Playful: Mark Sorrell Hide and Seek

LIVEBOGGED from Playfull. Potential mistakes and errors!

Mark is the Development Director at Hide and Seek. Will be talking about Computer Games NOT Video Games. Really about Computer Mediated Games. Take a look at a game called B.U.T.T.O.N You are given a task by the computer, a task in the real world. Then you press the button. So the first person to press the button wins. The game is doing it..not watching a screen. How about ‘slow button’ Long term tasks, eg learn French.

The same company (Die Gute Fabrik) went on to make Joust. You use PS Move controllers, connected to computers. You move your controller at the same tempo as the Bach music. You can do whatever you like to stop people winning, to stop their controllers. There are no rules aside from that. It is a great way to see who has survival skills – what will you do for winning! And Joust has been turned into Ludwig Van Beatdown – a video game. There are lots of games like this; using computers to mediate a real world game. Moneky See, Monkey Mime; Aaaargh; Flot; Idiots attack the top noodle. So computer games with no graphics.

Hide and Seek produced Searchlight. Uses Kinect and projector. Move blocks to your side. When in the searchlight, you cannot move. THe computer knows (via Kinect) if moved. So a computer mediated game. When you make a game, you only make a selection of rules. Games don’t exist without players. They are just things we hold in your heads. So why do we make games when you don’t look at the player but at the screen. Joust you can learn to play by watching people. It is the same in the playground – that’s how you learn to play. These are games for audiences. For people watching.

Looking at Games for Events. So great if you run events. But they don’t only exist at events. Look at Frobisher Says. It’s on PSVita and uses all the control elements of that console. So AR; touch screens etc. How about SIngStar. Definitely computer mediated play. Has a brilliant business model – has an in-app putchasing technique on drink people; those singing the karaoke. Lots of the Wii games are in the room. But still a fair amount of screen staring. The developers did not do a good job of putting the game in the room.

The consoles are high cost. The games are hi cost. The smartphone is high cost – but does cheaper games. Sometome soon there will be a mass market device in every house that plays games – and computer mediated games. Moves the game into the room. THis is a new way. Those games will have audiences. What happens to people who are watching the game. How do you make games people don’t have to learn how to play. All the peole making computer mediated games now are learning these skills.