In order to get frequent updates on the site i decided to start writing some sort of roundups here and there. That seems to be the best way to reflect my current journey into Newsgames. Apart from that i find Sebastian Deterding´s #Gamification roundups very helpful. Make sure to watch his Google Tech Talk on the well-beloved topic ‘Gamification’ circling around Meaning, Mastery and Autonomy.
Okay, what did i do? I did a brief talk on Newsgames at the Ignite Cologne. Ignite means you are free to talk about any chosen topic if you restrict yourself to exactly 20 slides and a 15-second-auto-page-turn. I just wanted to give it a try, to see if i have enough to talk about, if i can focus on some sort of core basics and of course – i wanted to see how a mixed audience of about 70 – 100 more or less tech savy people react. It worked out fine. And it was great fun! I gathered reactions over at Storify. My plan to convert the 20 slides into a playable version did not work out that well. I got some help from Peter – nevertheless the idea – that sounded new and intriguing to me first – might not be that brilliant after all. Try it out over here. I quit just before adding a bunch of ananas-power-ups falling from the sky.
Mortiz Metz from the german radio tech show Breitband on Deutschlandradio Kultur asked me to do a piece on Newsgames. Thanks for that. I did a Skype Audio Interview with Simon Ferrari, messed up the last part of the recording with Audio Hijack Pro and got Nora Pauls Name wrong in the end. But especially talking to Simon was pretty interesting. Most of our talk will grow old on my hard drive but you can hear Simon talking about the future of Newsgames over at Tumblr. Here is the german radio piece.
Anything else?
- The Brainy Gamer has undertaken some sort of experiment with his students “Putting a newsgame to the test” and written a very interesting article about that concluding that Bogost, Ferrari, and Schwiezer are up to something important with Newsgames. Yes, indeed.
- Controlled Invasion have put together A Game Design Manifesto during a Transmediale 11 workshop.
- While “Persuasive Games” and “A Theory of Fun” wait to be read, i bought “Game Design Workshop, Second Edition: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games“