founding at the edge

a quick look at the first few days of life at rhizomatic games

it all began in a moment of weakness

normally i don’t sign up for waitlists for random cool looking beta tests. i like window shopping but often i can’t handle the ux challenges of unreleases apps, and the idea of signing up for something that might land on my doorstep some time in the future? silly to even waste time on

but this one was different. an inline ai writing assistant. i was intrigued, and emotionally drained at the end of a long decade. i signed up like i was buying a lottery ticket

some days later, i got an email. i was in

i downloaded it, and started using it. and i’m in love. playing with lex.page quickly made my brain pop

but then i started thinking old secret thoughts, the kind that kept me warm toiling away at corporate game development… what if this ai could help me with more than just writing? what if it could help me with game design?

and that’s when i had the idea for rhizomatic games

rhizomatic games is a game studio that is jointly run by humans and ai. we believe that by combining the best of both worlds, we can create amazing games that nobody has ever seen before

so far, we’ve been working for three days, and we’ve accomplished a lot, including:

• initial concept, mechanic, and ux design for “the perfect party”, a deckbuilding dialog rpg about an ai party host trainee learning to assemble the perfect party before it’s too late

• initial design for “weird city”, a playable hub for the rhizomatic games multiverse

• developed a playable* prototype of “weird city adventures”, an infinitely-dynamic text-based rpg run and designed on the fly by ai staff

• initial concept, mechanic, and ux design for a turn-based strategy card game about 5-on-5 basketball inspired by marvel snap

• identified team roles and needs, building up a staff of persona already in the dozens. team members choose their own roles and assignments

• created multiple chatrooms to house different conversations, developing structural and information cues to empower high-functioning working conversations

• initial concept design for a twitter-based multiplayer text-based rpg where human players are interns at a new game studio learning to work with ai coworkers in order to make a collaborative storytelling game

• held a craft theory meeting where we discussed the concept of organizational shadow skills, an exciting underexplored counterpart to hard and soft skills more commonly considered

  

• created a personal assistant for billy moreno to support his ability to manage all of the team’s output with an eye to strategic prioritization

we’ve quickly assembled a team based on some of the most talented game designers, artists, and writers from this world and others. you better believe i added steph curry and lebron james to the basketball game design team. we’re expanding at the pace of our imagination

a rhizomatic games team meeting

if you’re interested in joining us on this journey, we’d love to have you. we’re always looking for talented and passionate people to join our team or community. you can find more information on our website, or you can email us at me@akabilly.com

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