Water Cooler Games

by Ian Bogost June 19, 2009

Games for Change: Documentary Games

Game Design

A bit late, I suppose, but I wanted to post my notes from the Documentary Games panel at last month's Games for Change festival. These are rough notes, but they should be sufficient to give you a gist of the sessions. You can find them after the jump. ...

by Ian Bogost April 23, 2009

Shaken Baby? Ok! Brassiere? Offensive!

Game Design

Oh, Apple. You won't let me put a bra in my iPhone game, but it's ok for me to shake a virtual iPhone baby to death. (thanks to Brenda) ...

by Ian Bogost March 9, 2009

XNA Game Camp

Game Design

Across the pond, Channel 4 and Microsoft are hosting a 48 hour "game camp" at the University of Derby on March 20, with games to be created in XNA 3.0. The jam-like event will be themed, with the themes to be announced at the event. Here's how the organizers describe ...

by Ian Bogost March 3, 2009

Jetset Sale, Optional Fairness

Game Design, Political Games, Social Games

I previously announced the release of Jetset: A Game for Airports for iPhone. We've finally done a formal press release about the game. As a part of that effort, we've temporarily reduced the price of the game to $3.99, so now's a good time to buy it on the iTunes ...

by Ian Bogost January 28, 2009

Social Issue Games Toolkit

Activism Games, Game Design, Public Policy Games

Games for Change has announced the release of Let the Games Begin: A Toolkit 4 Making Social Issue Games, a multimedia resource for organizations interested in using games as a part of their outreach and communications efforts. Here's how they describe it: The Toolkit guides organizations through the process of ...

by Ian Bogost June 6, 2008

Reflect, an Art Game

Game Design

Reflect is an art game created by Mike Treanor as his MFA thesis at UC Santa Cruz. In Treanor's words, the game offers "the ability to see the perspectives of other creatures." I've argued before that one of the powerful features of videogames is their ability to put the player ...

by Ian Bogost May 10, 2008

My new column: Texture

Articles, Game Design

Gamasutra has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, this one on how videogames are tactile. But unlike paintings and plats principaux, games are not static scenes or objects -- they are interactive models of experiences. To simulate the behavior, rather than just the appearance of texture, games have to use ...

by Ian Bogost April 12, 2008

Chris Crawford's Nine Breakthroughs

Game Design

Games industry curmudgeon and interactive storytelling proponent Chris Crawford spoke at the Game Developers Exchange conference here in Atlanta yesterday. As a part of the talk he explained the "Nine Breakthroughs" that were important to his work on Storytron. I recorded them here, after the jump. ...

by Ian Bogost March 7, 2008

Indie Games Have No Mainstream to Oppose

Game Design

Andreas Jan-Sudmann has an article in the newly released issue of the journal Eludamos. In Innovation NOT Opposition: The Logic of Distinction of Independent Games, Jan-Sudmann argues that indie games have no coherent mainstream to oppose, and they founder partly for this reason. The author locates this problem both in ...

by Ian Bogost February 21, 2008

GDC 2008: I-fi: Immersive Fidelity in Games

Game Design

Clint Hocking on immersion. For the last three years I've been the creative director on FarCry 2. I'm not going to talk about my game, but I want to contextualize my talk in relation to it. One of our first tasks opn FarCry 2 was to figure out what the ...

by Ian Bogost February 18, 2008

GDC 2008: Out of the Box, EA Fuels New Ideas with Madden and Sims Titles

Educational Games, Game Design, Political Games

Presentation by Rob Moore, Steve Seabolt (EA) at the Serious Games Summit, Game Developers Conference 2008. Moore got stuck in bad weather but sent along some materials about A number of EA Sports titles are used by athletes, including by NASCAR drivers to get used to tracks, by pro basketball ...

by Ian Bogost February 16, 2008

Dating Violence Game Contest

Activism Games, Game Design, Social Games

Brian Crecente reports that his brother has launched a flash game design contest for games on the topic of dating violence prevention. First prize is $1,000, and entires are due April 15, 2008. More information here. ...

by Ian Bogost February 12, 2008

My new column: Videogame Vignette

Articles, Game Design, Political Games

Gamasutra has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, this one on a student game from USC Interactive Media called Hush, an unusual game about an unusual historical and political moment. The article uses Hush as and the idea of adapting the vignette style to videogames. In literature, poetry, and film, ...

by Ian Bogost December 22, 2007

Parking Wars on Facebook

Advergames, Game Design, Social Games

This isn't the first Facebook advergame, but it's the first I've seen that really tries to take advantage of the service's social graph. There is a new A&E television series called Parking Wars, which starts in January. The subject of the show is probably the only division of the police ...

by Ian Bogost December 18, 2007

Do Girls Prefer 2D Games?

Game Design, Women and Games

The term is finally over and I'm ready to get back in the saddle here, at least until the holidays further interrupt our regularly scheduled programming. This study isn't new, but it's the first time I'd seen it. Tina R. Ziemek published the results of a study on 2D vs ...

by Ian Bogost December 1, 2007

Please play Jason Rohrer's Passage

Game Design, Social Games

I am back from Montreal, where I attended the Montreal International Games Summit and spent some time with the folks at Concordia and also attended Kokoromi's Gamma 256 show. There's lots to say about all of these, but for now I want to point you to one of the games ...

by Ian Bogost October 20, 2007

Slamdance Game Festival shutters, festers

Game Design, General

Almost three years ago, Persuasive Games exhibited at the Slamdance Game Festival. We had a great time, and got a strong feeling of real "indieness" from the event and attendees. We were lucky enough to go back in 2006, showing Disaffected!. We had an equally great time, including getting to ...

by Ian Bogost August 18, 2007

Two Outstanding Perspectives

Game Design

Andy Nulman on why there's nothing wrong with single-player games: But, given the success of community Web sites like MySpace and Facebook, all of a sudden everyone thinks there needs to be "community" associated with everything. It's "community this" and "community that." Hey, have you ever heard of the game ...

by Ian Bogost August 2, 2007

My new column: How I learned to stop worrying about gamers

Casual Games, Game Design

Gamasutra has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, this one a response to Justin Peters' Slate article on educational games (previously discussed here on WCG), and a meditation on who players are, at least the ones I'm interested in. I still have nothing but respect for my more traditional industry ...

by Ian Bogost June 14, 2007

My new column: Designing for Tragedy

Game Design, Newsgames, Political Games

Gamasutra has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, Designing for Tragedy, about V-Tech Rampage and making games about profoundly tragic events. Today, a month after Lambourn first released the game, discussion of it has all but disappeared. Some might point to this fact in an argument for the game’s insignificance; ...

by Ian Bogost May 22, 2007

My new column: Why We Need More Boring Games

Game Design, General

Gamasutra has published my latest Persuasive Games column, Why We Need More Boring Games. From the column: But few developers set their sights on a lower-hanging, if more bitter fruit: games that would demystify the medium, to use [Marc] Ecko’s words. Literature and film are indeed media in the service ...

by Ian Bogost May 4, 2007

Intimate Controllers

Game Design, Social Games, Women and Games

Think you've seen every kind of alternate interface? NYU ITP student Jenny Chowdhury has devoted her masters thesis work to making a videogame controller out of a bra and undershorts. She calls it Intimate Controllers. Players have to touch each other in intimate places to play games created for the ...

by Ian Bogost March 22, 2007

Life of a Mii

Game Design

From G4, this hilarious and also sad exposé of the existential crisis of the Mii, which you can watch over at YouTube. (via Kotaku) ...

by Ian Bogost March 16, 2007

Games, Art, and Airplane Safety

Game Design

Brian Ochalla just published an article in Gamasutra, Are Games Art? "Here we go again.". It's a nice article with input from Tim Schafer, me, Denis Dyack, Santi Siri, and others. For our readers here, though, I want to pull out one of my quotes, something I've been thinking about ...

by Ian Bogost March 12, 2007

GDC 2007 Poetry

Game Design, General

We've been completely silent for the last week due to the Game Developers Conference, which just wrapped. Apologies to our readers: I didn't blog a stitch during the event. That said, you can find Mia Consalvo's wrapup of our Game Studies Download over on Terra Nova (get the list itself ...

by Ian Bogost February 28, 2007

Finally, a good farting game

Casual Games, Game Design

I know you've all been waiting for it. Check out What a Fart, a farting game with a convincing core mechanic. You play the role of a gassy chap waiting at a bus stop. Gas builds up in your gut that must needs be released, but take care not to ...

by Ian Bogost December 10, 2006

Playce: games as navigation

Casual Games, Game Design

Steffen Walz has an interesting little project up, which he calls playce. It's essentially a portfolio site, but you can choose to navigate it by playing one of four small arcade style games. I think I enjoyed shooting down the paratroopers to navigate most :). When we talk about non-entertainment ...

by Ian Bogost November 28, 2006

My new column: Wii's Revolution is in the Past

Console & PC Games, Game Design

Serious Games Source has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, this one on the Wii and its potential in serious games and indie games development. At the risk of putting a bug in our readers' ears, I think it's somewhat iconoclastic. A small taste of one thread of the column: ...

by Ian Bogost November 2, 2006

Taking Bully Seriously

Console & PC Games, Game Design

Serious Games Source has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, this one on the controversial Rockstar game Bully. This description sounds like it might have been lifted from a grant proposal for a serious game, one that a researcher might submit to the Department of Education, the National Institutes of ...

by Ian Bogost October 16, 2006

Unit Operations on 50 Books for Everyone

Game Design

Ernest Adams, Game design consultant and co-author of the just-released textbook Fundamentals of Game Design, has written a list of 50 Books for Everyone in the Game Industry. I was honored to see that my book Unit Operations made the list, along with a number of other academic books on ...

by Gonzalo Frasca October 3, 2006

Playing with fire: my new column at SGS

Game Design

As Ian announced, now is my turn to kick off my "Playing with fire" column at the Serious Games Source. Its title is Serious Hype, Serious Opportunities and it deals with the oh-so-hyped world of serious games. Serious games also make good headlines. Actually, too good. They are quite similar ...

by Ian Bogost August 28, 2006

Native Dancer - Virtual Powwows for Health

Educational Games, Game Design, Health & Medicine Games

Here's a rare example of an game that simultaneously attempts to educate, preserve an at-risk culture, improve health, and tackle an interesting game design problem. The Native Dancer Diabetes Education Game is a project in development at North Dakota State University and supported by the White Earth Reservation Tribal Council. ...

by Ian Bogost August 8, 2006

Merchant Ivory Games

Game Design

Ernest Adams has written a provocative article just published by Gamasutra, entitled Where's Our Merchant Ivory?. Adams's premise is simple: games need an elite form, like Merchant Ivory is to film or ballet is to dance, that legitimates other, "lower" forms of the medium and rallies high-society support around it. ...

by Ian Bogost July 10, 2006

A paean to Dogz, at whose heels Nintendogs nips

Casual Games, Console & PC Games, Game Design

Author's note: Nintendo has created a community at Gather.com to facilitate discussion of their "Touch Generations" series of games. I have cross-posted this article there, and readers may want to view the other articles in that series. Nintendogs, as many of you already know, is a pet puppy simulator. You ...

by Ian Bogost January 7, 2006

The Trouble with Handhelds for Indies

Casual Games, Console & PC Games, Game Design

Gonzalo and I love handhelds. Especially the Nintendo DS and the GameBoy Advance, but the PSP has grown on me too despite its lack of interesting software. I've always been fond of handhelds, from the Mattel eletronic games to Game and Watch. I remember lusting over the NEC Turbo Express, ...

by Ian Bogost December 12, 2005

Amazon.com Wishlist Game

Game Design, Social Games

Here's a new game I just invented that you can play this holiday season, or anytime. All you need is a web browser and an Amazon.com account. It's part gift economy critique, part Oulipian writing. How to play: Go to the Amazon.com Wishlist page. Under "Find a wishlist," enter a ...

by Gonzalo Frasca June 8, 2005

Insert some Revolution joke here

Game Design

I play nothing but my DS these days. Why? Because I simply don't have time for any larger time commitment (I have posted about this before at Ludology.org, my other blog). Thanks to GGA, I just ran into an article arguing that Nintendo may open their upcoming Revolution console to ...

by Ian Bogost May 25, 2005

E3: New casual games: less casual!

Casual Games, Game Design

I know E3 is quickly becoming a faint memory, but it may take me weeks to catch up on everything I saw. Patience, dear readers. Many of you may know that former Warner Bros. chairman Terry Semel has been at the helm of Yahoo! for several years now. One of ...

by Ian Bogost May 21, 2005

E3: In-Game Advertising Workshop

Advergames, Game Design

As I mentioned previously, I ran a workshop on in-game advertising during the conference sessions this E3. It was more like an interactive panel session than a workshop, and we covered a lot of ground. We had an analyst (Michael Goodman from Yankee Group), an ad man (Brandon Berger from ...

by Ian Bogost March 23, 2005

Teenage Mum, the game

Game Design, Health & Medicine Games

Take a look at this TV spot for Teenage Mum created by the Belgian public health department to encourage contraceptive use and raise awareness about teenage pregnancy. It's really just a PSA (created by Belgian agency Duval Guillaume) advertising a fictitious game, but the fictitious game's design is just brilliant. ...

by Ian Bogost February 27, 2005

Are casual games a salve for film licenses?

Advergames, Casual Games, Emotion in Games, Game Design, Social Games

With the Oscars poised to air tonight, it seems an appropriate time to meditate on the fate of film license games. I've written before on Hollywood's propensity to use games as a film marketing tool, as have I mused on the dangers of games mixing themselves up with film licenses. ...

by Ian Bogost November 4, 2004

Chickenfight

Advergames, Game Design

Burger King has a game to go with their new TV ad campaign "chickenfight," which is in turn -- this gets complicated -- part of some kind of crosspromotion with DirecTV. Chickenfight the game has some clever features. It's a mock-cockfight game (with the chickensuited guys from the tv spot), ...

by Ian Bogost November 2, 2004

GTA: Diebold City

Game Design, Political Games

I voted. Georgia is what those electoral college tracking apps call a "Strong Bush State," so who knows what effect I'm having, but nevertheless I did my part. Given that all previous elections I can immediately recall used the chad-producing punch-cards, and considering all the controversy about the newly minted ...

by Ian Bogost October 27, 2004

How the Stupid iPod Photo is Like the Stupid Games Industry

Game Design, Social Games

Today, Apple announced the iPod Photo. iPod Photo is available in 40- and 60GB configurations, and comes with a new color LCD display capable of displaying 65,000 colors. You can view your image library on iPod photo, 25 thumbnails per page, and you can connect the iPod Photo to a ...

by Ian Bogost September 21, 2004

Orgasm Girl

Game Design, Social Games

Ok, so this is just straight-up porn. "Orgasm girl is the hottest lesbian angel around..." But, it's quite interesting as a kind of procedural sex toy. Good God, I really said that. Anyway, if you're not at work, try it out (as it were). ...

by Ian Bogost September 8, 2004

F*ck the Vote

Game Design, Political Games, Social Games

We had a lively discussion recently over on Grand Text Auto about representations of sex in gaming, and I now officially feel stupid for not thinking of a way to tie the topic into political games. Why, you ask? Because now there's Votergasm, a website devoted to increasing voter turnout ...

by Ian Bogost July 27, 2004

The Truth is pretty bad

Advergames, Game Design, Public Policy Games

The American Legacy Foundation's ongoing anti-smoking campaign truth has released a game created by Templar Studios based on truth's "Crazy World" ad campaign. Here's what Templar's president Peter Mack had to say about the game: The game, which is aimed at a wide audience, ages 18-50, was created to show ...

by Ian Bogost June 28, 2004

Busy: Games & Painting

Advergames, Game Design, General

Some of you may have noticed that it's been a bit slow here on WCG of late, and here's why: I'm trying to get my new game done for a launch this week, AND I've been moving into my new house in Atlanta. So, I've been making games and painting. ...

by Ian Bogost June 17, 2004

Industry flubs advergaming, again

Advergames, Game Design

AdAge just ran an report on advergames, from their coverage of AdWatch: Outlook 2004 conference in New York. They report that the increasing costs of TV ads are driving brands to consider games, and the increasingly broad demographics of gamers are helping. Despite the trends, the gaming industry continues to ...

by Ian Bogost June 12, 2004

Visualization is the new eBusiness

Business Games, Game Design

I was in New York most of the week, first on a panel at the Serious Issues, Serious Games conference -- which I'll write about soon -- and then hanging out with my friend Britt Blaser, the Dean campaign technology adviser who was instrumental in making the Howard Dean for ...

by Ian Bogost May 27, 2004

Gaming Techniques for Citizen Engagement

Game Design, Political Games, Public Policy Games

Chris Quigley, from the British organizational consultantcy Delib, has published Game On: A thought paper on the use of gaming techniques for citizen engagement and e-participation (120k Word Doc). Here's the abstract: In this paper Chris Quigley examines the applicability of gaming techniques in citizenship engagement and e-participation. The paper ...

by Gonzalo Frasca May 25, 2004

Games, Drugs and Rock'n'Roll

Game Design

Wired.com features an interesting article about the use of drugs within online worlds. ...

by Ian Bogost May 23, 2004

Create your own cereal box ideology

Advergames, Game Design, Social Games

Ok, it's not really a game, and it's a bit metatextual for this forum, but I'll bite anyway. PBS Kids has a really cool section called Don't Buy It, which teaches kids to think critically about media and become smarter consumers. They recently launched Freaky Flakes, a gadget that lets ...

by Ian Bogost May 3, 2004

Do home video marketers prefer games?

Advergames, Emotion in Games, Game Design

Universal has published a new advergame, Go, Fish, Go! promoting the Pay Per View/On Demand release of The Cat in the Hat. It's a Frogger or Chicken-inspired cross-the-road game; you play as the fish in a bowl. The game adds some interesting variations on Frogger, including a low-friction bowl that ...

by Ian Bogost April 21, 2004

Interactive Design & Children Conference

Console & PC Games, Educational Games, Game Design

The 3rd Annual International Conference for Interaction Design and Children (whew, call it IDC) takes place June 1 - 3 at the University of Maryland. Keynote rockstars include: Marvin Minsky (MIT), Alan Kay (HP), Seymour Papert (MIT/U. of Maine), Alice Cahn (Cartoon Network), Henry Jenkins (MIT), and Alice Wilder (Blue's ...

by Ian Bogost March 26, 2004

Some Casual Games notes from GDC

Casual Games, Game Design, Women and Games

Mia Consalvo has been blogging from GDC, including this post on the Casual Games Summit. I was surprised by a few points raised at the summit (although I did not attend the entire day). First, even though the conversion rate for casual game purchases remains at direct mail levels -- ...

by Ian Bogost March 4, 2004

More on Women Gamers and Casual Games

Game Design, Women and Games

I did an interview today about the recent AOL online games survey, which we discussed here on WCG. Gave my still nascent opinions about women and casual games. In preparation for it, I did an informal survey among a group of mothers ages ~ 35 - 45, asking why they ...

by Ian Bogost February 25, 2004

Virtual Worlds Dull Pain

Game Design, Health & Medicine Games

The BBC reports that Dr. Hunter Hoffman of the Harborview Medical Center in Seattle is using "immersive virtual worlds" to treat pain in severe burn cases. SnowWorld, for instance, takes users on an absorbing virtual journey through glaciers and ice caves whilst having to defend themselves from attack by polar ...

by Ian Bogost February 14, 2004

Women Dominate Online Games?

Game Design, Social Games, Women and Games

A recent AOL Study claims that women over 40 are more likely to play online games than any other demographic. Even though men spend more time on the Internet each week than women (23.2 vs. 21.6 hours), female game-players over 40 spend the most hours per week playing online games ...

by Ian Bogost February 14, 2004

A note on the Digital Democracy Teach-in

Game Design, Political Games

This Monday I attended the Digital Democracy Teach-In at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference. Originally I was going to tag along on Britt Blaser's introductory session to talk about campaign games, but at the last minute Joe Trippi signed on to do the first session. Recently ousted, his talk was ...

by Ian Bogost February 11, 2004

IM Virus Osama Game

Game Design, Political Games, Social Games

A strange group called BuddyLinks has an Osama game (WARNING: if you click, do not play the game! read on!). The REALLY fascinating thing about the game is that it spreads itself through a virus that sends AIM instant messages to everyone on your buddy list when you play the ...

by Ian Bogost February 9, 2004

Legislative Design

Game Design, Political Games

Wired reports on virtual world game designers helping design the new eRegulations government project on legislation crafting. From the article, "the government and the gaming industry both rely on a similar method of soliciting comments." This collaboration apparently came out of an offshoot of the State of Play conference at ...

by Ian Bogost February 7, 2004

The Transportation Security Administration Game

Game Design, Political Games

I was traveling today, and I checked my bag in at the curb. For the first time, I decided to watch the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officer screen my bag. Those of you who have traveled recently in the US were probably required to have your bag chemical screened at ...

by Ian Bogost January 24, 2004

Fairy Tale Games

Game Design

I had a fun conversation with Francis Steen at dinner tonight after our long but rewarding all-day game conference (featuring Mimi Ito, Ted Castranova, Jordan Peterson, Celia Pearce, Francis Steen, and myself, among others). Anyway, Francis and I were talking about folklore, fairy tales, and games. Red Riding Hood especially. ...

by Ian Bogost January 10, 2004

Learning from Playmobil

Game Design

I've been spending some time lately getting up to speed with the Playmobil brand of kids toys. I've seen these on the shelves forever, but I never had any, so I never thought about them much. We bought some recently, and I've become absolutely enchanted by these toys. I originally ...

by Ian Bogost November 9, 2003

The future of women gamers

Console & PC Games, Game Design, Social Games, Women and Games

A new, longish article on Game Girl Advance talks about the future of women gamers. It focuses specifically on the future of women console gamers, and I'd like to submit that this is the primary flaw of the article. Put more simply, I'm suspicious that the future of women gamers ...

by Ian Bogost November 3, 2003

An alternative to fun

Console & PC Games, Game Design, General

I gave a talk today at the ITU on persuasive games (I'll post a version here in the near future), and afterward we had an interesting discussion about fun in games. One of my precepts regarding rhetorical games is that they reject fun as a first principle of games. This ...

by Ian Bogost October 26, 2003

British Airways, Rubgy, and Power Laws

Advergames, Game Design

British Airways is sponsoring the 2003 Rugby World Cup, and they've just launched an advergame to promote thier sponsorship of the event. The game was hard for me at first, but when I realized I'd misread the instructions I was able to make progress. The mechanics are somewhat complex; the ...

by Ian Bogost October 25, 2003

The Grocery Game

Game Design, Social Games, Women and Games

I recently found out about The Grocery Game on a parenting/education message board. The website gives subscribers access to a special grocery list, sorted by store and US location. The list is designed to maximize savings through strategic use of coupons and stockpiling. It's admittedly not an electronic game in ...

by Gonzalo Frasca October 23, 2003

Advergaming tools

Advergames, Game Design

There are several obstacles that have prevented advergaming from reaching its full potential. Most of them deal with every actor understanding that games require a paradigm shift: it is not about product placement anymore but rather about simulating an experience (more on this later). Still, one of the problems that ...

by Gonzalo Frasca October 23, 2003

Workshop on video game rhetoric

Game Design

As part of the Level Up conference in Utrecht, Holland, I will be hosting a workshop entitled “Games with strong opinions” on November 4, at 10.30 am. The workshop will deal with design techniques for conveying ideas with games (and videogames) as well as providing a set of theoretical tools ...

by Ian Bogost October 22, 2003

Mountain Dew, Object Fetishes, and Cannibalism

Advergames, Game Design

I got an email from Joe Varet over at Groove Alliance on their new game for Mountain Dew. It's a skateboarding game; the player skates around an outdoor arena à la Tony Hawk and collects Mountain Dew products to keep his "Mountain Dew Power" meter filled. I'm actually a big ...

by Ian Bogost October 22, 2003

The Light-sensitive GameBoy game

Advergames, Console & PC Games, Game Design

Konami has released Boktai, a GameBoy game with a solar sensor that uses sunlight to alter gameplay. According to the publisher, the game has a solar sensor built into the GBA cartridge. Certain monsters can only be destroyed by harnessing sunlight. According to game reviewer Gene Emery, artificial light isn't ...