Paper, Plastic, or Playstation? Adapting a game to a wide range of technologies

   Scott Kim - Designer, scottkim.com
  
  scottscottkim.com

Seminar on People, Computers, and Design
Stanford University October 8, 2004

As a puzzle designer I work in a wide variety of electronic and nonelectronic media, ranging from paper and physical toys, to the web and mobile phones. Working in many media helps me keep a fresh perspective on the strengths and weakness of each medium. In this talk I will show how a game mutates when moved from medium to another, and discuss how to take advantage of the unique capabilities of each medium while being aware of its limitations.

Since 1990 I have been a full-time independent designer of visual puzzles and games for the web, computer games, magazines and toys. My puzzles are in the spirit of Tetris and M.C. Escher — visually stimulating, thought provoking, broadly appealing, and highly original. I have created hundreds of puzzles for magazines, and thousands for computer games. I am especially interesting in daily, weekly and monthly puzzles for the web and portable devices.

My background includes work in graphic design, user interface design, programming and mathematics education. My colleagues include leading puzzle designers around the world, computer puzzle game designers, and mathematics educators. I talk frequently at game design and mathematics education conferences. I have written two books: Inversions, and The NewMedia Puzzle Workout. I have a BA in music and a PhD in Computers and Graphic Design from Stanford University

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View this talk on line at CS547 on Stanford OnLine

Titles and abstracts for previous years are available by year and by speaker.