TRITON Magazine Winter 2019 | Page 44

THE SHELF
THE THINKER Amy Jo Kim ’ 79 applies her expertise in game development to the start-up world .
Photo : David Butow

GAME OF THOUGHT

Bringing video game thinking to the real world .

BY ANGEL AU-YEUNG ’ 13
IN THE LAST FOUR DECADES , video games have evolved from the pixelated mazes of Pac-Man to immersive and complex worlds — and game designer and start-up coach Amy Jo Kim ’ 79 has been at the forefront of it all . She attended her first gaming developers conference in the late 1990s , when consoles were just beginning to connect online , and , as she puts it , she was immediately all in . “ The moment I went , I was completely hooked by the people ,” Kim says . “ I ’ ve always been an interdisciplinarian , and that ’ s why I took to gaming and game design so much . The best people in gaming are both incredibly creative and highly analytical .”
You ’ d think Kim was describing herself . As a game designer she ’ s drawn out megahits like The Sims , a lifesimulation game of interacting avatars , and Rock Band , a skill-building game allowing players to jam together on individual instruments . Yet Kim ’ s next level is taking the principles she has used in video games to build products outside of gaming , garnering design credits in products like eBay , Netflix and The New York Times online site .
Kim calls it game thinking , a philosophy which combines game design , systems thinking and user experience insight to build engaging environments that cater to a customer ’ s innate desire to master a skill . Her method requires both creativity and analytical thinking — two dichotomous thought processes certainly found within Kim , and traceable back to her days at UC San Diego in the 70s .
Though her declared major was experimental psychology , Kim was able to interact and learn from other students in different tracks — from
42 TRITON | WINTER 2019