A fascinating discussion of different games, game design, and approach to creation with Anurati Srivastva.
You can find her collages @mixcontexcual and her website www.anuratisrinivastva.com.
Theme music is by Akshay Ramuhalli, you find him @btrptmusic. Editing by @beatnyk.
Making learning games is irritating. Making something fun is hard, teaching somebody something is hard — why would you want to do both at the same time?
Anything worth doing is not going to be very easy. It's always fun to do something very, very challenging.
Hi, I'm Divya. Hi, I'm Kahran. And this is... Thinking. I'm thinking.
Welcome to this episode of Thinking on Thinking. Today we talk to Andhra Deshrivaastava, who is a game designer, and we talk about how she got into making games, especially for children and educational games. Media, its impact on us, how she feels about making games collaboratively.
And we talk about a lot of different games because both of us are interested in narrative games. I hope you enjoy. Hi, Anurathi. So, do you wanna just like tell a little bit about who you are and what you do?
Hi, Divya. So, I'm Anurathi. I am a learning game designer and a new media artist. And currently I run my own design studio called Pedal Studio, which is short for playful experience, design and learning.
And mainly I design games for social impact, social change, designing digital learning experiences for children and young people. And yeah, that's what I've been doing for a long time. And it's been two years since I started my practice and before that I was working with UNESCO's Games for Learning team.
Yeah, so that's me. One of the most curious things that when we met and like one of the most interesting things that I thought, which I didn't get a chance to ask you, is like from my experience of making games,
making learning games is irritating. Like I have no other words for it. It's like making something fun is hard, teaching somebody something is hard. Why do you want to do it together? It's like why did you choose that as like,
this is the thing that I'm going to spend all my time doing. Yeah, I think, okay, like, you know, there are so many answers to this. Like I also think anything worth doing is not going to be very easy. So it's always fun to do something very, very challenging. But where it actually comes from is that when I was growing up,
I got access to some very cool education games, but which were actually a bit of both, like good education and also good games. Like there was Jump Ahead and there was another like two, three of these games, which were like they were about learning something.
So like I think my mom also bought these CDs because it was like, okay, this is an educational game. I think there were some games that I played where implicitly it was about learning something or like learning how to manage your life. So there was this another game.
I used to really love this game. It was called Chauvela. Basically, it was a 2D game and you had to manage this girl's life. And there were different bars indicating how well she's managing her life. So there was health, there was finance, there was harmony in your life.
And there was something about friends and like relationships, like how good your relationships are, things like that. And it would open up to an overview of a city, like a bird's eye view of a city. So there was the gym, there was the home, there was the church. You could like go pre at the church, you could go gym.
And within the gym you could do yoga, you could go swimming and you could do other things. The overall point of the game was, you know, of course it was a product of its time. So it might sound quite regressive and sexist now. But like the whole point was that she was basically, she had met a guy and across 10 levels that friendship was supposed to bloom to marriage.
Like they were like, so basically every level would end in a day. And the whole point of each level was that you have to maintain your health, your work finances, all of that. So you're happy enough to kind of impress this person. So there were also like all these dilemmas with your family that okay, someone needs money.
So you need to work extra hours and that reduces your harmony and health. If you work more, your finances go up, but your health reduces. And you also almost like real life. And you always have to eat at the right time because otherwise, you know, your health again goes down and you're not fit enough for the date.
So, you know, it was very interesting to me at that time. Like, imagine, like, you know, I think as a child having that kind of agency that okay, you know, these are some real choices that will have to be made and they will have real actions. And I think I was always very interested in designing for children because I think there is something very unique about designing for children. Because I think one, as a designer, it's quite exciting to try to look at things from the lens of a child.
When you don't know anything, you have no concept of the world. I'm a blank slate. Yeah, right. And at the same time, kids are very judgmental. They are the harshest users.
They'll just tell you on your face, you know, this is a very bad game. I can make better games than this, which I want. And then this girl, she was actually, you know, I was making games for Katha, which is a non-profit in Delhi. And there was a school in Govindpuri. And this girl, she's like, it's very easy to make an app these days.
It's 25 USD, he looks. And this is some seven, eight years ago. And I was like, wow, how do you know all of this? So I think just designing for children because at that age, you know, if you're exposed to some concepts, you know, even if it's as simple as that the main character is a girl who is leading a free independent life, getting educated,
instead of a boy doing the same thing, or maybe some things which are told in the Indian context, I think it's very powerful because most of us didn't grow up seeing the characters, you know, that are live. They look like us. Yeah, who look like us, talk like us, relatable. So I think there's a lot of value in creating that kind of media for children.
And also, because I don't think I had access to all that media, but certainly books I did. Like I grew up with a lot of books. So I think that's another thing that I feel strongly about that, you know, the wealth of literature that we have from India, translated literature, even the characters, storytelling narratives that we have, we can transform these into very powerful games.
My first job was exactly that because in Katha, like they are knowing, like they publish a lot of stories in different Indian languages and also just taking from Indian literature, ensuring like the characters are contextualized, a lot of stories to do with gender, culture, equity. So when I came in, my whole task was to translate that into a digital experience. So I ended up like making a game on Madhubani art because there was a book and story that was completely done in Madhubani.
And it was a story of a girl who grew up in Madhubani. It's the name of a place also. Yeah, so she was there and her story of her family and all of it done in Madhubani. And the game was actually picking up resources from again a Madhupani landscape. So because everything is a natural element in the painting.
So finding the natural elements for the child and then ultimately like a coloring game done in Madhubani. So now if you think about it, the mechanic is very simple, right? Like there's it's a clicking game and then a coloring game. But the fact that we don't have anything clickable or interactive which is done in Madhubani is just like... Yeah, makes it unique.
He makes it unique. Yeah, and I just feel there's so much that can be done just by with like existing Indian forms which are either in visual print or in maybe text form which are yet to go interactive. Do you play a lot of games? I don't think I play a lot of games. I play like games, shorter games on itch and I usually prefer like games that are for shorter duration and usually games that are visual novels or a lot of narrative based.
Like Florence Times. Yeah, yeah. What are some games that you would say, you know, like you played in the last whatever year or so that like really stuck with you? So there was Venba that I really liked. Oh, I have like I have just started Venba. I haven't gone too much into it.
Yeah, the Venba is really nice. And I also like Gree, G-R-I-S, Gree that game. Love it. Love that game. Oh my God. Yeah. It's interesting like when you were talking about how you have grown up playing educational games, I think I grew up playing like more story based games and even in the games that like, you know, didn't have too much a story like let's say Age of Empires or something. They would always have like that campaign mode, right? And I would just play that and I would like read up the encyclopedia of the game to understand what the story is.
And it's interesting because like now I'm like way more interested in playing like story based games. So like short to medium length, like maybe not super long games or like, you know, especially not games that like, you know, are very repeatedly you're just playing them, playing them. Says the person who has spent 1000 plus hours in Dota, but we don't talk about that. Yeah. But yeah, as a child, I played a lot of Diner Dash. So even reputed games, I played like a lot. Yeah. But we don't talk about that anymore. No, cosy games are great. Like those games where you're like, I am just farming. Yes, please let me farm on the pixels, not in the sun. Yeah, in some in an air conditioned room.
Like you said, like, you know, there are different sliders in the food was the name Chow Bella was the name of the game. Like give me the sliders. Do you want to be on an actual dating app? No, not really. Who is going to meet people in real life? Exactly. Tolerate another human being? No, not for me.
I mean, some what I just controlled interactions are better. I know. Speaking of that, I really liked the what was the bot love game that you the day you bought game. A suitable bot. A suitable bot. Yeah. So like, I just want you to talk me through why you decided to make it the way you decided to make it. But like, first I gave up all of my personal data and I didn't even get the date.
Yeah. Did you go retry? No, you were like, I'm done. I didn't. I was like, I will accept this as the Canon ending. Yeah, so the initial idea was to make a game on. So it was a part of a game jam where the focus was on media literacy.
And I was very intrigued by the idea of AI deepfakes and how to identify AI deepfakes. And I do know, unfortunately, one two people like my friends who got kind of scammed on dating apps. So I scammed, I wouldn't mean financial, but also like emotional scam where the person really doesn't exist or they are lying about that identity and things like that. And anyway, now with AI, it's very difficult to know who is speaking to you for what intention. You keep on getting so many messages and calls and you don't really know if it's real or not.
Like you always have to keep your suspicious guard quite high because the AI is just building up and they're not really guidelines for consumers to understand how to use this ethically so that your data privacy is safe. So I thought, like, how about this that, you know, there is a bot who is looking for love and because human dating apps are full of bots anyway, they decide to go into a dating app to find another bot, but a bot which is like a good bot like that will be a good partner to our cute little bot and kind of, you know, through choices, help the user understand like how how sneakily people would maybe try to get your data or there was another section where I created a persona, they're trying to sell you a fitness product. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So whatever you speak to them, they'll be like, okay, buy this now. Have you tried it?
Like, yeah, it's neaky Lee starts very like, you know, very softly, and then it just becomes more and more and more and more pressure. But have you thought about this? Yeah, right. Yeah. And then there was, there was one real person. So one person I actually made on a dating app. I asked them that can I please use your profile. And that was a human person. And then there was the sweet pot, which was kind of clingy. But yeah, I think it was a good match for our cute little bot.
And the nation idea was to of course make it like a nonlinear experience and maybe even integrate AI into this to make it seem old real life. But because it was done in just 48 hours, I thought let's just make it linear to get the prototype out. And I really want maybe like, in the future, if someone wants to build on this together, because there's a lot that can be done with it, like even the process of making this game taught me a lot about AI, because I trained these personas on chat GPT. So I asked AI, like, choose the name this person is from Delhi and should be around this age group. What do you think their responses to these prompts would be and AI gave me some answers. And then I said, okay, now you I gave them more data. And it's like now you talk to me as if you are this this this person. And what would your goal be if you are trying to market me something and there were some more options that I gave me and then it was solidified that this is your bio and this is your goal.
So I told them now you talk to me like I would play the board and you talk to me as if you were this persona. So that was an interesting process. Do you generally like work alone like all the games you've made quite a few games like all the games have you are you the sole author of it. So all my game all the games on itch I've made alone. Yeah, yeah, because those are all like, I would consider it's like for a long time I would say okay, you know, these are art, new media art type projects or game projects. And yeah, most of the commercial stuff of course I've done it with people but till now I've not like I would love to actually work with someone on these personal ideas but somehow they they are much smaller in scale till now all the games I've made alone. Interesting.
So I've worked on a lot of different types of media and like in many of them I've done solo work I think games are the only ones where I haven't done any solo work and I'm fortunate like my sister is a game developer. So we're like, how do you do it together and of course like you said, when it's one person you have to keep scale limited to something. But like when there are two people you can actually double the work. You can actually do a lot more like what's your view on building games alone because like one of the things that I find very challenging is that like game design is very complex compared to like, I mean like no shade to product design but game design feels a lot more complex than product design just on a baseline level. Like how do you feel about like you know, just working on it on your own especially like when you have let's just 48 hours to get something out. Yeah, I think doing game design alone is sometimes it's say for example for the game jam thing it was more about you know me wanting to really get out, you know, produce a game because I haven't created something for a while and maybe this topic interests me.
But I think the scope as you said it becomes pretty limited. But what I try to do it as is a writing exercise, because like at the core game design is like good writing and good storytelling. So even even with a suitable board game I was like, because it was just like narrative writing right at the core of it. I feel the visuals like there are so many tools available now like this canvass AI all of these things. If you want to get an okayish prototype out, you would be able to create some visuals of course it wouldn't be like the high fidelity version. But then I just try to focus on a good story like what what would be a good story to experience. But I do agree if you want to make it a more immersive experience with like interesting characters and maybe more non-linear storytelling you do need at least three to four people on board.
But I think that's why I focus a lot on narrative games. It's like okay it's a writing exercise for me. Like in then in my head I just like trying not to say that okay I'm just doing this alone. I'm just like okay this is me trying a new tool. So like for example there was a time under lockdown I was just trying out bitsy. So I was just like okay I just want to create something on bitsy and there's no other agenda. What is bitsy? So bitsy is a very simple 8 bit tool. It's on H and you can create simple narrative based games. Interesting. And then it looks really cool.
That's where the Dilwali Dulhania Lejange game is from. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. So one of the things that I have like learned in the last year in terms of like my own process is that like AI acts as a collaborator. Like the thing that you were also saying that when you were making a suitable bot AI was like your co-narrative designer in some ways. Right. But like how do you feel about AI overall because you're an artist and like you know you're like I can't use it as a tool.
But like what are your thoughts overall because for a lot of people it's like it's taking away jobs. It's definitely going to like you know change the landscape of how people are creating. Like there was some tool that yesterday or the day before that came out that like they've shown one image and then somebody has made an entire game out of that image. Like the tool has made a game interactive game out of that image. And like how do you feel about that because like the generating an image generating like you know some text is different.
But like when I started generating entire like interactive experiences like how do you feel. Yeah. I would love to see how that AI tool has made this interactive experience. Yeah. I think yeah that's a big big question. Right. And I think this is a question that like probably the biggest people in tech are grappling with and hopefully hopefully creating some ethical policies like around it. Because it's so new that probably they don't even know what is ethical and what is not ethical.
Like we are discussing most people can't even decide what would be a good policy to have. I think even with things like data data privacy where you know we were just accepting and we are still are accepting cookies left right center. GDPR came in so much later and even now things aren't tracked. Yeah. We're being tracked for everything and that's all we're doing everywhere. Yeah. We've been tracked for everything and it is kind of scary in many aspects.
So for example like you said right. Like if there is an image I created and although I do not provide the ownership of that image to anyone maybe the like AI can kind of pick it up and say that. Okay. Maybe create an image in the style of XYZ artists and then XYZ artist does not get compensated for their work. So I think for those cases I really feel there should be some policy that comes in where even if AI is using your data you are in some way compensated for your work. So or like if there is a repository that AI recomposites or mixes from my contribution to that repository should be like consensual.
And I say that OK it's free or I get paid for it which is not true. But I really hope that someone or like people are working on this. But it seems like they're working on it but I don't know. But like about jobs and all I think with anything you know I feel that it's just the nature of tech like things will become easier and easier. And people will find ways to make themselves useful to the economy or there'll be universal basic income and people don't have to labor so much all the time.
Because these tools will come in and in some ways they are they are helpful. Right. Like we discussed in our view we don't want like a complete removal of these tools. I think just for the very basic tasks I don't think you can completely erase like human intervention for AI maybe for recruitment processes but you would still need human intervention for biases or like even AI. Like even if it's used for design or maybe you need at least one instead of three designers maybe you need only one. But then that designer should be good enough with all the tools available and is quick enough.
Yeah. I also feel like at least in my experience it's starting to turn that like now maybe like at the entry level there aren't as many requirements. But like the requirement would then start concentrating towards a more directorial position or like a slightly more experienced person who can actually articulate what is the vision and what is wrong. Because like when you're talking to AI also always the argument goes into oh but I should not be making art like it should be helping people do it like you know automate easier things but very honestly like social media posts are they really art when you are making it for a brand like are brand social media posts that go up like Friday are they art like they are just automation they are actually being done by probably some unpaid intern somewhere who's being paid in exposure. So true. Yeah. And even then like a lot of times a lot of these accounts are just doing it for the algorithm to stay relevant.
It's not even as if there is some real contribution. It's like garbage feeding garbage to get more garbage. Yeah. Yeah. And it's like if I make one search engine like OK I'm feeling anxious or I'm feeling sad. My whole Instagram will be flooded on like 1000 things I can do to you know help out my anxiety go to a therapist by crystals. Leave me alone please like maybe you know because sometimes you don't want the algorithm to work for you you want to be surprised and that that element of surprise is now missing right. Yeah. It's like sometimes you're like why are you just sitting beside me always listening to everything that I am saying and so stop being so attuned.
I agree like I want to be surprised sometimes. It's very eerie how like so I had booked a pottery session some like you know some weeks ago. It was a very fun session. I had a good time since then because I made the mistake of going to one live thing. It's like here is an event that is happening here. You do you want to go there. Yeah. That's my whole personality according to Instagram. It's like do you want to go to Kochi. We are doing a meditation retreat. Do you want to come to go. We are doing sound bath for seven days. I'm sorry that I went to pottery for one day. Wow. So I met a friend recently. She is from Poland and her whole focus is on changing your relationship with phones like in the future. How do you kind of lead a life which is which is kind of free and sustainable.
And she's also a lot into understanding digital footprints like how your email usage or your social media usage how it releases energy and how like just digital devices change your mental health and your mental state. So for eight years she's been using the same phone. It's been four years that she's been off all social media accounts and she's uses her phone in black and white and she was telling me how it like she lost a lot of friends along the way. But she started nurturing other relationships. She's like I sometimes talk to plants and animals and she was like it's not easy at all. But it really has changed her in chemistry. Yeah. Yeah. Mental health. And she was like it's been such a short period of time. Right. Like I can remember like I got my first smartphone maybe in second year of college or first year of college. But like I knew a time where I was continuously hooked. So there is a way to maybe find a balance. But it's very difficult to do because you are like we are rewarded to be online but we're not rewarded to be offline.
You know not in terms of just the gamification rewarding right. Of course rewards in terms of like meeting a friend and it gives you joy or like being out in nature and gives you peace. But yeah those some of our brain isn't able to register those things. I feel like we have slowly almost culturally like you know trained ourselves to be unable to bear boredom. I was talking to somebody and she was like the moment I realized that Instagram is a problem is when I was brushing my teeth and I was watching greens. And it's like you know you are max brushing your teeth for two minutes. And I can you just to do one thing for those two minutes probably not like you know I'd be sitting in front of my computer. I have like my laptop screen my extra screen my phone screen my iPad screen. And like there are you know four four things which are sort of like giving so much visual information to me. And I'm sure like that is true for almost everybody. I agree with you. Like I don't think I started using smartphones until like I graduated from college.
And now I have no idea what I used to do in that like what was it like to not have your phone around you 24 seven. Yeah I feel that we were lucky enough. I would say I mean I'm sure the new generation will find their own ways of creating. But we were lucky enough to utilize creativity from the lens of like blank slate and I remember when the Internet first came it was so exciting because it was mostly about creation like I used to love the Internet back then like my space everyone's play website is completely different. Their own songs are playing. There are some sparkles and jifs and like it's so random. Everyone everyone's page tells their own personality and was a lot about making and less about Showcase consumption. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like Instagram and meta overall really like pushed the entire Internet in the direction of like oh you have to present yourself a certain kind of way on the Internet. Right. Like you're like my Instagram photo should be pretty. My breakfast is amazing. And it's like no man sometimes your breakfast looks like a slop and you still eat it because it's tasty. It doesn't have to be like an Instagrammable plate.
Right. Yeah. And also everything is also looks the same because like in terms of my space it was like everyone's page was different or you could really tell OK this person likes this kind of music and I think slowly and steadily because everyone's profiles started to look the same and everyone's posting the same kind of photos and then this like ascribing to one kind of living only and like that being the perfect way to live. I think it's quite pressurizing. Right. Like there are times I kind of fall into it like oh everyone has more friends or everyone's traveling mode or doing more work stuff but it's it's not true. And it's like I don't know after maybe many many years when we grow much older we'll probably realize like there'll be some research on how it has changed us. I feel like it would be one of those moments where like you know people after 30 years they realize oh lead in petrol was really bad for our mental development. Oh uncontrolled access to permanent dopamine sources is really bad for our neurochemistry. Probably yes. Why do I think of that.
Yeah but how do you make sense of it. Like I struggle with it a lot like when you're making things for the digital platform and you know that like what it does to you and like there should be limited access to it because I think I struggle with it when there are so many opposers of games right like especially in education. Oh like what are you going to give the kids and like parents and teachers are very concerned that OK games are bad. Well I don't agree with the entire philosophy is it's obviously hard to make a point with people who are totally against it. I have like certain shock and our tactics for that. So I remember like having this conversation with like somebody at a party and she was like so opposed to games. She was like an older slightly older lady maybe like you know what if I 50 something like that. She has two kids. And she was like I really hate it when my sons play games because I don't know what they're doing and like you know I really don't buy it. She basically said something like I know you are the kind of person who's making these addictive things. And then I was like but there are many kinds of games and then she was like so much. I mean she also had quite a bit to drink but like you know she was so much on attack. But then I was just like see what there are you know different kinds of games.
You can say that movies are bad but then there are so many different kinds of movies right. Like Discovery Channel is also making movies only. And then she's just like oh that's interesting. I was like so I don't know if you've played this game but like there is this game called that dragon cancer. Yeah I played. I've heard you played. So I don't have the courage to play the game. But I just describe like you know the synopsis of the game to people that like it's made by a father who lost their child to cancer. And it's about a parent taking care of like a newborn who they know is not going to survive for too long. Then she's just like stunned. I'm like that is also a game. Like there are games that are made which are like that as well. And then she's like oh I never knew. I was like yeah sure you know like most of the things that you hear about are like you know games that are about shooting and games that are about that. And then maybe like I talk a little bit more deeply. But so there are studies on like you know how kids who have played games their failure resistance is a lot higher resilience. Right. And I just then start talking about things like you know what teaches you that it's OK to fail and you should get up and try again.
Like your classes and courses and exams don't teach you that your exam actually labels you as a failure. If you've got a bad grade you are a failure. Right. Like oh you are a second banker always or like you will never be in the top three. Like that is what our examination system teaches us. But like games actually teach you go again and again and again and things. And then I think like it's just I mean it's slightly easier when you have gone to a grade college and you just tell people that like I play games and then I still did this and now I'm doing that. Somehow it's almost like proof by action that like yeah I did all of those things. I also personally feel like when I've been making things I have gotten into a lot of arguments with people around the ethical dilemma part of it. And like I'm very much myself on the side of oh you should take ownership of the thing that you are making you should feel the ethical and moral responsibility. Like for example what you are saying right. Like you're making games for children. You could very easily make them addicted. Right. Nobody like it's on your shoulders to make sure that they are not addicted as the maker of the game. And I feel like when I have been in those teams where I'm making things I'm always like no but we need to make sure that it's not addictive.
I mean it doesn't always go well. I've had like teams where the founders are just like but why wouldn't we want people to be addicted to our product. And then at that point you're like OK now do I stay with these people or do I like you know move on do I want to change the system from the inside. Or do I want to like you know go out and work with something and amplify something that is more ethical. That's how tricky thing but like that's how I would say I try to balance it. No it's completely right. And I think of course parents are justified with their arguments about higher screen time for kids. But the truth is also you know that if they are to be on the Internet anyway if they are to be watching or seeing their phone anyway why not make it for something fun. And because I have always been working in social emotional learning or games for social impact that is still an easier argument because I you know if you go in the metro or anywhere you go you see a lot of parents handling over you know just their phones to their child and God knows what kind of reels that like four year old five year old is just watching. It's like horrifying. I'm like oh my God I want to intervene what this child is watching. But you know they're already on their phones if there can be something that can be used for good. And like you said there are some mechanics that you can intentionally put to have like stopping points or to say that OK this is enough for a day maybe come again later or come tomorrow.
So even if it's something that you know it's behavioral maybe a game on mindfulness it's like it has a beginning and an end and you know they may become on another day and maybe slower mechanics or the focus is not on competing with someone all the time. There is a thread that like as you were speaking I just got reminded of many years ago I had seen this talk on using tendon befriending mechanics. OK so are you aware of tendon befriending mechanics. Yeah yeah yeah. So like I had seen a talk pre code. She used to be at that point she used to be a engineer at Ubisoft and then I became Twitter friends with her and then I became real friends with her because I was like you are so cool. But like she was just talking about at that point how like they are trying to create digital experiences on the tendon befriending mechanic rather than on an adrenaline response.
And like you know how do you generate that kindness and like you know generate that friendliness rather than because for many people warmth is what they are seeking. They're really not seeking like you know like you said competition is not the point actually connection is the point. That was also very interesting because like once I saw that talk like you know I started going down that rabbit hole and just like exploring more of those kind of mechanics and that really changed how my design work. Like you know sort of like that informed a lot of how I did my design thinking afterwards. Yeah. Yeah. In fact very similar to this. So just two years ago. So I also keep on doing some like research work on like how games can be used on learning on learning and things like that. And I collaborated with this friend of mine from UCSC who's doing a PhD on games and games for learning specifically.
And it was more of a review paper where we were trying to find out a common thread for mechanics and storytelling for games that can be used to inculcate compassionate leadership. So like which was quite opposed to like you know because when then when you say leader you want to you kind of imagine in the context of games at least like oh you know we'll be imagining someone just leading people and like there's a competition and there's some at nil in Russia and things like that. But we want to want to see if like compassionate leadership could be you know so that we took two strands like there is one self compassion compassion for others and then there is there are leadership qualities. And then we came up with a with set of mechanics with which where you know tenant befriend was one of them. And there were some ideal mechanics. So yeah we did come up with a few common threads and we did go through different kinds of games for this. So there was also overcooked. It's a co-op game and but like and also very different games. There's also kind of world. So very very simple ideal mechanic game where you have to maybe plan
a tree every day and every day blossoms and it gives you a message and maybe you track your emotions and things like that. You know just to identify different kinds of mechanics that exist in these games. But also I think a lot of what I learned was from my time with with UNESCO MGI beware. Our whole focus was on just finding commercial games that could be used for social emotional learning. Yeah. Interesting. That makes me think of so. Have you heard of the game Death Stranding. No I haven't. It's a post apocalyptic game like kind of dark world. And there is almost like this acid rain that ages everything that it touches. So like you know you build anything it will like if you are in the rain you will start aging. And what you are character is doing is like you know you are transporting boxes like you're a glorified career service. And like the game is beautifully made like proper triple A game. But one of my friends he played that game quite a bit. And his favorite part was while you can't go up in the game like you can't play with other people live. But if somebody else has made a road you can use that. Right. So there is like this community sense of building resources in the world that like you know you're just like making things easier and easier for like other people. So you might use the road once or twice.
But there might be hundred other people who have used that road. Right. And like as you were speaking about sort of like these more collaborative approaches to like you know just like mechanics that can encourage more collaborative things like these kind of things where it's almost like it's like real world. Right. I don't know who has made the road that I'm using. But I am using it every day. I think Death Stranding tried to capture that except it's like other players who are doing it. Wow. That's so beautiful. I'm going to check this game out. Yeah. Yeah. Like I couldn't get into it because it's a little bit like too slow for my taste. But yeah. Like it's just like theoretically it sounds really interesting. Yeah. Even Barry me my love have you played that game. I've heard of it. But like you know tell me about it. So it's a it's a game which is set on the refugee crisis migration issue and you play as the husband of a wife named Noor who is trying to flee Syria and that game has about like 28 different endings.
And you know it's also very like it actually feels like they have a nice bond. She's sending funny selfies and sometimes oh should I go to the bar or should I just eat go to the restaurant and like simple decisions like that. But then she's also seeking his help to make some more important decisions or like whether I should bribe this person and get on this ship and flee or should I just go back and basically larger decisions like these. And it's your job to help her make those decisions. And it's very interesting because there are times when she doesn't reply. So in like real life your loved ones don't reply and you're like anxiously waiting. So if you would actually there's no way you can play the game like OK I'll just finish it off in two hours because I think if I would say that you can actually finish it in one hour if you were to be like back to back but because there are these three hours passes where like three hours pass by and you don't receive a text back so you're like forced to just maybe keep your game down and just be like wait in that anxiety or like what happened to her.
That mechanic was really interesting and also the game conception was actually by a journalist who was covering Syria and like you know I think reportage itself it's so daunting like how do you explain all these lived experiences. So he spoke with a lot of people who went through these themselves and kind of build this experience. Yeah. So it sounds amazing. Like I have chills. Yeah it's a really interesting game. Yeah. Even Dot's home is good. That's a free game. And basically it's about how black people were denied to own property in the states and how hard it was for them to keep their homes and people were telling them to move out of certain areas which was just meant like because they wanted to have like white colonies and things like that. So this is like this girl is in like she's a third generation of the family and there's a way for you to keep switching back to the past and then coming back to the present. Although she's like a teenage like I don't care. I just want to live a life kind of a person but she's forced to kind of see what happened to her parents and what happened to her grandparents and kind of make sense of what is happening now.
So I found that pretty interesting and all the just to see because they don't utilize too many landscapes is the home and there are streets outside and maybe like the school area but to put that in like three eras like the same scenes painted. That's really in that I found that very interesting. Yeah like some of these narrative experiences are so I don't know like I think I felt similarly when I played gone home. Because that also is like you know you just are in this space and it's unfamiliar but also like you know there isn't much gameplay or walking around and reading things right. But it's just very interesting how the game is able to like just make you feel so much even these games you are describing. I'm definitely going to check them out because like it just feels like you would end up feeling so much more because you're immersed in this thing.
And also I think the music and the visuals everything just puts you in that experience. Do you want to make these kind of games. Yeah for sure like I would love to maybe make something you know maybe exploring Delhi's history or like you know I keep on thinking about like oh how this place looked like 10 years ago or 20 years ago or 30 years ago. And there have been so many drastic changes. It's very powerful to put things in this perspective. So I really do want to explore something around culture and yeah narrative experiences told through digital games. That would be fun. I would love to play it. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah it's really powerful and I think sometimes I think games become more powerful because you feel like you have that agency. So like the empathic response becomes higher because you feel that you made the choice. So like if you know what goes missing you really feel that oh God like you gave a response which so now she's no more or she's gone missing and things like that.
So it's like very very impactful. The music is by Akshay Ramu Halli of BTRPT music editing is by Beatnik. My professional work is available at www.andhurati-shrivastava.com which is A-N-U-R-A-T-I-S-R-I-V-A-S-T-V-A.com and you could also just message me on Instagram I'm at at the rate Anurati underscore Shrivastava.