Ephemera

(Or, games that don’t quite get their own portfolio page but are worth recording.)

The Ghosts of Christmas ______ (2016)

Interactive fiction, recombinant Christmas comedy.
My Role: Writer / Solo Dev

Customize a legion of ghosts to harangue a Scroogesque figure into the Christmas spirit in this psychodickensian litadventure.  A quick jam version of this Twine game was originally released as part of a holiday charity bundle, and I later edited together a definitive edition.  If you’re interested in my unfiltered off-the-cuff comedy writing, there may be no better place to look.

Adelbert Vester: Humoural Physician (2009)

Historical intrigue/medical sim.
My Role: Writer / Designer / Dev
Full Credits: David Mershon (Writer / Designer / Dev), Michael Annetta, Jay Bulvanoski, Teddy Dief, David Mershon, Mike Sennott, Samantha Vick (Voice Actors).

Take on the role of a young physician in 1590s Prague, looking to make his way in the court of Emperor Rudolf II.  Make important moral and medical decisions in a journey to become the best physician in the whole Holy Roman Empire.  To quote one playtester, “I’d better give Nostradamus one more enema just to be safe.”

David and I later made an “Exhibition Edition” that used experimental controllers to make the antiquated medical treatments into weird physical minigames:

• Applying leeches became throwing them at a target (using a webcam behind a transparent target).
• Inducing vomiting was done by reaching into a “mystery box of palpation,” kinda like a kids Halloween party (using pressure sensors).
• Mixing laxative medication was done by actually mixing different liquids (whose different conductivities would carry a current between sensors in a vessel).
• And of course, giving an enema was done using a bellows.

Early Flash Games

Deer Hunter X: Operation Worldsaver (2009)

My first publicly released game, made in undergrad.  What if a deer hunting game had a storyline, to explain why it’s so critical you hunt the deer?  What if that storyline spiraled into a sprawling homage to Metal Gear Solid‘s overambitious narratives?  What if there were forty-five minutes of fully voice-acted cutscenes, to ten minutes of actual shooting gameplay, and it was on a website for quick coffee break games?  Only one project was bold enough to ask these questions.

Walk Straight (2009)

A project made over a weekend my first semester at USC, it was of course much more popular than the cinematic deer adventure I spent over a year developing.  A game that asks you to follow a simple instruction. It’s about the nature of happiness and the afterlife, but don’t tell anybody.

USC Game Jams

Other USC Projects