This week on And Now for Something Completely Machinima, snacks are flowing, pretzels are implied, and Tracy throws us a curveball of a film pick. 🍪🎬
We dive into “Demoram” by Livviathen, a lightning-fast, 90-second burst of animated chaos made in Team Fortress 2 and Garry’s Mod—and somehow packed with more storytelling, personality, and punch than films ten times its length.
At first glance, it looks like old-school machinima. But look again, and you’ll spot razor-sharp animation choices, perfectly timed sound design, and a wild, Warner Bros.–style cartoon energy that feels both nostalgic and fresh. A furious Scottish cyclops ram, a doomed Scout, explosive slapstick violence, and blink-and-you-miss-it details all collide in a miniature masterpiece.
We talk about:
Why less than half the action is actually shown—and why that makes it brilliant
How sound design carries the story as much as the visuals
The genius of using gaps, cuts, and implication instead of over-animating
Why Livviathen’s claim of “not being an animator” absolutely does not convince us
And how this short channels Bugs Bunny, Road Runner, and Ren & Stimpy… inside Source Filmmaker
Plus, we explore Livviathen’s behind-the-scenes channel, her creature work (including the unsettlingly awesome Spantis), and why her workflow proves that instinct and timing matter just as much as polish.
Short, silly, ferocious, and shockingly smart—Demoram is proof that machinima can still surprise us.
👉 Watch along, then tell us: what do YOU call someone who animates like this if not an animator?
Audio only version here –
and YouTube version of this episode here –
Here’s the film –
The Demoram by Livviathen, released 20 July 2025
and the making of –
For more about Liv and her creation, Spantis, check this out.
🎮 What if the “bad ending” of Half-Life… wasn’t the end at all?
In this episode of Completely Machinima, Phil, Tracy, and Damien dive into one of gaming’s most legendary “what ifs.” We explore a fan-made Half-Life mod that does the unthinkable: it turns the game’s infamous impossible ending—the one where you’re meant to die horribly—into a brutal but beatable continuation of the story.
Instead of accepting your fate at the hands of the mysterious G-Man, this mod asks: what if you survived? The result is a fascinating piece of fan fiction-meets-game design, complete with eerie “backrooms” vibes, authentic Half-Life visuals, and a surprising amount of new gameplay—made nearly 20 years after the original game launched.
Along the way, we talk about:
Why Half-Life’s world still inspires creators decades later
The passion (not profit!) behind modding communities
How mods act as hidden résumés for future game developers
Steam, new hardware rumors, and the eternal hope for Half-Life 3
Plus a bonus machinima pick featuring Ryan Gosling awkwardly—but brilliantly—dropped into Half-Life 2 😄
Whether you’re a hardcore Half-Life fan, a modding nerd, or just love stories about creative communities keeping worlds alive long past their expiration date, this episode is all about the joy of saying: “What if we didn’t stop there?”
👉 Let us know what you think on our socials—tell us which game ending you wish someone would rewrite.
Here’s the audio version of this episode –
and here’s the YouTube version –
Here’s the link to the film –
Surviving the Bad Ending in Half Life (Remastered) by Sanity Lost, released 8 Oct 2025
And the second film is a Half Life machinima that includes Ryan Gosling
Ryan Gosling in Half Life 2 by eli_handle_b.wav released 21 Oct 2025
🎬 This week on And Now for Something Completely Machinima, we’re shaking (and stirring) things up with a deep dive into Benjamin Tuttle’s long-awaited James Bond machinima, Endgame – Part One 🍸💥
Host Damien Valentine kicks things off by revealing he actually voices Q in the film (recorded years ago!), before the panel digs into why this project is such a standout. Created in iClone and rendered in Unreal Engine, Endgame delivers a Bond look and feel that’s grounded, stylish, and refreshingly not sci-fi flashy—London actually looks like London, and the tone leans classic rather than futuristic.
🎶 From its full-length Bond-style title sequence and original theme song to slick action choreography, witty humor, and loving nods to Bond lore (Spectre, Q, M, Cold War vibes, and yes—the car), we agree: this is a heartfelt homage made with serious craft. There’s also a touching dedication to Ken White, honoring the machinima community that helped shape projects like this.
Of course, no good Bond briefing is complete without critique 👀 We debate storytelling clarity, episodic structure, sound mixing, facial animation quirks, and whether Part One leaves us with enough of a cliffhanger to fully ignite anticipation for what comes next.
🎤 Along the way, we talk:
What makes a Bond feel like Bond (without copying the originals)
Machinima’s evolution as a filmmaking medium
Unreal Engine vs iClone (and why skill matters more than tools)
Why this project is a major proof-of-concept for solo creators
💡 Bottom line: Endgame – Part One is ambitious, polished, and packed with love for both James Bond and machinima—and it sparks a lively, thoughtful discussion you won’t want to miss.
👉 Grab your martini, hit play, and join us for one of our most energetic episodes yet.
🚍 This Week on Now for Something Completely Machinima 🎮
What if the most boring video game ever made was actually a goldmine for creativity?
This episode kicks off with Ricky’s unconventional pick: Desert Bus, a notorious 1990s “anti-game” by Penn & Teller where you drive a bus from Tucson to Las Vegas… in real time… for eight hours… and earn one point. That’s it. No explosions. No shortcuts. No pause button. Just desert, drift, and existential dread.
But instead of dismissing it as pointless, we flip the script. What if boredom is the point? What if empty, quiet, repetitive spaces are actually perfect canvases for machinima storytelling?
From comedy-driven conversations and Tarantino-style dialogue, to slice-of-life sci-fi journeys, existential bus rides, lonely astronauts, AI companions with zero empathy, and even an eight-hour “Are we there yet?” gag, the group explores how creativity thrives when spectacle disappears.
Along the way, they we into:
Why originality matters more than flashy assets
How boredom fuels imagination
Using obscure, “weird,” or abandoned games as storytelling tools
Desert Bus’s surprising cult following and charity legacy (yes, millions raised!)
Why machinima has always been about writing, ideas, and voice more than graphics
The big takeaway?
🎨 Creativity isn’t about having more tools — it’s about seeing possibilities where others see nothing.
If you’ve ever wondered how to turn the dullest game, the quietest moment, or the emptiest road into a compelling story, this episode is for you.
Buckle up. It’s a long ride… and that’s where the good ideas start.
Check out this review of the dullest game –
Audio only version of this episode –
and here’s the YouTube version –
Here’s the link to LoadingReadyRun’s annual fund-raising challenge.
This week on the podcast, we’re diving into a grab-bag of big creator news, starting with YouTube, and yes… the “slop” situation.
Tracy kicks things off with what looks like YouTube’s latest attempt to clean house: platform changes that claim to improve privacy and the viewing experience, but also mess with how videos behave when embedded on third-party sites. If you stream shows inside places like Second Life, that’s a real headache, because some embeds and API-based workarounds are suddenly unreliable or broken.
But the bigger story? YouTube appears to be cracking down on the explosion of low-effort, mass-generated content. The buzz is that Gemini is being used to evaluate whether videos look human-made, original, and honestly presented – plus there’s talk of internal “trust scores” that creators can’t actually see, but which may influence how channels are treated behind the scenes. Tracy even tests how an AI describes our channel, and it basically nails the vibe: a legit passion-project podcast with deep experience… while also very clearly not the unrelated, controversy-riddled “Machinima Inc” from back in the day. Check out this video –
Phil jumps in to untangle the embed drama: it may not be “AI policy” so much as an ad-delivery and revenue control move because some embedded browsers can bypass ads, and Second Life gets caught in the crossfire. Workarounds exist (including the very ironic “embed it somewhere else first” method), and Vimeo comes up as an alternative… but with price hikes that feel more “premium platform” than creator-friendly. Locked-in subscriptions, anyone?
Then it’s off to the creative tools corner: Phil’s been deep in Blender, and he’s found some very machinima developments, like a third-person controller kit that basically turns Blender into a game-like character puppeteering environment. On top of that, there’s a newly released Blender cloth-building and simulation tool that could become a budget-friendly alternative to pricey standards like Marvelous Designer – huge potential for indie creators who want great-looking outfits without a studio budget.
From there, the conversation swings to Reallusion’s latest move: Video Mocap, turning ordinary video footage into motion capture data, integrated straight into iClone’s workflow. The group talks practical realities (camera framing, background contrast, space constraints, upper-body capture modes) and why this could be a game-changer for animators who don’t have mocap suits lying around.
We also touch on Unreal Engine’s rapid evolution and its ever-improving animation tools—plus the eternal question: with tech this powerful, why aren’t we seeing more great films made with it? Check this out –
Damien drops some rock-solid creator advice: don’t try to learn new tools by making your magnum opus. Make a short “training film,” and if you switch platforms… remake it. Same story, new tech, better skills. Simple, smart, and honestly kind of brilliant.
Finally, we hit a spicy AI update: major AI music platforms (Suno and Udio) have reportedly reached settlements with record labels, meaning they’ll rework how training and licensing works going forward. That could reshape what “responsible” AI music use looks like in 2026 – and what it’ll cost creators.
And to wrap up on a lighter note, there’s a shoutout to NeuralVIZ and a fun character-driven sci-fi project, The Adventures of Remo Green, as a reminder that experimentation can still be entertaining (and weirdly impressive).
And that’s the episode: YouTube changes, creator workarounds, new animation toys, and the future of AI tools, served with equal parts curiosity and chaos.
And btw, to hear more about Ricky’s epic bus trip, check in on next week’s episode!
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