Author: Kellian Pletcher

This week my hubby and I got an invite that could not be declined: we were invited to try out Brown University’snew Yurt facility!!!! Who could resist a Yurt invite??! Not us, definitely. We would have gone at 2 in the morning on a Sunday if they’d asked us. We wanted to see this yurt!!  So what’s…

The last blog post, I whined a little and then I recognized an interesting design challenge: What can we in the Serious Play community build that’s as engaging as Dave and Buster’s– but maybe does something more positive for people than a say… a kid-friendly casino? I used my “goals/resources/restrictions” design process for sussing out…

Dave and Busters… can we do better? I’m not a huge fan of video games. I’m not totally against video games. I just like to move around and video games involve lots of sitting still so they’re not my jam. I do love a good arcade… like a boardwalk arcade where you can find an air…

What happened at this year’s Games for Change conference?? Swedish chefs, living Hamlets, new books, inspiring folks… all sorts of stuff. But here we’ll take a second to go over the three award winners from the conference… and attempt to edit video. Be kind. 

A Year in Review! Aka: my favorite games and culture stuff of 2014 HAPPY 2015!! I know… it’s February. I’m late… but I just want to talk about all of my favorite trends, projects and discoveries at the Labs of 2014 so I’m claiming February in-bounds! So, Green Door… what was new in 2014?? 1.…

A happy holiday season to everyone!! Whether or not you celebrate Christmas it’s very likely that you’re going to have time off and that you’re going to have to spend that time off with some people in a group. You may be indoors.. with museums, businesses and fun places closed and it being too cold…

Dear Barbie, I know there’s been a lot of controversy lately about the cute puppy game that you designed and hired Brian and Steven to develop.  You later claimed that you would learn to code because Barbie, you can do anything! Which is true, you can! But it’s going to take some time. I wanted…

Cheerio!! I am BACK, blog! I was on a fabulous trip to London and Paris. While I was there I was on a hunt for games and activities that connected people with spaces and I have some great stuff to report! So read on to hear location-based, immersive experiences that you can play in Jolly…

This week, I’m off to the SeriousPlay conference, another once of my favorite organizations in the Games for Good movement. (My other favorites are Games for Change and the Games, Learning and Society conference, which I STILL Haven’t been to!) SeriousPlay is seriously awesome. Last year Jesse Schell was a speaker- and he was inspiring as…

People often ask me about “Gamification” and “Badges”, two words that make any game designer cringe. Badges are the most visible but reductionist and often harmful version of an otherwise complex study. “ification” or “ify” usually suggests that something is NOT something and you’re shoehorning it to make it that. A dead giveaway is that nobody…