Funomena
Robin Hunicke (; born March 15, 1973) is an American video game designer and producer. She is a professor of game design at UC Santa Cruz and the co-founder of Funomena. Hunicke began her career at Electronic Arts where she worked on multiple games including ''MySims'' as Lead Designer and ''Boom Blox'' and its sequel as a Producer. After leaving EA, she was hired by thatgamecompany where she produced ''Journey'', an online cooperative game for the PlayStation 3. After its completion, Hunicke joined Tiny Speck to develop the social MMORPG ''Glitch'', teaming with ''Katamari Damacy'' creator and personal friend Keita Takahashi. Prior to the release of ''Glitch'', Hunicke left Tiny Speck to co-found Funomena together with Martin Middleton, former teammate and engineer at thatgamecompany. In October 2012, Funomena announced their first project: "to build a game that takes data from a pedometer and does something fun with it." They announced two new games, '' Wattam'' (directed by K ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Funomena
Robin Hunicke (; born March 15, 1973) is an American video game designer and producer. She is a professor of game design at UC Santa Cruz and the co-founder of Funomena. Hunicke began her career at Electronic Arts where she worked on multiple games including ''MySims'' as Lead Designer and ''Boom Blox'' and its sequel as a Producer. After leaving EA, she was hired by thatgamecompany where she produced ''Journey'', an online cooperative game for the PlayStation 3. After its completion, Hunicke joined Tiny Speck to develop the social MMORPG ''Glitch'', teaming with ''Katamari Damacy'' creator and personal friend Keita Takahashi. Prior to the release of ''Glitch'', Hunicke left Tiny Speck to co-found Funomena together with Martin Middleton, former teammate and engineer at thatgamecompany. In October 2012, Funomena announced their first project: "to build a game that takes data from a pedometer and does something fun with it." They announced two new games, '' Wattam'' (directed by K ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Wattam
''Wattam'' is a 2019 puzzle-platform game developed by Funomena and published by Annapurna Interactive. It was designed by Keita Takahashi, better known for creating the ''Katamari Damacy'' series, and was released for PlayStation 4 and Windows on December 17. Gameplay The game is played either solo or co-op, and consists of befriending other inhabitants of the world, including trees, flowers, rocks, toilets, poop, mouths, and more by holding hands, uncovering secrets, playing minigames, and solving puzzles. Characters each have unique melodies, which can be combined. Development Originally revealed in December 2014 as a PlayStation 4 exclusive, ''Wattam'' was to be published by Sony Interactive Entertainment and developed jointly by Funomena and Santa Monica Studio. However, it was revealed in October 2016 that Sony were no longer involved with the game. In August 2017, Annapurna Interactive was announced as the new publisher, and that it would additionally be released for ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Game Developers Conference
The Game Developers Conference (GDC) is an annual conference for video game developers. The event includes an expo, networking events, and awards shows like the Game Developers Choice Awards and Independent Games Festival, and a variety of tutorials, lectures, and round Table, roundtables by industry professionals on game-related topics covering Video game programmer, programming, game design, design, audio, production, business and management, and visual arts. History Originally called the Computer Game Developers Conference, the first conference was organized in April 1988 by Chris Crawford (game designer), Chris Crawford in his San Jose, California-area living room. About twenty-seven designers attended, including Don Daglow, Brenda Laurel, Brian Moriarty, Gordon Walton, Tim Brengle, Cliff Johnson (game designer), Cliff Johnson, Dave Menconi, and Carol and Ivan Manley. The second conference, held that same year at a Holiday Inn at Milpitas, California, Milpitas, attracted abou ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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MMORPG
A massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) is a video game that combines aspects of a role-playing video game and a massively multiplayer online game. As in role-playing games (RPGs), the player assumes the role of a Player character, character (often in a fantasy world or science-fiction world) and takes control over many of that character's actions. MMORPGs are distinguished from Online game, single-player or small Multiplayer online game, multi-player online RPGs by the number of players able to interact together, and by the game's persistent world (usually hosted by the game's video game publisher, publisher), which continues to exist and evolve while the player is offline and away from the game. MMORPGs are played throughout the world. Worldwide revenues for MMORPGs exceeded half a billion dollars in 2005, and Western revenues exceeded a billion dollars in 2006. In 2008, the spending on subscription MMORPGs by consumers in North America and Europe grew to $1.4 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Maxis
Maxis is an American video game developer and a Division (business), division of Electronic Arts (EA). The studio was founded in 1987 by Will Wright (game designer), Will Wright and Jeff Braun, and acquired by Electronic Arts, EA in 1997. Maxis is best known for its simulation games, including ''The Sims'', ''Spore (2008 video game), Spore'' and ''SimCity''. In the late 2010s, Maxis suffered from a series of studio closures and layoffs. This included the shutdown of Maxis Emeryville in 2015, EA Salt Lake in 2017, and a wave of layoffs at Redwood Shores in 2018. With the remainder of Maxis reorganised under EA Mobile, and EA opening new studios under the label from 2019, some commentators have suggested that only the brand name from the original studio survives. History Independent studio (1987-1997) Maxis was founded in 1987 by Will Wright (game designer), Will Wright and Jeff Braun to help publish ''SimCity (1989 video game), SimCity'' on home computers. Before then, t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Chartered by the Illinois General Assembly in 1851, Northwestern was established to serve the former Northwest Territory. The university was initially affiliated with the Methodist Episcopal Church but later became non-sectarian. By 1900, the university was the third largest university in the United States. In 1896, Northwestern became a founding member of the Big Ten Conference, and joined the Association of American Universities as an early member in 1917. The university is composed of eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools, which include the Kellogg School of Management, the Pritzker School of Law, the Feinberg School of Medicine, the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, the Bienen School of Music, the McCormick ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech recognition, computer vision, translation between (natural) languages, as well as other mappings of inputs. The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' of Oxford University Press defines artificial intelligence as: the theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages. AI applications include advanced web search engines (e.g., Google), recommendation systems (used by YouTube, Amazon and Netflix), understanding human speech (such as Siri and Alexa), self-driving cars (e.g., Tesla), automated decision-making and competing at the highest level in strategic game systems (such as chess and Go). ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Doctor Of Philosophy
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common Academic degree, degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is an earned research degree, those studying for a PhD are required to produce original research that expands the boundaries of knowledge, normally in the form of a Thesis, dissertation, and defend their work before a panel of other experts in the field. The completion of a PhD is often a requirement for employment as a university professor, researcher, or scientist in many fields. Individuals who have earned a Doctor of Philosophy degree may, in many jurisdictions, use the title ''Doctor (title), Doctor'' (often abbreviated "Dr" or "Dr.") with their name, although the proper etiquette associated with this usage may also be subject to the professional ethics of their own scholarly field, culture, or society. Those who teach at ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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University Of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the best universities in the world and it is among the most selective in the United States. The university is composed of an undergraduate college and five graduate research divisions, which contain all of the university's graduate programs and interdisciplinary committees. Chicago has eight professional schools: the Law School, the Booth School of Business, the Pritzker School of Medicine, the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice, the Harris School of Public Policy, the Divinity School, the Graham School of Continuing Liberal and Professional Studies, and the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering. The university has additional campuses and centers in London, Paris, Beijing, Delhi, and Hong Kong, as well as in downtown ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bachelor Of Arts
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years, depending on the country and institution. * Degree attainment typically takes four years in Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Brazil, Brunei, China, Egypt, Ghana, Greece, Georgia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kuwait, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Mexico, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Netherlands, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Scotland, Serbia, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, the United States and Zambia. * Degree attainment typically takes three years in Albania, Australia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Caribbean, Iceland, India, Israel, Italy, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa, Switzerland, the Canadian province of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dynamic Game Difficulty Balancing
Dynamic game difficulty balancing (DGDB), also known as dynamic difficulty adjustment (DDA) or dynamic game balancing (DGB), is the process of automatically changing parameters, scenarios, and behaviors in a video game in real-time, based on the player's ability, in order to avoid making the player bored (if the game is too easy) or frustrated (if it is too hard). The goal of dynamic difficulty balancing is to keep the user interested from the beginning to the end, providing a good level of challenge. Traditionally, game difficulty increases steadily along the course of the game (either in a smooth linear fashion, or through steps represented by levels). The parameters of this increase (rate, frequency, starting levels) can only be modulated at the beginning of the experience by selecting a difficulty level. Still, this can lead to a frustrating experience for both experienced and inexperienced gamers, as they attempt to follow a preselected learning or difficulty curves poses many ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Indie Game
An indie game, short for independent video game, is a video game typically created by individuals or smaller development teams without the financial and technical support of a large game publisher, in contrast to most "AAA" (triple-A) games. However, the "indie" term may apply to other scenarios where the development of the game has some measure of independence from a publisher even if a publisher helps fund and distribute a game, such as creative freedom. Because of their independence and freedom to develop, indie games often focus on innovation, experimental gameplay, and taking risks not usually afforded in AAA games, and may explore the medium to produce unique experiences in art games. Indie games tend to be sold through digital distribution channels rather than at retail due to lack of publisher support. The term is synonymous with that of independent music or independent film in those respective mediums. Indie game development bore out from the same concepts of amateur ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |