“Sweetland Slumber Party” for Taddug Media Steam release Spring 2025
Product Owner, Lead Designer, Production Manager & Technical Director

• Game Studio title developed in conjunction with my research on multi-generational, local, cooperative play to encourage bonding
• Designed for 2-4 players with three unique cooperative levels
• Crafted  with easy to learn mechanics, friendly methods to interact, and a playful and bright design
• Showcased at PAX East 2023 (80k attendees)  with over 80 positive, unique, feedback cards received

This title reflect my continued interest in cooperative multiplayer game design, but I am also influenced by my own and my students’ experience of game play during lockdown. I spoke with a number of students who now have a deep admiration for local multiplayer games, citing how that genre worked well for not only their non-familial friends, but also specifically their family-based friends. This accessibility was critical during the pandemic and now remains so, I wanted to explore what design features were important while still leaving room for tiered enjoyment based on age and interest.

I considered the practice of shared entertainment experiences with family that has been a common occurrence for thousands of years, though to varying degrees of popularity. Certainly, family might sit down to a shared experience watching tv programs while also having their own devices or their own time with such devices, say in the 1950s-1980s even. But then increasingly television became very segmented and no longer really a family affair, the young children dominating the tv during work hours, adults watching after hours, and everyone having access to their own set in their private locations (bedrooms or dens for example).

What is interesting though, is that when it was not uncommon for multi-generational family viewing of television to occur, shows often contained material that was only appealing or accessible to one specific age range at a time, and yet included a wide variety of material for all ages across the episode’s duration. For example. it was common for certain jokes to go over the head of one age group, but without taking away from any one else’s enjoyment. And so I wanted to include elements in the design that are appealing to a wide range, but also include elements that are more likely to be appealing for a smaller segment while avoiding that inclusion from deterring from the overall enjoyment of the game for any one group.

This is a challenging design goal, but certainly a fun one! My usual success evaluation is, would I continue to play the game — well I had to take a two semester break from development, and I did indeed play with friends, basking in the glee of being wobbly little pj friends, spawning our dragon friends while traversing a magical, Japanese inspired dreamworld and collecting playing cards, candy corn, and taiyaki! Genuinely the game always puts a smile on my face, as it references everything I love dearly while the mechanics are what might be deemed beautiful ‘friend slop’ these days!

Furthermore, our experience at PAX East reflected the mulit-generational appeal and the ability for the game mechanics to be easily understood with a short learning curve: these were two paramount goals for the game design, so I am quite pleased.