Game design Quest – 1st week

Game Design Quest – Week 1

We’re back in the studio and we’ve started a new session! Hurray! We had a very busy week 🙂

Game Design Quest – The current session is particularly short because of the upcoming holidays break, so we have quest time each day of the week. This time, the quest is all about Game Design. Each Eagle is supposed to design two types of games: a board game and a video game. The first week is dedicated to exploring probability and its important role in the world of games. As part of the quest, Alden and I prepared a “Play lab” for the Eagles, where we brought lots of board games and super cool video games. The Eagles can play with them after they finish the daily challenge. They love this quest and to my big surprise the challenges of  probability were also a big success: Eagles worked in pairs, and explored the subject through fun activities such as playing Rock Paper scissors 18 times and investigating the result distribution. As always, quest materials are prepared at the highest possible finishing level.

Trip to Manhattan – As I mentioned at the end of the previous session, on Friday we went with the Eagles to visit two large architectural offices in Manhattan. You can probably imagine the excitement of all of us: Riding a train for a full day visit to Manhattan! Alden opened the morning with a launch: The Eagles set the rules that would guide the day and the Eagles brainstormed about questions that they would ask the architects. After the launch we went to the train station and took the train to the first office in Brooklyn. The office was small and stylish with three amazing architects, who received us in such a generous way. Alden asked them to tell the Eagles their “Hero’s Journey” and it was fascinating to hear how each one of them came to the world of architecture. They talked about their biggest failure and what each had learned from it. We learned again how important failures are on the way to success. Afterward, one of the architects showed Eagles real architectural plans, a 3D cardboard model and many 3D models on the computer. The Eagles asked a lot of questions and were fascinated throughout the visit.

After the visit to the first office, we went to the second architectural office in Manhattan, which again entailed two trains and some walking. The Eagles took this in stride. When we reached the second destination, we found a larger office of about 50 architects. About 7 architects were waiting for us in the conference room with pizza and cold drinks. The Eagles were very happy with this reception. We were well received in this office too: We saw different projects, which are planned by that office, we heard a lot about planning a school building and the Eagles talked about the schools they had planned. We heard about how architects renovate old buildings and saw lots of restoration work done by the office. We stayed there for almost two hours, and in my opinion, the Eagles could have stayed there for another hour if we had had the time. We left the office around 3 pm and started the long journey back home. Overall, it was a great experience and it clearly showed me how important it is for the Eagles to experience the real world. A significant part of the quests should be meeting real heroes, which is exactly what this visit provided to the Eagles. It was absolutely exciting and inspiring.