Honest indie dev talk from the trenches.
The gist
Lostcast follows Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair through the practical mess of indie game making. The conversations move from code architecture and engine choices to launches, books, side projects, Steam sales, and the emotional cost of finishing work.
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About Lostcast
Lostcast is indie game development talk with the polish left off in the right places. Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair sound like developers who have spent years turning ideas into games, then arguing honestly about the damage done along the way. The show is funny, digressive, and technical. It can move from a launch-week gut check to a debate about whether a grid should expose state or hide it behind methods. That mix gives the series its shape. Lostcast is not only about what to build, but about the decisions that make building easier or harder later. Code architecture comes up often. So do game loops, roguelikes, turn-based systems, physics engines, platform constraints, marketing pressure, Steam behavior, and the strange economics of sales. The hosts are comfortable admitting when a project has become exhausting. They also know the appeal of starting over, refactoring too much, or trying to make every piece alone. That honesty makes the show useful. It is not a lecture series from a distance; it is a record of people thinking through the work while still carrying the bruises. Recent excerpts touch on How to Make a Video Game All by Yourself, Indie Game Sim, Project Chisel, Spelunky 2, Destiny 2, Doom, and long-running Lost Decade Games conversations. The references are specific, but the underlying questions are broad. How long can a game stay in development before the world changes around it? When does reuse reduce friction, and when does it make every change feel ceremonial? Is a prepackaged library a shortcut, or just someone else's future problem? Lostcast works best for listeners who like the practical middle ground between design theory and production diary. It respects craft. It laughs at itself. It keeps coming back to the hard, ordinary work of finishing something playable.
Made for: Lostcast is for indie developers, solo creators, game programmers, and design-minded players who enjoy practical conversations about how games actually get made. It especially suits listeners who care about shipping, architecture, scope, and small-team tradeoffs.
What sets it apart: The show stands out for pairing loose, long-running rapport with granular production talk. It treats messy code, stalled projects, market timing, and launch anxiety as normal parts of the craft rather than side notes.
In their own words
Lostcast is a weekly podcast about making better video games with small teams.
As heard by us
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Lostcast pairs relaxed co-host chemistry with unusually candid talk about code, scope, creative ambition, and the practical work of finishing games.
Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair turn Lostcast into a candid workshop on making games, where design ideas meet unfinished code, technical choices, and the occasional wrong turn.
Why you'd press play
A buggy game rewritten twice: good company when your side project starts fighting back.
Press play if you want
- Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair to weigh turn-based sanity against real-time ambition
- to hear how choosing a JavaScript physics engine can become its own project
Talks about
Podcasts like Lostcast
The Game Informer ShowGame InformerGame Informer's editors review new releases and debrief hands-on previews from events like Summer Game Fest.
Episodes
- 1
Lostcast 220: Organize Nation
·1h 8m - 2
Lostcast 250: Make the Game
·59m - 3
Lostcast 249: Matt's new book How to Make a Video Game All By Yourself
·1h 10m - 4
Lostcast 248: Double Your Badness
·1h 40m - 5
Lostcast 247: Ship It!
·2h 51m - 6
Lostcast 246: Penultimania
·1h 17m - 7
Lostcast 245: The Beginning of the End
·1h 25m - 8
Lostcast 244: Spelunculation
·1h 11m - 9
Lostcast 243: Podcast of the West
·56m - 10
Lostcast 242: Humble Speculation
·57m - 11
Lostcast 241: Your Mind is the Ultimate Scare-Factory
·1h 3m - 12
Lostcast 240: Cupdead
·1h 3m - 13
Lostcast Indietober: Indietober
·1h 7m - 14
Lostcast 239: Procedural Mania
·1h 3m - 15
Lostcast 200: Grandaddy Edition
·1h 29m - 16
Lostcast 199: Ineffective Complexity
·1h 12m - 17
Lostcast 198: Horror Music
·1h 5m - 18
Lostcast 197: Openboy
·56m - 19
Lostcast 196: Lostplay
·1h - 20
Lostcast 195: All Casts Are Good Casts
·1h 3m - 21
Lostcast 237: Even Baggy Pants are Scary in the Dark
·1h - 22
Lostcast 236: Xenoprobia
·1h 11m - 23
Lostcast 235: This Episode is Just Called Dead Cells
·1h 12m - 24
Lostcast 234: Designy Designerson
·1h 5m - 25
Lostcast 233: Abstract Kingdoms
·1h 7m - 26
Lostcast 232: Turdoise
·1h 8m - 27
Lostcast 231: The Podcast Trap
·1h 19m - 28
Lostcast 230: Podcastulous
·1h 11m - 29
Lostcast 229: Nephthys for Games
·1h 22m - 30
Lostcast 227: Raise a Glasser
·1h 32m - 31
Lostcast 226: Steamy Themey
·1h 10m - 32
Lostcast 225: WWWWWWW
·1h 3m - 33
Lostcast 224: Focus Gump
·1h 14m - 34
Lostcast 223: An iPad and a Closet
·1h 15m - 35
Lostcast 222: Steamworld Philosophy
·1h 10m - 36
Lostcast 221: The Podcast of Geoff's Infinite Wisdom
·1h 27m - 37
Lostcast 238: Children Probably Not Included
·52m - 38
Lostcast 219: Game.Hit()
·1h 3m - 39
Lostcast 218: Lava Disaster Zero
·1h 11m - 40
Lostcast 217: Podcast Vision 8
·2h 11m - 41
Lostcast 216: Breath of the Oceanhorn
·1h 33m - 42
Lostcast 215: Early Burnout
·1h - 43
Lostcast 214: 7/10
·1h 2m - 44
Lostcast 213: Underpromise and HTML5
·1h 6m - 45
Lostcast 212: Spaceboy Zack
·1h 1m - 46
Lostcast 211: Podcast Direct
·1h 5m - 47
Lostcast 210: Junuary
·1h 5m - 48
Lostcast 209: Jamunity Discounts
·1h 2m - 49
Lostcast 208: Matt Tested It
·1h 2m - 50
Lostcast 207: Rayjamming
·1h 3m - 51
Lostcast 206: Proc Gen 13
·1h 2m - 52
Lostcast 205: Year.remove()
·54m - 53
Lostcast 204: Dork Fortress
·1h 7m - 54
Lostcast 203: All Over the Mapcast
·1h - 55
Lostcast 201: Podcast Treasure
·1h 4m - 56
Lostcast 194: Stock Thief
·1h 2m - 57
Lostcast 192: Politicast
·1h 23m - 58
Lostcast 191: Webbishing
·1h 8m - 59
Lostcast 190: Some Hand Bones
·1h 2m - 60
Lostcast 189: Platform Percolator
·1h 6m - 61
Lostcast 188: Level Up Lars
·1h 11m - 62
Lostcast 187: Crowcast
·1h 5m - 63
Lostcast 186: Indie Game Cast
·1h 19m - 64
Lostcast 185: Protocast
·1h 28m - 65
Lostcast 184: Parallax Trolling
·1h 9m - 66
Lostcast 183: No Hand Bones
·1h 2m - 67
Lostcast 182: Pokejam
·1h 6m - 68
Lostcast 181: Just Trine to Get By
·1h 6m - 69
Lostcast 180: 2D or not 2D
·1h 15m - 70
Lostcast 179: Map 2 Boss
·1h 2m - 71
Lostcast 178: Sham3
·1h 3m - 72
Lostcast 177: One McFunk a Month
·1h 17m - 73
Lostcast 176: Lostcast 176: Mise en Cast
·1h 5m - 74
Lostcast 175: Ahi Moment
·1h 6m - 75
Lostcast 174: Booklunky
·59m - 76
Lostcast 173: Dream-First
·1h - 77
Lostcast 172: Pit Targeting Optimization
·1h 4m - 78
Lostcast 171: PAX-Mortem
·1h 8m - 79
Lostcast 170: Oh, Baby!
·1h 10m - 80
Lostcast 169: Mattacast
·1h 14m - 81
Lostcast 168: Loudcast
·1h 14m - 82
Lostcast 167: Pre-release Geoffers
·1h 3m - 83
Lostcast 166: Sprite Artless
·1h 10m - 84
Lostcast 165: The Ides of Restitution
·1h 4m - 85
Lostcast 164: Soul Thitch
·1h - 86
Lostcast 163: Triagecast
·1h 7m - 87
Lostcast 162: Rain Thief
·1h 1m - 88
Lostcast 161: Spousecast
·1h 19m - 89
Lostcast 160: Dueling Tooling
·1h 3m - 90
Lostcast 159: Communication Break Down
·1h 1m - 91
Lostcast 158: Ticket to Die
·1h 8m - 92
Lostcast 157: Learncast
·1h - 93
Lostcast 156: Jackhammer Weeding
·1h 11m - 94
Lostcast 155: 2015 Retrocast
·1h 14m - 95
Lostcast 154: Tropescast
·1h - 96
Lostcast 153: Knockback Attack
·1h 4m - 97
Lostcast 152: LDG Catchup 2
·57m - 98
Lostcast 151: Bosscast
·1h 7m - 99
Lostcast 202: How to Survive a Podcast Without a Hit
The hosts discuss the upcoming launch of Indie Game Sim and the challenges of marketing and working on a game.
·59m - 100
Lostcast 228: DOOMEEED
Co-hosts Matt and Jeff discuss indie game development, E3, the Steam Summer Sale, and their game club pick Doom.
·1h 20m - 101
Lostcast 250: Make the Game
Hidden gem["LostCast 250 opens with Matt Hackett pitching his new podcast Make the Game and a two-minute Ladria game-dev survey before shifting into an extended ECS discussion with Jeff Blair.", "Jeff Blair says he watched Timothy Ford's Overwatch Gameplay Architecture and Netcode talk three times, and that GDC video becomes the center of the episode's architecture argument.", "Matt and Jeff contrast Unity-style components that bundle state and behavior with an ECS approach built around separate state, separate systems, and fewer classes.", "The conversation keeps returning to the \"pit of success,\" rails, grid data structures, and John Romero's advice to write code for \"this game only,\" not a future game."]
May 9, 2022·59m·4 clips - 102
Lostcast 249: Matt's new book How to Make a Video Game All By Yourself
Hidden gemLostCast 249 is a return conversation between Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair about Jeff's book, "How to Make a Video Game All by Yourself," and the four-year gap since the last LostCast episode on November 28, 2018.
Mar 8, 2022·1h 10m·5 clips - 103
Lostcast 248: Double Your Badness
Hidden gemLostcast 248, "Double Your Badness," centers on Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair comparing Chasm to Castlevania Symphony of the Night, Dead Cells, Bloodstained, and Hollow Knight.
Nov 28, 2018·1h 40m·5 clips - 104
Lostcast 247: Ship It!
Nov 29, 2017·2h 51m - 105
Lostcast 246: Penultimania
Hidden gemLostCast 246: Penultimania turns into a practical discussion of 2D physics engines, with Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair weighing custom code against packages like Box2D, Matter.js, Plank JS, and p2.js.
Nov 21, 2017·1h 17m·5 clips - 106
Lostcast 245: The Beginning of the End
Hidden gemLostcast 245 features Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair discussing Jeff’s TypeScript project, a browser-based tactical RPG inspired by Shining Force.
Nov 14, 2017·1h 25m·5 clips - 107
Lostcast 244: Spelunculation
Hidden gemLostCast 244 opens with Matt Hackett and Jeff Blair on October 31, 2017, then jumps from Joshua Morris’s "Demon’s Seed" single to the Spelunky 2 announcement.
Oct 31, 2017·1h 11m·2 clips - 108
Lostcast 243: Podcast of the West
Oct 24, 2017·56m - 109
Lostcast 242: Humble Speculation
Oct 17, 2017·57m - 110
Lostcast 241: Your Mind is the Ultimate Scare-Factory
Oct 10, 2017·1h 3m - 111
Lostcast 240: Cupdead
Oct 3, 2017·1h 3m - 112
Lostcast 239: Procedural Mania
Sep 26, 2017·1h 3m - 113
Lostcast 238: Children Probably Not Included
Sep 12, 2017·52m - 114
Lostcast 237: Even Baggy Pants are Scary in the Dark
Sep 5, 2017·1h - 115
Lostcast 236: Xenoprobia
Aug 29, 2017·1h 11m - 116
Lostcast 235: This Episode is Just Called Dead Cells
Aug 22, 2017·1h 12m - 117
Lostcast 234: Designy Designerson
Aug 15, 2017·1h 5m - 118
Lostcast 233: Abstract Kingdoms
Aug 8, 2017·1h 7m - 119
Lostcast 232: Turdoise
Aug 1, 2017·1h 8m - 120
Lostcast 231: The Podcast Trap
Jul 25, 2017·1h 19m - 121
Lostcast 230: Podcastulous
Jul 18, 2017·1h 11m - 122
Lostcast 229: Nephthys for Games
Jul 11, 2017·1h 22m - 123
Lostcast 228: DOOMEEED
Jun 27, 2017·1h 20m - 124
Lostcast 227: Raise a Glasser
Jun 13, 2017·1h 32m - 125
Lostcast 226: Steamy Themey
Jun 6, 2017·1h 10m - 126
Lostcast 225: WWWWWWW
May 30, 2017·1h 3m - 127
Lostcast 224: Focus Gump
May 23, 2017·1h 14m - 128
Lostcast 223: An iPad and a Closet
May 16, 2017·1h 15m - 129
Lostcast 222: Steamworld Philosophy
May 9, 2017·1h 10m - 130
Lostcast 221: The Podcast of Geoff's Infinite Wisdom
May 2, 2017·1h 27m - 131
Lostcast 220: Organize Nation
Apr 25, 2017·1h 8m - 132
Lostcast 219: Game.Hit()
Apr 18, 2017·1h 3m - 133
Lostcast 218: Lava Disaster Zero
Apr 11, 2017·1h 11m - 134
Lostcast 217: Podcast Vision 8
Apr 4, 2017·2h 11m - 135
Lostcast 216: Breath of the Oceanhorn
Mar 28, 2017·1h 33m - 136
Lostcast 215: Early Burnout
Mar 21, 2017·1h - 137
Lostcast 214: 7/10
Mar 7, 2017·1h 2m - 138
Lostcast 213: Underpromise and HTML5
Feb 28, 2017·1h 6m - 139
Lostcast 212: Spaceboy Zack
Feb 21, 2017·1h 1m - 140
Lostcast 211: Podcast Direct
Feb 14, 2017·1h 5m - 141
Lostcast 210: Junuary
Feb 7, 2017·1h 5m - 142
Lostcast 209: Jamunity Discounts
Jan 31, 2017·1h 2m - 143
Lostcast 208: Matt Tested It
Jan 24, 2017·1h 2m - 144
Lostcast 207: Rayjamming
Jan 17, 2017·1h 3m - 145
Lostcast 206: Proc Gen 13
Jan 10, 2017·1h 2m - 146
Lostcast 205: Year.remove()
Dec 27, 2016·54m - 147
Lostcast 204: Dork Fortress
Dec 20, 2016·1h 7m - 148
Lostcast 203: All Over the Mapcast
Dec 13, 2016·1h - 149
Lostcast 202: How to Survive a Podcast Without a Hit
Lostcast episode 202 discusses the upcoming launch of Indie Game Sim, with hosts sharing marketing experiences and challenges of indie game development.
Dec 6, 2016·59m - 150
Lostcast 201: Podcast Treasure
Nov 29, 2016·1h 4m