“Pick up one feeling at a time.

Shout or say every feeling you pick up.”

Intention & Influence

Intention:

Are negative emotions bad to have? 

Nowadays, we’re told they’re not. That it is good when we express our feelings, talk about them, communicate to others how we feel, and be empathetic. Emotions, especially negative ones, and expressing them are important in order to process them and let them go. They’re not bad to have, but they’re bad to hold on to.

However, traditional Asian households think differently. I remember the multiple arguments I had with my friends. They wouldn’t tell me how they were feeling and kept it inside until I eventually found out, got angry at them for not telling me, and for not trying to work it out with me. It was frustrating to hear that they were feeling left out, or that they got upset at something I did from another person and the way they resolved those issues and those feelings were by keeping it in and distancing themselves. After talking to them, they told me this was how they were raised. This was what they were used to, that it’s hard to be confrontational, and that it’s hard to express what they were feeling, especially the negative feelings.

In a way, I was raised similarly. Mental health was a faraway fantasy in my mom’s and some of my Asian friends’ parents’ minds. You had to focus on your grades and get As. You weren’t allowed to stay home if you were sick or feeling mentally unwell. 

As we know now, this wasn’t healthy for us. Bad mental health DOES eventually affect one’s physical health. They affect your grades, your work, your relationships, and your life. If left alone, it takes over and breaks you into pieces. 

That was why I decided to make this my final piece. It took my mom and I multiple years of arguments, crying, misunderstandings, and hurt. However, she’s begun to understand its importance. I wanted to create this piece to simulate that feeling of being unable to express your negative emotions in a traditional Asian household, having you hold chopsticks and pick out noodles with feelings on them from a dinner table. If you talked about happy emotions, you weren’t reprimanded. However, if you picked the negative emotions, you would get hit. This was the conditioning that many Asian children experienced that eventually made it so that they were scared to express their own emotions, especially the negative ones.

Influence:

So, this artwork was a combination of a score and appropriation. When I first saw the prompt for this project, compared to my last two artworks, I wanted to create something more simple but meaningful. For a while, I didn’t know what it was that I wanted to create. A lot of the experiences I’ve had I already put into an artwork; my score was about the significance of gift giving, my appropriating artwork was about the cultural appropriation of my religion, and my intervention was about societal pressure and sheep mentality. So, I was stumped for a while thinking about what I would like to create an artwork out of. 

However, that was when I ran into trouble with my group of friends. We had a long talk, and one of my Chinese friends justified a friend’s failure to communicate the problems he was facing because he came from a traditional household and that was the culture in his family; to not express emotions or problems. She expressed that she was similar and would rather let it pass over than talk about it. So, with that in mind, it influenced the meaning behind this game. 

I also took inspiration from the case studies Sharp mentioned in his book “Work of Games” — “The Marriage” by Rod Humble and “Dys4ia” by Anna Anthropy.

Dys4ia by Anna Anthropy.

The Marriage by Rod Humble

Both utilized simple shapes, mechanics, and colors to convey the experience that they wanted to tell players, whether it was the balance of a marriage or the experience of societal pressure and gender dysmorphia. The focus was on the expression, feeling, and experience rather than how polished the game was, which I enjoyed. Similarly, in my game, the player only has some fake clay noodles with emotions on them, a bowl to hold them, and some chopsticks. Despite its simplicity, it creates a scene and mechanic which has meaning that the player understands when playing the game. Like in “The Marriage” and “Dys4ia”, they have basic shapes and mechanics, but it communicates an idea and creates a scene for the player. For example, in the beginning of “Dys4ia”, the player doesn’t exactly ‘fit’ into a slot when trying to get through a hole in the wall blockade. Although it doesn’t directly mention it until later into the level, the player automatically understands that the blocks they were moving were an abstract representation of this person’s body. The player has a sense that the person didn’t feel like they fit into the body that they had. When playing my game, players automatically see its relation to Asian culture without anything directly telling the player what the artwork was about.

In general, Sharp’s book explained how games are legitimate art that DO parr traditional artistic mediums like cinema and paintings which convey ideas, emotions, and aesthetics through its mechanics, interactivity, and symbolic/abstract design. He also exclaimed about how art games are similar to artistic movements like the Fluxus and Dada movement, which emphasized simplicity, conveying a message, and which  strayed from traditional art (in this case, straying from the tradition of games simply being fun and entertainment). So, I wanted to make a game that was a combination of those movements while following Sharp’s definition of art games. 

Process

For the process, I went through two iterations and tweaked the score a bit. This artwork contains a score, which tells the player what to do, and has elements of appropriation as I borrowed a bowl and chopsticks from a friend of mine that, to me, represented Asian culture the most. The noodles were made from baked clay that I then wrote emotions on after it was fully baked. At first, they really looked like worms. 

Before all of this process, I had originally wanted to make it so that the negative emotions would be impossible to pick up. However, if a player decides to pick up the negative emotions, then they would get punished for it. The problem with this iteration was that one, the punishment was too hard and was not inclusive of older, younger, disabled, or weaker individuals and two, because I laid the emotions on a piece of paper and they only had chopsticks to give them that hint, players couldn’t really tell the cultural background the artwork was stemming off of. So, instead of a harsh punishment, a slap on the wrist was enough to condition players to avoid the negative emotions, and instead of making it impossible to pick up the negative emotions, I made it so that players would have to repeat the game over and over again until they no longer picked up negative emotions. Not only was this more efficient mechanically, it carried the message that I wanted to convey more accurately. Traditional Asian households are always very passive aggressive, and most of the hurt comes from the words of our parents when they choose to ignore the emotions we are trying to convey to them. Then, in addition to the bowl and noodles as my medium, it created the game what it is now.

Before I baked the noodles. The dome on the right was filler noodles so that the ball would look more realistically full.

First iteration of the artwork.

Playtests

There were a total of 4 playtests, however I only had photos for two of those playtests. One of them is seen above with the lined paper used to write out the emotions and the pens to be the chopsticks the players use to pick up the emotions and the second was the third to final playtest where I just changed the wording to the score a bit from “Pick up your feelings; Shout or say every feeling you pick up” to “Pick up one feeling at a time; Shout or say every feeling you pick up”. The playtests, except for the first one, went as I would have expected with every player eventually avoiding the negative emotions and only picking up the positive emotions until there was none left. I think it was a fairly successful artwork, but if I had more time I would add more color to the noodles and maybe some other ingredients when eating udon or pho.

One of the playtesters choices of noodles and emotions. They chose three negative emotions and two positives before only choosing positive emotions.

Introduction

Many strategy or building games exist on the market that have a nation or civilization aspect to them, where you maintain a country and expand its influence. Most of these are typically war-oriented or resource management games, or both. For example, Civilization is a series of games that involve exploiting the resources in your surroundings and conquering other nations.

Thus I set out to make a game about building a country but have its focus not be war. I tried to design a game that had more of a focus on the player’s relationship with the environment and also the player’s relationship with their own nation. This is to oppose the mindset that most games create: that the environment is simply something that exists to be exploited, and that the nation is something that only functions to serve the player. Through my game’s design that fosters environmental care, these ideas are challenged.

The result is Countryworks, a (relatively simple) environmentally oriented country builder.

Aesthetics

I wanted to have a pixelated isometric style similar to Habbo Hotel. It was also supposed to evoke Minecraft.

In the top left corner there is a country customizer where you can change the flag and country name. On the left bar is a list of all the different structures you can build, such as farms, towns, and roads. Below that is a list of all the Points you have, which are used for performing actions (such as building, destroying, farming, etc.)

In the top right corner are the 3 health bars: Environment, Country Satisfaction, and Food Supply. If any one of them drains to zero, the game ends.

The button on the bottom right is used to go to the Next Day, which regenerates all your Points and shows you all the newspaper articles that highlight events in your country.

Resources

Resources are extracted from the structures you build (towns, farms, etc.) When you click on resources in your inventory, they are converted into Points or Cultural Items. There are resources like Metal, which you acquire by mining, but there are also abstract resources like Ideas.

Culture

Like mentioned earlier, you can convert Resources into Cultural Items. For example, there is a random chance that a Resource can get converted into a Cultural Item like a novel, poetry compilation, etc.

From there, you can give it a name, change its appearance, and then add it to your collection of your country’s produced cultural works.

Every cultural item you create will raise your Country Satisfaction level, meaning that culture serves a distinct purpose for keeping your nation happy.

The newspaper events at the end of each Day should reveal to you how your population is feeling as a result of this.

Environment

The environment is full of many natural landscapes. In the start of the game, you can place your country anywhere you want. This means you could have a nation hiding in the freezing mountains, camped in the arid desert, or living on an isolated island: highlighting how human populations can find ways to survive in any part of the world.

The more you build, the more your Environment bar will drain (forcing the player to consider how they use their land and what they place down). This means that they can’t just destroy everything in search of resources for they will poison their own citizens if they cause environmental damage.

Even the names of some of the tools used in the game for shaping the environment around you have very drastic and direct names for what they do. Instead of something like “Axe” for a tool for chopping wood, the tool is called “Deforestation” and has an image of a chainsaw cutting a tree stump. There are other tools like “Mining Excavator”, “Monoculture Grass”, “Land Reclamation”, and “Grove”.

I would argue that “Grove” should not belong on this list as a form of environmental destruction, but I think that any form of human interaction with the environment should be highlighted: that forest you just built wasn’t there before, who knows what effect it might’ve had on the animals or plants that were already living there.

If a player neglects their environment for long enough, they will lose the game in a game over screen similar to what is shown below.

To Be Improved

Countryworks functions very well at teaching the player how to be conscious of their environmental decisions. It teaches them to handle resource management in a different way through the challenges the game provides.

In the future, I would like the Country Satisfaction health bar to be more sophisticated. At the moment, it goes down during random events such as infrastructure breakdowns where the citizens will be unhappy. However, the only way to bring the Country Satisfaction back up is by producing Cultural Items (which have nothing to do with infrastructure), so in the future I will make infrastructure distinct from (but somehow related to) Country Satisfaction.

Conclusion

As I didn’t have enough time to gather detailed feedback on how the player perceived the environmental message, I still have work to do in the area of value messaging. The game is quite limited in scope but it definitely has the possibility of being something much more creative and sophisticated. I hope to improve on it more in the coming months and hopefully I will have something that is much more replayable and fun.

I had a lot of fun working on it and I hope to eventually publish it to my page at syndhex.itch.io.

Game by Bastión Toledo-Altamirano

Maze of Life

Welcome to The Maze of Life, an immersive and introspective journey through the twists and turns of existence. In this game, you will navigate a maze filled with challenges drawn from the realities of life—financial crises, relationship struggles, health setbacks, career hurdles, and personal growth dilemmas. Each step you take will test your resilience, decision-making, and emotional endurance.

Creative Intent: 

In today’s fast-paced world, we are constantly bombarded with information—news, social media updates, and personal stories. People have become quick to judge, comment, and critique others’ experiences, often without pausing to consider the emotions and struggles behind those stories. This tendency to treat others’ lives as entertainment or debate material strips away empathy and humanity.

The Maze of Life is designed as a response to this phenomenon. Its core purpose is to immerse players in the realities of life’s challenges, forcing them to confront complex situations as if they were their own. This isn’t just a game; it’s a tool for fostering understanding, building empathy, and encouraging self-reflection. By the end of the experience, participants will hopefully think twice before passing judgment on others, instead choosing to approach the world with greater compassion.

Game Setup

1. The Maze:
   • The maze is a 6×6 grid, containing 36 cards:
     • 32 Event Cards: These represent life challenges you must confront.
     • 4 Lucky Cards: Special cards that allow you to skip any one event of your choice.
2. Shuffling:
   • Shuffle all 36 cards and place them randomly face down in a 6×6 grid.
   • Each row represents a decade of your life, starting in your 20s:
     • Row 1: Ages 20–30
     • Row 2: Ages 30–40
     • Row 3: Ages 40–50
     • Row 4: Ages 50–60
     • Row 5: Ages 60–70
     • Row 6: Ages 70–80
3. Starting Position:
   • Begin at the first card in Row 1 (your 20s).

Game Rules

1. Rolling the Dice:
   • Roll a six-sided die to determine which card in the row you must face:
     • 1: First card in the row.
     • 2: Second card in the row.
     • 3: Third card in the row.
     • 4: Fourth card in the row.
     • 5: Fifth card in the row.
     • 6: Sixth card in the row.
2. Facing Events:
   • Flip over the card matching your dice roll to reveal the life event.
   • If it is an Event Card, write down or discuss:
     • Your Reaction: How does this challenge make you feel?
     • Your Plan: How would you approach this situation?
     • Your Outcome: What do you hope to achieve by overcoming this challenge?
   • If it is a Lucky Card, save it to skip any future event of your choice.
3. Skipping Events:
   • Use a Lucky Card to bypass an event that feels too difficult or unwanted.
   • Discard the Lucky Card after use.
4. Advancing Through the Maze:
   • Once you complete or skip an event, roll the dice again to proceed to the next card in the same row.
   • After completing all six cards in a row, advance to the next row (representing the next decade of your life).
5. Completing the Challenge:
   • Successfully finish all six rows to complete your journey through life.
   • If you fail to overcome an event or run out of Lucky Cards before finishing Row 6, the challenge ends in failure.

Winning and Reflection

• Victory: Completing all six rows signifies that you’ve navigated through life’s trials and emerged stronger. Reflect on your journey:
  • Which challenges were the hardest?
  • How did you use your Lucky Cards?
  • What does this game reveal about your problem-solving style and resilience?
• Failure: If you cannot finish all rows, consider:
  • What challenges stopped your progress?
  • What would you do differently next time?

♠ Spades – Financial and Career Challenges

Spades represent challenges involving finances, careers, and external struggles.

1. You lost 3 million on a risky stock investment. Worse, you borrowed money to make the investment, and creditors now block your door every day demanding repayment.
2. Your main source of income is suddenly cut off due to a layoff, leaving you with only enough savings to last two months.
3. A close friend asked to borrow a large sum of money to start a business but failed, and now they refuse to pay you back.
4. Your credit card debt has spiraled out of control, and banks are threatening legal action unless you settle immediately.
5. After years of saving, your dream home purchase falls through due to a real estate scam, leaving you both homeless and penniless.
6. After years of loyalty, your boss fires you without warning, claiming your skills are no longer relevant.
7. Despite working tirelessly for years, you’re passed over for a promotion in favor of someone less qualified.
8. Your company is on the verge of bankruptcy, and you’re forced to work unpaid while trying to find a new job.

♥ Hearts – Health and Relationship Challenges

Hearts focus on emotional, physical health, and interpersonal struggles.

1. You’ve been diagnosed with a chronic illness requiring expensive treatment. Without it, your condition will worsen, but the cost is beyond your means.
2. A sudden accident leaves you with a permanent disability, forcing you to quit your job and adjust to a new way of life.
3. A loved one is diagnosed with a terminal illness, and you must decide whether to quit your job to care for them full-time.
4. You are severely injured in a road rage incident caused by someone else but receive no compensation due to lack of evidence.
5. You discover your spouse has been hiding significant financial troubles, and your trust in them is shattered.
6. Your best friend betrays you by sharing a deeply personal secret, leaving you unsure if the friendship can survive.
7. You find out your sibling has been manipulating family members against you, causing deep divisions in your family.
8. A toxic relationship in your life is draining your energy, but you feel guilty about cutting ties with them.

♣ Clubs – Social and Personal Growth Challenges

Clubs symbolize social dynamics, personal growth, and moral dilemmas.

1. You are falsely accused of something at a public event, and the rumor spreads through your social circle, damaging your reputation.
2. A once-close group of friends drifts apart after a heated argument, leaving you feeling lonely and unsure how to reconnect.
3. You witness a serious injustice in your community but are too afraid to speak up, fearing backlash.
4. You’re excluded from an important gathering of your peers and only find out through social media.
5. You’ve realized that you’ve been living a life based on others’ expectations, but you don’t know how to start living authentically.
6. You set a major goal for yourself but fail to meet it, leaving you doubting your abilities and worth.
7. You discover a past mistake has come back to haunt you, and you must decide whether to confront it or let it linger.
8. A deeply held belief of yours is challenged, making you question your values and identity.

♦ Diamonds – Lucky Breaks and Positive Opportunities

Diamonds represent moments of hope, lucky breaks, and unexpected opportunities.

1. A long-forgotten stock investment unexpectedly skyrockets in value, covering all your debts and leaving you with extra savings to start anew.
2. An anonymous donor clears your medical debt, allowing you to focus on recovery without financial stress.
3. A groundbreaking new treatment for your chronic illness becomes affordable, significantly improving your quality of life.
4. A distant relative passes away and leaves you a substantial inheritance, helping you secure financial stability.
5. You’re offered a dream job with excellent pay and work-life balance, without even applying for it, thanks to a glowing recommendation.
6. An unexpected opportunity forces you to choose between stability and pursuing a lifelong dream.
7. After years of ignoring your passions, you now feel it’s too late to pursue what truly makes you happy.
8. Your child confesses to being involved in illegal activities, and you must decide whether to turn them in or protect them.

🍎 is a live-action roleplay game made for children and adults. I cherish the unexpected things that people would not usually think or do in real life, so I wanted to provide a media (the game) as an excuse for them to experiment with different views of the world and to enjoy the simple joy of exploring their childish side.

The Larp starts with the perspective (narrative) of an apple that has been forgotten on the road by its owner on their way home. The player will be roleplaying as the poor apple in the process of trying to get back to the supermarket.

It was a typical day at the bustling supermarket, where shelves were stocked with the freshest produce, ready to make their way into the homes of eager customers. Among them sat a bright, shiny apple, nestled in the fruit section, waiting to be chosen. But when the last customer of the day hurried out of the store, in their rush, they forgot the apple. 

Left behind, alone on the cold concrete outside, it sat for what felt like an eternity, its glossy skin slowly fading. As the hours passed, the apple felt an overwhelming sense of sadness. It had been so close to finding its place in someone’s kitchen, but now, abandoned and forgotten, it faced a world it didn’t understand. Its once bright, cheerful hue began to dull with every passing minute, the emptiness inside it growing larger. The sounds of the city, once full of promise, now felt harsh and distant. With no one to turn to, the apple began its lonely journey back to the supermarket, hoping that somehow it could find its way home—but deep down, it couldn’t shake the feeling that it might never be noticed again. 

Determined to get back to the supermarket, the apple pushed forward, rolling as fast as it could. The street was cluttered with trash bags, blowing around in the wind, and the apple tried its best to push them out of the way. But in its hurry, it didn’t see a small pile of blueberries ahead. With a soft thud, it crashed into them, crushing the berries under its weight. The blueberries quickly bounced up, their tiny round bodies shaking with anger. “Hey, watch where you’re going!” one of them snapped. The others joined in, grumbling loudly. “You squashed us!” another blueberry complained. 

action 1: The player should say sorry to each blueberry and of course you will count the number first. 

The apple froze, feeling a deep wave of guilt. It hadn’t meant to hurt anyone, but now it realized how much damage it had caused. Slowly, it rolled forward, its heart heavy, and said softly, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t see you there. Please forgive me.” The blueberries stared at the apple for a moment. Finally, one of them spoke up. “You need to be more careful next time.” The apple nodded, feeling embarrassed but relieved. The anger faded, and with that small act of kindness, the apple continued on its way, hoping its journey would lead it back home.

The apple continued its journey, determined to find the aisle it belonged in. As it rolled down the street, it spotted something familiar—a loaf of bread. It was an old friend, now its golden-brown, no longer the small doughy loaf it once was. Even though the bread had grown strong, the apple still felt protective. It gently rolled up to the loaf and covered it with a small cloth, like a blanket, to keep it warm and crispy. The bread smiled softly, touched by the apple’s care. “Thank you,” it said quietly. The apple felt a little less lonely, happy to have helped its old friend.

action2: Find a blanket-like material to warp the bread you find in the supermarket and gently pet it. 

As the apple rolled on, it realized how much time had passed. Feeling brave, it decided to confess its feelings to the celery, the one it had admired from afar in the produce aisle. The apple rolled up to a bunch of celery and, with a hopeful heart, slipped a small ring onto one of the stalks. “Will you be mine?” it asked quietly. The celery didn’t answer, standing still and silent. But the apple didn’t mind. It had shared its feelings, and that was enough. The apple rolled away, content, knowing it had tried.

action 3: put your ring on a stalk-like vegetable and purpose to it

Rules

High School

Rules:

To Start:

1. 1. Every player needs a sheet of paper and a pencil for a “Resume” 
   2. Something to mark the players on the board
   3. Two Dice

• DO NOT LOOK AT CARDS

Game Play:

1. 1. First everyone roles to find there GPA and SAT:
      1. To role for GPA you role both dice, you begin with a baseline of 2.8 and multiply your role by 0.1 and add that to the 2.8 (a 10 would be 2.8 + 0.1×10 = 3.8)
      2. SAT has a baseline of 1000 and you multiply 50 times the dice role and add it (a 10 would be 1000 + 50×10 = 1500)
      3. You write both your GPA and SAT on your resume
   2. After certain squares on the board there are circles, you stop at these circles no matter what your role is and re-role and continue on your next turn
   3. Role to see the number of spaces you move, if you land on a square write it down on your resume and do nothing until the end of the game unless stated below

• The only squares you do anything on in game are:

1. 1. 1. SAT and GPA
      2. Fail class, Senioritis, Get In a Fight:
         1. On these squares you immediately role, if you roll doubles or an odd number you get minus 1 full GPA point if not nothing happens
      3. How many apps: You simply roll both die and whatever you get is the number of schools you applied to, write it down

• Change GPA or SAT: You can choose to re-roll for your GPA and SAT if you land on these squares, this is done the same way as before

1. 1. Get in ED: Skip to the end

End of Game:

1. 1. Flip over cards corresponding to what you landed on, if you roll even it comes true if you roll odd it does not.
      1. These cards have points that can change your GPA, Happiness, and your “Application Score” tally these up they will all affect what school you go to

• Only when everyone is done with can you finally reveal the finish card, do as it says to find out your college

Authors Note

For my fourth and final artwork, I decided to recreate one of the most stressful experiences I have been through, and one that any college student can relate to…college applications. My board game which is simply called Senior Years does its best to depict the decisions, choices, and opportunities you have while in your Senior Year. A few of the squares you can land on are definitely far fetched, such as “Cure Cancer,” but these are just to add to the intentionally dramatic and infuriating ending. The game works by giving each player a resume. Throughout the game players will add things to their resumes like their GPAs, SAT scores, and potential extracurricular activities. What all of these are is completely decided by luck, you also may land on something and not end up getting it. There are both positive and negative things that can happen, you can become valedictorian or fail a class, in theory you could do both in the same game. At the end of the game you find out your “results” by adding up the scores measured based on your decisions. The methods of scoring are GPA, SAT, and arbitrary scoring methods called “Happiness Points” and “Application Points.” Some outcomes can have both negative and positive impacts for example if you go to a party your GPA may decrease but your happiness goes up. What players do not know while playing the game is that everything is entirely pointless.

I feel very fortunate to have gotten into Northeastern. While I had good grades, a very good ACT score, and fairly impressive extracurriculars (this is not me boasting just a reference) colleges often seem to just pick whomever they want sometimes at random. Some of my best friends back home who are much more impressive than me on paper never got into the schools they wanted. This is not to say they went to bad schools, just schools that were below their academic potential. While they all love their schools now, when decisions first came out so many people were upset over unexpected results. I wanted my game to mimic this. When you come to the end you find out it was all completely random and you have a process of rolling the dice to figure out where you end up. Obviously this is satirical and not how the admissions process works, but to a high school senior getting rejected from their dream school it seems that way.

While this was an experience project I used two main pieces of appropriation in my work. The first was a pizza box. My entire game was designed to be stored in and be made on a pizza box. This I stole from Allan Kaprow and one of our first lessons in a way. I wanted to make something out of a found object to add a little bit of creativity into it. The lesson I am referring to is the outdoor lesson we did where we made scores and games out of random objects people had brought. This was an aspect I had not yet incorporated into one of my artworks, and so I did. The other thing I appropriated was The Game of Life. This was less intentional. I wanted to make a board game, I decided that when I settled on using a found object to make the board. At the time I had a loose idea about wanting to make it about college applications but could not think of how to do that. I thought about various board games that I had played, and I eventually realized that the timeline way that The Game of Life is played would be perfect to portray applying to and hearing back from colleges. The board game aspect allowed me a little bit extra artistic license with the look which was mildly scary so I kept it simple enough to wear it looked nice, but did not do too much extra in fear of messing it up. Overall I am proud of the concept and production of my final artwork.

In a world filled with superficial interactions and digital distractions, I created an avant-garde card game Quintessence which offers a refreshing opportunity for profound human connection. This innovative game combines simple mechanics with thought-provoking prompts to facilitate deep conversations and foster empathy between players.

The card game Quintessence and Yoko Ono’s Grapefruit share a focus on fostering human connection and encouraging introspection through simplicity and creativity. Both create opportunities to break free from the distractions of everyday life and engage in meaningful experiences. Quintessence uses its deck of cards to guide players toward empathy and understanding through structured conversations, while Grapefruit employs poetic instructions and art to inspire moments of reflection and imagination. Both demonstrate how even simple tools—whether cards or conceptual prompts—can spark profound connections and bring people closer to one another by encouraging vulnerability and authentic expression.

A Deck of Discovery At the heart of Quintessence lies a deck of cards divided into three types: Them Cards, You Cards, and Us Cards. Each type serves a unique purpose in guiding players towards mutual understanding.

Them Cards challenge players to step into each other’s shoes by answering questions from the other player’s perspective. This role-reversal exercise encourages active listening and empathy as players seek to understand their partner’s point of view.

You Cards inspire vulnerability and self-reflection by asking players to honestly share personal experiences and opinions. By relating to one another’s stories, players build trust and find common ground.

Us Cards spark collaborative discussions on topics that matter to both players. Working together to find a shared answer fosters a sense of unity and highlights the power of cooperation.

Simple Mechanics, Profound Insights Quintessence’s gameplay is elegantly straightforward. Players take turns drawing cards, reading questions aloud, and engaging in heartfelt conversations guided by the card type drawn. Correct answers and points of agreement are celebrated by placing cards in the shared Agreement Pile. In moments of divergence, cards are placed in each player’s respective Disagreement Pile. These piles serve as visual representations of the journey towards understanding and connection.

More Than Just a Game By delving into personal experiences, beliefs, and dreams, Quintessence creates a sacred space for authentic human interaction. It invites players to set aside their digital devices and be fully present with one another. This game has the power to strengthen bonds between friends, deepen romantic partnerships, and even build bridges between strangers. It reminds us of the transformative potential of genuine dialogue and active listening.

Playtest Notes In playtesting Quintessence, I was struck by the depth of conversation it facilitated. Players quickly moved past small talk and dove into meaningful discussions about their hopes, fears, and life experiences. Even in moments of disagreement, there was a palpable sense of respect and a desire to understand each other’s perspectives. The game’s structure created a safe space for vulnerability and encouraged players to be their authentic selves. One player remarked, “I’ve known my best friend for years, but Quintessence helped me see a whole new side of her. It brought us closer than ever before.” Another couple said, “I love how this game can be played by people who just started dating like us and people who have been dating for years.” And the third said, “Although there were something we disagreed with and maybe didn’t want to talk about yet we were able to be understanding with each other. This also helped us put in perspective where we were in our relationship and what we could do to make each other more comfortable.”

A Game for Connection in a Disconnected Age In an era where screens often serve as barriers to genuine human connection, Quintessence offers a timely reminder of the power of presence and dialogue. This avant-garde card game is more than just entertainment; it’s an invitation to connect deeply with others and rediscover the transformative potential of authentic communication. Whether you’re looking to strengthen existing relationships or forge new ones, Quintessence provides a structured yet organic way to foster understanding, empathy, and connection. It’s a game that leaves you not just with fond memories, but with a renewed appreciation for the people in your life and the stories they carry.

PLAY IT HERE ON ITCH : https://jasonkinggamedev.itch.io/heart-defense       (Password : Jason)

Playtesting Video :

All in all, I would say the playtest went well, and the user enjoyed. Many of the criticisms I list later were brought up, such as a lack of enemy variety. However, my playtester loved the central premise having gone through similar experiences themselves. I’m glad I was able to make that connection as that’s part of what I sought to do with this game in the first place.

Overview

Heart Defense, my fourth artwork, is the artwork I have the most passionate love and hate relationship with out of all the artworks I made. As per the assignment directions, I decided to make a game that emblematic of the experiences I had growing up and my view of growing up in general. I wanted to convey the added strain that growing up can provide as more and more responsibilities are accumulated. Even more than added strain, I wanted to convey the sacrifice inherent in growing up as it becomes more and more apparent that life, especially in this society (and this economy) doesn’t afford people the time to do everything they want to do. I think I have partially succeeded and partially failed in this goal, and overall been left with a final product that I am happy with, but not content with, and I will seek to expand this game further going forward (and hopefully I will be able to show off the updated version next semester).

Reflection – Cons :

The areas of improvement regarding Heart Defense mainly concern lacking features and content.

I wanted to add a feature where the player heart would bleed and lose health when shooting after a certain point. This is because the “bullets” you are shooting are meant to represent “time” (as in the time we use to do things) and so convey the difference between spending time as a youth (it feels free and infinite) and spending time as an adult (every second you spend doing something is a second you could spend doing something else and you’ll never get to everything and your going to die so chose wisely) I wanted the “time” (the bullets) to cost more, to cost so much more that it went from not hurting at all to hurting (which mirrors my shifting perspective regarding spending time as I aged). Coding this was easy, but without the visual feedback with the heart bleeding, it was hard to tell exactly what was happening, and I didn’t have time to implement that visual feedback.

The game needs more “enemies”. As the gameplay loop is incredibly simple, every step towards variety should be taken, including visual variety. Thus, the game needs more enemies that take your health and friendlies that heal you when shot.

The game needs better visual signalizing. As I want the game be symbolic of my experiences, I think a lack of dialogue helps, as this is something I feel not something I had expressly explained to me. However, I didn’t have time to implement clearer visual signaling for enemies being enemies or friendlies being friendlies. Additionally, the death screen should be an image representing my conceptualization of failure and how that changed as I aged, but I alas, as with the other visual signaling improvements, I did not have time to implement that.

The enemies and friendlies could use more interesting movement patterns. I’m glad I worked out how to add parabolic sine wave movement in addition to linear movement, but more variety would help the game (for example, teleporting enemies).

Reflection – Pros :

I believe the concept was executed well in terms of format and genre. The game has a very plain pixel art visual style, but I think the decision to forgo a background draws the eye even more to what really matters for this game, which is the heart and the enemies/friendlies coming to hurt/help it. I loved the opportunity to work on my pixel art skills more, and I believe this project both has good pixel art assets and allowed me to improve. I’m proud of the pixelated enemy explosion effect I created, as well as my decision to make the heart be beating the entire time. The phases of game as a concept has a very strong foundation, as currently the enemy spawns (in terms of enemies spawned and frequency) enemy movement patterns, and heart model all change phase to phase, paralleling aging. The added difficulty in conjunction with the amount of changed things from phase to phase I think conveys my message well, if not perfectly.

Conclusion :

Overall, this was definetly my favorite artwork to work on, and one I look forward to working on more in future.

Official Rules:

1. Use WASD to move
2. Reach the Bed

Game Link:
https://play.unity.com/en/games/2faa68b0-3fc1-4e80-83a1-345bd5f64cd0/time-game

Description:

The game I made was a 2D puzzle game where the player tries to grab key items (Food, toothbrush) and avoid distractions(phone, friends, TVs) in order to head to bed on time.

Playtest #1:

In the early phases of the game there was only a friend and a phone as well as the bed. Because of these limiting options, there was only one level but it worked well enough as a proof of concept.

After this playtest there was a request from the playtesters for more variety of distractions and key items.

Playtest #2:

During this time there were 3 levels of varying difficulty, including key items and an added TV distraction. Player feedback was there should be a few more components as well as more challenging levels

Summary:

I initially wanted to make an art game commentary on easily it is to ruin your sleep by seemingly harmless distractions. My initial idea was a time game based around a sort of clock system. The clock would increase after each action you do and depending on the action you take it might consume more or less time.

I diverted from this idea because although it was an interesting concept, im not the biggest fan of text games and much prefer puzzle games. That is when i was inspired by a classmate’s 2D puzzle game that used direction inputs to change the puzzle. Through this inspiration, I decided to make my own 2D puzzle game and I created a (kind of) turn-based grid system puzzle game.

Game Title: The Universe Unfolded

The Initial Inspirations

The game I was mainly inspired by is the Table Top Roleplaying RPG “Dialect: A Game About Language and How it Dies”. Although the book for how to play it is fairly thick, the game boils down to a series of prompts to get players to craft a story and a community together.

From Sharp’s “Works of Game”, I have learnt the importance of noticing ludic affordance offered by the medium and the mechanics of the game. The game very tactfully makes use of the idea of languages as a way to prompt people into crafting their story and community. While narratives are not necessarily crafted by words, the idea of conveying intent and generating meaning is fundamental to languages, and which is what Dialect takes advantage of to allow players to craft interesting narrative that they otherwise wouldn’t have.

Is Dialect merely a game about crafting stories? Or does the mechanics of the game lend itself to deeper concepts that prod players into seeing the world in a new way? In “Works of Game”, one point of view discussed was that the a game’s mechanics are not just about what the player does, but also what it means. Unlike any other mediums, games are interactive. How designers design experiences when games are inherently unpredictable? How could designers make the game mechanics mean something when players could do so many things, and come from all walks of life? For instance, in the experimental game “The Marriage”, until it was given a title at a later time (because people were confused about what it meant), the game mechanics had little meaning. But once the title was given, the game mechanics revealed a deeper concept via a simple system.

But in Dialect, this is not a dilemma, but is exactly what powers the game. Dialect embraces the idea that players can come from all walks of life and can assign whatever meaning they want. While the main mechanic of Dialect is to create new words and to tell stories based on them, the consequence of the mechanic is that players are given a platform and a guide in which they can practice expressing themselves in ways they wouldn’t have thought of. This is a view point shared by Jonathan Blow. In “Works of Game”, it is said that he did not spend most of his energy arguing whether games are art, but rather, allow his games to be a platform in which players experience the mechanics of the game first-hand, and figure out for themselves the consequences of the mechanics.

I wanted a game that also took advantage of the power of languages to keep players a platform and a guide as to how they can express themselves in new and interesting ways. I started by removing everything about Dialect except that bit, and replaced the idea of generating new words with folding pieces of paper.

The main reason for paper folding is that I personally enjoy folding paper, and I find that similar to languages, paper has a lot of ludic affordances and is fundamental to communities and civilisations. It is a resource that most people have on hand, yet so versatile. Although it is thin and flat, there is still so much you can do with it.

Original Version

The original version of the game was run with pieces of paper from my lined notebook, as well as the following prompts:

Setup

1. Have a pile of pieces of paper on the side which players can use to fold. The more pieces of paper in the pile, the longer the game will last, and the more content the stories will have.

The Beginning

1. Each player should fold a piece of paper into something, and bring it to the center.

2. As a group, the players must come up with a story as to how their community begins, and how the 5 folded things play a role.

The Change

1. Players can continue the game by either taking a new piece of paper and folding it into a new thing, or they can re-fold an existing folded thing.

2. If a new addition, come up with a story on the new addition. If re-folding, come up with a story on how and why it was changed, and the consequences it has on the communit.

Termination

When players feel like the ending the game, or when the stories feel like they are leading to their conclusion, it is time for the stories on how the game ends.

1. Each folded thing must be folded into something new, or torn into pieces. For each thing, explain why and how the folded thing changed, or why it was torn into pieces, and the consequences it has on the community.

Final Version

The game was play-tested again with index cards and then construction cards, as well as the following new prompts.

The Setup

Have a pile of pieces of paper on the side which players can use to fold. The more pieces of paper in the pile, the longer the game will last, and the more content the stories will have.

The Beginning

As players of this game, you all will tell the story of a community in a world shared between you all. The nature of this world is up for you to decide. Is it on an alient planet? An ancient civilisation? A coffee shop in the city?

Every community has a beginning. Tell the story of the beginning of your community by folding a piece of paper into something. Once done, place it at the center and wait for the rest to finish.

When everyone is finished, each person shall explain how their folded piece relates to the beginning of your community. Every player should link their story to the existing ones.

Etiquette: Each speaks on behalf of everyone. Say “we”.

The Change

Every community changes over time. Each player shall either fold a new piece of paper if there are any left, or re-fold an existing one.

If a player folds a new piece of paper, they must explain what the new addition means to the community.

If a player re-folds an existing one, they must explain what the folded piece was before, what the new folded piece is, and what does the change signify.

Players can repeat this phase of the game as many times as they like, but eventually, all communities reach The End.

The End

All communities eventually end, but the world will live on.

Each player should take an existing folded piece, and either fold it into something entirely new, or tear it into pieces.

If a player decides to re-fold a piece, they must explain what the folded piece was before, what the new folded piece is, and what does the change signify.

If a player decides to tear a piece, they must explain what the folded piece was before, and what the tearing signifies.

Conclusion

In the three times that the game was ran, every story that was crafted was different. However, people who played the game multiple times tend to fold the same things. For example, one person folded a boat twice.

While I think construction paper feels the best for folding, I also find that every paper type had its own pros and cons:

• The lined paper from my notebook was used the most creatively by the players. Players did all sorts of things with it, including tearing it into pieces, poking holes to put a stick in them.
• The index card paper was used to create sci-fi folded pieces, and structures that could stand.
• The construction paper had the most personality, because of the colours, but I felt reservations from the players to fold whatever they wanted. Granted, the playtest with the construction paper had a crowd watching, which may have influenced how people would have normally behaved.

It is evident that different paper qualities have different ludic affordances, and hence different outcomes. I hypothesize that for games with more players with less folding experience, there should be more lined paper, so that players don’t feel that they are messing with something precious. However, for players with more folding experience, construction paper would be good as it gives them the best flexibility in what they could fold.

As for whether the game achieved its goal of being a medium for players to come together to craft stories and meaningful experiences together, I think it did, but I also think that there is room for improvement. A variant of the game could exist with instructions on folding techniques, so that players can “expand their vocabulary” to make more interesting folded pieces and hence more interesting stories.

Pictures

Playtest #1: Lined paper from my notebook

Playtest #2: Index cards

Playtest #3: Construction paper