Playmakers - the story so far Part 1

NESTA (that’s the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) have commissioned Playmakers, a ground-breaking project exploring the future of games through film and playful experiences. The project will officially launch at the ICA Sandpit on April 22. Ahead of that date, we’re going to blog a little about the project, how it came about, and what we’re hoping to do with it.

Back in September 2008, I had the pleasure of running through Igfest’s Journey To The Middle Of the Night with Rohan Gunatillake. Rohan, as well as being fleet of foot, sharp of eye, and strong of stamina, was interested in pervasive gaming, and what it all might mean for collaborative innovation.

Rohan, mid-Journey

He blogged extensively about the weekend here. We were very delighted indeed when, a few months later, Rohan got in touch suggesting that NESTA commission a piece of learning around Hide&Seek this summer. He had refined his thoughts about pervasive gaming around the term ‘ungeeking’, the definition of which is:

“Ungeeking is what happens when behaviours developed online make their way into areas of our lives independent of the technology through which we learnt them.”

Hide&Seek seemed to be ungeeking in two ways. The first was that we were taking ideas and design concepts from video games and online experiences and translating them into live, social spaces. The second was that the community that had developed around Sandpit was collaborating and sharing ideas, both in real life and on the web, using a variety of digital tools in the process.

So, we came up with a commission that would explore both these elements. The project comes in three parts:

1. A NEW PERVASIVE GAME. Holly and I are working to create a new pervasive game - one that builds on the knowledge we’ve accumulated as makers, curators and players.

2. A COLLABORATIVE PROCESS. In order to make that game as good as it can be, we’re going to ask for the support of our community. We’re going to playtest the game at every Sandpit between now and the end of July, and we’re going to launch a dedicated website (www.playmakers.org.uk) which will make community involvement in the creative process as easy as possible.

3. A FILM. Ivo Gormley, director of the brilliant Us Now is going to document the whole thing, Sandpits, playtests, brainstorms, disagreements and all. The footage will form the main thread of a film looking at the whole of the pervasive gaming scene, featuring interviews with a host of great minds from the pervasive gaming community to boot. Ivo is going to blog about the progress of the film at playmakers.org.uk, and the community will have their chance to participate in this part of the project too.

In Part 2 I’ll blog about the game itself, the basic mechanic which we tried out in March, and where we’re hoping to take the project creatively over the next few months.