Player vs. System: The Overlooked Design Challenge in Games for Change

Dear Members,

We are joining forces with the Seattle meetup and we'd like to thank both Ana Mendes from the Redmond Eastside Game Developers Meetup Group for setting up this talk and our presenter Francesca Palamara. Thanks again for sharing this event with the Seattle and San Francisco Unity User Groups

BY: Francesca Palamara

If you’re like me, you might have fallen into games accidentally. Whether that was stumbling onto an old GameCube console, or having a friend showing you something on their phone, or hearing about games as a potential career path in your late 20’s. We all discover it in a unique and personal way that’s very indicative of our life choices. What’s certain is that once you find yourself in this community, it’s hard to imagine any other.

Games feel like magic because of the worlds we can create. We fall in love with the idea that games allow us the ability to replicate any idea or system we want. It’s what drew me in and it’s what has kept me here. But there’s a catch. There’s always a catch. The catch is that not every social issue is capable of being made into a game for a change.

In this talk, I will reflect on my own experience as a young game designer hoping to make games for social change and the design challenges I experienced along the way. Whether it was my first game about the affordable housing crisis through an Afro-futuristic lens, or my second game about the importance of voting in a cat-filled world, or my most recent game about humanizing front-line healthcare workers during pre-pandemic times. Each of these very different fields have given me insight into how play-centric thinking is formed and how by starting conversations about them, we as a community can begin to prioritize our player experience goals long before our system goals.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER:

Francesca Palamara is a third-year MFA student at the number one gaming school in the country: University of Southern California’s (USC) Interactive Media and Game Design program. Prior to this, she attended Scripps College and self-designed her major in Computational Media. Francesca has worked professionally at Skybound Entertainment as a Narrative Designer on the Walking Dead franchise and most recently interned as a Producer at Jam City.

She is passionate about games for change and understanding the design challenges that lay in between every great idea and a designer. In her free time, she likes to play Animal Crossing, surf, bake and play with her kittens.

Twitter: @frenchiee_fries
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/francesca-palamara/