Asbjørn Thirslund (born 1996 or 1997[2]), better known by his online alias Brackeys, is a video game developer and YouTuber who creates tutorials related to programming and video game development. The channel centers around the Godot game engine.
Content[]
He co-hosts annual game jams with the admin team of the official Discord server, where he and other developers must design and create a small video game over the course of one week. At the end of the jam, the developers will play and rate each others' games and declare a winner.[3]
History[]
On December 27, 2017, Thirslund uploaded a video titled "HOW I STARTED MAKING GAMES", in which he explains where his interest in video game development started. He describes how it began with an interest in sandbox video games - such as Minecraft - where there are no real goals.
When playing these games, Thirslund often expressed that he wanted to create video games of his own which led to him downloading GameMaker. He enjoyed using it, however he felt that he wanted to do more - including 3D game development - so he began developing games in Blender which contains a visual scripting solution. These games were basic, and often made use of basic 3D shapes (like cubes or spheres) as opposed to more complex geometry. However, still not fully content, Thirslund expressed he wanted to write code of his own; leading to him learning a number of programming languages including Python, Visual Basic, and HTML.
However, he found that he didn't massively enjoy programming, stating that he was frequently confused or bored by it, so he decided to begin creating games with his friends. At this point they discovered Unity, and he learned how to use the engine himself by using online tutorials. The group of friends began to work on a few games that did not finish development, however during this time he began to develop an interest for - and better understanding of - programming. Together, they realized they would need to find a way to create an audience without any advertising budgets - which is what led to Thirslund creating the Brackeys YouTube channel.
On September 18, 2020, Thirslund uploaded a video titled "GOODBYE - And thanks for everything!", in which he explains that he has decided to no longer create videos for his channel. He explains that he had been making videos for almost 8 years, had been using Unity since he was 12 and making Unity tutorials since he was 15, and therefore wanted to move on and try new things. He stated in this video that no content will be removed, both on YouTube and other platforms.[4]
On September 28, 2023, Thirslund posted an announcement to the social networking platform Twitter which hinted at a transition to the Godot game engine as a response to Unity's then-planned changes to its licensing model[5]. This transition was then confirmed on April 21, 2024, by the release of a new video titled "The Future of Game Development", in which he announced that new videos would be published which centered around Godot.[6]
Games[]
Throughout his YouTube career, he has developed and published a large number of video games, Many of which were published as part of game jams or other events, these include:
- Kill Pill (2012)[7]
- Seananners (2013)
- Diggin' (2016)
- Maniac Inc. (2016)
- Shrinking Planet (2017)
- Crafty (2018)
- Sugar Warrior (2018)
- Farm Alarm (2019)
- Date Night (2019)
- Soul Surge (2019)
- Detective Truth (2019)
- Party Killer (2020)
Gallery[]
References[]
- ↑ https://dk.linkedin.com/in/asbjoernthirslund
- ↑ Discord Q&A Session - Andreas Gielov, Published September 22, 2020, Retrieved May 1, 2025.
- ↑ HOW TO GAME JAM! - Brackeys, Published May 17, 2020, Retrieved October 11, 2020.
- ↑ GOODBYE - And thanks for everything! - Brackeys, Published September 18, 2020, Retrieved October 11, 2020.
- ↑ X post - Brackeys, Published September 28, 2023, Retrieved April 30, 2025.
- ↑ The Future of Game Development - Brackeys, Published April 21, 2024, Retrieved April 30, 2025.
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20180901203007/http://old.brackeys.com/preview/kill-pill/