Gadgetory

remember how much joy you got out of your toys as a kid you'd squeeze them and they'd make a funny noise it was enough to put a big smile on your face as simple as these toys might seem their creation is actually a complicated blend of arts and science of dreaming big and then turning those dreams into reality there are so many different parts to tour design I think it's probably one of the most complicated disciplines to learn in the first semester they don't actually really know what a toy is Judy Ellis is the founder and head of the Fashion Institute of Technology's toy design program it was the first program of its kind in the US when I was founded over 25 years ago its alumni probably had some material impact on your childhood many graduates have gone on to win the coveted tuyo of the Year award or toady some of these pieces were actually made in the model making shot like that piece on the top these are products that are on the market or war on the market and they're all designed by aldo night how would you biggest define a toy a vehicle that's going to take that child on some kind of wonderful adventure the moment that you realize that your toy has to enhance out of the way they learn to touch or hold or speak or interact with people that's when you have a toy and the best toys no matter what they are in the real world or just a representation of something much bigger this is Raul he's a frog he's really only about this big but he thinks that he is the most important thing in the world and it takes him a long time to learn to be humble I came here thinking I was going to win every event and now I'm going home empty-handed roll gets on stage and says to the crowd I don't have a talent like my Brazilian friend mill but i can do what i can do is whistle the crowd is on its feet cheering and clapping none of them expected such a beautiful song or for it to be so loud and clear and come from such a little frog this sort of original world building feels less common these days games and toys seem to be dominated by franchises featuring your favorite superheroes or TV characters which is to say of course licensing one of the big changes that I've seen is that there was in the beginning what we called standalone product that meant that you didn't have to have a movie behind you you could just have something that was great for a child to play with when this country started to experience some economic issues licensing became much more prominent most toys that everyone runs to the store to have to have your running because your child's has seen it there's a movie there's of this that doesn't have a lot to do with what makes a toys success that will have a lot to do with what makes you run to get that toy Cardinal Industries is a family owned business that's been making games and toys for about 70 years even if you don't know Cardinals name chances are you've seen their work they make games for minions Marvel Disney and even less common tions like Wikipedia and the ABC drama scandal for something like scandal I actually sat down with shonda rhimes so that was actually a really a collaborative effort we worked specifically with her and her team to bring a game to life that she would want to see on the shelves we made some tweaks along the way to make sure gameplay worked but classic play patterns never go away and no matter how old you are or how young there's something very comfortable about classic play patterns you know it's kind of like how even trends happen with TV shows or movies you know what's old is new again right now I know dominoes are surging again a few years ago mahjong had a really big resurgent it comes in waves it can work in Reverse two games can be turned into brands themselves any game with a hint of a larger world attached to it can be grown into an ecosystem of products if you enjoy angry birds for example you might enjoy having new ways of getting those characters or the imagery you can do that by extending that out into other products and mediums a newer increasingly popular trend is finding ways to blend the digital and physical world think Skylanders Nintendo's amoeba characters and Disney infinity you're calling a twist to life they're taking the physical toy and having it be able to interact with the screen the world the story can be much larger and yes kids definitely want that but if you give your child everything that they want that has to do with technology only you're not going to develop the skills to handle the challenges or where this world is going we have a very big responsibility to still hold on to things that are real if we don't I'm will lose the one thing that makes us really special with our humanity being human is about making connections between person and person between person and idea and if you spin even five minutes talking as that gauge the artisan designer perhaps best known for iOS games like spell tower you start to think about games interaction these philosophical terms one of the things that's weird about making interactive art is you're always designing an experience for people that they've never had anything like before you have to think a lot about like what is it going to be like when someone walks up to this piece how will they learn people are so complex and interesting that often you can design mechanics that don't actually work but when you add a human being into it it becomes functional in a way that it wasn't functional as a pure system cards against humanity does a similar kind of thing like relies on this like human element I think my litany of toys and games growing up was kind of the standard set I played parcheesi and mouse trap and monopoly a lot of bad board games what made them bad games to you well I mean the canonical example is monopoly it sets up an experience where somebody is going to have a miserable time and then makes that experience as long as humanly possible mousetrap is like all glitz and no content but now you've got carcassonne a you got slopes catan got these European games he's dreaming if you're talking about kind of coming over why why do you think these games do better now one mobile phones happened and created such a phenomenal shift everybody plays games now when you have like groups of young people who want to get together and want to do something they can't play multiplayer games on their console because those games barely exists outside of Nintendo and everybody's primed play a game so they want to play a game and what do you do will you go play Settlers of Catan which is just magically shown up at the right time we're right smack in the middle of the Golden Age of board games Kickstarter's on board games they're going crazy every couple of months some new board game comes out that I'm really excited about playing you know everything is exploding outwards in every direction right now we never lose the need to play to create new worlds and assume new identities games and toys allow us to escape and connect with one another in a visceral way even as our lives are filled with more and more screens the need to play still thrives and now more than ever we have so many amazing options for bringing out our inner child Oh