client

National Constitution Center

objective

Create an educational game about Prohibition-era rumrunning, implemented in an arcade-style kiosk and aimed at players of all ages.

duties

• Exploration & definition of look-and-feel
• Storyboards
• Final graphic elements & animations
• Scripting assistance
• Coordination with development team

collaboration

• Andrea Weatherhead: creative direction
• Susan Merrill & NCC: script
• Red Card Studios: software development

release

​American Spirits: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition traveling exhibition

Vision

The players are Coast Guard captains, each with their own boat, trying to intercept rumrunning boats coming down from the top of the screen. In addition to my visual design and art contributions, I was involved in fleshing out the game design and melding it with historical facts.

For example, the client wanted stashes of alcohol to appear on the shore from time to time that the players could pick up, which actually did happen in real life. But it seemed to me that some extra incentive was needed to make it worthwhile for a player to pull away from the main focus of intercepting boats. I hit on the idea of using other historical facts – such as that the Coast Guard boats were upgraded with faster engines a few years into Prohibition – as the basis for power-ups that the players would receive for picking up stashes.