Reason Presents: Video Game Nation

Get your game on as Reason magazine celebrates "Video Game Nation" with editor-in-chief Matt Welch!

Button mashers everywhere (that means you!) are cordially invited to grab a joystick and a can of Four Loko at Reason's Los Angeles' HQ as we kick off the release of the June 2014 issue of Reason magazine. "Video Game Nation" features an in-depth look at how video games are making America freer--and a lot more fun. Food, drinks, and LA's best game trucks will be on site to keep your minds nimble and your fingers busy. And stick around as Reason.tv pulls out the first-person shooter guns in a free-for-all discussion with Spark Unlimited’s Craig Allen and USC professor and game designer Tracy Fullerton. You won’t want to miss what these two experts see on the video game horizon!

Thursday, May 8
Reason's Los Angeles HQ
6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

5737 Mesmer Ave,
Los Angeles, CA 90230
valet parking will be provided

Eat, drink and digitally conquer others who share your passion for liberty! RSVP via Eventbrite or to Mary Toledo at Mary.Toledo@reason.org or (310) 391-2245 or by Wednesday, May 7. We look forward to seeing you there!

Craig Allen
Chief Executive Officer, Spark Unlimited
Craig Allen brings to Spark Unlimited more than ten years of experience in managing creative production, launching new consumer brands and articulating franchise opportunities to a diverse range of partners while understanding how to nurture and grow new global business by pursuing collaborative programs as they become enabled through new technology.

Mr. Allen was formally the Executive Vice President and General Manager of Jim Henson Interactive where he was the primary creative architect behind The Jim Henson Company's expanded digital media activities - a program that allowed Mr. Allen to work individually and collaboratively with a wide variety of companies ranging from traditional media groups (television networks, film studios and magazines) to emerging and new media concerns working to deploy online entertainment, wireless gaming networks, and enhanced consumer products.

While Mr. Allen was able to form strategic and business relationships with a wide variety of corporate partners (including Sony Computer Entertainment, Ubisoft, Microsoft, AOL/Time Warner, IBM, Intel, AMD, Andi Networks, Vivendi Universal, TDK MediActive and The Disney Channel, among others) Mr. Allen is particularly proud of his contributions to the formation of the Henson Digital Performance System, a process for bringing live performance to digital graphics that received the 2001 Smithsonian Award for Outstanding Achievement in Media and Technology.

Tracy Fullerton, M.F.A.,

Tracy Fullerton is a game designer, educator and writer with fifteen years of professional experience. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Interactive Media Division of the USC School of Cinematic Arts and Director of the USC Game Innovation Lab. In December 2008, she was installed as the holder of the Electronic Arts Endowed Chair of Interactive Entertainment. Tracy is the author of Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Designing Innovative Games. This design textbook is in use at game programs worldwide. Recent credits include faculty adviser for the award-winning student games Cloud, and flOw; and game designer for The Night Journey, a unique game/art project with media artist Bill Viola. She is currently designing a game based on Henry David Thoreau's experiment in living at Walden Pond. Also, she is leading a team of designers to create a suite of college knowledge games collectively known as Collegeology Games.

Prior to joining the USC faculty, she was president and founder of the interactive television game developer, Spiderdance, Inc. Spiderdance's games included NBC's Weakest Link, MTV's webRIOT, The WB's No Boundaries, History Channel's History IQ, Sony Game Show Network's Inquizition and TBS's Cyber Bond. Before starting Spiderdance, Tracy was a founding member of the New York design firm R/GA Interactive. As a producer and creative director she created games and interactive products for clients including Sony, Intel, Microsoft, AdAge, Ticketmaster, Compaq, and Warner Bros. among many others. Notable projects include Sony's Multiplayer Jeopardy! and Multiplayer Wheel of Fortune and MSN's NetWits, the first multiplayer casual game. Additionally, Tracy was Creative Director at the interactive film studio Interfilm, where she wrote and co-directed the "cinematic game" Ride for Your Life, starring Adam West and Matthew Lillard. She began her career as a designer at Bob Abel's company Synapse, where she worked on the interactive documentary Columbus: Encounter, Discovery and Beyond and other early interactive projects.

Tracy's work has received numerous industry honors including an Emmy nomination for interactive television, best Family/Board Game from the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, most "sublime experience" from the Indiecade Festival, ID Magazine's Interactive Design Review, Communication Arts Interactive Design Annual, several New Media Invision awards, iMix Best of Show, the Digital Coast Innovation Award, IBC's Nombre D'Or, Time Magazine's Best of the Web and the Hollywood Reporter's Women in Entertainment Power 100.