james everett

A wide-ranging conversation with James Everett, game designer, creative producer, co-founder of NZXR (the XR stands for Extended Reality). His Canada-New Zealand journey has included Ubisoft, Sidhe Interactive, Magic Leap/Weta Workshop, and Dr Grordbort's Invaders.

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Outline

Here are the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.

(00:00) - Introduction
(00:48) - Pikpok, Ubisoft, Montreal and New Zealand
(08:17) - Starlink: Battle for Atlas, Magic Leap
(12:50) - Operating rhythm and SiSSYFiGHT 3000 workshop
(19:11) - Systemic Design: Dishonored 2’s clockwork mansion, Arkane Studios, Looking Glass, Thief 
(30:31) - Visual design and combined vision: Ubisoft, Hades
(34:55) - The Inheritance trilogy by N.K.Jemisin
(41:58) - Formative experiences: Dune by Frank Herbert, J.G.Ballard, G.I.Joe, Animaniacs
(51:22) - Connections with novels and games: Tana French, Passage, Fez
(66:26) - What goes into a project: working vs creating
(70:47) - Magic Leap: Dr. Grordbort’s Invaders. 
(92:27) - NZXR Collective: VR, Aardvark, experience accessibility, cultural change 
(104:41) - Information accessibility: Adam Greenfield, classism via information, smart cities, and moral responsibility
(120:05) - Finishing up

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Mentioned

The Inheritance Trilogy by N.K. Jemisin
Dishonored 2, a masterpiece of systemic game design and worldbuilding
Dune by Frank Herbert
Passage, a 5 minute game about life and death
A brief history and overview of XR (Extended Reality), the umbrella term encompassing Virtual & Augmented Reality technologies
James at the NZXR Summit talking about core principles of XR design
James at the Game Developer's Conference talking about Invaders

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