Cover events as they
unfold in a fictional town
Game Info
 | Teens & Tweens |
 | Unity Game Engine |
 | Web |
 | Research Project |
Key Solutions
- Systems Design
- Pedagogical Alignment
Challenges & Outcomes
Headlines and High Water started as “Journalism Game”, a grant-funded project by the Field Day Lab team, with help from the journalism faculty at UW-Madison.
I was brought on initially to find the form that the game would take, and then to do systems design around the key constraints of the game, such as player stats, the snippets you gather, how those snippets are assembled into a story, and how the system assesses that story. It was challenging, and went through many iterations, but we were able to pull from both the experience of real journalists and hew to the core learning goals to deliver a stellar game experience.
Headlines and High Water ended up winning two Games for Change awards in 2024, for Best in Learning and Best in Civics.