Open Licensing & Beyond: How to Help Creators Build on Your Games

• Sat Apr 1, 1:10 PM - 2:00 PM
• • Panel
  • Practicum
• April Walsh, Lex Bobrow, Viditya Voleti, jay dragon
• ()
• 0 of

Description:

An open license is an invitation to create and provides the clarity and certainty that others need to build on your designs. Beyond granting legal permission, though, there are many ways to make your game inviting to hack and build upon and to support a community of creativity. In this panel, four game designers will share their insights into licensing, grant programs, positioning your game to be hacked, supporting follow-on creators, resources like templates and reference documents, and more to give you a wide range of approaches to help others create.

Panelists

April Kit Walsh (she/her or gay/ghem) writes queer games about feelings, vulnerability, and caring for one another, including Thirsty Sword Lesbians and End of the Line. She used to be a swordfighting ballerina, but claims those days are behind her; she has absolutely no idea who that masked heroine with the sword and the tutu might be. You can find April’s games at GaySpaceship.com and on Twitter at @GaySpaceshipGms. When not writing RPGs, April is a civil liberties attorney working to protect the rights of criminal defendants, activists, journalists, and everyone else impacted by technologies of control or empowerment.

Lex Kim Bobrow (they/them), known as @titanomachyRPG, is a mixed-Asian, non-binary tabletop roleplaying game designer and writer. They are the creator of Caltrop Core, a d4-based open license system for creating your own TTRPGs, featured in Dicebreaker’s “9 best tabletop RPG systems to hack into a custom game.” Over 200 games have been created by a diverse community surrounding the system since its release in October 2021.

Viditya Voleti (he/him) is a QPOC, South Asian, interactive artist and game designer who loves to mess with play and interactive media! His own games are never the same, always iterating or trying out new ideas and approaches to what TTRPGs can be. He primarily loves making collaborative worldbuilding games and explorations into GMless and GM-Agnostic design.

Jay Dragon (no pronouns) is a queer disabled TTRPG game designer located in upstate New York. Jay writes games about community, liminality, and the magic of the mundane, and is an author of games like the award-winning and critically-acclaimed Wanderhome. Jay is also the editorial director at Possum Creek Games, which publishes games like Yazeba’s Bed & Breakfast. These days Jay can often be found sitting on a dock by the creek, listening to music and watching the sun set.

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