This is an amazing article written by a man in Venezuela about Chavez's insane anti-video game laws. This guy risked his freedom to write the article- not only is possession of a violent video game now a crime, but the very act of questioning the law is also a criminal act. Venezuela is basically attempting to heap the blame for the country's insanely high crime, murder, and kidnapping rates squarely on video games and the people who play them. I wish more Venezuelans would write like this. This guy, Guido Núñez-Mujica, deserves a medal.

So... this is what i come up with in a week for the 534 class...

The plane in the game is constantly pulling down by the gravity and your job is to pull it up by making sound to the microphone. The higher the sound intensity the higher the plane goes. However, you must be careful not to hit anything within the game. The six sided spinning polygons are your enemies, you must peak the sound input in order for the plane to produce a bullet which will kill them off. Orange polygon will move while blue are stationary. IF THE PLANE IS PRODUCING A BULLET EVERY TIME YOU MAKE A SOUND, PLEASE LOWER THE MICROPHONE SENSITIVITY FOR PROPER GAME PLAY.

BTW... if you found this game too difficult... press space bar to cheat... :P

Enjoy~ (hopefully) :)



======= CLICK HERE FOR THE GAME =======

SpaceWolves is a board game developed by myself, Samantha Vick, and Mike Sennott, as part of our "Up the River" variation assignment for Tracy Fullerton's class. For anyone who might be curious or want to play it, we've decided to post up the rules and the panels so you can download it and make it yourself!

Here's what you need to do:

Hey, I know this girl! I worked on this game! I'm famous by association!
Congrats Kyla!

UCLA Design|Media Arts' Mobile Media Lecture Series continues tomorrow at 6:00PM with expanded storyteller and ARG designer Jordan Weisman. From the UCLA website: "Jordan has been the creative force behind a number of entertainment companies, including his newest venture, Smith & Tinker (connected toys), FASA Corporation (roleplaying games), Virtual World Entertainment (networked virtual reality entertainment) acquired by the Disney Family, FASA Interactive (PC games, including the MechWarrior franchise) acquired by Microsoft, WizKids (collectible games) acquired by Topps Inc., and 42 Entertainment (alternate reality gaming). During his career, Jordan has created some of the largest and longest-lasting franchises in the gaming industry, including BattleTech/MechWarrior, Shadowrun and Crimson Skies."

Speaker: Mark Bolas, Associate Professor, Interactive Media Division, SCA

Time: Wednesday, November 4, 6-8 pm
Location: USC's Robert Zemeckis Center for Digital Arts (RZC)
Room 201 Zemeckis Media Lab (ZML)

Please join us at the IMD seminar this week for a presentation by IMD Professor Mark Bolas. He also serves as the director of Graphics Lab at USC's Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT). Professor Bolas' research explores perception, agency, and intelligence; he creates virtual environments that are designed to engage one’s perception and cognition to create a visceral memory of the experience. His work has been exhibited in many venues including six Emerging Technology exhibits at Siggraph. In 1988, Bolas co-founded Fakespace Inc. with Ian McDowall and Eric Lorimer to build instrumentation for research labs to explore virtual reality.

This Wednesday, from 1pm to 5pm, the 594 class is open for 'walk-arounds' by the IMD community. Students will have their projects running, and would love to have you come and try their projects and give feedback. This is a chance to go a little deeper than is possible in standard presentations. Come one, Come all! Location is the Flower Street Colab.

I don't think this requires any explanation...

The challenge is to be the first to submit the locations of ten moored, 8 foot, red weather balloons located at ten fixed locations in the continental United States. Balloons will be in readily accessible locations and visible from nearby roadways.

For our third assignment in CTIN 534 (Experiments in Interactivity) we were tasked with creating a navigable space which should "convey a sense of space based on the collaboration of the author with the viewer: the author formulates a space within which the viewer can decide by himself or herself in which direction to proceed, where to look and how to read the space in such a way that the exploration follows a dramaturgical development." I've created a pastoral scene for viewers to explore, which is timed well with this weekend's activities.

Click here to explore Pastorale in full screen and with sound!

The assignment was to explore a space. This is my interpretation of the assignment. Unfortunately, I wrote the USC piece in AS3 and the Turtle one in AS2, and merging the two was not feasible. So I couldn't really create the integrated piece that I wanted too.
Anyways here are the flash apps :)



Click the green buttons, and after the short clip click the screen to go back to the menu. (This flash app is pretty big, so it might take a bit to load.)

Mozilla just announced a design competition to develop "Firefox add-ons that turn the open Web into a rich learning environment."

As this is a subject that is very near and dear to my heart, I'd like to put together an IMD team and give it a shot. If you are interested, please contact me at jloganolson@gmail.com.

More info here: http://design-challenge.mozillalabs.com/jetpack-for-learning/index.html

FYI: The "jetpack" refers to a tool Mozilla just released that makes extension development more accessible to designers, but for the initial phase of this competition, all you need is a written pitch and mock-ups.

Let's do it!

Computational designer Jonathan Harris will present a talk titled "Escaping Aesthetic Alcatraz: Re-imagining the Architecture of our Online Homes" as part of UCLA's Mobile Media Lecture Series this Tuesday October 27 at 6:00 pm in the Broad Art Center.

"Jonathan Harris makes projects that re-imagine how humans relate to technology and to each other. Combining elements of computer science, anthropology, visual art and storytelling, his projects range from building the world’s largest time capsule (with Yahoo!) to documenting an Alaskan Eskimo whale hunt on the Arctic Ocean (with a warm hat). He is the co-creator of We Feel Fine, which continuously measures the emotional temperature of the human world through large-scale blog analysis, and has made other projects about online dating, modern mythology, anonymity, news, and language."

Warning. Nepotism ahead.

Muse Games is holding a contest to find a new, interesting game concept. The winner of the contest receives money and a publishing deal. Most of the stuff there is akin to "You're on a boat and you can go off sweet jumps." Now, that can be fun, but it ain't new. Vincent Diamante and I have an idea that is so sweet that it's sick. So nice that it's nasty.

Wellness Partners is a collaborative research project about exercise habits and perceived wellness designed by the USC School of Cinematic Arts, Keck School of Medicine, and School of Social Work. The study is coordinated through a partnership with USC's Center for Work & Family Life.

You are invited to help us test a newly developed intervention by participating in very brief activities via the Internet and/or mobile phone over the period of 10 weeks. We will also be taking in-person physical measurements (height and weight) and asking you to answer questions online.

As a token of our appreciation, you may receive up to $45 for participating in the study.

Your participation is voluntary and any information collected during the study will be kept confidential.

Support for this study is provided by a grant from the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

If you have additional questions please read the
Frequently Asked Questions

If you are interested, please email:
WPSTUDY-L@USC.EDU
Phone: 310-933-6648

When: Friday October 23nd 2pm-4:30pm
Where: USC SCA Digital Collaboratory Annex, 2823 S. Flower Street
(entrance on 29th Street between Figueroa & Flower).

Announcing the (long-awaited) second meeting of the SCA Stereoscopic Imaging Research Group. This group is for anyone in the USC SCA community with an interest in any aspect of Stereoscopic 3D cinema, production and research, and this meeting is a chance to learn about and discuss our plans for a 3D curriculum, as well as a number of other current projects, proposals and opportunities.

The IKEA company just issued this unusually recondite solicitation for counter-intelligence agents to document potential weaknesses and points of resistance in their pursuit of world domination of the home furnishings market. IMD students - especially those enrolled in CTIN 532: Interactive Experience and World Design - may want to take this opportunity to analyze an IKEA retail outlet in terms of its deployment of world-building strategies and its production of scripted spaces. What really is the difference between an IKEA store and a theme park?

Surfacescapes Demo Walkthrough from Visual Story TAs on Vimeo.

"I don’t want to put any pressure on Michael and the team over at Carnegie Mellon University, but you guys should be getting an A for your class project this semester. Their Dungeons & Dragons experience called “Surfacescapes” on Microsoft Surface is amazing. This is the future of how computers will aid in board games. Remember, D&D playing aids like this are for serious role playing gamers who might normally use balsa cutouts and not just wimpy printed maps. The computer is has a technical role in the gameplay but the DM and the players are the storytellers. That’s why it doesn’t look exactly like a video game. Not that it isn’t seven shades of wonderful. This is crazy cool stuff for role players – unless your dream is a mashup of Project Natal and LARP. ;)"