Skins 4.0 Summer Institute on Aboriginal Storytelling and Video Game Design
Concordia University
Montreal, Quebec
May 27 – June 14, 2013
Participants of this three-week intensive workshop became a team, taking on game-industry roles to turn one of our stories into a playable video game. The youth collaboratively wrote the story, then built the game around it. Ienién:te and the Peacemaker’s Wampum follows our heroine, Ienién:te (yeh-YAWN-day), home from university with her brand new Archeology degree, as she is visited in a dream by a bear spirit. The spirit tells her of evil wrongdoings nearby–which only she can set right. Using a combination of the school smarts she brings home from University and the traditional knowledge that she learns from her grandmother in the game, Ienién:te avoids security guards’ flashlights and solves increasingly difficult puzzles to reach an ancient sacred and powerful artifact–the Peacemaker’s original wampum. The wampum was stolen by her evil archaeology professor, who is using its power to achieve immortality. Only by rediscovering her culture and returning the artifacts can she foil the corporate aspirations of world domination and protect humanity from the powerful ancient evils they had carelessly unleashed.
Created by the Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace (AbTeC) research network as part of the Initiative for Indigenous Futures (IIF). indigenousfutures.net.
Skins 4.0 Summer Institute on Aboriginal Storytelling and Video Game Design
Concordia University
Montreal, Quebec
May 27 – June 14, 2013
Participants of this three-week intensive workshop became a team, taking on game-industry roles to turn one of our stories into a playable video game. The youth collaboratively wrote the story, then built the game around it. Ienién:te and the Peacemaker’s Wampum follows our heroine, Ienién:te (yeh-YAWN-day), home from university with her brand new Archeology degree, as she is visited in a dream by a bear spirit. The spirit tells her of evil wrongdoings nearby–which only she can set right. Using a combination of the school smarts she brings home from University and the traditional knowledge that she learns from her grandmother in the game, Ienién:te avoids security guards’ flashlights and solves increasingly difficult puzzles to reach an ancient sacred and powerful artifact–the Peacemaker’s original wampum. The wampum was stolen by her evil archaeology professor, who is using its power to achieve immortality. Only by rediscovering her culture and returning the artifacts can she foil the corporate aspirations of world domination and protect humanity from the powerful ancient evils they had carelessly unleashed.
Created by the Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace (AbTeC) research network as part of the Initiative for Indigenous Futures (IIF). indigenousfutures.net.