Isaac Turns 3!

3 years to this day The Binding of Isaac was released on steam and after well over 3 million copies sold it still continues to be played obsessively by its ever growing fan base.

to celebrate this occasion we put isaac on sale for 90% off! (the cheapest its ever been!).. that’s right you can buy the binding of isaac for less than 75 cents!

but as we all know, you already own it, so think of this as your chance to become a true hero! buy a round of isaac for everyone at the bar! “ISAAC FOR EVERYONE” you’ll scream as you throw steam gifts at your buddy list.

or better yet, buy copies now then gift them later when its back at full price so you dont look like a cheap ass! either way you should buy more copies so people will like you more!

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i could go on for days here about the dev of isaac, its meaning and origins in celebration of isaac turning 3… but i think its best done in a video format.

a while back the guys that made IGTM made a mini doc called Binding of Isaac Origins, as part of the Super Special edition of IGTM. well this week you can see it fo free on youtube!

im constantly asked about the hows and whys when it comes to isaac, and if you have any burning questions about it, this video should cover them all.

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as a bonus im going to try and list a few fun facts that aren’t public knowledge.

- the 1st title for the game was Love Sick, and the 1st build was code named “Tears”, the title “Mom” was also considered before settling on The Binding of Isaac.

- the games title is not only a play on the biblical story of the same name, but also a play on the word structure of The Legend of Zelda

- the sound when you pick up a key is a play on the same sound in gauntlet, i also did this in smb.

- the original game took me and Florian less than 3 months part time to finish, it was originally planned to be a free flash game that i was going to sell to a sponsor, but after demoing it to a few other devs they convinced me to release it on steam.

- steam had suggested the game sell at 9.99, but we set it to 4.99 because i assumed it was far too weird and inaccessible to catch on and i wanted more to play it.

- the wrath of the lamb expansion was actually started because my wife Danielle 100%ed the game and wanted more content. (she had well over 500 hours clocked in by that time).

- isaac was originally going to featured 8 bit art, but i decided to go with the hand drawn look to save time. this is why the icon for isaac is an 8bit image.

- ??? (aka blue baby) is a reference to my 1st “game” dead baby dressup and the mascot called “the blue baby”, also my screen name on newgrounds.

- there was an item in the Halloween update called “the pumpkin mask” that got cut because i hated it. it can still be seen in game when an item goes into an “undefined” state, but has no function.

- The Sad Onion was the 1st item ever made. In Isaac’s initial design the game featured only 20 items, almost all were just stat padding items which later became the “boss pool”.

- Spoon bender is a reference to uri geller.

- the way isaac wears moms bra is a reference to weird science.

- the necronomicon is an obvious evil dead reference.

- a lot of the drug references in he game are references to alice in wonderland, a story the game also mirrors ( as well as mario ).

- the teleporter is a nod to Spelunky, one of the games biggest influences. (aside from zelda of course)

- the dead bird comes from a comic i did about my childhood called thicker than water .

- a lot of isaacs themes reference the movie psycho.

- the icon for brimstone is an alchemy symbol that means Sulfur

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see you tomorrow! <3