About the Experimental Gameplay Project

The Experimental Gameplay Project began as a student pitched project at the Entertainment Technology Center at Carnegie Mellon University. The project started in Spring 2005 with the goal of discovering and rapidly prototyping as many new forms of gameplay as possible. A team of four grad students, we locked ourselves in a room for a semester with three rules:

1. Each game must be made in less than seven days,
2. Each game must be made by exactly one person,
3. Each game must be based around a common theme i.e. “gravity”, “vegetation”, “swarms”, etc.

As the project progressed, we were amazed and thrilled with the onslaught of web traffic, with the attention from gaming magazines, and with industry professionals and academics all asking the same questions, “How are you making these games so quickly?” and “How can we do it too?” Though we successfully met our goal of making over 50 games, we realized that this project had become much less about the games, and much more about the crazy development process – and how we could help others do the same thing. We wrote about this process in our white paper How to Prototype a Game in Under 7 Days.

After leaving school, we all went our separate ways, using the experience and prototyping skills we”d learned and applying them in large companies in the games industry.  Though separated, we continued to run the site from afar – holding a series of prototyping competitions, with winners gaining internships at various game companies. Eventually all of our attention was turned to pet projects: Kyle Gabler went on to create indie darling, World of Goo from his 4-day prototype, Tower of Goo, alongside EA veteran Ron Carmel. The two would later port the game to WiiWare, where it really took off, with the help of Allan Blomquist. Kyle Gray used the lessons he learned from the project to pitch and make the cult classic Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure for the Nintendo DS.

Contributors

Allan Blomquist needs to update his bio.

Kyle Gabler left EA to form indie dynamo, 2D Boy alongside the charmingly enigmatic Ron Carmel. Together the two made indie darling, World of Goo.

Kyle Gray left EA on his wedding day after completing work on Henry Hatsworth. He likes making games with character.

Petri Purho was inspired by the original Experimental Gameplay and started prototyping his ideas and releasing them every month on his blog: Kloonigames. The process eventually sparked the creation of Crayon Physics Deluxe. And all was good.

Shalin Shodhan is all about juice. He wants to make attractive games that make you want to touch them. If you must know more about Shalin, check out www.shalinshodhan.com

Want to Participate?

If you’re interested in participating simply leave us a comment in the monthly theme announcement post and we’ll make sure to include it in our net round up!

Contact

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