Dungeon 3 on July 30 and its new offshoot, Yokohama Game Dungeon on August 27! If you are going to either or both, stop by the Nice Gear Games booth and say hi! We'll also be taking turns checking out the other games at the event, and we'll probably livetoot any cool stuff we find, so be sure to follow us on Mastodon!
ICYMI
📰 Get the 2023 May issue
Check out the 2023 May issue and its games if you haven't yet! Or you can get it plus the March and April issues for $10 in the 2023 Spring Collection!
🎉 Indiepocalypse Presents: Indie Tsushin
Our special issue that Andrew of Indiepocalypse commissioned from us broke even, so now it's been passed over to us! To celebrate, I added some community copies, and there are still some left! Be sure to grab a copy and see how Indie Tsushin got started!
🍸 Happy Hour!
Subscribe to our YouTube channel and tune in every Thursday from 9PM for Happy Hour, a bilingual show introducing some indie games! We plan on streaming even during our summer break!
And now, a word from our sponsors
Just kidding! インディー通信 Indie Tsushin is ad-free, does not (and will never!) run sponsored content, and is mostly made by two people in their spare time. We write the articles, buy the games out of pocket, conduct and translate the interviews, lay out and edit the website and zines, pay for hosting and recording equipment, and so on. We do all this because we are gigantic nerds and hope that more people can play and appreciate Japanese indie games and their developers. We would gladly do it even if we never made a single yen from this.
BUT! If you enjoyed the zine, please consider paying for it! Any amount would be more than enough, and would go a long way towards boosting our morale and keeping us going. Not only that, it lets us pay guest writers to appear in the zine! If you can't afford to donate, don't even worry about it! Indie Tsushin will always be available to read for free and will never go behind a paywall. You can help us a ton just by sharing our articles and videos, or rating and reviewing our games and zines on itch.io. Thank you so much for all of your kind support!
We also have a Ko-Fi where you can make a one-time donation or sign up for our ¥300/month tier.
Support Indie Tsushin on Ko-Fi!
🙏 Thanks for reading!
That's all for now, but be sure to check the インディー通信 Indie Tsushin blog for the latest articles, subscribe to the RSS feed, and sign up for our monthly e-mail digest so you don't miss anything! Hope you enjoy the issue and games!