I’ve often talked to students about how no experience is ever truly wasted, and that ideas and experiences often return in a useful fashion. I was a DJ in college and in commercial radio, and so doing a podcast and being a DJ in Second Life naturally followed. My experiences making films when young resurface now as I try my hand at that medium again.
When I was kid, I wanted to make a game. I don’t know where that impetus came from, but I worked on creating boards, cards, and rules. I have absolutely no memory beyond that—no specifics about the games themselves other than that I wanted to try my hand at that.
In my MA grad program, I became a Dungeon Master for a Dungeons and Dragons campaign. At the end of my senior year as an undergrad, I developed Erstworld, sprinkled with dungeons and populated by many monsters. There I used the D&D books as my resources, so I wasn’t truly inventing a game, but I did a great deal of world-building.
Then, a couple of years ago, for a team-taught course, I created an Alternate Reality Game. We divided the students into two groups, had them watch an introductory video, and then gave them further information (such as their code names and a message from the revolutionary leader). The process frustrated me because the students didn’t get that they had to role-play and “make stuff up” as I kept telling them, but they would happily play Humans vs. Zombies on campus—the same sort of para-theatrical thing. (It also served as the basis for a conference presentation on ARGs.)
A bit later, I decided to try to add gaming elements (“gamification”) to my Intro to Theatre course. Student would gain experience points (XP) instead of points and then advance in level. An email would announce their new level with a graphic of a gem. Teams competed for spots on the leaderboard. I did surveys, crunched the numbers, and wrote an essay on it (published online but needing context, I added a preamble), and let it fizzle out after only a few semesters.
Now, after meeting with a local shop owner, I’m working on creating an 80s/90s Music Trivia Night. Back to inventing a game! Google and ChatGPT has helped a bit with structure and general questions but it looks like the majority of the creation and questions is on me.
But once again, like recently writing an interactive murder mystery event, I feel like my entire life has been leading up to this moment.
BUT I NEED YOUR HELP! Please send me your 80s and 90s music trivia questions, or point me to any repositories of such questions.
MUSOFYR 