PLAYING WELL
gavan wilhite
life as a video game
Storyline
- How I've applied video game tech in other fields
- Life lessons I've learned along the way (told through analogs to video games)
- from these journeys
Short Stories
Hitting Max Level
- Got good (enough) grades
- Graduated high school
- Got into a good college
- Stayed out of (too much) trouble
- Graduated on time
- Got a good job
"Is this the end?"
Enjoy the End Game
It was just the end of prescribed steps
The end-game is where it really begins
You get to make your own goals
Thailand Story
Rolling the Dice
Games like Backgammon teach the value of creating expanded ways for luck to happen
Simultaneous projects can help expand those opportunities
It did for co-founding AltspaceVR
AltspaceVR
socializing at a distance via game technology
Reporter Story
Your Role in the Party
Especially as a founder, your role changes even when your title doesn't
Feeling overwhelmed -> There's an aspect of your role you haven't learned how to do well yet
- Managing people
- Prioritizing
- Delegation
- ...
Sometimes the role your ego wants isn't the role you as a whole really want
Forging your Gear
-
Limit spending "innovation tokens"
- Each "non-battle hardened" technology costs a token
-
Avoid only using skills you are good at
- For me, this is spending time coding to avoid other work
-
People say it's awesome != people will use it
- This ratio is especially high in AR / VR
Getting Gud
We started by making a maximally flexible system
We only grew once we used that to learn where to focus
- Events
- Humor
- Creativity
I fought the focus sometimes, but it was critical
Comedy Story
Players of all Types
Altspace users came from all walks of life
You learn a lot about cultures when someone from Brazil is suddenly teleported next to someone from Saudi Arabia
Diversity brings pragmatic advantages
Women at the company were critical in recognizing and building important anti-harassment tools
Rainbow was very helpful with this
Maze Story
Leading a Raid
- Learn individually how people want to be worked with
- Clear tasks vs collaborative ideation vs ...
- Let others make decisions, it's how they grow
- Leader-leader vs leader-follower
- Minimize meetings with more than 3 people
- Don't take too many teammates to lunch at the same time
HAH Story
Party Selection
Most important challenges require rallying multiple people
You can notice when people are being agents in the world
Believe people when they show you who they are
Receiving feedback well and taking responsibility are crucial
Work with people who are working on themselves
Watching Replays
Worry & regret don’t help
Planning, reflection, accountability & processing do
It's sad to loose something you and others put a ton of care into
It's still best to work on things that can make you feel that way
It takes work to unwind what is "you" from a project you worked on
Boat Story
Losing Your Gear
You get tossed in a dungeon, or you stow away on a spaceship
You loose the things that you felt you were relying on
This is part of the hero's journey, embrace it
It becomes evident that you still have what you need
Your greater mission can get you through
Character Building
Stoicism is awesome (and not what it sounds like)
Therapy is giving yourself "upgrades" not "reaching healthiness"
Steel-manning 'woo' can be great
Combining ethical frameworks for better choices
- Consequentialism
- Deontology
- Virtue ethics
Meaningful Choice
Notice when you are "playing a role" vs being an agent
Under-served causes and oblique approaches can create extra impact
Doing things that otherwise would not happen is ideal
Invest in Passives
Strategy games teach you to build passive income systems
The earlier the better
IRL these are residuals, businesses, stocks, crypto, etc
These aren't easy, but keep an eye for oportunities
Bits to Atoms
Finding new applications for existing skills can be rewarding
"Where can my background (game tech) apply to the physical world?"
- Robots
- Self-driving cars
- Bioprinting
- Projecting
- Big games
- ..
- Addresses similar combinatoric challenges
- Leverages battle-tested UI patterns
- Powered by generative design
Tissue Workshop
a character customizer for designing human tissues
Generative Tissue Design
- Uses the same techniques as generating cities in games
- Few bits in, many bits out
Inspiration from Archetypes
Embracing character architypes that resonate with you can keep projects engaging
- Rogue (UpGIF)
- Inspired by bending the rules
- Paladin (ReRoute)
- Inspired by a righteous fight
UpGIF.com
You'd be surprised how big of a building you can light up with a normal projector..
an activism tool for projecting GIF animations on surfaces
Security Story
ReRoute.fm
Reminding yourself that others are fighting the good fight alongside you fends off despair.
a podcast about ways to create a brighter future
Questing Forth
Life is better with a quest!
I'm building an app to help people find and do quests that matter
Collaborators and testers are welcome
Thank You Rainbow!
gavan@wilhite.io
- Lorem
- Ipsum
- Dolor
- Sit
- ...
Creativity Exercise
List Making
- Take 3 minutes to list 20 items
- Good daily creativity practice
- Numbering helps
- Mind map (#nofilter)
- Highlight interesting ideas
- Erase the board
- Add the highlights back
- Repeat..
Creativity Exercise
Expansion <> Contraction
- Get post-its or a text editor
- Set a 3 minute timer
- Brainstorm privately
- Combine everyone's items
- Organize and consolidate together
- Use in meetings with > 3 people
- Great way to ensure people get heard
- Can be kept anonymous
Parallel Brainstorm
- Game design involves constant cycles of creativity
- Lenses can remind us of important considerations
- Useful in UX design
- Some might not fit, but most can spark thought
Game Design Lenses
Bonus Tool
Bonus Tool
Rory's Story Cubes
- Interpreted metaphorically
- Useful for escaping local maxima
- Adds significant "annealing heat"
- Out of the cube thinking
Character Select
- Born in Honolulu, Hawaii
- Always loved digital art & technology
- Studied Computer Science (Games) @ USC
Play Well
By Gavan Wilhite
