Podcast | Polygamer

Polygamer #94: Jeri Ellsworth of Tilt Five

Posted on October 9, 2019 by Ken Gagne

Jeri Ellsworth recently launched the Kickstarter for Tilt Five, a mixed-reality headset and game board. Its proprietary approach to augmented reality allows gamers to bring Dungeons & Dragons, racing, pinball, and other games to life, using either symmetrical or asymmetrical gameplay, both locally and online. Having successfully reached its crowdfunding goal of $450,000 in just 17 hours, Tilt Five is on track to ship in the summer of 2020.

In this podcast interview, Jeri and I talk about what makes Tilt Five unique among todays many approaches to mixed reality (MR); how its technology and applications differ from professional-grade devices such as the Microsoft HoloLens; whether Tilt Five is aimed more at video gamers or board gamers; what lessons Jeri learned from her previous MR project, castAR; what she’s doing differently this time to avoid the obstacles castAR encountered; and Tilt Five’s reception at PAX West and JoCoCruise.

Stream the audio edition of this interview below or from iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play Music, Mixcloud, Spoke, Overcast, acast, Pocket Casts, Castbox, TuneIn, RadioPublic, or the Internet Archive. Click past the jump for links to resources mentioned in this episode and a transcript.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:02:15 — 29.4MB) | Embed

Polygamer #93: Dr. Aurit Lazerus on playfulness

Posted on September 18, 2019 by Ken Gagne

Dr. Aurit Lazerus, PsyD, is gamer and board game geek with a private clinical practice in Providence, Rhode Island. She uses playfulness and creativity to help her patients feel more understood, connected, balanced, self-aware, and empowered.

In this podcast, we chat about the mental health benefits of video games; what playfulness can look like, and how to incorporate it into one’s daily life; how it feels when video games are used to procrastinate; and whether video games can be addictive. We also discuss the difficult subject of abusive relationships, how they work, and how to both offer and get help.

Content warnings: suicide and abusive relationships.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 58:30 — 27.6MB) | Embed

Polygamer #92: Bobbi A Sand of Transcenders Media

Posted on August 14, 2019 by Ken Gagne

Bobbi Augustine Sand is the game designer and author of Knife Sisters, a visual novel published by Transcenders Media. In Knife Sisters, players assume the role of Leo, a non-binary twenty-something exploring BDSM relationships and the occult. Players navigate this black-and-white world by choosing who to spend time with, what kink to explore, and how to respond to new situations, all while safely negotiating power exchange and communicating consent.

Bobbi and I start this interview by reviewing the basics, such as what BDSM, edgeplay, and polyamory are, where gamers can learn more about these subcultures, and how people interested in kink can find each other. We discuss the different sexual cultures of Bobbi’s native Sweden versus my own in the United States, how the game’s adult content made it difficult to market internationally, and the resulting challenges for its Kickstarter. And, of course, we talk about Knife Sisters: the different ways Leo and Mo express consent; whether Naomi would’ve chosen to be childfree; how Dagger’s rituals fit into the theme of power exchange; and what exactly Kylo Zen is.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 56:39 — 26.8MB) | Embed

Polygamer #91: Alicia Caillier of Harmonix Music Systems

Posted on July 10, 2019 by Ken Gagne

Alicia Caillier is a product manager at Harmonix Music Systems, developer of music-rhythm video games such as Rock Band, Guitar Hero, Amplitude, and Frequency. Their most recent release is Dance Central for Oculus, the first virtual-reality entry in the long-running Dance Central series. For the first time, players can go online and explore a virtual dance club, learning moves from the game’s pros and tearing up the dance floor with other players.

In this podcast, Alicia and I talk about how a master’s degree in music business led to an internship at Harmonix, kicking off an unimaginable career in an industry she never expected. What is "music business", and how did it prepare her to work in video games? How did studying in Valencia inform her global perspective? What does a product manager do, and how do they help ensure a game is the right balance of difficulty and accessibility? What opportunities did Dance Central’s transition to virtual reality create, and what does it mean to create an inclusive virtual space? And just how good is DJ Pineapple at DropMix? All this and more in this week’s Polygamer!

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 59:41 — 28.2MB) | Embed

Polygamer #90: Athena Z Peters of Adventure Pub

Posted on June 19, 2019 by Ken Gagne

Athena Z Peters is the founder and co-owner of Adventure Pub, a gaming gastropub located in the suburbs of Boston in Arlington, Massachusetts. Friends, families, and strangers can order from a full food and drink menu, borrow from a library of 400 board games, card games, and role-playing games, and even reserve event space for their Dungeons & Dragons campaign. Whether you’re looking to try a game before you buy, discover something new, revisit a favorite classic, or enjoy a good meal, Adventure Pub will accommodate all these tastes.

Prior to Adventure Pub opening its doors in December 2018, Peters worked in the video games industry, most recently as an executive producer at Turbine, where she managed such projects as Lord of the Rings Online and Batman: Underworld. In this interview, I ask Peters what prompted the career change from digital games to physical; what’s behind the emerging trend of gaming cafés; whether the popularity of Game of Thrones and the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has driven players to board games; what rare or unusual games visitors might find in the pub’s library; whether she might open an indie game studio next; and how she juggles all this with her performance group, Incantrix Productions.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:02:37 — 29.5MB) | Embed

Polygamer #89: Twitch variety streamer SlyTQ

Posted on May 8, 2019 by Ken Gagne

TQ is a Twitch variety streamer and Take This Ambassador. Her channel frequently hosts charity streams in support mental health, children’s hospitals, and other non-profits close to her heart. This advocacy recently extended to PAX East, where TQ appeared on the panel “Avoiding Burnout in Creative Professions“, speaking from her experience working 60+ hours a week to maintain her channel and audience. In all her work, she focuses on how our differences as people make us better as a whole, rather than something we should have separate us.

In this podcast, we talk about how to launch a streaming career; separating one’s success and failures from one’s self-worth; using Patreon and Discord to build a community; the offline work that goes into maintaining a Twitch subscriber base; maintaining a healthy work/life harmony; avoiding creative burnout; how emotional support animals are different from service dogs; and the games she keeps to herself and won’t stream.

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:12:46 — 34.2MB) | Embed