autoclav – The Mechanics of Magic

Final Class Reflection – Yinlin Zhao

June 7, 2025

Coming to college opened a new door to playing video games for me. A combination of control over my spare time, a lack of…

Critical Play: Play Like a Feminist – Yinlin Zhao

May 30, 2025

Heaven Will Be Mine is a visual novel created by Worst Girls Games (Aevee Bee and Mia Schwartz) and Pillowfight Games (Conrad Kreyling and…

May 30, 2025

Heaven Will Be Mine is a visual novel created by Worst Girls Games (Aevee Bee and Mia Schwartz) and Pillowfight Games (Conrad Kreyling and…

Sketchnote: Onboarding in Plants vs Zombies – Yinlin Zhao

May 27, 2025

Critical Play: Games of Chance & Addiction – Yinlin Zhao

May 23, 2025

Hay Day is a mobile farming game created by Supercell, who is also responsible for other popular mobile games like Clash of Clans and…

Sketchnote: Addiction By Design – Yinlin Zhao

May 20, 2025

Critical Play: Worldbuilding – Yinlin Zhao

May 16, 2025

Ultrakill is a video game created by Arsi Patala, also known as Hakita. It is available on Windows PCs, and is still in early…

Sketchnote: Loops & Arcs – Yinlin Zhao

May 14, 2025

A game I like is Celeste, which is a platformer about climbing a mountain, while the mountain manifests your character’s internal conflict as physical…

Critical Play: Puzzles – Yinlin Zhao

May 9, 2025

Portal is a video game by the game developer Valve, which can be played on PC and console systems. The age range of its…

Sketchnote: Puzzles in Games, Puzzles as Games – Yinlin Zhao

May 7, 2025

Individual Team Member Deliverables – Checkpoint 1

May 5, 2025

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6PeszY1vTKdzTUPKFTmxrv?si=8f2591b2ff9e4a1a Emotions: Urgency, comedic horror, dread One narrative direction I was thinking for the game was to lean into “annoying rich people” aspect of…

Critical Play: Mysteries & Escape Rooms

May 2, 2025

Who’s Lila? is a point-and-click horror game created by Garage Heathen. It can be played on a Windows PC. Its intended audience are adults…

Sketchnote: Designer’s Notebook: The Role of Architecture in Videogames – Yinlin Zhao

April 29, 2025

Critical Play: Walking Simulators – Yinlin Zhao

April 25, 2025

Firewatch is a video game by Campo Santo. While I played it on my PC, it is also available on console, but not…

Mindmap: Narrative Architecture

April 23, 2025

Critical Play: Competitive Analysis

April 17, 2025

Town of Salem is an online browser game by BlankMediaGames. It is based on Mafia-style games, but instead of being a simple in-person party…

Sketchnote: Game Design Patterns for Building Friendships – Yinlin

April 14, 2025

Short Exercise: What Do Prototypes Prototype? – Yinlin

April 10, 2025

How long should players have to play out each round? This is an important question to answer because time limits can make sure that…

Critical Play: Bluffing, Judging, and Getting Vulnerable – Yinlin

April 10, 2025

Secret Hitler and Active/Passive Play Secret Hitler is a social deception board game created by Max Temkin, Mike Boxleiter, and Tommy Maranges, who make…

Short Exercise: MDA & 8 Kinds of Fun – Yinlin Zhao

April 7, 2025

On Saturday I played six nearly-unbroken hours of Pentiment, where you play as an artist investigating murders in a 16th-century Bavarian town. The core…