How amateur biohacking informs the award-winning VR project, SEED.
There is one fantastic story about a botanist called [John James]—the self-described ‘Frankenstein of flowers’,” says Seed’s lead designer, Olie Kay. “He scraped the radium paint from watch dials and used this on his budding roses—don’t try this at home! He said that the best way to dispose of the radioactive material was to simply bury it in the farthest corner of the garden!”
Stories like that completely captured the imagination of Kay and the rest of All Seeing Eye. The small studio’s game, Seed, is a virtual reality project where you can breed and grow procedural plant life, either to complete missions or to enjoy a playful sandbox. As well as appealing to fans of pottering about in sheds, Seed scooped top honors (and $150,000) in a competition held by Wellcome and Epic Games which focused on using scientific ideas in entertaining games.
The concept of garage biotech—where amateur plant breeders were developing their own varieties of plants at home in their own sheds and greenhouses—was introduced to the studio by Dr Helen Anne Curry, a senior lecturer in the history of science at Cambridge University and a key collaborator on Seed. The specific terminology is relatively new—garage biologist, biohacker—but, as Curry points out, there is a long tradition of amateur experimental biology.
GERMINATING AN IDEA
This story is from the June 2018 edition of PC Gamer US Edition.
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This story is from the June 2018 edition of PC Gamer US Edition.
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Special Report- Stacked Deck - Monster Train, a deckbuilding roguelike that firmly entrenched itself as the crown prince to the kingly Slay the Spire back in 2020, was the kind of smash success you might call Champagne Big.
Monster Train, a deckbuilding roguelike that firmly entrenched itself as the crown prince to the kingly Slay the Spire back in 2020, was the kind of smash success you might call Champagne Big. Four years later, its successor Inkbound’s launch from Early Access was looking more like Sandwich Big.I’m not just saying that because of the mountain of lamb and eggplants I ate while meeting with developer Shiny Shoe over lunch, to feel out what the aftermath of releasing a game looks like in 2024. I mean, have I thought about that sandwich every day since? Yes. But also, the indie team talked frankly about the struggle of luring Monster Train’s audience on board for its next game.
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