Fast Five – John Sietsma

Helping to turn Freeplay itself into a game, John Sietsma from Tall Games set up the backchatter code & server for us.  He’ll also be speaking on the Beyond the Controller panel.

What are you working on right now?

I’m working on an augmented reality game based on the prank of taking a garden gnome from someones front yard and sending back postcards from around the world. There is collecting, sharing and vicarious travel involved.

And I work on other augmented reality projects for various clients.

What are you most looking forward to?

I’m learning to enjoy the process!

What do you wished you’d worked on? Why?

I Love Bees. It was created by a small team who were quickly blown away by, and had to quickly react to, what could be done through world-wide co-operative puzzle solving. Reacting to your players everyday, adapting a story on the fly would be amazing.

What are you playing right now – digital or otherwise?

Nothing, I’m going screen media free for a month (why did I choose August!). But recently I’ve played; Torchlight, Kyntt Stories, Alien Swarm, Kingdom of Loathing and Psychonauts. I’m always heavily addicted to TF2. I’ve been known to carry a chess board around and I regularly play cards with my kids.

What thing that you’ve worked on, personal or paid, are you most proud of?

My current game. I’m making something I think will be awesome not making something someone else thinks will be awesome.

John Sietsma is an augmented reality games developer. He is very tall and works with the also very tall Finn Morgan, which is why they called themselves Tall Games (http://www.tallgames.net/).