On Saturday, Decemeber 13th we held a Video Game Design Workshop at the Lillian Marrero Neighborhood Library. We helped facilitators from E-Line Media kick off their national workshop tour to expose youth from grades 5-12 to basic game design principles and the National STEM Video Game Challenge.
Unfortunately the boiler was going out at Marrero, but we had a great showing from across the city. Participants ranged from elementary school students who frequent our programs, interested youth and their parents, and high school students from the Charter High School for Architecture and Design. This led to an interesting mix of outcomes as participants talked about their favorite games, recreated rock-papers-scissors, and learned how to navigate design principles from mechanics to goals.
Redesigning #rockpaperscissors at the 1st #stemchallenge workshop w/ @MakerJawn & @FreeLibraryPHL #hourofcode pic.twitter.com/ygSRww64HJ
— STEM Challenge (@STEMChallenge) December 13, 2014
To further engagement E-Line brought in a designer who worked on GameStar Mechanic. He shared his story about how he got into game design, helped introduce GameStar to us, and showed off a new game he is currently working on. It was great to see active engagement as the workshop navigated physical game creation, digital making, and question and answer sessions.
Digital making side of the Game Design Workshop in full swing! #hourofcode @GamestarMech @FreeLibrary @STEMChallenge pic.twitter.com/jhrTfVRUl6
— MakerJawn (@MakerJawn) December 13, 2014
As of right now we have a two brothers at the Cecil B. Moore Neighborhood Library who are working on two entries to the competition. They plan on entering a game blueprint(a write-up) for a complex fantasy game and a simpler mini-game based on the world they create in Gamestar Mechanic. More to come on their story and other budding game designers as we get closer to the competition deadline!