In Gemini, navigate two stars throughout the heavens. We talk to game designer Atlas Chen about the three-year design process and what it means to apply to Chinese values to game design.
There’s a brand new game out of the NYU Game Center. Meet Gemini, in which players navigate a star through a series of colorful, futuristic tableaux set to music. It was built by Atlas Chen and Nick Zhang, both graduates of NYU’s MFA program in game design, in collaboration with graphic designer Kevin Chen, composer Tony Yen and technical artist Zack Zhang.
The game is designed as a metaphor for life’s journey, as Chen explains on his personal website. The star each player navigates moves in tandem with another star, and it’s up to the player to figure out how both interact. (The game designers “began with the idea of building an emotional and meaningful relationship between the player and a non-player character,” Gemini’s website reads.) After one round of play, the game unlocks a two-player mode, so that players can invite friends to join. It’s set up as a quest, and the different scenes draw from cultural influences such as Greek mythology and Buddhist teachings.
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