Eric Zimmerman discusses the evolution of gaming

To continue the Humanities Center theme for the academic year, PLAY, the college welcomed Eric Zimmerman to the Student Union Building on Sept. 24 as the external speaker to discuss his career and the future of gaming.

Zimmerman is the co-founder and CEO of GameLab, known for the game Diner Dash. According to the Humanities Center newsletter, he has worked in game design for more than 25 years and been a faculty member at New York University after founding the school’s game center.

The talk, “Living in the Ludic Century,” focused on the experience games have on the player.

“Ludic is a way of framing thinking of the century through the lens of play,” Zimmerman said.

He said games are more relevant to how the world works, and the 21stcentury is becoming more defined by play. Games are a way of thinking about the world, Zimmerman said.

Looking at the design aspect of games, Zimmerman said everyone is a game designer because people understand the game and play it, but they all create their own interpretation.

“In a game, we may create the rules,” Zimmerman said, “but we don’t create the resulted experiences or the impact on people in their lives and culture.”

Bailey Schrader, a senior graphic design major from Austin, said she attended the lecture because she wants to make art for video games after graduation. With the thought that Zimmerman would discuss the mechanics of game design in depth, Schrader said she was surprised throughout the discussion.

“I liked the fact that it wasn’t what I was expecting,” she said. “The general ideology was honestly really refreshing.”

Although she did not know much about Zimmerman prior to the talk, Schrader said she has respect for Zimmerman and the games he makes.

“He thinks of something that has a greater impact in life,” Schrader said. “It’s so pure. He does it to help someone else.”

During the lecture, Zimmerman gave the audience a glance of an unpublished game of his, Loss Words, for the first time in public. The interactive phone app is designed to encourage participants to read books. It is expected for release in 2019.

Zimmerman said he expects games to be a big part of the future, and he will continue convincing people the sophistication and the importance of games.

“I hope games will become this socially accepted human value that we don’t question, and that we put alongside music, image making, and storytelling as a basic and positive human activity,” Zimmerman said.

The Humanities Center is hosting film series, book readings, and other events throughout the year to incorporate their PLAY theme for the year. A list of events is available online at http://www.depts.ttu.edu/provost/humanities-center/index.php.

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