By far the most interesting aspect of generating P3 for me was working on a digital game with no previous video game experience (and honestly, very little video game exposure). I had no idea what this would be like, and was worried I wouldn’t be useful at all to my team!
I ended up learning some things about using Aseprite and engaging a lot with the postal system/the system mapping parts in order to make up for my lack of coding skill. I still don’t think I was particularly useful, but I really enjoyed adding a new skill to my toolbox and messing around with pixel art for the first time. I learned a lot from seeing Houston’s designs and from online tutorials about pixel art. I think now I am a fan of the genre! Houston’s main character and mentor sprites were SO cute and taught me about shading and outlining as a part of the core of pixel art creation. While I still think I could up my game a lot (my planets and packages were just so-so), I am looking forward to making more pixel creations in the future.
With regards to the system, I also enjoyed learning about the package delivery process, as it made me reflect heavily on how goods miraculously (or, rather, with lots of hard work) arrive at my doorstep in neat boxes. My sister’s wife works for UPS and is regularly out on the floors of the giant sorting centers, loading trucks and directing people. I appreciated her work a lot more as I was thinking through the model of this game. Time is so vital and everything needs to run so smoothly in order for a package to make it to a customer in just a few days.
In the future, I am inspired to potentially learn some coding skills to be able to create a unity game, as it felt like magic when my teammates would show up with a working mini game. Engineers might be actual wizards. I am also really intrigued by the relational aspect of systems games and how this relates to some broader philosophical framings: care ethics, for example, and feminist methodologies for qualitative research. Viewing relationships as core to understanding is a kind of radical and awesome take. I’d love to make use of the principles of P3 to address other systems I am interested in, from the brain to teen wellbeing to the classroom.
