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Profile

David Fono
Game Designer & Developer
Online Media | Toronto, Canada Area, CA

Summary

I make unusual games. I've made, oh, about a dozen or so. Soon, I'm going to update this bio. It's going to be wild!
Specialties: game design, experience design, writing, web development, programming

Experience

  • May 2007 - Present
    Co-Founder / Game Designer & Developer / Atmosphere Industries
    As Atmosphere Industries I and my collaborators develop innovative games and gamish experiences that delight and engage. We have:

    - Created a locative game for Perth's ByteMe Festival, where players tracked down BlueTooth nodes across the city to unlock a story about the city.

    - Developed an SMS-based game for Curtin University's Open Day festival, which had visitor solving situated puzzles across the campus.

    - Ran a game on Twitter as a buildup to the Edge of the Web conference in Perth, and an SMS-based team-building game at the actual conference.

    ...and more! (The list sorely needs to be updated.)
  • Nov 2009 - Oct 2011
    Lead Developer / Chocolate Liberation Front
    - Led development on 4 major online entertainment projects, consisting of over 20 sophisticated Flash games and applications.

    - Worked closely with other developers to manage software architecture; with artists to manage asset workflows on projects with substantial graphical requirements; and with producers on project planning and scheduling. Collaborated with the entire team to effectively respond to evolving project requirements.

    -Contributed to all stages of project lifecycles, from idea conception and requirements analysis, to design and development.

    - Led and/or contributed to game design and interaction design on all interactive project components.

    - Took initiative in writing detailed functional specifications for large projects.
  • May 2007 - Oct 2009
    Web Designer / Developer / Freelance
    Developed sites for a variety of clients using PHP, .NET, MySQL and SQL Server.
  • Oct 2006 - Apr 2007
    IT Consultant / Fantsuam Foundation
    Independently developed web design curriculum, a 5-week course teaching basic design, HTML, CSS, and PHP skills; trained local staff on curriculum.

    Coordinated development of for-hire web design services by local staff, and led initial consultation with clients.

    Commended by management for turning Fantsuam Foundation into the “local expert” on web development.
  • Feb 2006 - Sept 2006
    Founder / Lead Designer / Torgame
    Founded organization and recruited executive team.

    Served as lead designer for initial production: a two-week game with over 100 players that attracted press coverage from all major national papers, as well as several television stations and radio shows.
  • Jun 2005 - Aug 2005
    Research Intern / Microsoft Research
    Conceived, designed, prototyped, and evaluated a system for collaborative multimedia composition on mobile phones.

    Designed a trial study for the prototype, and deployed to six groups of external users in order to analyze effects on sociability.

    Presented and pitched project to staff across the organization several times.

    Authored a write-up of the project, which won the Best Short Paper Award at the ACM Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Work.
  • May 2003 - Aug 2004
    Research Assistant / Queen's University
    Independently conducted research in the field of human computer interaction.

    Helped to develop prototypes of cutting edge eye-tracking technology, some of which were featured on major North American TV networks (ABC, Discovery, Space.)

    Performed several laboratory usability studies to evaluate novel technology.

    Co-authored two long papers and two short papers for the ACM CHI conference, one short paper for the ACM UIST conference, and one short paper for the ACM Workshop on Continuous Archival and Retrieval of Personal Experiences.
  • Sept 2003 - May 2004
    Web Developer / General Knowledge
    Developed first stages of web-based architecture and interface for an intelligent peer-to-peer distribution system.
  • Jun 2001 - May 2003
    Designer / Developer / Visual Infinity
    Built Internet storefront, a robust e-commerce system powered by Java Servlets and connected to a MySQL database, as well as numerous interactive applications for user access.

    Created user interface artwork, product logo, and manufacturing artwork for flagship software.

Education

  • 2004 - 2006
    University of Toronto
    MSc in Human-Computer Interaction
  • 2000 - 2004
    Queen's University
    BSc in Computer Science

Additional Information

Websites:
Personal Website, Company Website
Honors:
Best Note Award, 2006 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work 2005 Canada Graduate Scholarship
Interests:
games, stories, cross-media, internet, mobile computing, social technology, ict4d, args, pervasive games, locative games, technology, human-computer interaction, cscw
linkedin profile

Posts

November 14, 11:15 PM
This is for work.

Methods for a board game to interact with a separate on-screen software component?

Software to board game…

- software triggers events in the board game at random times

- software triggers events in the board game in set feedback loop

- software generates multiple iterations of the board game

- software presents isolated challenges that when resolved, modify the board game

Board game to software…

- enter state of board game in software when prompted

- enter an aggregate value or particular indicator when prompted

- take action in software as a result of player choice

- board game prompts an action in the software

- AR tracking (madness!!!)

September 20, 02:52 PM
chaotic good

Normally in designing experiences, I seek to minimize chaos. This is the general rule of thumb. One of the interesting things about games, which runs contrary to other manifestations of interactivity, is that there needs to be some impedance on performance; some amount of confusion is often a good thing. I was recently reading a game design textbook that described this phenomenon in a formal sense; it talked about a feeling of emergent randomness within the rules that provided for a sense of possibilities, unpredictability, which can make games exciting. That’s true, but I’ve found that chaos has a certain aesthetic quality as well, which is more immediate and primal than the rational explanation. There is something about short, frenetic bursts of activity, and the scramble in them, that activates the senses in a unique way. I’m sure there’s an evolutionary explanation. Not all games have this, but when it happens, it’s pretty magical.

August 16, 04:26 PM
emergence is like a religion

I’m extremely interested in being clever. I try very hard to be clever: I like all my words to have wordplay, I like my music intricate and layered, and I like my game mechanics to have that kind of “zam-zow” elegance that makes you believe they were created by astronauts from the future. In other words, I’m very into over-designing. My natural inclination is to believe that deep, compelling gameplay only results from deep, compelling game components.

This is often true, of course, but for every rule and asset one adds, there tends to be something lost; simplicity can give rise to more complex behaviour than complexity. It’s a tough rule to learn, and learning it has largely been the fundamental task of my game design career. I find it difficult to picture and predict that something complicated can emerge from something basic; it doesn’t make intuitive sense; I have to take it on faith. Of course, that makes it all the more wonderful when it works out.

August 03, 08:35 PM
I hate complex gauges

I’ve got a quantity that behaves in different ways, depending on stages. Initially the player fills it up, and it only goes in one direction; once filled, it goes in both directions, depending on player performance; and if it drops below a certain threshold, it empties entirely, and returns to the first stage. The idea here is create a binary state for the player, affected by the quantity; either it is empty, and the player needs to fill it; or it has been filled, and the player needs to maintain it. But cramming all this functionality into a single gauge runs contrary to the simplicity of a standard UI element, and the assumptions that underlie it. There are UI design solutions around this, but that’s not something I want to futz around with right now.

Alternate solution: transfer the functionality of the gauge’s second state to a function of gameplay instead. The gauge only fills up, and once full, stays full. But once full, it is targeted by certain attacks from enemies; if those attacks are successful, the gauge is emptied. Players learn that the gauge needs to be protected from a unique threat once full, which is intuitive enough.

Audio

hurried notes on game design
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