Something From Nothing 2

Last week, I had an idea… I wanted to host a sort of regular live video show similar to the Game Designer Round Tables that the Building the Game podcast guys ran at GenCon. It would be a simple process using Google Hangouts On Air to let others join in and participate in a variety of ways. The stream will be broadcast simultaneously through both Google+ and YouTube and episodes will be archived automatically at YouTube. I tweeted about it and that sparked a flurry of interest:

Click for full conversation… (it’s long!)

I was honestly just considering doing something off-the-cuff every now and again and hoping other people would be interested in jumping in. When the Twitter groups started showing all sorts of interest, I became overwhelmed… which means, I was super happy when the Building the Game guys decided to step in and run the beast! I love helping people design games, but when managing that process gets in the way, I fall apart.

Jason wrote a little press release about it: http://www.btgco-op.com/2013/09/05/something-from-nothing-game-designers-hangout/

So, What is This?

The premise is simple. There will be a group of game designers joining a Google+ Hangout every other Sunday and talking about projects. Maybe their own. Maybe their buddies. Might be new ideas. Might be old prototypes. It’s not going to be scripted or planned in advance… we’re just going to discuss. Maybe some nights we fix a game. Maybe another night we talk about beer for an hour…. who knows. What I do know, is that it’s going to be a blast.

Participation is open to anyone and everyone. We are going to restrict the number of people participating in the video and voice cast to keep the confusion down, but we’ll also be more than happy to field questions from Google Chat, Twitter, text message, HAM radio, carrier pigeon, or smoke signal while we’re live. If you want to be ON the show, I suggest emailing the Building the Game guys. If you want to beg me, that’s fine… but it’s their show now. You’d have better luck with them.

The takeaway: stay tuned to Twitter this Sunday evening. We’ll be tweeting links to the YouTube cast and all that throughout the show. We’d love to have audience participation!