108 From XP to UX – Brett Wardle

How a gamer leveraged Gamification to jump from Game Designer to User Experience and Product Designer

Bret Wardle is a game player, game designer, and product designer who speaks on the national level about leveraging game mechanics and player types to enhance user experience.

In this episode of Gamelayer, we dive deep into the crossroads of game design, user experience, and product development with special guest Brett Wardle. From his roots in gaming to his current work at the intersection of UX and gamification, Brett shares his unique journey and insights.

We explore what makes games engaging, how game mechanics translate to product design, and why humility and continuous learning are crucial in any creative field. Along the way, we discuss the evolution of gaming platforms, the power of the modding community, and how games like Minecraft are shaping not just entertainment but also education.

Bret criticizes the Bartle player taxonomy for being narrow in the sense that it was developed around MUD (Mulit Layer Dungeons) and instead proposes using the HEXAD methodology. The Hexad player types, developed by Andrzej Marczewski, categorize users based on their motivational drivers in gamified systems. These six types are: Socializers, Free Spirits, Achievers, Philanthropists, Players, and Disruptors. https://myhexad.com/about-hexad

Whether you're a designer, developer, or just a curious gamer, this episode is packed with wisdom on creating meaningful experiences—from earning XP to mastering UX and LX.

Transcripts and swag at ⁠Gamelayer.fm⁠

Theme Music by Caleb Willitz. ⁠calebwillitz.com/⁠ ⁠calebwillitz.bandcamp.com/music⁠

OUTLINE

00:00 Introduction to Gamelayer and Guest Introduction
00:56 The Value of Humility in Expertise
01:19 Introduction to Brett Wardle and His Journey
04:12 The Intersection of Gaming and Product Development
07:08 Understanding User Experience and Gamification
09:55 The Role of Gamification in Product Design
12:47 Defining Games and Their Appeal
15:56 The History of Games and Their Evolution
23:56 Reading the Room in Design
25:19 Quality Over Quantity in Gaming
28:09 The Importance of Mechanics in Game Design
30:10 Sharing Knowledge in Game Design
33:43 The Journey to Becoming a Game Designer
39:49 The Evolution of Gaming Platforms
43:36 Favorite Games and Their Impact
46:25 Nostalgic Gaming Favorites
47:36 The Allure of Minecraft
50:16 The Modding Community and Its Impact
52:44 Exploring Game Mechanics in Minecraft
01:04:55 Learning Through Play: Minecraft as an Educational Tool

CREDITS

Found Sound on the "domain of play" borrowed from ⁠⁠⁠Balance in the Spiritual Life Dharma talk by Sr. Trai Nghiem⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠

Theme Music by Caleb Willitz. calebwillitz.com/ calebwillitz.bandcamp.com/music

Transcript

[In this recording, David Kolmer was logged into the system as “Improvement Dave”.]

Improvement Dave (0:1.004)

Hey, awesome. So we have Brett Wardle on this show. Am I saying your name right, Brett?

Bret (0:5.086)

Yeah, yeah, you can call me whatever you want.

Improvement Dave

Mr. Wardle,

Bret (0:5.086)

Anything but Mr. Wardle.

Improvement Dave (0:8.149)

Mr. Wardle, thank you so much for being on the show today.

Improvement Dave (0:14.121)

All right, Brett, you wanna go ahead and just start off by letting us know what you're most interested in or what you're up to these days.

Bret (0:21.012)

Yeah, so I'm interested in games in general. Like I love gaming. I worked in video game development for 10 years as a game designer. I worked on franchises like The Sims 3, uh did a handful of movie to game conversions with a small studio here in Salt Lake City. uh Was part of the boom of Facebook gaming, the explosion and crash of Facebook and mobile gaming. And at that point just kind of started to

Improvement Dave (0:24.908)

Uh huh. Okay.

Improvement Dave (0:32.107)

Oh wow.

Really?

Improvement Dave (0:38.830)

Okay.

Ooh.

What?

Improvement Dave (0:48.248)

Okay.

Bret (0:50.622)

like, realized that I needed to spend more time with my wife and kids and moved over to product development. And that's kind of where I found myself, Cinch, is that that sort of niche of, hey, we're, people love and talk about games. And there's, there's this idea that like, I mean, me and you can sit and talk about a 30 year old video game for hours, but nobody has those, like, I don't sit down with you at the water cooler and talk about like what cool stuff we're doing in Excel or what outlook.

Improvement Dave (0:55.267)

Love it.

Bret (1:18.228)

what new features or stuff is in Outlook. And I'm trying to find that convergence of why don't we talk about the products we use the same way we talk about the games we play. And so that's kind of where I found myself is that sort of intersection and more or less that's what I'm doing. I build products, I design emergent experiences and experiences that people love to engage with and in somewhat traditional or non-traditional sort of spaces.

Improvement Dave (1:21.314)

Yeah, not really.

Improvement Dave (1:29.814)

Interesting.

Improvement Dave (1:39.790)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (1:46.222)

So you're making me think of like UX or what's an example of a product that you're designing or would design?

Bret (1:51.903)

Yeah, so UX is actually where I found my way to product. Like I work with a game studio and one of the engineers, after a game studio collapse, one of the engineers had gone to a company called Spillman Technologies that makes software for law enforcement, first responders, 911 centers. And he's like, hey, I know that you're a game designer, but this concept of user experience, UX, is just sort of taking off. I mean, this was like...

Improvement Dave (2:5.548)

Okay.

Bret (2:21.056)

15 years ago when UX was sort of brand new and he's like I know it's new and I know it doesn't like in your head it might not compute but these UX people are doing what game designers have been doing for the last 30 years in the form of like understanding why users do something how do they retain information how do we learn how do we remember where buttons are and he's like I think you could actually like kill it at this UX thing and so I found my way over and since then that's where I've been I've gone through UX found my way to product but

Improvement Dave (2:28.812)

Uh huh.

Improvement Dave (2:34.337)

interesting.

Improvement Dave (2:42.125)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (2:45.910)

Okay.

Bret (2:50.932)

I mean, I've built that, I've built law enforcement software, first responder software, I've built security software for like people showing up at stadiums that are getting privileged access to stadiums. I've worked in EECOM, I worked for Overstock, I don't know if you're familiar with there, but I was in charge of the homepage at Overstock. Yeah, so tons of stuff and I've just kind of bounced around and do some consulting on the side and a ton of talking, I've given a TEDx talk on

Improvement Dave (2:56.119)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (3:0.896)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (3:7.433)

Oh, yeah. Yeah, people talk about that even in St. Louis. Yeah, okay. Okay. Uh huh.

Cool. Uh-huh.

Bret (3:19.710)

why I think Super Metroid is the greatest digital experience ever created. And I just try to bring that to more and more products that I work.

Improvement Dave (3:20.535)

Yeah.

I love that.

That's my game. I don't know if I've ever shared that with you, but I heard you say that at GameCon and I was like, okay, I need to talk more to this guy because if he has any interest in Super Metroid, then we need to have a discussion.

Bret (3:34.965)

Bye!

If you haven't watched the TEDx talk, you should. It is a...

Improvement Dave (3:40.823)

You know, I didn't watch it yet because I don't want to be, you know, have like fame shock, you know, for how cool you are being on Ted.

Bret (3:45.216)

I am super not cool. I don't know if being a TEDx speaker is a qualifier for being cool. Fair, fair.

Improvement Dave (3:51.690)

It is in my world, which isn't the coolest world, but okay. I wanted to ask if you're aware which Bartle player taxonomy you are. And I hope you were aware of that question.

Bret (4:0.384)

So, I am, and I'm familiar with Bartles. I probably most identify as an explorer. Like, I'm one of those that like, I don't necessarily care about the achievements and I would say I'm like 75 % explorer, 25 % socializer. Like, I love the social aspect of games, but as soon as something becomes tedious or starts to feel like a grind, I'm

Improvement Dave (4:3.871)

Okay. Uh-huh.

Improvement Dave (4:14.261)

Uh-huh.

Improvement Dave (4:21.451)

Okay. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (4:28.287)

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay.

Bret (4:28.682)

So if I can walk around and discover new things, I love games like a Fallout um games where there's just like this open world and it's really good. We are in this golden age of video game to movie slash show conversions that I am just like, I'm absolutely loving. Cause when I was young, when I was working,

Improvement Dave (4:35.661)

Mm-hmm. I loved that show, by the way, too. Yeah, that show was amazing. The fallout show on Amazon turned into a great show. Yeah. Right. You're right.

They're doing good, yeah. It's like way better than the old Mortal Kombat movies or Street Fighter movies, right? They're okay, but they're actually pretty terrible.

Bret (4:55.324)

When I was working in games, yes, we were stuck with Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter movies, like that original Super Mario Brothers movie.

Improvement Dave (5:6.017)

Yeah, not so much. But the new one with Jack Black, pretty good, right? Like pretty, pretty, pretty stellar.

Bret (5:9.748)

Yeah, no, like it's solid. Like all of the new stuff has been really good. Like I've been really loving the Last of Us show, the Fallout show, the Sonic the Hedgehog movies are fantastic. Like we are in a golden age. Yeah, it is a golden age. But so going back to Bartles, are you familiar um with the Hexad player type framework?

Improvement Dave (5:15.051)

Yeah.

I haven't seen that. Okay. Those are, my kids love those movies. Like they beg us to watch them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, please.

Improvement Dave (5:34.315)

No, I mean, I'm an explorer, so tell me all about it. I'm gonna write that down.

Bret (5:37.029)

So I love Bartles, but Bartles, if you're not familiar, anyone listening is not familiar, Bartles is built around MUDs, around multi-user dungeons in like the 70s and 80s. And explicitly, like Bartles or Bartle built this around what players do. Like the whole framework is built around what players do specifically in multi-user dungeons.

Improvement Dave (5:51.104)

Okay, sure, sure.

Interesting.

Improvement Dave (6:2.883)

Oh, okay. Okay.

Bret (6:5.604)

So it doesn't capture like a big picture. um And the hex ad, what the hex ad does is it's created by um a gamification designer named Andre Marchewski. And I may be getting that wrong and the spelling is significantly different than it sounds. But he created it. um And I love it because what it does is it takes Bartles and this concept of what players do and it combines it with the self-determination theory.

Improvement Dave (6:23.989)

Okay. Uh-huh.

Bret (6:35.390)

like if you're familiar with that at all. But it is a triad of groupings on why humans do stuff, like completely outside of games. It is like why humans build houses, why we get jobs, why we do all this. But it takes this like what we do and how we're motivated and smashes them together. And it kind of creates this like six, there's like six player types and different motivations. so I use it, like when I consult, I use the hex ad framework.

Improvement Dave (6:37.741)

Yeah, it rings a bell.

Improvement Dave (6:44.781)

Mm-hmm. Okay.

Yeah, right. So motivation. Uh-huh. Yeah. Nice.

Improvement Dave (6:59.949)

Okay. Uh-huh.

Bret (7:5.360)

Um, just because I feel like it's a great combination of not only what we do as humans and players, but why we do it, why we're motivated to do it. So yeah, you you should totally check. I. Yes. Yeah. Dive into it. So yeah, whenever I consult, like I go, I go to hex ad, like I, I really love it. And I, I encourage people like whenever I'm building personas and stuff for products, I'll include that hex ad type on there because it can, it can completely determine.

Improvement Dave (7:5.803)

I love it.

Improvement Dave (7:13.385)

I have absolutely never heard of that. So that's why I'm here. That's why we're having conversations. I can't wait to go check that out. That sounds fantastic. Uh huh. Okay.

Improvement Dave (7:28.203)

Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

Bret (7:34.120)

what type of game mechanics, what type of KPIs you should be tracking. um And it's a really good robust system. Like I like the way that it's set up. um Although Bartles is fantastic. Like that's my one hang up on Bartles is A, it's hyper centered on muds and B.

Improvement Dave (7:35.991)

Mm-hmm.

Improvement Dave (7:41.879)

That's cool.

Improvement Dave (7:46.911)

Yeah, no.

And that's true with even like the ones that we use for corporate America, right? Everyone kind of has their favorite. They all have a different flavor. They all are maybe geared differently. um And you know, they're, they're repeatable ish, right? So kind of we're talking about people here. We do, we like that. We're not that good at it, but we do like doing it.

Bret (7:53.931)

Yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah. Yeah, yes. Yeah.

Bret (8:3.732)

Yeah, I mean it's all gray area, it is... Humans love to classify things, right? We love to group things together, but yeah. We love classifying them and it's always wrong. And five years later there'll be something different and ten years later we'll look back and go, oh the Briggs-Meyer is completely bogus and not psychologically founded and... Yes, yes.

Improvement Dave (8:19.415)

Thank you.

It's a journey.

Improvement Dave (8:28.413)

AI proof that it was all wrong. Oh, fantastic. So it's really interesting to hear that you're not in the proper learning and development space. And that actually really excites me. I'm really happy to hear that because I'm trying to break gamification out of the L and D world because I think it is sort of a, an L and D word. And you might disagree with me on that, but you seem to be nodding. And I kind of like this idea that it could be more than that.

Right, I'd like to hear more of, yeah, you're okay. Yeah, so how does it fit into your product design or how does it fit into sort of the UX work that you do? Or is there anything more you'd like to add there?

Bret (8:58.566)

Oh, it... It is.

Bret (9:8.948)

Yeah, so I mean, it fits everywhere, right? Like gamification is this blanket and gamification is a term itself as this blessing and a curse, right? There's some people that swear to never use it and it's a garbage term, but when it's all said and done, that is the term we use. There is not another term that other people use, so we're stuck using it. But it is this idea of just, by definition, is just using game mechanics in non-traditional game settings.

Improvement Dave (9:14.775)

Sure, thank you.

Improvement Dave (9:21.579)

Yeah. Correct. Well, it is. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (9:31.350)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (9:37.203)

Mm-hmm. I love it.

Bret (9:39.194)

L &D is a great space for it I've kind of like wiggled my way into this L &D world because of like Sentacia and USDL, like the US Distance Learning Association has had me talk at their conference and a few other like TechLearn put on by TrainingMag. But like as a product designer, the way that I fit into gamification, like coming from an ex game development standpoint with a video game,

Improvement Dave (9:44.681)

Okay, a lot of us have. uh

Improvement Dave (9:55.341)

Sure.

Bret (10:4.606)

The rule is you have five minutes. Like you have five minutes to capture a player's attention or they're gone. Like A, gamers have an even shorter attention span than normal people if we use that. But there's so many things that they can go to. If I don't like this game, there's 10,000 other games. Products are honestly no different. Like in product design, especially in this day and age, there is no more, like market saturation is everywhere. There is no longer a

Improvement Dave (10:7.661)

Okay. Yep.

Improvement Dave (10:20.845)

Sure. Yeah. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (10:28.119)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (10:32.599)

Right.

Bret (10:33.694)

Well, I've got to use Microsoft Outlook because it's the only email tool. No, there's a hundred email tools. If I don't like your email tool, I will use another email tool. There's 50 of them. Yeah, I can choose from a number of them. So the same things apply. Like I need to be engaging. I need to keep people hooked. And it boils down to like what your KPI is, right? Like if you're familiar with key performance indicators, what are we tracking? Like if our goal is to increase

Improvement Dave (10:40.492)

Right.

Improvement Dave (10:45.559)

Several hundred. Right. Mm-hmm.

Improvement Dave (10:57.687)

Sure. Totally. Yeah. What does success look like? Yeah.

Bret (11:3.700)

Yeah, if we are trying to increase daily average users, monthly average users, there's different mechanics that we might use than say if we're trying to increase revenue. If we're saying like, hey, I need to, we just need to get people to pay for the service where conversion is the KPI we're looking for. You would use different mechanics. And so that's kind of where I found my space is this sort of Venn diagram, or I like to refer to it as the Triforce because I'm a gamer, but this Triforce of

Improvement Dave (11:11.245)

Totally.

Improvement Dave (11:20.406)

Okay.

Bret (11:30.971)

user types, which is where the hex ad comes into play, KPIs, where it's like, hey, am I tracking monetary KPIs, conversion KPIs, engagement KPIs, and then game mechanics. And you've got to find where those three things meet. What mechanics match the player type that I have and match the KPI that I'm trying to enact change on. And that's kind of where I find myself in product is I study games, I love games, I've played thousands of games. How can I bring

Improvement Dave (11:31.724)

Yeah.

Okay. Okay.

Improvement Dave (11:47.148)

Okay.

Bret (11:59.125)

the things that make a game fun, engaging, retain players into the product world so that we can talk about, use, and have the same feelings about the products we use as we do about games. Because we can have these passionate conversations about video games and board games and card games and trading cards and all these things, but nobody sits around and talks about the products we use on a day-to-day basis until, I would say like probably the last five years, you start to have like,

Things like Duolingo and Waze and some of these other products start to work in where you are actually having these engaging like, hey, what's your Duolingo streak? Hey, what trophy level are you at? And yep.

Improvement Dave (12:29.803)

Yeah. Oh yeah.

Improvement Dave (12:37.285)

emotional conversations even people have love around those apps. Like the first person who told me about Waze, it was in a training class. I was training customer service and credit. This guy was excited. Like he was like, yeah, his hair stood up on the back of his head and he was just like on fire. Like, oh, there's this app. They tell you, know, where the traffic is. So I a hundred percent agree with that. And yeah, it's a, it's a new age, right? It's a new vibe. It really is. Yeah.

Bret (12:41.694)

Oh yeah.

Bret (12:48.978)

I love Waze.

Bret (13:2.910)

Super exciting. Like, as someone who came from video games to products, like, it genuinely excites me to say like, hey, there are things that we can learn from these, like, these garbage experiences, at least, like, from the outside world. Games are still, they still have that stigma. Like, when you talk about video games, people are just like, oh, I don't play video, I don't play games. Like, you do. Like, I'm pretty sure I can look through your phone and show you that you do, whether you think you do or not.

Improvement Dave (13:7.551)

Right.

Improvement Dave (13:12.182)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (13:15.894)

Right.

Improvement Dave (13:26.411)

You do. Yeah.

There's gonna be something in there. Right, yeah. And we all play games. And with that in mind, I'd like to just openly ask you, especially since you've been a game designer, what are games? How would you define games? And what causes us to love them, right? Why do we love them so much?

Bret (13:33.279)

You do.

Bret (13:44.801)

Yeah, so the, true. Yeah, yeah, that's, that's the big question, right? And there's not a, I don't know that there's a distinct answer to that. As far as defining them, the definition I use and that a lot of, um, at least in the, um, academic world, there's this idea of play versus game. And then you have like granularity of games, but play is the idea of doing anything for enjoyment. Like you're, you don't have a point.

Improvement Dave (13:51.297)

Yeah, it is.

Bret (14:14.292)

you are just doing it for enjoyment. And then to take that a step further, the second you add a rule set, it becomes a game. Like that is the difference between play and game, at least in academia is concerned. So the examples I always like to use is if I go out in my front yard and me and my daughter throw my frisbee back and forth, that is play. But if we go to the park and play a game of ultimate frisbee, we have now, that is a game. We now have a rule set, we,

are keeping score, we have these things that like you have to adhere by. so game to me is just structured play. Like it is play in the form you've given play structure, right? Like that is how we define games. And by that definition, like there's all sorts of things that suddenly become a game, which we don't really think of. Like even things like there's the like where you write one sentence and then you pass the paper to someone else and write a sentence. You've now given that

play structure. Like that is a game and you've kind of transcended that as as far as why we love them. Like that is the question, right? Like, and I don't know, like there's countless reasons and I think that's kind of the point or at least the the thing that I take away from it is everyone is different. Like I love games for a different reason than you love games. My daughters and son love games. Like my son is an uber competitive Mario Kart player. Like he loves games for a very different reason.

Improvement Dave (15:22.647)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (15:28.439)

Well said. Yeah. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (15:39.724)

Nice.

Bret (15:42.197)

then I love games. Like, he loves the competition. Like, he's like going back to like the Bartles. He's that like, I forget what the like, the Achiever. Yeah, like whatever it is, like he is the uber competitive, whereas I'm the like, no, like get your competition out of my games. Like I'm just here to explore and have fun. So everyone, everyone loves them for different reasons, but we as humans are intrinsically drawn to them. I mean, they are as old as civilization themselves. Like, and that's, that's the

Improvement Dave (15:43.659)

Yeah. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (15:48.833)

the achiever or the killer, right? Yeah, yeah. Uh-huh.

Improvement Dave (15:58.338)

Yeah. Yeah. With you. Right.

Improvement Dave (16:7.435)

Right.

Bret (16:11.508)

That's the biggest takeaway for me is although we love them for different reasons, we love them. And why we love them, I don't know. I don't know that there's a clear, like, I'm sure someone has philosophies as to what the clear answer is to that. But from my perspective, yeah. Yes, yes.

Improvement Dave (16:26.061)

Yeah, cause I might as well just ask you what's the meaning of life, right? I might as well just say like, why, what's the purpose of not, you know, dying or why would we want to continue? So it's a difficult question. I just want to address that, but you kind of just started to inch into another topic that I'd really like to dig in with you. And that's the history of games, right? You seem to know a lot about, or have researched or have experience with understanding where did games come from or what's the history of games. So anything that you'd like to share on that.

Bret (16:33.235)

Yeah.

Bret (16:44.362)

Yes.

Bret (16:53.534)

Yeah, I mean, I love this topic and I've given a handful of talks about this and I mean, ultimately, I could just say, like, well, how much time do we have? Because this could literally go on for hours. I mean, in short, um like I said, are as old as civilization. They've unearthed one of my favorite little facts is in Kenya,

Improvement Dave (16:58.188)

Yeah.

Okay.

Improvement Dave (17:10.508)

Well, I have all day.

Improvement Dave (17:21.121)

Yeah. Okay.

Bret (17:21.652)

They've unearthed this. I mean, I don't know if it's unearthed because it's like surface level, but, um, dug into rocks. They have found this like ancient arcade where multiple Mancala boards have been dug out and civilization, like civilizations in Kenya would gather around together and play Mancala as a group. It's almost like the chess boards in New York in Central Park, except these Mancala boards. And this dates back to like,

Improvement Dave (17:34.189)

Okay. Okay.

Improvement Dave (17:44.801)

Right.

What?

Bret (17:48.319)

roughly 6000 BC. So we're talking at this point like 8000 years ago is when we're dating and that's kind of cited as like the first instance of like group gaming. And I mean you get into things like the Royal Game of Ur is kind of cited as like the first board game um sort of. But I mean even the building blocks, even the current building blocks that we use as game designers in like dice, cards, tokens.

I mean, these are all thousands of years old. mean, dice were carved into sheep's bones and um used thousands of years ago. So we've been, as a civilization, playing games for thousands of years. And I think we discount that sometimes. I think we think of games as like, Monopoly was like, what, 1937 or something. Like, no, we're talking way older than that. And even, yes.

Improvement Dave (18:22.987)

Wow.

Improvement Dave (18:39.405)

sure. Older than capitalism even maybe, right? Yeah. uh

Bret (18:43.508)

Like even computer games, like the other thing that I love is we create these mainframe computers. You have like Edsac, EdVac. Within a decade of creating these mainframe computers, we made video games for them. Like we made video games for computers before we started making like modern personal computer software. Like in the form of OXO, Space War, Tennis for Two. Like these are being played on these mainframe computers on like

Improvement Dave (19:5.772)

Right.

Bret (19:13.096)

oscilloscope screens like the second we got Tennis for two is in it's incredibly similar the difference is there is it plays a little more like tennis you could look it up but it has a ball that it goes over a net like it uses physics to kind of bounce over and I mean space war I don't know if you're familiar with space war but it's a two-player game

Improvement Dave (19:16.065)

Is that the same as pong? The tennis for two? Is that pong or is that different? Is that older? Okay. It sounds similar.

Okay, yeah.

Huh. Wow.

Improvement Dave (19:35.469)

I'm gonna check that out too, yeah.

Bret (19:38.741)

that use like legit physics. Like it was a PVP spaceship, almost like an asteroids, but it's two ships trying to shoot each other, but they are slowly being pulled into a black hole. And it used like real physics simulations, which is create like within a decade of creating computers. We're already doing this. didn't go and figure out like, oh, well, how can we build better software? No, like people started screwing around with games and yes. And I mean,

Improvement Dave (19:46.187)

What?

Improvement Dave (19:52.319)

What?

Improvement Dave (20:3.285)

Right. We didn't invent Excel.

Bret (20:7.748)

I mean continuing that games are now as an entertainment industry games are larger than movies music and books combined like you can take all of those and the game industry is larger than that so to say that like when people are like oh I don't play games or games or child's toys or they're not like it's it's a two billion two hundred billion dollar industry and growing exponentially so

Improvement Dave (20:17.485)

heard that. Right. That blew my mind. Yeah, that-

All right.

Bret (20:35.528)

I mean, from that standpoint, like games, the history of games has a ton of knowledge to be kind of taken from it. And in one of the lectures that I've given, I have a handful of points that I kind of talk to, but I mean, taking a couple of them, like three of the ones that I love are know your user or player. Like if you go and study games, uh I'm an advocate. Like one of the things that I always end my discussions with is

Improvement Dave (20:50.465)

Yeah, what are your favorite ones? Yes, what you'd love.

Okay. Okay.

Bret (21:4.140)

As designers, as L &D experts, we need to be playing more games. I'm kind of dumbfounded by how often I talk to people. like, they'll talk about a mechanic or something. And I'll be like, oh, have you played The Last of Us? Like it uses that mechanic really well. They're like, oh, I don't play games. Like, I'm just an L &D designer. I'm like, how can you say that you're like into gamification and not play games? But knowing your player is huge because we can't design for a player.

Improvement Dave (21:26.785)

Right. Yeah.

Yeah.

Bret (21:33.429)

without knowing them. so knowing that player is one of the key takeaways that like, if you look at like Grand Theft Auto versus Bejeweled, wildly different games and appeal to wildly different audiences. I can't sit a Grand Theft Auto player down with Bejeweled and say, hey, enjoy this. I can't sit a Bejeweled player down with Grand Theft Auto and say, hey, like this should be fun, right? And.

Improvement Dave (21:40.813)

Okay. Sure. Probably different audience. Yeah. Right.

Improvement Dave (21:52.568)

Enjoy the game. Yeah.

Probably not.

Bret (21:59.795)

It brings up this idea like you really do, not only do you need to know your player and know what works for them, but test, play test, play test, play test, play test. Like we can't say it enough. Get iteration one, try it. Get iteration two, try it again. Iteration three, try it again. And just take feedback, make changes, and just keep that cycle up. It's that iterative process.

Improvement Dave (22:0.076)

Yeah, interesting.

Improvement Dave (22:11.223)

Yeah. um

Improvement Dave (22:21.933)

Yeah, I'm working on a project right now of gamification and that's just, I presented it to the SME's and they're like, well, let's go see, some people playing this and see what happens. Right. And that's, that's the perfect response. Yeah, you have to. Yeah. What, what is this missing? Like, is this fun? Yeah. You don't know.

Bret (22:29.908)

Yeah, you have to, you have to, right? Yeah, yeah, you can't, yeah, you don't, you don't, and you don't know. Like we can sit, like as much as I, as much as me as a product designer wish that I was making products for myself, I have very rarely been in charge of a product that I am the end user. Like when I was designing stuff for cops and firemen, I'm not a cop or a fireman, I'm far from it. So I have to go and,

Improvement Dave (22:46.017)

You're not.

Improvement Dave (22:50.207)

Uh huh. Interesting.

Improvement Dave (22:58.081)

Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (22:59.476)

do ride alongs. have to go and talk to them. I have to interview them. I have to put myself in their shoes. as any designer, you have to do that. If you're building a gamified experience, you have to understand those people that are using.

Improvement Dave (23:13.185)

Yeah. And you're making me think of a lot of different things with that, right? Thinking of my background. I have a background in theater and that always kind of seems to come up in these conversations. And it's just knowing your audience, right? You're not going to want to do some pagan ritual at a church. You know, it's just not going to play well, right? So you have to know the people. Um, and that's just what it always comes down to. Read the room. Yeah. I've been a training facilitator as well. You just.

Bret (23:23.872)

Absolutely.

Bret (23:28.586)

Yep. Yeah.

Yeah, read the room.

Improvement Dave (23:38.817)

Yeah, you have to know the people you're talking to. And if it's not working, you got to change it up, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (23:43.356)

Absolutely, absolutely. It's like a standup. Like you get your time on stage, like you've got to start adjusting your jokes, like as you're reading that room and the product design process is no different.

Improvement Dave (23:51.445)

Right. Yep.

Yeah, that's so interesting.

Bret (23:57.611)

So, I mean, moving from that, so the other one that I love is quality over quantity. this comes up a lot, the example I use a lot is the game crash. Like, I don't know if you're familiar with like the video game crash of the early 80s, but the Atari 2600 just blew up the market and then just started pumping out absolute garbage.

Improvement Dave (24:1.004)

Yeah.

Ooh, love that.

Improvement Dave (24:14.955)

Yes. Yep.

Well, every Kellogg's box had a terrible game in it, right? And there was this over-saturation of video games because quality went way low. Yep. Yep. I've heard a lot about that. Yeah, right.

Bret (24:23.924)

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And people, yeah, people grew, they distrusted what they were getting. And like between ET, like a lot of people cite ET as like the straw that broke the camel's back kind of thing. It's, it's bad, but I honestly, like I, I usually will cite the Atari 2600 version of Pac-Man. I think was just as bad because people had something to compare it to.

Improvement Dave (24:37.867)

Was it that bad? Is that, was that?

Improvement Dave (24:48.277)

Really? Really? I was not familiar. Okay, sure. Okay.

Bret (24:53.354)

People had played Pac-Man in the arcade and they saw what Pac-Man could be, how it played, how it worked. If you fire up the Atari 2600 version of Pac-Man, is like, like to say that it's like Fisher Price, my first Pac-Man is an understatement. Like it is trash. It does not play like the arcade. It does not look like the arcade. The ghosts are completely random. They're all the same color. Like everything is garbage in that game. And so as bad as ET was like,

Improvement Dave (25:14.796)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (25:19.949)

I don't think I've played that version.

Bret (25:22.356)

It had a huge marketing effort and didn't live up to expectations, but Pac-Man was a direct like, no, we know what Pac-Man should be as users and you did not pull it off. And so that distrust came from that. And what ultimately pulled the industry out of that crash was Nintendo and specifically Nintendo's seal of approval. Like, I don't know if you're familiar with Nintendo had the little like golden seal that.

Improvement Dave (25:24.653)

Sure. Okay.

Improvement Dave (25:31.265)

Right. Right. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (25:46.657)

The little, yeah, that little seal for sure. Yeah.

Bret (25:48.903)

everything and a lot of people say Nintendo is like over controlling and you had to buy your cartridges from them and a whole bunch of other crazy stuff but ultimately like that stranglehold on quality is the only thing that brought us out of that crash now I've always been a Nintendo fanboy but like that is why like they they yes

Improvement Dave (26:3.103)

I love Nintendo games. always have. And I love Nintendo. Yeah. Cause there is just such a sense of quality. Like when Mario three came out, I couldn't contain myself for that Easter. was so excited that I might get that. Yeah. You know, it's going to blow your mind. You just know it. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah.

Bret (26:17.182)

No, you know it's going to be solid. Like if it is a Nintendo game, it will be solid. Yeah. Yeah. And so, mean that, and you've seen this repeated. when Facebook and mobile gaming started to take their ramp, just got saturated. Market gets saturated, market crashes. And you kind of have to build yourself back out of that. The Wii is another great example. Like this is where Nintendo kind of screwed it up. Like they started to just allow shovelware because they wanted console saturation.

Improvement Dave (26:33.301)

Yeah, sure, sure.

Improvement Dave (26:38.344)

Okay.

Bret (26:46.112)

But there are so many motion control games on the Wii that are just trash because the quality wasn't there. They went for quantity over quality and it hurts. I cannot think of an example in history where quantity trumped quality. Like it just doesn't always err on the side of quality.

Improvement Dave (26:46.688)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (26:51.189)

Yeah, I have experienced that. Yeah. um

Improvement Dave (27:6.027)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Especially for that sort of experience you're looking for, right? You really want to err on the side of quality. Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (27:9.054)

And then my other, oh, for sure. Don't rush something at the sake of quality or don't add 50 mechanics as opposed to one good mechanic. that's the, yeah, that's the real example I like to use is, hey, if you're thinking about a gamification strategy, think about it from that standpoint. Add one mechanic at a time. Don't add a whole bunch of stuff.

Improvement Dave (27:19.499)

Right.

Improvement Dave (27:24.682)

One that fits. Yeah.

Bret (27:38.526)

and then not be able to track your data and know what worked and what didn't, start with one thing and do it well. And if it works, then layer on another thing and try and see if that works.

Improvement Dave (27:42.699)

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I like that approach. That's interesting because I think it can get a little bit overwhelming because there are so many game mechanics. So when you read through a list, it's like, where do I start on that?

Bret (27:56.363)

Oh yeah. Yeah. If you start screwing with a bunch of variables, like how do you know what worked and didn't? Like, right? Like as a product designer, like I rely on data. Like I can't know if I've changed a KPI. Well, I can know if a KPI changes, but I cannot point that change to any one variable if I have 20 variables going on. Like I can take guesses. Like I can start making wild assumptions and say like, Hey,

Improvement Dave (28:4.363)

Yeah. Right. Yeah.

Okay.

Bret (28:25.364)

based on my knowledge of this mechanic, I think this is what did it. I don't know. Like I really need that one-to-one relationship of like, hey, I know that this AB test affected that mechanic and if not otherwise, like it wasn't one of these other ones. it's important, like it's important for data clarity and data quantification to be able to do that and associate that data properly.

Improvement Dave (28:51.689)

Awesome. So you've talked about two of the things I think that you love around this topic. Is there anything else or another topic that you'd like to work into?

Bret (29:1.216)

I I don't think so. Like I love applying those like historical lessons just because I think there are like as a ex game designer, as someone who's been playing games since I was a little kid, I just think there's so much knowledge in that industry to be garnered. I think a lot of times we as gamified experience designers, we don't tap into that enough. And

Improvement Dave (29:7.638)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (29:15.574)

Uh-huh.

Bret (29:29.628)

Even outside of that, even as game designers, one of the other things that I've kind of tried to do in my professional career a little bit is share just knowledge of game design. Because when I was a kid, like I wanted to make games, but there was nowhere for me to learn what that meant. Like, and even today, like when I tell people that I'm a game designer or I build games, they're like, oh, so you like write the code? No, I'm not an engineer.

Improvement Dave (29:42.327)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (29:46.402)

Right.

Bret (29:55.261)

Oh, so you like do the like art, you're like a designer that does the art. No, not that either. Like I make things fun and they, people just don't understand what game design means and what gamification design means. And so I try to share those kinds of lessons. Like what is a game mechanic? What, what mechanics are part of what games? And if I'm trying to build a certain mechanic, what games can I go reference and play and try to understand? And so I've tried to share that data as well and say like, Hey, if we're

Improvement Dave (30:2.935)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (30:9.270)

Yeah.

Bret (30:24.990)

If we're studying games, not all of us can sit down and play the 20 hours that is the last of us or whatever game. So I've tried to kind of build these experiences where like, let's break down this game so that if you have an hour, you can get the rundown of what last of us is about, what mechanics it uses, what's good, what's bad, how can we apply that to things? And so that's kind of what I've started doing more and more recently is as I've talked to people and not only understood that

Improvement Dave (30:34.999)

Yeah.

Bret (30:54.374)

us as designers aren't playing games, but for the most part, we don't have the time to play some of these games. Like I don't have the time to go and do these 20 hour games as research. So um I've gone ahead and like taken the fall for all of us and played through Last of Us and built videos on why the Last of Us is good. But that's kind of what I've been trying to do more recently is how do we break down game mechanics? How can we understand what worked well, what didn't work well and

Improvement Dave (31:2.189)

I don't. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (31:16.365)

I love it. Uh huh.

Bret (31:23.776)

m Put that out there for not only gamification designers, but aspiring young game designers too. Like as a game industry, I want to push the game industry forward too. Like it's becoming more and more indie and I want these indie projects to succeed. I want to play more of the Celestes and Stardew Valley's and Bellatros and like all of these indie one and two person games. I want them to succeed. I want to find great mechanics in indie titles.

Improvement Dave (31:30.028)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (31:34.285)

Sure.

Bret (31:51.689)

And as a youngster growing up wanting to be a game designer, I didn't have that when I was young. And so I try to provide that to students and that kind of stuff as well so that we can better just understand why, going back to the why people love games, like just trying to understand that more and more.

Improvement Dave (32:6.519)

Yeah.

Yeah, I like some of the smaller titles too. My brother had a PlayStation 3 and ended up with that. And I don't know if you would consider this indie, but I started playing pixel junk a lot. There's a smaller, a pixel junk shooter. I think it's my favorite game and it's not complicated. It has like basic flash animations, but you can get like a magma gun and an ice gun. It's just really fun to play. It's not especially hard, but...

Bret (32:30.688)

Some of those little indie games are fantastic.

Improvement Dave (32:35.019)

Yes, yeah, I think we bought it for like 10 bucks, you know, and it's just a download. You don't even get a disc. um But I've probably played that game more than anything in the last 10 years, just because I only have like 10 or 15 minutes. What am I gonna do? I don't have time to get into a Zelda mission or this forever quest. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Bret (32:48.906)

Yep, yep.

Single- single serving games.

It's like the like Slay the Spy, have you played Slay the Spire?

Improvement Dave (32:59.725)

No, but I'm gonna check it out. What's Tell me more about that.

Bret (33:1.588)

Like it's another like, hey, I only have like 30 minutes. I'm gonna do a run up the tower of Slay the Spire. It's the, it's the like the rogue-like genre where it's procedurally generated, like a playthrough doesn't last very long and it's different every time you play through kind of concept, but.

Improvement Dave (33:10.561)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (33:15.542)

Uh-huh.

Oh, that sounds fun. Yeah. So you kind of mentioned that you got into game design and then there was really no way to learn about that. I'd like to hear a little bit more about what that process was like or how did you learn on this track where there really wasn't a track maybe.

Bret (33:34.537)

Yeah, so I mean when I was young, there wasn't a track. Like I would read Nintendo Power and in the back of Nintendo Power there were like the addresses for Konami and Capcom and I don't know why they put them there but I would like write out these game design ideas and just ship them off to them and just be like, hey, I have a game idea and you never heard back. Like maybe they'd email you, like they wouldn't email you, this is way before email. They would mail you back a letter.

Improvement Dave (33:37.141)

Uh huh. Right.

I did that.

Improvement Dave (33:52.225)

Really? uh

Improvement Dave (33:56.941)

You

Yeah, they'd write you a letter.

Bret (34:1.312)

that just says like, we got your letter, cool, and send you a sticker. And it was like, okay, well, I don't know. I don't know what happened to that, but yeah, I would do that. And I mean, even going through high school, like I think I had two computer classes that I was able to take. I have loved games. I, so I mean, I started like back on DOS, like I had a golf game on DOS on the first personal computer I bought.

Improvement Dave (34:4.267)

Yeah, denied. Rejection letters for like 10 year olds.

Uh huh, okay.

So you just always have done this. You just loved this.

Improvement Dave (34:27.062)

Okay.

Bret (34:31.188)

that you could in a text editor build golf courses. And I would sit and do that. I would sit and be like, okay, the G is green. The F is fairway. And you would literally in a text file build this golf course that you would play a DOS golf game. And that slowly graduated like modding Duke Nukem and Doom levels and just slowly progressed. But even in high school, there was nothing. Like at my age, I mean, I'm older than I look.

Improvement Dave (34:35.969)

Wow.

Improvement Dave (34:47.917)

What?

Improvement Dave (34:51.373)

Sure. Sure.

Improvement Dave (34:56.748)

Yeah.

Bret (34:59.018)

But at my age, there were no computer classes in high school. There was one graphic design class and like one like computer for business. There was no coding. There was no coding class that I could take. And so I had nothing. And even when I started, like I went to college for a little bit out of high school and within a semester, I was like, there was nothing for me here. Like I don't want to be here. I don't care about these other courses. I'm going to spend three years learning generals that I don't care about.

Improvement Dave (35:12.151)

Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (35:28.672)

So I ended up like leaving college and went back like five years later once they had game design programs. And I was kind of one of the first cohorts of college graduates to graduate. My degree is in digital entertainment and game design. Like I have a bachelor's of computer science in digital entertainment. And that was in 2008 is when I graduated. I graduated high school in 99. So I had a huge, a super gap year.

Improvement Dave (35:36.333)

Wow.

Improvement Dave (35:43.765)

Okay. Now where was that?

Improvement Dave (35:50.444)

Okay.

Bret (35:57.523)

as I like to call it, until honestly the industry caught up with what I wanted to do. Like I had nothing for that time and there weren't... So this was in Salt Lake City, this was actually at ITT, which is now completely defunct. But back then, your choices literally were like Full Sail University down in Florida, which like I couldn't afford to go to Florida for college. uh ITT had locations all over.

Improvement Dave (36:5.427)

What university was that at? Or what area? Was that Salt Lake City? Or... Okay.

Improvement Dave (36:14.443)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (36:20.204)

Okay.

Sure.

Bret (36:26.088)

and they were a tech school and specifically they touted like, hey, you don't have to spend a ton, you do the bare minimum of generals and it's very project-based learning, which I was good at anyway. I hated lecture and that kind of stuff. Like I wanted to make stuff. And so it honestly was perfect for me. They ended up like failing because it was crazy expensive and the job market was garbage. But I mean, it did help me land my first job ultimately in games. And what...

Improvement Dave (36:28.086)

Nice.

Improvement Dave (36:37.463)

Oh yeah. Yeah. Good.

Improvement Dave (36:46.847)

Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

Improvement Dave (36:52.330)

Okay.

Bret (36:54.954)

Probably landed me that job is on the side. I was going to school I was learning this stuff, but then I was writing for a site that was it was called gamma sutra Which is now I'm pretty sure it's defunct but it was just a game News and design side and so I was writing little articles on the side just to try to get noticed and I wrote an article on Movie to game conversions because back in the day these were bad. I mean, they're still kind of bad but

Improvement Dave (37:11.309)

Wow.

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (37:19.021)

Uh huh.

Improvement Dave (37:22.443)

Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (37:22.548)

this idea of like, can these be good? Like what design elements can we use to make these movie to game conversions good? And I went and interviewed at a studio that was at the time building pretty much that, pretty much movie to game conversions, a small little indie studio that was taking contracts from publishers to build like an Alvin and the Chipmunks game. uh I specifically was on the, I don't know if you're familiar with the Tell of Despereaux franchise, but it's a book.

Improvement Dave (37:26.828)

Yeah.

Interesting.

Improvement Dave (37:49.973)

I'm not. Okay.

Bret (37:50.699)

that became a movie, that became the game, and I was hired for that game. And I honestly think that article is what got me hired and getting into the industry is the hardest part. And I think that article is honestly what did it for me. And from there, I just, worked in games. I worked on that and that studio went down. And so I went and worked at a studio that was just starting in the Facebook gaming realm. And I built a game that was kind of built on... um

Improvement Dave (37:56.077)

That's awesome.

Improvement Dave (38:2.989)

interesting.

Improvement Dave (38:14.871)

Yeah.

Bret (38:17.532)

would go and find your real life ancestors. This was called Family Village where it kind of hooked into like an ancestry.com backend where you would go and discover your real life ancestors and by discovering them and seeing that they're in your family tree it would pull them into your game and other than that it kind of had some like Farmville mechanics where like you could like have them work on a farm and you would build crops and it was Facebook gaming at the time but from there I went to EA and worked on the Sims 3 franchise and

Improvement Dave (38:37.727)

Aha, nice.

Bret (38:47.208)

I'm just kind of bounced all over the place. But I mean, that was my path. uh I would say a pretty non-traditional collegiate path. I mean, that's where I am now. And I've now kind of found my way into UX, into product design, into product management. And that's kind of where I stand now.

Improvement Dave (38:51.532)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (39:7.437)

That's awesome. Yeah, it's interesting you brought up the Facebook games, right? Cause I think recently I actually started playing games on LinkedIn of all places. They have like these brain games that I'm doing that I'm really actually liking quite a bit. Cause you really feel like you're kind of sharpening your mind a little when you're probably not, you're just playing games and having fun. But you know, word puzzles, things like that, it's fun, know? Probably are. Yeah. Yeah. The plasticity stuff. Yeah.

Bret (39:14.666)

Yeah.

Yeah?

Bret (39:26.056)

No, you are like, they are, they're building your brain. It's elasticity, right? It's brain elasticity. It's just this idea of like, hey, using parts of your brain that you wouldn't normally use in day-to-day life. When you're reading emails, when you're sitting in meetings, you're not using that nonlinear brain. um So if you're not like, I get a lot of that from playing what would be considered more traditional games.

Improvement Dave (39:46.848)

Right.

Improvement Dave (39:50.487)

Sure.

Bret (39:53.429)

But I still hop in and play those LinkedIn games. They're still fun. Like they have game elements. They're exciting. Like the challenge of the like socialization of like, hey, I did better than you today. There's fun in that, right?

Improvement Dave (39:57.644)

Yeah, they are.

Improvement Dave (40:5.355)

Right. Yeah. How long can I keep the streak going? Yeah. Damn.

Bret (40:8.478)

Yeah, absolutely. But it is an interesting, like, that you see Facebook, the rise and fall of Facebook games and LinkedIn is traditional, is like 10 years behind everything. And they're like, hey, what if we did games? What if we made this more like a social network instead of a networking site? Like, they're honestly just, they're like 10 years behind everything. But sometimes that's good because those, those other ones have kind of come and gone. I mean, Facebook has obviously evolved.

Improvement Dave (40:15.340)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (40:25.173)

Yeah, they're trying. They're trying. Yeah, you're right.

Improvement Dave (40:34.637)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (40:41.537)

Well, fantastic. I also wanted to ask just similar to the Bartle taxonomy, what sort of animal do identify with the most or what's your favorite animal?

Bret (40:52.906)

So identify with I don't know. And I'm a bit of uh a favorite animal free agent right now because what was my long time favorite animal? I actually discovered that the reason I loved it is a myth and it's not founded to be true. So I always loved, whenever someone asked what my favorite animal was, I would tell them,

Improvement Dave (40:56.522)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (41:2.243)

Okay, I like that

Improvement Dave (41:12.833)

Well, tell me about that. Let's talk about the history of your love for animal. uh

Bret (41:22.612)

My favorite animal is a jaguar because I had heard that jaguars were the only animal to habitually hunt man for sport, not for food. Which was intriguing to me that like there's this one animal on earth that's like, nope, I'm gonna bite back. Like I'm sick of you cutting down my forests. I'm sick of you invading my space. Like I'm going to kill you and leave your body behind because that's just fantastic to me that.

Improvement Dave (41:24.939)

Oh!

Improvement Dave (41:36.311)

That's intriguing.

Improvement Dave (41:44.012)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (41:51.851)

Yeah, that's funny. Yeah.

Bret (41:51.943)

animals would bite back at us but I guess that's like that statement is fairly unfounded they found like they they will hunt humans sometimes um if you're invading on their space they're generally like pretty shy creatures but they will they will use the human for food as opposed to just like killing them for sport so I've the reason that I loved them has kind of been found to be untrue but um I still love them they're still they're still beautiful creatures so

Improvement Dave (42:6.849)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (42:18.669)

That's still pretty cool though. Definitely.

Bret (42:21.777)

That's probably one like are you familiar with the petoo or like some people call it the ghost bird?

Improvement Dave (42:28.821)

I'm not the ghost bird or the patoo.

Bret (42:31.774)

Yeah, it's so this is like bird. think it's like I want to say it's like central and South America. I could be completely I'm not a I'm not a biology major by any means, but it is this freaky looking bird that has a cry there. They're they're they're almost like an owl. They're like a lock turtle bird. I don't know if they're in the owl family, but they have this call that is like haunting like it is this like bone chilling.

Improvement Dave (42:41.825)

Oh, no, you're fine. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (42:52.416)

Okay.

Bret (42:58.568)

like call and so they're like referred to as like the ghost bird but they're just just like crazy looking birds like p-o-t-o-o is their like actual name

Improvement Dave (42:59.062)

Alright.

Improvement Dave (43:2.742)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (43:7.361)

We are gonna find an open source recording of this sound and it's gonna play right now. Cause that's gonna be cool. That's awesome.

Bret (43:13.684)

Yeah, it is freaky. They have this freaky call. So I don't like, between those two, I think those are probably some of my favorite animals.

Improvement Dave (43:21.164)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (43:24.685)

Those are good choices. Yeah. Because so far I've noticed a lot of people are going to go with cat or dog. Right. And so I'm, I'm thinking I should add that caveat other than cat and dog. Um, I don't, I don't know if you heard the, I like dogs. Yeah. Dags. I like dag.

Bret (43:34.805)

I mean, uh I'm a huge dog. I'm at like my, oh, she left. was gonna say my, oh, yeah, my golden, I have a golden right here, laying right beside me. I have another, like I have a Black Lab Great Dane mix upstairs. Like I love dogs. We have a cat too. Like we're a big animal. Like we have ferrets. We had chickens for a while. Like we're a pretty big uh animal family, so.

Improvement Dave (43:45.357)

Aww, lovely.

Improvement Dave (43:49.621)

Oh my gosh. So plural dogs. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (43:56.834)

Wow, you have pets.

Yeah, that's fantastic. That's good. So we've talked about a lot of games. And you've talked about I love the history of games that you've talked about, especially the Mancala. That's just really interesting that it's gone back that far. But if you had to narrow it down, could you peg down your favorite game or maybe just your favorite type of game? Because

Bret (44:17.162)

Crazy.

Bret (44:24.234)

So, so I'm in a caveat.

Improvement Dave (44:25.845)

In the opener you've said, play everything, right? We have a recording of you in the show saying that already. So this is gonna be a hard question, I think, for you.

Bret (44:32.542)

All I do, I do try to play everything, stuff that I wouldn't, like it's research, right? Like I can't, if all I'm doing is studying the games that I like to play, then I'm leaving these giant gaps of research. So I mean, to say favorite game is like a near impossible question for at least someone like me. Like, I don't know who else can maybe have something, but.

Improvement Dave (44:48.599)

Sure, sure.

Improvement Dave (44:58.999)

Well, thank you.

Bret (45:2.432)

So I'll caveat it. have a few ways to break this down. So I'll give a couple of answers. So if you were to say, what is the one game that if I could experience it again for the first time, I would say Baldur's Gate. Like the original Baldur's Gate game would classify that like that. That game captured me as a like 16, 17 year old.

Improvement Dave (45:2.775)

That's a compliment.

Improvement Dave (45:7.679)

Okay, sounds good. I like that.

Bret (45:29.948)

I don't know that any other game has done that. Has it holed up through time to be considered my favorite game? I don't know. If I were to say, if you were to say, is one game that I would recommend everyone play, it would probably be Dungeons and Dragons. Like I think everyone should sit down at a table and play a, and it doesn't even necessarily, I side with D &D because that's what I grew up on, but just any tabletop role playing game. think everyone.

Improvement Dave (45:46.038)

Okay.

Bret (45:58.731)

should experience that um for once. um If you were to ask me what is the most like artistic and deep, like if you were to like classify games as works of art, I don't know if you've ever played Outer Wilds and this might be my recency bias talking, but I recently played Outer Wilds and it was actually recommended to me. um So I do YouTube videos and I allow people to...

Improvement Dave (46:11.053)

I love it.

Improvement Dave (46:15.415)

heard of that. Okay.

Improvement Dave (46:25.229)

Uh huh.

Bret (46:26.528)

donate to the Extra Life Foundation and choose what game I play. And my friend Dylan sponsored this game and it is unlike anything I had ever played. And it is this like, it's not very long, but it is truly like a piece of storytelling art that just, it's beautiful. It's a beautiful game. If you ask me single game versus franchise, like my favorite franchise is The Legend of Zelda.

Improvement Dave (46:31.434)

Okay.

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (46:46.679)

Hey.

Bret (46:55.296)

but I don't know that I could pinpoint any one of those that I would say, this is the game.

Improvement Dave (47:3.885)

For me, it was Ocarina of Time. I'll just say it, because I just liked that one. Maybe it was just the time of my life that it came out, but it's like the one that I had too. Yeah, I think so.

Bret (47:5.950)

Yeah? I'm-

Bret (47:11.664)

I had always been, yeah, that plays a huge part of it. I never had a GameCube, so Wind Waker was this like gap. Until it released on the Wii U as the remake, I had never played Wind Waker, but I've always been a Majora's Mask over Ocarina of Time stand, just because I think its game design is more interesting. Ocarina of Time is like, it's a little too, I hate to use the word basic.

Improvement Dave (47:21.824)

Okay.

Okay. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (47:31.511)

That's fair. That's fair.

Improvement Dave (47:36.406)

Okay.

Bret (47:41.056)

But like, loved the time loop design in Majora's Mask.

Improvement Dave (47:41.547)

No, that's fair. That's fair.

Yeah, yeah, I didn't play that one as much. We had it, but that's fair. Yeah, I think that's fair. Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (47:50.111)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I love I love that game if you if you would ask me what the greatest Designed game of all time is that's where super metroid I think comes into play like I think it is probably the most well designed game of all time and that's why I chose it like as the TEDx talk, but if you were to ask me like if we if we say like What is your favorite game? the way that I would probably Define it

Improvement Dave (48:0.088)

I love it.

Bret (48:17.392)

is if I could only play one game ever for the rest of my life, what would it be? And I would say the answer to that one is probably Minecraft, which I'm fairly recent to. Like I only started playing Minecraft during the COVID lockdown, but um it has become this game that if I ever have downtime, if I have a couple of minutes or I'm bored or I want to do something social with my family, like

Improvement Dave (48:21.517)

That's a good question.

Improvement Dave (48:35.242)

Okay.

Bret (48:46.404)

If you were to say if there was only one game I could play for the rest of my life, what would it be? Minecraft would probably be my answer. So to say like, what is your favorite game? It's probably that, just because of that stipulation, because of the like, my favorite game I would classify as like the one game that I would play if I could only play one ever. And I would say that would be it.

Improvement Dave (49:7.159)

Yeah. And that might be a better version of that question, because it would actually be my answer as well. My son is obsessed with Minecraft, but then so is his younger sister, right? And it's something that we can all do together. We can all contribute to it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (49:20.838)

everything for everyone. Like it literally has something for every, when we go, going back to the like, find your player type and understand what they want to do. No other game has the breadth of player types that Minecraft covers. Like literally everyone. Yep.

Improvement Dave (49:34.732)

Yep. Yeah. Yeah. It just, it does. It hits all the boxes. You're right. And I think my son had a really good critique of it. I'll bring it up here. Why the bedrock and the Java split on Minecraft. Cause that's, that's a thing for us, right? We have an iPad, we have a Mac, we have a PC, and it's really difficult for our family to all come together and play Minecraft because it's who has what version, right? And what platform.

Bret (49:51.295)

Yeah?

Bret (50:1.440)

uh We're a bedrock family.

Improvement Dave (50:5.673)

Oh, that's cool. So you, you, yeah, it's like having a Google family, right? It's like we're, yeah.

Bret (50:9.556)

But yeah, but that's because we have like, primarily play on consoles. Like I don't play a ton on PC. And we have like my daughters play on phones. so Java is, I mean, I don't know, but Java is like primarily PC only, right?

Improvement Dave (50:14.815)

Okay. Okay.

Improvement Dave (50:26.941)

I'm gonna get this wrong now. think, so we have a MacBook that we have Minecraft on and it's running the Java. But then the iPad does back bedrock. it almost doesn't make sense at a certain point.

Bret (50:31.834)

Okay, okay

Yeah, so mobile devices I think have to be bedrock. Mobile devices and consoles I believe are bedrock only. And then personal computers, be it Mac or PC like Windows can run both, can run either. But we're primarily not a PC gaming family. Like we're console and mobile. So we're all bedrock.

Improvement Dave (50:41.399)

Okay.

Okay.

Improvement Dave (50:53.527)

Right.

Improvement Dave (50:58.934)

Okay.

That's awesome. We need to move towards that. think we have a better family life if we could all just make up our minds.

Bret (51:6.708)

But some of the mods, like that's the thing about Java is like the mods that you can do in Java. Like I haven't played because I haven't played Java, but I have seen some mods that are like, okay, this might be worth me installing Java just to try this out because there are some incredible and I love the modding community. that's one of the reasons why I think Minecraft falls into that. what is my favorite game concept is the modding community. Like you have.

Improvement Dave (51:10.347)

The mods always come up. Yes. Yes.

Improvement Dave (51:23.052)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (51:26.849)

Yeah, really interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%.

Bret (51:35.932)

a literally gigantic modding community in that game.

Improvement Dave (51:38.754)

Oh my gosh. Yeah. That's like an understatement, right? And then just, just the YouTube shows around modding Minecraft. It's, it's my, my kids. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. My kids love that. Yeah. If I say you cannot watch Mikey and JJ today, my kids lose their marbles. Like they're so mad. It's like, kind of hold that sword over them, right? Okay. The weekend's coming. You know, if you're good.

Bret (51:45.308)

Oh, Minecraft made YouTube. Like I legitimately think like Minecraft videos like exploded YouTube.

Bret (52:1.384)

I love it. I mean, but I mean, you look at like some of the biggest.

The biggest YouTube stars, like, I mean, MrBeast started with Minecraft videos. Like, this is where it started.

Improvement Dave (52:11.580)

Yeah, I'm not surprised. Yeah, and now he's dropping. Yeah, what Lamborghini is into a grinder just because he can, you know, lucky guy.

Bret (52:19.678)

Yes, yes. Well, uh it's a fantastic game. it's, it literally has something for everyone.

Improvement Dave (52:25.247)

It really is. Yeah. And have you seen some of the music videos that they've done where they have like, they jump from block to block and it's all in sync? It absolutely blows my mind. Yeah, it's beautiful.

Bret (52:34.885)

It's crazy. Like it's just, you can do anything. Like you can make movies, you can make music videos, you can tell stories, you can explore, you have action. Like it's a work of art. Like it really is.

Improvement Dave (52:43.297)

Yeah. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (52:48.267)

Yeah. Yeah, it is. And it's interesting because when it came out, I'm to be honest, I didn't think it was going to go anywhere. I saw it. I was like, it's like a bad rendering of like, doom or something. It's like, it's like just huge blocks. Like what? Same. I can't get into that. Right? Yeah.

Bret (53:1.852)

I mean, I didn't play it for almost 10 years because I was like, no, I just I don't think it appeals to me. Like I don't. And I just didn't know. And part of it was like when it first came out, it obviously wasn't what it is now. And so when it first came out, like what it was back then was kind of like, I just don't know that this is for me. But then as they've added and they've created new and they have these releases and the world has grown, it has changed.

Improvement Dave (53:17.069)

That's That's true.

Improvement Dave (53:24.012)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (53:28.951)

Yeah. It's true. Yeah.

Bret (53:32.192)

Now it is it's a completely different game than it was in What 2011 I think is when it released so to to say that like when it came out. It didn't capture my attention. That's not I mean not to like Save myself here, but like that's not completely on me. Like it was a very different game 10 years ago than it is now

Improvement Dave (53:50.486)

Yeah. Well, I think, I think we've both kind of pointed out it changes a little bit when you have kids too, cause I I'm always looking out for like the collaborative games or the co-op games because I don't want my kids to just sit around playing Mortal Kombat, right? It's not the life I want for them. So I love the social aspect for my kids around it.

Bret (53:56.392)

Oh, for sure. For sure.

Bret (54:1.300)

Yes.

Yes. Yeah. I love, I love, mean, my yeah. Yeah. My love for couch co-op goes back to like the old school, like playing like TMNT arcade and like all of these like couch co-op games that like Minecraft scratches that itch for me where we can, like we are like, we're literally down in this room and we'll have six of us on our realm.

Improvement Dave (54:13.837)

Yes. Oh man. 100%. Yes. With you. Yes. Yeah. It does. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (54:31.091)

Awesome. Yeah.

Bret (54:32.062)

Like playing live and we don't need to be on headsets. We can just say, Hey, can someone bring me wood? Can someone, Hey, does anyone have an extra ax that I can borrow? need to go get some wood, but I don't want to craft an ax, blah, blah, blah. Like being able to sit together and talk and play together and be in this lived in world is there's, there's an experience to it. And as I look back, like there's a part of me, like we actually just did this, like last weekend we had like six of us playing Minecraft. And like, I kind of took that like step back and I'm like,

Improvement Dave (54:35.937)

Yeah. Awesome.

I love that. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (54:47.095)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (54:51.031)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (54:55.191)

Okay.

Bret (55:1.108)

What would, like if I were my daughter's age, like what would I think of this back, because we didn't have this. When I was 10, 12, I did not have these. Like we couldn't sit around on our own devices playing a game in a lived in online, like the internet didn't even exist. I mean it did, but like not to the average person. And it just blows my mind sometimes how far technology has come and the fact that games are leading that charge.

Improvement Dave (55:8.161)

No. Nothing like that. Not at all. No.

Improvement Dave (55:18.209)

Yeah. Yeah. Not like that. Right.

Improvement Dave (55:27.383)

Yeah.

Bret (55:30.364)

Again, we go back to the like, it doesn't take us long to like build new technology and go, well, how can we make a game out of it? And that is what we do as humans.

Improvement Dave (55:37.858)

Yeah, yeah. So it's something for my family to aspire to. think I've already shared, right? We need to get our act together around that. My kids are pretty young still, but it would really enrich our family life, think, having more of that social mine crafting together. So something to look forward to. Yeah, yeah.

Bret (55:56.810)

It's fun. There's tons of games that are great for that. even single, like my younger ones, they've started to get a little too old for this, but they used to love to just watch me play. Like when they were still like in learning to read age, like they would watch me play Breath of the Wild because they hadn't learned to read that level of text yet. And so I would read it aloud and they would watch me play Breath of the Wild and just be enthralled with like,

Improvement Dave (56:5.921)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (56:9.993)

Oh yeah. Yeah.

Sure.

Improvement Dave (56:19.693)

Yeah. 100%. Yeah.

Bret (56:25.278)

watching this experience. Like they didn't need to play. Like watching me play was enthralling to them. And it's incredible how that can slowly morph to where they're playing their own games and we're finding these new couch co-op experiences and yeah, there's a ton of them. Like I have a handful for you. once your kids get a little bit older, like I have a few more that um would be fun. Like Castle Crashers is one of our go-tos.

Improvement Dave (56:35.853)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (56:39.469)

Uh-huh.

Improvement Dave (56:45.803)

Okay. Yeah. Well, maybe in a few years, right? When they're older, I'll have you back on the show again. You can share that list, right? I'm actually playing through Ocarina of Time now. I'm doing it with my son and it's taken us like three years, right? Cause there's never the time, but he really prefers it when I play and he can play. He's a good player. But when I get in there, I I grind it out. Cause I've played that game several times throughout my life, right? I know it backwards.

Bret (56:53.312)

Do it. I will.

Really?

Bret (57:13.091)

Yep, yeah

Improvement Dave (57:15.349)

So it's something we do together. I kind of wanted to talk more about, and this is just one of the prepared questions is, so looking at Minecraft, what, since you essentially fell on that as your favorite game or the game that you would play if there's nothing else, what are the game mechanics in there you think that really draw you in?

Bret (57:36.671)

Yeah, so to me there's three and these are like all three of these are a little bit broad. um But the first one is exploration. Like it has this sense of like it is infinite exploration. Like almost quite literally because things are procedurally generated. Like the world has limits but there's no limit to the number of worlds. If I...

Improvement Dave (57:40.471)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (57:44.055)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (57:48.311)

Yeah, okay.

Improvement Dave (57:53.471)

It is.

Bret (58:4.892)

If I reach the world limit and some but no, like I've never even thought about going the million blocks out. But if I reach a world limit, I can just generate a new world and have another million blocks. Like, and there's this infinite exploration. And as I explore, things are procedurally generated for me. And that exploration is just fun. Like being able to just say like, I'm hopping on a horse and I am going is that that mechanic is.

Improvement Dave (58:18.775)

Yeah. Huh.

Bret (58:33.098)

For me, incredibly exciting, just because I grew up in this like left to right, like platformer game, like there is no like open world. So open worlds to me are fun. And even like what we consider open world games, like we talked about like Fallout and some of these that are considered open world, like Breath of the Wild is an open world game. Well, I've explored the entire map in Breath of the Wild and it didn't take me that long. Minecraft, I couldn't even.

Improvement Dave (58:40.407)

Super Mario, yeah.

Improvement Dave (58:45.132)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (58:51.959)

Mm-hmm.

Improvement Dave (58:57.569)

ish.

Yeah. Right. You can't even begin to. Yeah. Yeah. Sure.

Bret (59:3.028)

wrap my head around exploring the entire map. so that to me is like one of its like, the exploration aspect is just so fun. I don't know what is around the next chunk or block or whatever they call it. Like I literally don't know. Like it is being generated as I move and there's something incredibly fun to

Improvement Dave (59:24.983)

That's awesome.

Bret (59:26.088)

The other one is like action, the idea of action in combat. I love the way that they differ it. I love it's not just like if you play like your classic beat-em-up, it's like punch punch kick punch punch kick punch punch kick. Like the skeletons have ranged weapons, the creepers explode, the zombies are just straight up melee, and then you get to like the bosses like all the ender dragons in the air, the wither can fly around and blow stuff up and

Improvement Dave (59:35.168)

Okay.

Yeah, sure.

Improvement Dave (59:44.287)

Yes. Right. OK.

Yeah, that's interesting. I never thought about that. Yeah, yeah.

Bret (59:55.263)

like they vary their action incredibly well. Like it's not just this classic, like I get my sword and I've just got to hit things till they die. And you have to play with these different levels of action. And one of my favorites of that is like, I don't know if you're familiar with the Warden, but the Warden is this like unique gameplay element. Oh yes. But it's this idea that most of the enemies, like the enemies are the bosses. You defeat them.

Improvement Dave (59:59.118)

Mm-hmm.

Improvement Dave (60:4.257)

Yeah, yeah.

Improvement Dave (60:11.339)

Yeah, I am. Who wouldn't be familiar with the warden? I mean, I'm just kidding.

Improvement Dave (60:20.619)

Uh-huh.

Bret (60:24.720)

and the loot that they drop is like the reason for the adventure, right? Well, the ender dragon drops the dragon egg and the wither drops the nether star that you can make a beacon with. The warden doesn't drop anything and it's probably the hardest boss in the game. But the idea is like the loot is in the ancient city. Like the gameplay is exploring that ancient city in hopes to not summon the warden. The goal is to never see the warden as a boss.

Like you don't spawn the warden in order to fight him. Like the ender dragon, you seek out the ender dragon. You literally craft the wither, but the warden is like, we don't talk about the warden. It's this like unique gameplay element. Oh, they should be, right? Like it's terrifying, but it's this idea that like as a gameplay element, the idea is not to see the boss, which like from a game design standpoint is crazy. we've, yes.

Improvement Dave (60:57.633)

Yeah.

There's good loot. Yeah. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (61:6.689)

My kids are afraid of the warden. Yeah. Right.

Improvement Dave (61:21.857)

It's clever though. It's an interesting change. Yeah, that's cool.

Bret (61:23.902)

Like 100%, like you're used to like, I fight the level and I beat the boss at the end. No, the ancient city, the treasure is in the biome and your goal is to never see the boss, which just another way that they're like doing this weird layering and change up of the action in that game, that's just fun. Like it's just a completely different gameplay element than you're used to. And I love the way that they change action. Like.

Improvement Dave (61:29.779)

Hit to Bowser, yeah. Yeah.

Improvement Dave (61:43.693)

Cool. Yeah.

Bret (61:51.207)

Action doesn't have to be fighting. Action can be sneaking. Like the sneak is an action that I take as a player. that's incredibly fun to me. Yes.

Improvement Dave (61:51.382)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (61:59.096)

Yeah. Or the defense, right? A lot of people, a lot of the Mikey and JJ episodes are, we're going to build a defense wall. And this time we're going to have like flaming arrows. And this time there's going to be a pit. And right. There's always like that secret base element. And I, I for one really liked that because I'm, I'm interested in kind of the house design and now I'm just kind of putting them, inserting my own love of it. But my favorite thing about Minecraft is getting up on a cliff and building some weird modernist.

Bret (62:10.495)

Yes.

Bret (62:16.373)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (62:27.319)

house, you know, has a waterfall like coming out of a mountain like that's so fun for me. I've never really played the game. I just do creative mode all the time. That's yeah, I just I love it.

Bret (62:30.560)

I love it. Yeah, it's literally everything, everyone.

Yeah. We love like, I like we build, there's something fun. So our realm, um, is a, it's a survival realm, but I've kind of, I've almost walled off this Ville. found a village and we've lit it up enough that like my kids and wife can live in this village without, like if they, if they venture outside of the village, like it's fair game, but within the village, it is more or less creative because

Improvement Dave (62:44.865)

Okay.

Uh huh, nice.

Improvement Dave (62:51.991)

Uh-huh.

Improvement Dave (63:0.843)

Yeah, it's odd. Yeah.

That's awesome.

Bret (63:5.300)

We've lit it up enough that there's not spawns and like my wife built a roller coaster. Like we've built a pirate ship. Like we have all kinds of like, it's just fantastic. Like it really is everything for everyone.

Improvement Dave (63:8.748)

Uh-huh.

Improvement Dave (63:12.567)

Yeah, we've done that. Yeah. oh

That's cool.

Improvement Dave (63:22.059)

So you mentioned two, I think, if I'm counting right. The second one was the action. And the third one, you said there's three.

Bret (63:28.628)

The third is the way that the game ramps. um Because ramping is one of these important game design elements where you go from zero to 60. And the way that you do that, the way as a game designer, you go from zero to 60 is incredibly important. cause you can't just, it's really hard, um especially when you're designing for kids, which Minecraft definitely has that like,

Improvement Dave (63:33.877)

Okay, yeah explain that.

Improvement Dave (63:42.379)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (63:49.111)

Okay.

Improvement Dave (63:57.758)

It's for kids. It sure is. Yeah.

Bret (63:57.803)

firmly in its demographic, you have to be slow. And the way that they layer their ramping is just like an absolute, like it is a chef's kiss because anyone can jump into it. The children, the elderly, like you, doesn't take a large, like you can start with creative. Like you don't have to go and start a survivor world. Start with creative and learn to build, learn to craft, then maybe move to like a peaceful survival and like,

Improvement Dave (64:12.246)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (64:18.434)

Yeah.

Improvement Dave (64:21.717)

Right. That's interesting. Uh huh.

Bret (64:27.304)

you have the ramping of the worlds. Then you have the ramping of the crafting. Like, okay, well, I've got to go gather wood and with wood I can build a crafting table. And then that crafting table ramps up where I can build bigger stuff and I can start to craft these. Yeah. And it's just like, and then you start to like, you craft things and then you use the things you've crafted to craft new things. And then use those things to craft like, and it just becomes this like, you.

Improvement Dave (64:32.237)

Mm-hmm, sure.

Improvement Dave (64:40.193)

And now you're entering into like survival mode, right? Because you're gonna have to craft things. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

Improvement Dave (64:51.682)

Right.

Bret (64:56.510)

you can slowly work your way through from beginner to expert and there's something for everyone. Like kids can enjoy it with, I would argue, zero barrier to entry. There is no barrier to entry for Minecraft. And expert players, like you still have like the YouTube streamers and all of these, these expert players, like they could play this game in their sleep. Like if you watch like the PVP server videos,

Improvement Dave (65:9.281)

Yeah. Yeah.

Bret (65:23.454)

Like some of the things they're throwing cobwebs to trap the other players and they're vaulting themselves up in the air. They're doing this stuff that's like incredibly expert movesets. it's at the game is as fun for them as it is for the five year old that is first entering a creative world and knows nothing about the game. And I cannot think of another game that can pull that off. Like I played thousands of games. I do not know another game that can entertain.

Improvement Dave (65:32.619)

Yeah, okay.

Bret (65:53.055)

the five-year-old at the same level, it can entertain someone who has been playing for over a decade. Like there just isn't.

Improvement Dave (66:0.194)

You know, I agree with you 100 % and at the same time, I don't think I would have expected that to be your favorite game. It's like, I'm kind of surprised. And when you explain them, like, but it makes sense. In the ramping, I have a point on the ramping because it makes me think of my son's life. Like he started playing multi-craft, which is what you get on Mac for free. It's the same thing as Minecraft. It's just not as cool maybe. And he even ramped up through the different types of games.

But it's like when he was five or six, I forgot when he started. It just makes sense because it's moving along with his development stages, right? His abilities, his fine motor skills, and it's just staying relevant with him. And I feel like I'm pushing him into it because there's this sense of design with Minecraft that's easy to latch onto as a parent, I think. Yeah, it feels productive. They do.

Bret (66:44.096)

Does?

Bret (66:51.621)

I mean, it's it like they use it they use it as an educational tool in Sweden and I mean we have Minecraft education here in the States like it is it is a sound enough design that can be used to teach kids computer science like Yeah, yeah. Oh, oh, yeah but like it it's there like It has a draw like I I can't

Improvement Dave (66:57.889)

Right.

Improvement Dave (67:7.799)

They know the difference though. They smell it. like, wait, this is education. Yeah. But it's a fair point. It's there and it works. Yeah.

Bret (67:19.762)

I can't give my kids a math worksheet and say, hey, you guys, this is a good, like, although they can smell the difference, they'll still eat it. It's like, I know this is broccoli, but because you've put cheese on it, I'll still eat it. Whereas if I just give them straight up uncooked broccoli, they're not gonna eat it. I can't give them a math worksheet and say, do this math worksheet. But I can give them, I can give them Minecraft and say, it's Minecraft, but you're learning. And they'll...

Improvement Dave (67:23.007)

You

Yeah, no, they definitely still like it. There's just enough butter and cheese.

Improvement Dave (67:42.039)

That's such a good point.

Improvement Dave (67:48.107)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like you're learning on both of them, but yeah, that's that. Yeah. are. Yeah. Which is the whole question. And I think it's the point of the whole podcast is how can we have enriching learning experiences that are also enjoyable.

Bret (67:49.034)

They can swallow that pill.

Bret (67:55.013)

I mean you are, the question is just are you enjoying the learning?

Bret (68:4.160)

It is.

Bret (68:9.140)

Yeah, how do we talk about the products we use, the way that we learn in the same way that we just talked about Minecraft? Like, that's it, right?

Improvement Dave (68:18.261)

Right, yeah, that's it. Yeah. So with that in mind, is there anything that I didn't ask you that you wish I would have?

Bret (68:27.080)

No, this has been a fantastic conversation. Like, yeah.

Improvement Dave (68:32.343)

So how can people reach out to you, Brett?

Bret (68:34.942)

So the best way, like if you wanna keep up to date with what I'm doing, LinkedIn is kinda just my platform of choice. Like I know it's not social media, but like I've dropped off of X. Facebook is for my family. Like LinkedIn is kinda where I give updates on what I'm doing, like where I'm talking, what I'm doing. If you want more content, like if you want to hear more about games, if you wanna learn about design, um YouTube is where I've kind of started to wrap that up.

Improvement Dave (68:55.415)

Awesome.

Bret (69:4.532)

Like it's in its infancy, but I do have a YouTube channel um where we talk about Minecraft, we talk about other games, we break down these design elements. um And that's probably like between those two things, like that's where I would go. um I have, I, it's just Brett Wardle.

Improvement Dave (69:14.955)

Okay, I love that.

Improvement Dave (69:39.201)

Yeah, yeah. Awesome. Well, I really appreciate the time. Fantastic conversation. And I just thank you so much. I really appreciate you taking the time. Cool.

Bret (69:49.673)

No, this has been great. I love it. This is a fantastic, like I'm, I'm up for talking about games anytime you want.

Improvement Dave (69:56.119)

Cool. Well, definitely have you back on the show, especially my kids are a little bit older. I need some more ideas on some new co-op games, but thanks brother. Appreciate you. Awesome.

Bret (70:2.740)

Do it.

Yeah, of course.