iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

Today marked my first day as a full professor. This professor-ing thing has been a wild ride and it's been pretty great, thanks to all the people I get to work with! I celebrated by not working, and instead hiking through a coastal forest to a beach in Olympic National Park. Can strongly recommend.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Advice from my Serious and Applied Games class this term. I asked them to make a manifesto based on what they've learned and done, and then to adapt it for different audiences. Then, we rewrote it to be a call to action for ourselves. (First one is mine, the rest is from the students.)

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

AND that's a wrap!! If you are local to the Worcester area, you can come see all these projects AND MORE at ShowFest. May 1st, 5:30-8:30pm, on the second floor of the Innovation Studio on the WPI campus. wp.wpi.edu/showfest/

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

“Stay whimsical and magical!”

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

And, last but certainly not least, Myndspell! This is a turn-based RPG with dialog and mini-games and characters that change based on player emotional model that updates with choices. Their paper takes inspiration from old game handbooks and manuals, AND they made merch as a form of data collection!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

9 to 5 is a social commentary game about corporate greed and unethical behaviors that lead to the creation of a billionaire class.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Treasure of the Sierra Madre is a digital multiplayer board game with mobile phone control! Releasing soon on Steam.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Last session, and it’s all large interdisciplinary production projects! First up is “Disillusion”, a narrative puzzle game dealing with themes of grief and guilt. The player repairs a space ship that they crashed, causing the death of the crew. The player is asked: whose legacy should be passed on?

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Trey Bowen also did his MQP in Japan, and joined an existing research project on creating a “sleep tamagotchi”: a serious game to encourage healthy sleep habits. He refactored the game, set up sustainable dev pipelines, and the co-facilitated a workshop to understand user experience with it.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Our next project was sponsored by NVIDIA, in which students explored the impact of different latency mitigation techniques in human-AI gameplay.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Our next team did a deep dive into interface techniques used in tactics and autonomous control games, and extrapolated how to apply design lessons to real-world autonomous systems.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Now entering session three, which focuses on technical research in games. Up first, we have a team who compared methods for improving quality of experience in streamed games. They made a little demo fishing game and experimented with different buffering and latency conditions.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Crow Zubrick’s project focus is on ritual, witchcraft, antifascism, and transformative play to enact better futures. ❤️ Compassion Cards bring play into life to make the world a better place, one tiny step at a time.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Sofia Napierata has a very different kind of MQP this year: her project was to be a simulated “independent contractor” for audio across multiple other MQPs. Really great to hear her reflect on getting this kind of professional experience!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Shin’Ai rewritten is a cozy gardening game, made in our Japan MQP center. Much of their presentation focuses on the iterations they made across the project.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

DigiDiva is an absurdist, comedic, girlypop game that makes social commentary on gender roles. “We wanted to make a game for women that is not a feminist game.”

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

This team also did an immense amount of audio work! You can check out their soundtrack here.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

We’re temporarily back with SPI-Glass, which was also an MQP in the studio this year! The team is reflecting on their experience iterating on an existing design and moving into full production on the first version of the game.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Unstrung is an alternate controller game where you create shadow puppets that form level geometry in an auto-runner platformer. Nice reflection on the technical challenges and design challenges in creating an alt.ctrl.MQP!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

First up is Leaves of Fate, a zany puzzle platformer. This team had a tight focus on managing an iterative design process on a short timeline. They targeted a middle school (and older) audience with a core message about positive self worth. They are sharing some great advice for future projects.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Closing out graduate project presentations is Mohit Patel and Ryan Stebe, who created an Endless Runner toolkit for supporting procedurally generated levels. It is currently in the review stage for publishing on the Unity Asset Store!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

The Pixel Scriptorium is a new learning lab, directed by Prof. Karen Stewart, in which students work together on a long-form dark academia visual novel. This year’s team is exploring how to launch an academic game studio that supports student learning, while also building a creative foundation.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Mind Walker (Xingyi Liu, Chaoyi Wang, Haoming Xhang) is an RPG that balances dialogue, real-time combat, and logic puzzles with fire-fighting as a core mechanic.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Thomas Jolicoeur is sharing his narrative work on SPI-Glass, but moreso is sharing the challenges of the creative process. Extremely open and relatable to all creators who go through the “this is crap, I am crap” experience and made it to the other side with work they can be proud of!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Thomas Branchaud was the tech lead for SPI-Glass this year and has been working to build the baseline tech to support future years of work: defining a tech stack, and creating modular UI and dialogue systems. Designing from day one for future use, rather than messy prototyping (which he inherited).

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

First up, Minyun Pan is presenting about creating seamless interaction design mechanisms for AR ghost hunting. How do you make the phone feel like the actual tool you are using as a player? Also some very cool ritual mechanics in the game!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Hunter Simone made two games to explore notions of unpredictability and mechanisms to preserve agency in systems design. Hazy Bones is a War-like card game with deck building. Broken Motion is a roguelike/deck-building FPS.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Bashar Alqassar shares his new game, “Bots That Explode (Most of the Time)”, a critique of using AI to bypass the core experience of being intrinsically motivated to work.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

First up, Abraham Goodman shares his game poem about how AI erodes critical thinking skills.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

#genuary12 Boxes only. A tiny and simple sketch before my evening screen time cutoff. I do like the texture, though! #genuary #p5js

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 10/01/2026

One day late #genuary9, playing with cellular automata rules based on hue. #genuary #p5js

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 08/01/2026

#genuary7 Inspired by boolean algebra. I don't feel much like making silly art on this horrifying and sorrowful day. But it's been nice seeing a bit of art show up tonight, as I struggle to stop doomscrolling. #p5js #genuary

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 07/01/2026

#genuary6 A tiny city that becomes that little bit more complex every time you turn out the lights. Until, suddenly, your city is gone and a new one takes its place. #genuary #p5js

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

#genuary5: write "genuary" and avoid using a font Handwritten text used as a mask when generating surrounding shapes. (Looks a bit like a colorblindness test, especially when I make "genuary" green!) A fun, quick sketch that also made me want to draw with my iPad more often. #genuary #p5js

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 04/01/2026

Here's some of my favorites from the cross stitch patterns. #genuary4

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 04/01/2026

#genuary4 lowres This was a lot of fun! Started out making a cross-stitch pattern generator (my favorite low-res non-digital rendering technique) and ended at making dragon scales. #genuary #p5js

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 04/01/2026

#genuary3 prompt is the fibonacci sequence: I used the fibonacci numbers for mapping circle color and position within each bloom. #genuary #p5js

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 02/01/2026

It's #genuary! Today's prompt: one color, one shape. Keeping it simple for #genuary1. Hoping to keep this up at least until the new term starts. #p5js

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 02/01/2026

New Year’s Day with my husband’s great uncle. He is 101 years old and has lived in the same farmhouse in Central MA for 100 years. His granddaughter found a ledger from the farm’s old creamery covering 1895-87. It has absolutely perfect penmanship and later became a kids’ sketchbook. I love it.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 11/06/2025

We are in Western Colorado at a museum that (weirdly!) has an 1809 copy of the Boston Chronicle. It details how the town next to where we live in MA celebrated Independence Day. “Massachusetts — First to assert her rights, may she be the last to forget them.” Feels appropriate to see in 2025.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

And the last one of the day! Saving the Terrorbirds: a project where this team collaborated to create a fictional world, and then made four different projects within that world to compare/contrast different forms of interactivity within it.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

This team focused on mitigating latency in cloud-based racing games. Super cool project where they implemented a unique controller assistance technique and used bot playtesting to determine optimal values.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

This team is working on mitigation techniques for latency in cloud-based games. They made a racing game and implemented a controller assistance technique to improve quality of experience, and used bot testing to determine the optimal values for intervening with assistance.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

It’s documented! They made weekly code poems! They did think aloud studies! And you can play with it here: stinkymilo.github.io/Prosetta/Fro...

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

Prosetta is a new esoteric programming language (esolang) where code is hidden within a poem you compose, inspired by constrained writing methods. Absolutely delightful! The text of the poem is the code, it encourages people to hide messages. It’s like a code puzzle!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

Spiral Development MQP - this team focused especially on the production method, and makes a game following that method. They chose to make TWO games, meaning they had two case studies to reflect on. They followed 15 (!) spirals over the year. In each spiral they implemented a new feature.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

Much To Do To Say I Do! A wedding planning simulator game, emphasizing the importance of building and maintaining relationships. Two “brooms” (the marrying couple) are getting married, and you are playing mini-games that get them ready for the altar. This is so sweet and lovely!

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

Up next is the Japan project center team! They are sharing about both the amazing robot game project they made with students at Ritsumeikan University, and the “arcade management simulator” they made as an entire game. Shinsekei Arcade is a cozy arcade management simulator.

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Gillian Smith @codingcrafter.bsky.social · 25/04/2025

And The World Went Dark is a roguelike that invites players to care about their characters and make gameplay choices that impact their emotional state. Made in Godot, which they say allowed all team members (including artists and writers) to contribute in-engine.

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