Tag: BUROPONY

Week 169

Fiona Raby once told me that the majority of her work with students at the RCA was about psychology. After a week like this, I can see where she’s coming from. Without going into too much detail, I had my work cut out for me with a new group of students who I will be working with on a design research project at the HKU. After a first meeting with the team and a kick-off with the client the next day, it became clear I was dealing with a group with some serious motivational issues. The trick was to figure out where it all was coming from. To do this it was vital to try and see things as they really are in stead of as they were presented to me by the group. After several additional sessions (messing with my schedule but that comes with the territory) I had it figured out more or less and have formulated a plan to deal with it. Psychology.

In between all that craziness my week consisted of:

  • Working with my two new interns at Hubbub. We reflected on their experiences at the Natural Networking Festival and presented a post-mortem of the first game to Thieu after attending one of the Learning Lab meetups.
  • Sketching out additions to the PLAY Pilots website necessary to support the Zesbaans installation for the Netherlands Film Festival. These will launch next week in time for the installation’s unveiling on Thursday.
  • Presenting my preliminary list of interactive works suitable for next year’s Tweetakt festival. This is my first time curating an event other than This happened. I am keen to mash up playful interaction design with the fringes of game design and it seems Tweetakt are up for it too. Happy days.
  • Another full day of work on Maguro. Best part of which was a few quiet hours to bang out a first playable paper prototype of the game. Convergence is a bitch but always rewarding when it happens.
  • Today, I hung out at BUROPONY and took care of a few odds and ends for their website. In return work has started on a last bit of Hubbub corporate identity: a design for the box to hold our business-slash-collectible playing cards.

And with that I am signing off. A train is taking me from Rotterdam to Utrecht, perhaps I will be in time to catch the tail end of friday drinks at the Dutch Game Garden. Never a dull moment there.

Week 165

So week 165. One of those old-fashioned fragmented weeks that reminds me of why I decided a while ago that I should stop having more than two meetings on one day. Anyway.

Following the weekend of Stekker Fest craziness I had a bit of an off day on Monday. Tuesday I sat down with Ianus and Alexander to make plans for the next This happened – Utrecht. We’ve had a bit of trouble finding a venue, getting financing and everything but it looks like we’re all set. Monday 4 October at Theater Kikker in Utrecht, NL. Save the date.

From Amsterdam I traveled on to Rotterdam and spent some time at Simon’s sketching out the additions to PLAY Pilots for the Wip ‘n’ Kip game data. I also dropped by BUROPONY. They might make something cool for This happened attendees…

Wednesday I had coffee with Thieu and Godelieve at the Westergasfabriek in Amsterdam to talk about a new project which I’ve dubbed Fugu. It deals with experimental (game-like) new forms of higher education. I am taking on board two interns to help me out with that. That’ll be an interesting new experience. I also hooked up with Peter, who is now at Adaptive Path Amsterdam. Cool building, they seem to be doing well. Nice.

In the afternoon on Wednesday I was back in Utrecht to talk to Ezra, who is involved with some interesting research into cycling. He’s based in Copenhagen. We discussed ways in which we might use low-tech pervasive urban games to shape cycle use. Who knows, Hubbub might venture there to do some experiments in future.

I finished that day off with a review of a student presentation. Final exams is next week; that’ll eat up a lot of my time.

Ah what’s more? Thursday, more educational work, I attended a kick-off of the new academic year at the HKU‘s school of art and technology. I liked the fact that all teachers were there and sat down to sync their classes and assignments in such a way that they all connected to projects students would be doing. Proper project-based art education. Good to see that happen.

And today I am reviewing one more student presentation and am spending some time with Alper on PLAY Pilots and related bits.

Looking ahead, next week will be about the aforementioned final exams and also the kick-off of project Maguro. I have to say I am running on fumes a bit and can’t wait for next week because on friday I will head to Terschelling for a week and unplug completely.

Almost forgot about Bocce Drift this Sunday. Come along and play.

Week 141

It’s been a while since I spent time at my own desk in the Dutch Game Garden. It was nice to do this again yesterday, having the city right outside my door and kindred spirits such as FourceLabs upstairs. I wasn’t inside the whole time though, in the morning I had another chat at EKKO about Tako. And in the afternoon I headed to Leidsche Rijn accompanied by Julius to attend a workshop concerning Utrecht’s bid to become European capital of culture.

I kicked off the week with two days of work at Layar (now on my way to Amsterdam in a diverted train for my third and last day of the week there). I’ve been collaborating closely with some of the engineers to shape some upcoming new… stuff. Things are developing at such a high pace that it’s a real challenge to keep up. It feels like being on top of a rodeo bull sometimes, but in a good way. This means I need to be pragmatic and fast with developing and documenting designs.

In between, I’ve posted a long overdue project description to the Hubbub site for Mega Monster Battle Arena. It’s this quirky project – a cross between a game and an opera – that I was involved with last year. It feels good to finally have it out there for me and others to point to.

Other in-between stuff includes a final review of several graduation project proposals. I need to provide feedback by the start of next week, and then I’ll switch to coaching a handful of students.

The week will be topped off with what is sure to be a fun friday at the BUROPONY studio. I’ll do some work on their site, and in return have them do some additional work on the Hubbub brand. Scratching each other’s backs, that’s how small creative enterprises flourish.