1 00:00:15,774 --> 00:00:17,688 I want to talk about games for a change. 2 00:00:17,713 --> 00:00:20,159 When we think of games, there's all kinds of things. 3 00:00:20,183 --> 00:00:23,568 Maybe you're ticked off, or maybe, you're looking forward to a new game. 4 00:00:23,592 --> 00:00:25,450 You've been up too late playing a game. 5 00:00:25,474 --> 00:00:26,937 All these things happen to me. 6 00:00:26,961 --> 00:00:28,396 But when we think about games, 7 00:00:28,420 --> 00:00:30,590 a lot of times we think about stuff like this: 8 00:00:30,614 --> 00:00:33,645 first-person shooters, or the big, what we would call AAA games, 9 00:00:33,669 --> 00:00:35,543 or maybe you're a Facebook game player. 10 00:00:35,567 --> 00:00:37,442 This is one my partner and I worked on. 11 00:00:37,466 --> 00:00:40,769 Maybe you play Facebook games, and that's what we're making right now. 12 00:00:40,793 --> 00:00:42,295 This is a lighter form of game. 13 00:00:42,319 --> 00:00:44,922 Maybe you think about the tragically boring board games 14 00:00:44,946 --> 00:00:47,188 that hold us hostage in Thanksgiving situations. 15 00:00:47,212 --> 00:00:50,951 This would be one of the tragically boring board games that you can figure out. 16 00:00:50,975 --> 00:00:52,740 Or maybe you're in your living room, 17 00:00:52,764 --> 00:00:54,621 playing with the Wii with the kids, 18 00:00:54,645 --> 00:00:58,379 and there's this whole range of games, and that's very much what I think about. 19 00:00:58,403 --> 00:01:01,344 I make my living from games, I've been lucky enough to do this 20 00:01:01,368 --> 00:01:04,805 since I was 15, which also qualifies as I've never really had a real job. 21 00:01:05,328 --> 00:01:09,207 But we think about games as fun, and that's completely reasonable, 22 00:01:09,231 --> 00:01:10,845 but let's just think about this. 23 00:01:10,869 --> 00:01:13,181 So this one here, this is the 1980 Olympics. 24 00:01:13,199 --> 00:01:15,024 Now I don't know where you guys were, 25 00:01:15,048 --> 00:01:16,423 but I was in my living room. 26 00:01:16,447 --> 00:01:18,249 It was practically a religious event. 27 00:01:18,273 --> 00:01:20,860 And this is when the Americans beat the Russians, 28 00:01:20,884 --> 00:01:23,123 and this was... Yes, it was technically a game. 29 00:01:23,147 --> 00:01:24,474 Hockey is a game. 30 00:01:24,498 --> 00:01:26,244 But really, was this a game? 31 00:01:26,268 --> 00:01:28,007 I mean, people cried. 32 00:01:28,031 --> 00:01:31,372 I've never seen my mother cry like that at the end of Monopoly. 33 00:01:31,396 --> 00:01:32,538 (Laughter) 34 00:01:32,562 --> 00:01:34,914 And so this was an amazing experience. 35 00:01:34,938 --> 00:01:37,448 Or, if anybody here is from Boston... 36 00:01:37,472 --> 00:01:40,525 So when the Boston Red Sox won the World Series 37 00:01:40,549 --> 00:01:43,456 after I believe, 351 years... 38 00:01:43,480 --> 00:01:44,757 (Laughter) 39 00:01:44,781 --> 00:01:47,040 when they won the World Series, it was amazing. 40 00:01:47,064 --> 00:01:49,462 I happened to be living in Springfield at the time, 41 00:01:49,486 --> 00:01:51,481 and the best part of it was, 42 00:01:51,505 --> 00:01:54,118 you would close the women's door in the bathroom, 43 00:01:54,142 --> 00:01:57,033 and I remember seeing "Go Sox," and I thought, really? 44 00:01:57,557 --> 00:02:00,606 Or the houses, you'd come out, because every game, 45 00:02:00,630 --> 00:02:03,414 well, I think almost every game, went into overtime, right? 46 00:02:03,438 --> 00:02:06,787 So we'd be outside, and all the other lights are on in the whole block. 47 00:02:06,811 --> 00:02:09,871 And kids... the attendance was down in school, 48 00:02:09,895 --> 00:02:13,043 kids weren't going to school, but it's OK, it's the Red Sox, right? 49 00:02:13,067 --> 00:02:15,714 I mean, there's education, and then there's the Red Sox, 50 00:02:15,738 --> 00:02:17,503 and we know where they're stacked. 51 00:02:17,527 --> 00:02:19,348 So this was an amazing experience, 52 00:02:19,372 --> 00:02:22,861 and again, yes, it was a game, but they didn't write newspaper articles, 53 00:02:22,885 --> 00:02:27,204 people didn't say, "You know, really, I can die now, because the Red Sox won." 54 00:02:27,228 --> 00:02:28,678 And many people did. 55 00:02:28,702 --> 00:02:31,647 So games, it means something more to us. 56 00:02:31,671 --> 00:02:33,540 It absolutely means something more. 57 00:02:33,564 --> 00:02:35,813 So now, this is an abrupt transition here. 58 00:02:35,837 --> 00:02:39,139 There was three years where I actually did have a real job, sort of. 59 00:02:39,163 --> 00:02:41,719 I was the head of a college department teaching games, 60 00:02:41,743 --> 00:02:43,518 so, again, it was sort of a real job, 61 00:02:43,542 --> 00:02:47,179 and now I got to talk about making them as opposed to making them. 62 00:02:47,203 --> 00:02:50,475 Part of the job of it, when you're a chair of a department, 63 00:02:50,499 --> 00:02:52,309 is to eat, and I did that very well... 64 00:02:52,333 --> 00:02:55,174 And so I'm out at a dinner with this guy called Zig Jackson. 65 00:02:55,198 --> 00:02:58,752 So this is Zig in this photograph, this is also one of Zig's photographs. 66 00:02:58,776 --> 00:02:59,937 He's a photographer. 67 00:02:59,961 --> 00:03:05,003 And he goes all around the country taking pictures of himself, 68 00:03:05,027 --> 00:03:08,149 and you can see here he's got Zig's Indian Reservation. 69 00:03:08,226 --> 00:03:09,746 And this particular shot... 70 00:03:10,770 --> 00:03:12,910 This is one of the more traditional shots. 71 00:03:12,919 --> 00:03:14,582 This is a rain dancer. 72 00:03:14,606 --> 00:03:16,704 And this is one of my favorite shots here. 73 00:03:16,728 --> 00:03:19,983 So you can look at this, and maybe you've even seen things like this. 74 00:03:20,007 --> 00:03:21,931 This is an expression of culture, right? 75 00:03:21,955 --> 00:03:24,500 And this is actually from his Degradation series. 76 00:03:24,524 --> 00:03:27,003 And what was most fascinating to me about this series 77 00:03:27,027 --> 00:03:29,659 is just, look at that little boy there, can you imagine? 78 00:03:29,683 --> 00:03:31,934 We can see that's a traditional Native American. 79 00:03:31,958 --> 00:03:33,996 Now I just want to change that guy's race. 80 00:03:34,020 --> 00:03:35,917 Just imagine if that's a black guy. 81 00:03:35,941 --> 00:03:39,421 So, "Honey, come here, let's get you a picture with the black guy." Right? 82 00:03:39,445 --> 00:03:41,255 Like, seriously, nobody would do this. 83 00:03:41,279 --> 00:03:42,664 It baffles the mind. 84 00:03:42,688 --> 00:03:45,569 And so Zig, being Indian, likewise it baffles his mind. 85 00:03:45,593 --> 00:03:46,839 His favorite photograph... 86 00:03:46,863 --> 00:03:49,741 My favorite photograph of his, which I don't have in here... 87 00:03:49,765 --> 00:03:53,004 Is Indian taking picture of white people taking pictures of Indians. 88 00:03:53,028 --> 00:03:54,538 (Laughter) 89 00:03:54,562 --> 00:03:56,957 So I happen to be at dinner with this photographer, 90 00:03:56,981 --> 00:03:59,032 and he was talking with another photographer 91 00:03:59,056 --> 00:04:00,745 about a shooting that had occurred, 92 00:04:00,769 --> 00:04:02,489 and it was on an Indian Reservation. 93 00:04:02,513 --> 00:04:04,769 He'd taken his camera up there to photograph it, 94 00:04:04,793 --> 00:04:07,373 but when he got there, he discovered he couldn't do it. 95 00:04:07,397 --> 00:04:09,179 He just couldn't capture the picture. 96 00:04:09,203 --> 00:04:12,098 And so they were talking back and forth about this question. 97 00:04:12,122 --> 00:04:14,040 Do you take the picture or not? 98 00:04:14,064 --> 00:04:16,445 And that was fascinating to me as a game designer, 99 00:04:16,469 --> 00:04:17,899 because it never occurs to me, 100 00:04:17,923 --> 00:04:21,072 should I make the game about this difficult topic or not? 101 00:04:21,096 --> 00:04:23,010 Because we just make things that are fun 102 00:04:23,034 --> 00:04:26,515 or will make you feel fear, that visceral excitement. 103 00:04:26,539 --> 00:04:28,496 But every other medium does it. 104 00:04:28,520 --> 00:04:29,689 So this is my kid. 105 00:04:29,713 --> 00:04:32,386 This is Maezza, and when she was seven years old, 106 00:04:32,410 --> 00:04:34,050 she came home from school one day, 107 00:04:34,074 --> 00:04:37,328 and like I do every single day, I asked her, "What did you do today?" 108 00:04:37,352 --> 00:04:39,698 So she said, "We talked about the Middle Passage." 109 00:04:39,722 --> 00:04:42,076 Now, this was a big moment. Maezza's dad is black, 110 00:04:42,100 --> 00:04:44,699 and I knew this day was coming. 111 00:04:44,723 --> 00:04:47,839 I wasn't expecting it at seven, I don't know why, but I wasn't. 112 00:04:47,863 --> 00:04:51,216 Anyways, so I asked her, "How do you feel about that?" 113 00:04:51,240 --> 00:04:52,797 So she proceeded to tell me, 114 00:04:52,821 --> 00:04:56,330 and so any of you who are parents will recognize the bingo buzzwords here. 115 00:04:56,354 --> 00:04:59,027 "The ships start in England, they come down from England, 116 00:04:59,051 --> 00:05:01,241 they go to Africa, they go across the ocean... 117 00:05:01,265 --> 00:05:02,910 That's the Middle Passage part... 118 00:05:02,934 --> 00:05:06,133 They come to America, where the slaves are sold," she's telling me. 119 00:05:06,157 --> 00:05:08,165 But Abraham Lincoln was elected president, 120 00:05:08,189 --> 00:05:10,480 and then he passed the Emancipation Proclamation, 121 00:05:10,504 --> 00:05:11,671 and now they're free. 122 00:05:11,695 --> 00:05:12,999 Pause for about 10 seconds. 123 00:05:13,023 --> 00:05:14,337 "Can I play a game, Mommy?" 124 00:05:14,361 --> 00:05:18,048 And I thought, that's it? And so, you know, 125 00:05:18,773 --> 00:05:22,830 this is the Middle Passage, this is an incredibly significant event, 126 00:05:22,885 --> 00:05:26,800 and she's treating it like, basically some black people went on a cruise, 127 00:05:26,824 --> 00:05:28,832 this is more or less how it sounds to her. 128 00:05:28,856 --> 00:05:30,013 (Laughter) 129 00:05:30,037 --> 00:05:32,903 And so, to me, I wanted more value in this, 130 00:05:32,927 --> 00:05:36,107 so when she asked if she could play a game, I said, "Yes." 131 00:05:36,131 --> 00:05:37,316 (Laughter) 132 00:05:37,340 --> 00:05:39,821 And so I happened to have all of these little pieces. 133 00:05:39,845 --> 00:05:42,944 I'm a game designer, so I have this stuff sitting around my house. 134 00:05:42,968 --> 00:05:46,221 I said, "Yeah, you can play a game," and I give her a bunch of these, 135 00:05:46,245 --> 00:05:48,655 and I tell her to paint them in different families. 136 00:05:48,679 --> 00:05:50,766 These are pictures of Maezza when she was... 137 00:05:50,790 --> 00:05:52,732 God, it still chokes me up seeing these. 138 00:05:52,756 --> 00:05:54,581 So she's painting her little families. 139 00:05:54,605 --> 00:05:57,241 So then I grab a bunch of them and I put them on a boat. 140 00:05:57,266 --> 00:05:59,675 This was the boat, it was made quickly, obviously. 141 00:05:59,676 --> 00:06:02,617 And so the basic gist of it is, I grabbed a bunch of families, 142 00:06:02,641 --> 00:06:05,077 and she's like, "Mommy, but you forgot the pink baby 143 00:06:05,101 --> 00:06:06,519 and you forgot the blue daddy 144 00:06:06,543 --> 00:06:08,415 and you forgot all these other things." 145 00:06:08,439 --> 00:06:09,977 And she says, "They want to go." 146 00:06:10,001 --> 00:06:12,217 And I said, "Honey, no, they don't want to go. 147 00:06:12,241 --> 00:06:15,546 This is the Middle Passage, Nobody wants to go on the Middle Passage." 148 00:06:15,570 --> 00:06:19,452 So she gave me a look that only a daughter of a game designer would give a mother, 149 00:06:19,476 --> 00:06:22,248 and as we're going across the ocean, following these rules, 150 00:06:22,272 --> 00:06:24,331 she realizes that she's rolling pretty high, 151 00:06:24,355 --> 00:06:26,644 and she says to me, "We're not going to make it." 152 00:06:26,668 --> 00:06:28,785 And she realizes, we don't have enough food, 153 00:06:28,809 --> 00:06:30,126 and so she asks what to do, 154 00:06:30,150 --> 00:06:32,880 and I say... remember, she's seven... 155 00:06:32,904 --> 00:06:34,940 "We can either put some people in the water 156 00:06:34,964 --> 00:06:36,835 or we can hope that they don't get sick 157 00:06:36,859 --> 00:06:38,481 and we make it to the other side." 158 00:06:39,505 --> 00:06:42,076 Just the look on her face came over... 159 00:06:42,100 --> 00:06:44,029 Now mind you this is after a month of... 160 00:06:44,051 --> 00:06:45,730 This is Black History Month, right? 161 00:06:45,754 --> 00:06:48,894 After a month, she says to me, "Did this really happen?" 162 00:06:49,200 --> 00:06:51,986 And I said, "Yes." And so she said... 163 00:06:52,510 --> 00:06:54,157 This is her brother and sister... 164 00:06:54,181 --> 00:06:57,158 "If I came out of the woods, Avalon and Donovan might be gone." 165 00:06:57,183 --> 00:06:58,350 "Yes." 166 00:06:58,374 --> 00:07:00,182 "But I'd get to see them in America." 167 00:07:00,206 --> 00:07:01,357 "No." 168 00:07:01,381 --> 00:07:03,910 "But what if I saw them? Couldn't we stay together?" 169 00:07:03,934 --> 00:07:05,185 "So Daddy could be gone." 170 00:07:05,209 --> 00:07:06,367 "Yes." 171 00:07:06,391 --> 00:07:08,828 She was fascinated by this, and she started to cry, 172 00:07:08,852 --> 00:07:12,251 I started to cry, her father started to cry, and now we're all crying. 173 00:07:12,275 --> 00:07:16,148 He didn't expect to come home from work to the Middle Passage, but there it goes. 174 00:07:16,172 --> 00:07:18,265 And so, we made this game, and she got it. 175 00:07:18,289 --> 00:07:20,845 She got it because she spent time with these people. 176 00:07:20,869 --> 00:07:24,114 It wasn't abstract stuff in a brochure or in a movie. 177 00:07:24,638 --> 00:07:27,706 And so it was just an incredibly powerful experience. 178 00:07:27,730 --> 00:07:30,710 This is the game, which I've ended up calling "The New World," 179 00:07:30,734 --> 00:07:32,016 because I like the phrase. 180 00:07:32,040 --> 00:07:34,824 I don't think the New World felt too new worldly exciting 181 00:07:34,848 --> 00:07:37,279 to the people who were brought over on slave ships. 182 00:07:37,303 --> 00:07:40,389 But when this happened, I saw the whole planet; I was so excited. 183 00:07:40,413 --> 00:07:42,799 I'd been making games for 20-some years, 184 00:07:42,823 --> 00:07:44,822 and then I decided to do it again. 185 00:07:44,846 --> 00:07:46,262 My history is Irish. 186 00:07:46,286 --> 00:07:49,418 So this is a game called "Síochán Leat." It's "peace be with you." 187 00:07:49,442 --> 00:07:51,973 It's the entire history of my family in a single game. 188 00:07:51,997 --> 00:07:54,496 I made another game called "Train." 189 00:07:54,520 --> 00:07:57,575 I was making a series of six games that covered difficult topics, 190 00:07:57,599 --> 00:08:01,309 and if you're going to cover a difficult topic, this is one you need to cover, 191 00:08:01,333 --> 00:08:04,061 and I'll let you figure out what that's about on your own. 192 00:08:04,085 --> 00:08:06,938 And I also made a game about the Trail of Tears. 193 00:08:06,962 --> 00:08:09,416 This is a game with 50,000 individual pieces. 194 00:08:09,440 --> 00:08:12,824 I was crazy when I decided to start it, but I'm in the middle of it now. 195 00:08:12,848 --> 00:08:14,075 It's the same thing. 196 00:08:14,099 --> 00:08:17,026 I'm hoping that I'll teach culture through these games. 197 00:08:17,050 --> 00:08:19,352 And the one I'm working on right now, which is... 198 00:08:19,376 --> 00:08:21,202 Because I'm right in the middle of it, 199 00:08:21,226 --> 00:08:23,692 and these for some reason choke me up like crazy... 200 00:08:23,716 --> 00:08:25,771 Is a game called "Mexican Kitchen Workers." 201 00:08:25,795 --> 00:08:28,240 And originally, it was a math problem, more or less. 202 00:08:28,264 --> 00:08:30,331 Here's the economics of illegal immigration. 203 00:08:30,355 --> 00:08:32,556 And the more I learned about Mexican culture... 204 00:08:32,580 --> 00:08:34,850 My partner is Mexican — The more I learned that, 205 00:08:34,874 --> 00:08:37,203 you know, for all of us, food is a basic need, 206 00:08:37,227 --> 00:08:40,534 and it is obviously with Mexicans, too, but it's much more than that. 207 00:08:40,558 --> 00:08:42,988 It's an expression of love. It's an expression of... 208 00:08:43,011 --> 00:08:45,462 God, I'm totally choking up way more than I thought. 209 00:08:45,486 --> 00:08:47,358 I'll look away from the picture. 210 00:08:47,382 --> 00:08:50,678 It's an expression of beauty, it's how they say they love you. 211 00:08:50,702 --> 00:08:52,054 It's how they say they care, 212 00:08:52,078 --> 00:08:55,106 and you can't hear somebody talk about their Mexican grandmother 213 00:08:55,130 --> 00:08:57,183 without saying "food" in the first sentence. 214 00:08:57,183 --> 00:08:59,243 And so to me, this beautiful culture, 215 00:08:59,267 --> 00:09:03,587 this beautiful expression is something that I want to capture through games. 216 00:09:03,611 --> 00:09:07,112 And so games, for a change, it changes how we see topics, 217 00:09:07,136 --> 00:09:10,648 it changes our perceptions about those people in topics, 218 00:09:10,672 --> 00:09:12,394 and it changes ourselves. 219 00:09:12,418 --> 00:09:14,607 We change as people through games, 220 00:09:14,631 --> 00:09:16,667 because we're involved, and we're playing, 221 00:09:16,691 --> 00:09:18,180 and we're learning as we do so. 222 00:09:18,204 --> 00:09:19,402 Thank you.