Design games as a tool, a mindset and a structure Kirsikka Vaajakallio

Fig. 5
In the two first images F is sketching an idea of binoculars with a Make Tools block, whereas the
picture on right side is an illustration of F and K in a situation where they are developing an idea
of “watching a mood board as watching a sky”. Drawn images were used as tool in analyzing
the data.
The playfulness came not from referring to the activities as a game or utilising
characteristics related to games (playing cards, game board, rules or
turn-taking), but from the performances supported by various props. The
game metaphor in co-design and the possibilities afforded by that are taken
into the focus again in the following cases. For instance, in the next case
the dialogue will be guided through the structure and rules provided by the
design game in a manner similar to that of the Eco Game when utilised in
the second experiment with kids. But whereas the Eco Game aimed at inviting
responses from the kids as user representatives, in the next case the
design game is used to make sense of the stories collected from users who
are not present in the gathering. It also resembles the case described above
in that the researcher is actively participating in co-design.
Case 3.
Stories
as
source
of
inspiration
The third case included three sessions organized through the same game
framework but with distinct aims, participants and researchers. The main
objective was to transform narrative data into a design game that would
allow collaborative interpretation 7 . The data consisted of hundreds of
stories which were gathered by Kalevala Women’s Association as a part
of a writing competition in 2007, the topic of which was significant jewellery.
Collaborative interpretation is needed in many user-centred design
processes to allow personal interpretations for wider group of people and
to approach the data from several views that participant represent in the
session. For instance, ethnographically inspired field studies can be transformed
into a video-card game (Buur & Søndergaard 2000) to enable collaborative
viewing in a structured but inspiring way.
7 The data was part of Petra Ahde’s doctoral research about meaningful jewelries. Together with her,
I organized the first session at Kalevala Koru Oy , while Sanna Latva-Ranta took care of the student
project at Kuopio Academy of Design and Young-Ae Hahn helped Petra with a third case in the Illinois
Institute of Technology.
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