Kids Play is my Master of Arts thesis project from Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture. In the thesis a music game for the iPad was designed together 52 children from the kinderkarten of Pajamäki, Helsinki. In the workshops age-appropriate co-creation and research methods were used for creating new ideas for the game. The workshop results were the basis for designing and developing the early stage game prototype into a finalized product. I have worked in the project as game designer and producer.

The designed game is a music game for 2 to 6 year-olds. It let’s your kids to explore wide range of music genres and instruments. The game will include 5 original songs with matching venues: balkan beat, electro, jazz, surf rock and hip hop. The game music and graphics are hand crafted with mixed techniques which gives a unique look and feel to the game. The game team wants to inspire the little ones to get excited about different types of music. The game will be available on the Apple App Store this summer.

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Download the thesis

The game team: Tuomas Ahva, Henna Luoma, Gökce Taskan, Juha Vaaraniemi and me

Powderlove is a social online service for active downhill skiers and snowboarders. I came up with the original idea and then we made the service with a small team. The idea is to provide a place for snow enthusiasts to keep track of snowdays and to exchange experiences and stories with others. The site was launched in October 2009.

The first season was a quite nice success, but there is still things to improve. The team received a small fund from AVEK (The Promotion Centre for Audiovisual Culture) for developing the service. We are coming out with a new and polished Powderlove for the winter 2010/2011. We will also launch the service internationally (it’s only in Finnish at the moment).

The team: Juha Vaaraniemi, Anssi Väisänen and me. Credits also for Linda Söderholm for great character design.

http://www.powderlove.com