Reading path · 12 stops · 66 min of reading · 4 tools and data pages
O'BLOCK: how it's made.
What you'll learnHow we built and launched a Steam game in Rust: lying NPCs, 639,000 units on screen, a bot-proof economy and launch week.
The path, in order
Topics: Game dev, Games. Ticks show what you have read in this browser.
- Article · 2 minMy game has one mechanic, so I taught the NPCs to lie
O'BLOCK is a sneaker-flipping haggling game with one verb: name a price. How every NPC hides a real limit and opens with a different number, so haggling stays interesting.
- Article · 3 minAdding Chinese, Japanese and Korean to my Rust game engine without touching 39,000 lines
How O'BLOCK got Simplified Chinese, Japanese and Korean in a custom Rust game engine without touching 39,000 lines: glyph atlases, fonts and string width.
- Article · 12 minBevy instancing: drawing 639,000 units with one draw call per mesh
Bevy instancing past automatic batching: units as plain data, 48-byte instances, Arc hand-off and one draw per mesh. Real Rust code and measured frame times.
- Article · 14 minSweeney wants rockets. 37,800 bots crashed my vibe-coded game
My AI-coded game is out now, free on Steam. 37,800 bot runs of its economy: cheating fails on the street, but the finance layer prints $14 trillion. The data.
- Free toolSneaker resale calculator
StockX, GOAT, eBay or cash: profit, ROI and break-even on any flip.
- Article · 8 minSteam Next Fest opens Oct 19. Our game launches 24 hours later
Steam Next Fest October 2026 runs Oct 19 to 26. Valve's rules, the randomized first days, wishlist inflation data, and a free game launching 24 hours in.
- Free toolSteam capsule resizer
One key art to all 7 Steam capsule sizes, cropped around your focal point.
- Free toolSteam wishlist to sales calculator
Wishlists to week-one and year-one sales ranges, from dated launch data.
- Explainer · 7 minSteam update visibility rounds, explained
Every game on Steam gets five Update Visibility Rounds. Each one gives your game a slot on the Steam front page for up to 30 days or 1 million impressions, whichever comes first, but only for people who already own it...
- Article · 9 min2,077 claimed our free Steam game. 16 played it. 30 GB did that
O'BLOCK launched free on Steam: 2,077 claims, 16 players, 13 min median play. The 29.8 GB download, 58 top free games compared, and the bots behind claims.
- Article · 11 minBorrow Balatro's UI grammar, not its cards: 5 builds in one night
A player's bug list, 5 builds in one night: how O'BLOCK borrowed Balatro's UI grammar, got called a rip-off, and rebuilt its menus as a wall of shoeboxes.
- PlayFrom a shoebox to a billion.
O'BLOCK is a sneaker reselling and haggling game: flip a $300 shoebox on a Chicago block into a billion. Out now, free on Steam, with a $4.99 Supporter Pack.
When you finish
Paths that pick up where this one stops.
Real things built in Rust
A SQL engine, an LLM proxy, a game engine and a live wallpaper: the Rust code that shipped and the numbers it hit.
The game industry, with the numbers
Launches, shutdowns, prices and AI fights in games, each one checked against sales data and primary sources.