3.3 Designing Jocoi: A Game about Pregnancy Loss

Abstract

This chapter addresses the process of designing Jocoi, discussing features of the final prototype1 and the way we got there. In previous write-ups of this process, I have focused on the movement from brainstorming to final prototype in chronological order. This came at the cost of explaining how we actually adapted design devices to accommodate participant stories. To show how the ergodic continuum works in practice to address lived experience, I found it more useful to switch to a structure which resembles the analysis chapters in part 2 of this book. This acknowledges that Jocoi exists within a design tradition. It is part of a history of games which have used different strategies to make love and loss tangible. Based on the women’s priorities emerging from the planet models, the game design goal was to respond adequately to these themes through a videogame. This required a balancing of design autonomy, accepting liability for the process and the final prototype but also implementing it in a way that would appeal to the women’s tastes. The idea was to continue the muse-based design process in a way that would ‘amuse the muses’ and lead to interesting observations about designing for grief.