Ludology 244 - Games Brought to Life

Emma and Gil chat with Jeeyon Shim, game designer, nature fan, and mushroom enthusiast. Jeeyon's games are about connecting with one's environment, and we discuss what it's like to make games like this. We also discuss playtesting (or not playtesting) indie games, the conception of "nature" and its connection with humanity, and how cute our pets are. SHOW NOTES 1m53s: The IGDN is the Indie Game Developer Network, an organization supporting indie tabletop designers. They offer mentorships and convention scholarships; one of these is to Metatopia, a tabletop game design convention in New Jersey. 4m25s: Jeeyon's games Dear Poppy, First Lesson, Your Dead Friend 8m30s: Daniel Kwan, half of the Asians Represent podcast. 12m09s: Avery Alder's Belonging Outside Belonging and D. Vincent Baker and Meguey Baker's Powered by the Apocalypse (PbtA) are both tabletop RPG "engines" that can be used to make other games. Belonging Outside Belonging first appeared in Dream Askew, and PbtA first appeared in Apocalypse World. 13m36s: Here, have some sample ecosystem maps. 31m56s: The genus Lactarius, aka Candy cap mushrooms. 34m32s: We had Kienna Shaw, Lauren Bryant-Monk, and John Stavropoulos on Ludology 227 - Respect the X discussing safety tools in games. 39m55s: Matthew Gravelyn is a tabletop game designer. Jeeyon mentions her game Pin Feathers (part of a diptych with its second half, Cloud Studies). 41m05s: Pontifuse was part of the Cheapass game collection Chief Herman's Next Big Thing. 41m31s: We've already mentioned Avery Alder's Belonging Outside Belonging. Variations On Your Body is a collection of 4 solo LARPs  and one essay about learning to accept oneself.  43m50s: Jeeyon's game Crimson. 47m09s: Avery Alder's game from Variations that Emma is referring to is "Teen Witch." 57m27s: We chatted with toy inventor Kim Vandenbrouke in Ludology 212 - Inventing Play. 1h09m10s: "Itch" is itch.io, a popular sales platform for digital and tabletop indie games. 1h11m33s: Pseudohydnum gelatinosum, aka cat's tongue mushrooms. 1h19m12s: "Rubenesque" refers to the work of Flemish Baroque painter Peter Paul Rubens, who was known for painting plus-sized women.  1h21m51s: More info about Zine Quest, from Kickstarter. 1h25m57s: More info about Lucian Kahn's Zine Quest anthology Hibernation Games, which includes one of Jeeyon's games. 1h30m00s: Jeeyon's Twitter and Patreon.