The most fun you can have with a belly full of parasites
I mentioned the Experimental Gameplay Project website in my last post, but should probably fill in more details. The project started out as a class assignment in CMU’s Entertainment Technology Center, and got lots of press not because all of the games were “experimental”, but because they were each created by one person in less than a week. Once the class was over, the department decided to turn the project public, create the Experimental Gameplay Project website, use it to distribute all of the games made for the class, and invite the rest of the world to submit their own damn experimental-games-made-in-less-than-a-week (cough cough).
Many of the games are more “toy” than “game” (i.e. they are interactive, but don’t really have any “goals” or “risks”) but most of them are certainly “experimental”. (The admins are doing a good job of enforcing the “experimentality”, and booted a generic sudoku implementation a couple days after it was submitted.)
One of the most notable, almost-a-game experiments is Super Tummy Bubble, one of the original set of games created for the class by Kyle Gabler. Created under the “addictive puzzle” theme, the gameplay’s a little random and there is no risk/reward beyond accidentally creating huge combos. Somehow it still manages to be very addictive, though, with its colorful, Hertzfeldt-esque graphics, its simplistic gameplay, its kooky music, and its mildly disturbing theme. Go check it out, and get inspired to make your own damn experimental-game-made-in-less-than-a-week!