Bug Hunt Revealed

My recent work on a board game has seen fruition today.

It was great to see the response to the game, it was great to see a public response to a few of the game products I've designed recently.

It was a great experience especially when you consider that I was the only male in the room, and there were over a dozen girls upset that they wouldn't have time to play the games I had designed. These included cultural groups I hadn't really associated with the notions of gaming...sure there were Caucasian "gamer girls" and some of Asian ethnicity, but I was drawing interest from Muslim girls (wearing their full headscarves)...it was awesome to see the concept of gaming across cultural boundaries in an academic format. Maybe it is just preconceived notions that I'm being confronted with; there is certainly no reason why these communities wouldn't engage in the playing of games.

We had a guest marker for our assignment, and that was probably even more interesting. He had been travelling South America with the famous Clown/Doctor Patch Adams. He was doing research into the play and learning rituals of various Amazonian tribal groups, and my quick talk with him led to discussions into shamanism, mind altering drugs and meditation techniques, and understanding the psychology of play within the rules of life. He urged me to become a shamanic game designer and mentor to the world around me...I didn't even get the chance to talk with him about "Walkabout". 

I really need to do more research into his work, maybe I can start incorporating more of it into my own.