00:00:00:00 - 00:00:36:06
Ibi
Hello and welcome to ITV's Digital Nomad Stories, featuring real conversations with professionals who've cracked the code to sustainable, nomadic lifestyles. These people aren't beach and Wi-Fi chasers. They're building competitive advantages that traditional employment could never match. Global mobility, income diversification and the freedom to capitalize on opportunities anywhere. I'm AB Malik, your favorite digital nomad consultant, and today I'm joined on the show by Dave Neel, someone who did the sensible thing.
00:00:36:11 - 00:01:00:11
Ibi
He got a PhD in psychology from Cambridge. Yes. The Cambridge. And then he became a Cambridge professor. Yes, a real professor. But then on one random evening he did a strange thing. He rewrote the rules for an old Sherlock Holmes board game, not for money or for career advancement, but just because he wanted to see people play it.
00:01:00:12 - 00:01:28:21
Ibi
He sent it to a publisher on a whim, and that casual email became the pivot that changed everything. Now he designs narrative games while living in co-living across Europe. His philosophy play make things because making them is worthwhile. This is a masterclass in trust. Trust that following what's interesting will lead somewhere interesting. Here's Dave. Hi, Dave. How's it going?
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Ibi
And are you a nomad?
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Dave
Yes. With a slight pause. But yes.
00:01:37:22 - 00:01:39:07
Ibi
What's the pause?
00:01:39:09 - 00:02:06:12
Dave
Tell me. I guess the pause is I do have a home base. I do have a place I rent in Cambridge, just like a room in a house that I keep that so I can go back. And as my stuff in it, but, and I but at least for the last couple of years, I have spent most of my time traveling and have definitely I didn't fight as a nomad online.
00:02:06:12 - 00:02:26:00
Ibi
You identify as a nomad? Yeah. That's actually why I was super excited about this interview. Yeah. Interesting. And are you a writer or a game developer because your email is Dave Neil. Writer. Yes. But you told me you're a game developer that. Yes. And I had the distinct pleasure of experiencing one of your games and they were incredible.
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Ibi
So, the murder mystery in the castle, which took 36 hours to solve and blew my mind on more than one occasion.
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Dave
Yeah. So. Well, it's both, but a lot of the game design stuff I do is is writing, so I, and I suppose my kind of niche in the game design world is writing and storytelling and combining games with stories and figuring out how best to tell a story through a game format. So I.
00:03:06:05 - 00:03:07:04
Ibi
Definitely identify as.
00:03:07:04 - 00:03:18:00
Dave
Both a writer and as a game designer and I, I yeah, I guess my identity is kind of at the intersection between the two.
00:03:18:02 - 00:03:25:02
Ibi
What comes first? The writing of the game, designing to come up with the thing first and then you put a game around it?
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Dave
Sometimes. Yeah, I guess it can be either way. It can be like the theme and the story, and then it's about how best can this kind of setting and story be told through a game and through an interactive narrative, like, where are the choice points? How does it work? Is it the case? The players are kind of, do they get a score at the end for how much they learn?
00:03:52:02 - 00:04:13:09
Dave
Is it a kind of mystery thing? Are they trying to solve something or are the multiple endings that they can get to? And so what they're trying to do is just get the best ending, and it's how they get to that ending. So it can be that way around. We have a story and then you figure out how the game fits can be the other way around, where you come up with an interesting way, an interesting game thing, and then find a story that fits like one game.
00:04:13:09 - 00:04:31:02
Dave
I, idea I had was a jigsaw puzzle. So you have some of the pieces, you make part of it, and you see a little bit of a world like a map, and you can see some objects, and you have to figure out how you want to use those objects to get past obstacles and explore more of the world.
00:04:31:04 - 00:04:47:09
Dave
And to do that, you kind of you look for the object you want to use, and you find jigsaw pieces that have that symbol on you. Take them and you see if they fit at the place you want to use them. Or if they do, you found the right object and you make more of it. So that was kind of a concept for the that was the game rules concept with no story attached.
00:04:47:11 - 00:04:55:07
Dave
So then it was a cases like, well, what kind of story can fit this. So it's both ways around interesting interesting.
00:04:55:09 - 00:05:12:16
Ibi
And so was there like okay that's how you kind of put them together. Now in the grand scheme of your journey, did you want to go down the writing paths of the game development path or something totally different?
00:05:12:18 - 00:05:30:21
Dave
Originally, I mean, like as a kid I was into writing and games, but I kind of wanted to be an author. I knew I wanted to write. That was the main thing I knew. I knew I wanted to tell stories, I guess, and the main way I knew people told stories was to write novels. So I really kind of wanted to do that.
00:05:30:23 - 00:06:05:10
Dave
Then I went off into psychology after university. I did English literature, then I did psychology. Basically. I didn't really know what to do with the English literature degree because it's not like you can just apply for a job to be a writer or something, generally speaking, a novelist or whatever. So I went down the psychology route. Then I ended up getting the PhD and becoming a psychologist, but also ended up sort of accidentally looping back into stories and games and it was it was not really, I guess I didn't have a plan at that point.
00:06:05:12 - 00:06:28:16
Dave
I kind of stumbled into a thing and did a thing because I loved doing it, and that ended up becoming my job. And then that job also led to me realizing I was location independent, doing that job. And that led to me then identifying as a nomad, I guess, because then I could travel. And I did travel.
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Ibi
So you kind of fell into location independence.
00:06:31:22 - 00:06:57:02
Dave
In a way. But part of me is always wanted it, I think. I mean, even I remember as a kid having these like, ideas about travel and being fascinated by travel and, just thinking about, like, hiking across the UK. And I was never thought about as a kid and or, or traveling around in a, in a band and stuff, which both the things that appealed to me less now really, I guess.
00:06:57:02 - 00:07:11:16
Dave
But still, that travel idea was in my mind. And the idea of the exotic ness of travel and the people you might meet. But then, you know, I guess you never see that as.
00:07:11:18 - 00:07:12:18
Ibi
I guess it felt like a sort of.
00:07:12:18 - 00:07:35:21
Dave
Child hood idea that sort of faded out in my teens, and that when I went to university and into adulthood, when it became more like, oh, yeah, in sort of real life, you pick a place and you live there and you do a job and you, like is more stable. And it wasn't until I was doing my PhD that I discovered the concept of digital nomadism.
00:07:35:21 - 00:07:57:14
Dave
So that was in 2016, and I went on one trip and then I kind of knew about it, but I still wasn't in a place to really do it. I could just go and like, you know, stay like like we're here in the chateau, kind of like, now go and do like a one month thing, then go back to Ordinary Life, where I was doing academic stuff, maybe do that again later on.
00:07:57:16 - 00:08:08:06
Dave
So yeah, it was, it was calling to me the whole time. I just didn't I didn't set out to build my life around it that much, but I knew I wanted to do it if I could.
00:08:08:08 - 00:08:36:21
Ibi
I can say it's a common, journey that a lot of people have been on to do for. If I think about a lot of the nomads that I've met, there's 20, 16 to 20, 20 years, quite pivotal because that's when nomadic was kind of like getting a lot of global traction. I think, you know, a lot of, bloggers were talking about it, podcasters were talking about it.
00:08:36:23 - 00:08:56:12
Ibi
A lot of governments had it in mind about the digital nomad visas. Not a lot. But that was the first time governments started thinking about it. Maybe not the first time, but I think Portugal and Spain were around then. What do you think of those years 2016 to 2018, 2019 years, or what was your view on the Nomad?
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Ibi
Well, then it's still.
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Dave
Different because that's when I discovered it. And then, you know, it kind of feels like you had that, and then you had the post pandemic years when it also entered much more, I guess, public consciousness as this, because it suddenly everybody was remote working at least for a period of time. And then, so then this idea of like, wait, can I do my job from anywhere?
00:09:17:13 - 00:09:39:19
Dave
I kind of became more of a, a general mainstream. So I think and so I think you had kind of a boom in more people try out digital nomads and straight off the pandemic, before the pandemic. So those kind of years, the kind of 20 from 2016, I remember when I went in 2016 and I just did like one trip.
00:09:39:21 - 00:09:41:11
Ibi
And I remember it feeling.
00:09:41:11 - 00:10:13:13
Dave
And it's hard to know now whether this is partly just my perspective, because where I was coming from or if it was an actual difference at the time, but it felt much more like a group of us doing something that was, kind of like kind of rare and secret, like something that not many people knew about. It was kind of had this adventure quality to it, like, oh, we're here doing this thing that most people don't do or even know exists.
00:10:13:13 - 00:10:36:07
Dave
And, so it had this kind of sort of exciting energy and edge to it in that way. And anytime I mentioned it to people when I kind of came back and they were like, what's that? What do you mean, what's this digital nomad thing? And people hadn't heard of it, like in my regular life. So it had that quality to it, which I kind of liked.
00:10:36:09 - 00:10:52:15
Dave
Post-pandemic, it feels much more like most people kind of know roughly what it is, or a lot of people you talk to in normal life know the concept. They know what remote working is. They understand a lot of the core ideas, and it feels more like there's an international community around it. And you can, like, turn up places.
00:10:52:15 - 00:11:22:03
Dave
And it's very much like, oh, yeah, this is a digital nomad place. Cape Town, for example. Tons of digital nomad groups, communities. And I guess maybe it was like that bit before and I never really realized it, but it definitely feels like it feels to me, at least from from my detective, that there was that shift, that there was like a sort of slightly secret adventure, hidden world of it before and then post-pandemic, like much more, a bigger community, which is kind of good.
00:11:22:05 - 00:11:38:17
Dave
But it's sort of lost a bit of the this sort of, oh, we're doing this little fun secret thing, edge to it, but now it's easier to do, I guess, easier to find, easier to engage with. A lot more people are doing it, easier to find your people, I guess, because so many more people have been doing it.
00:11:38:19 - 00:12:02:22
Ibi
Interesting, interesting. How do you find the power of play in going through the nomad journey? Because I know you've talked about the power of play or the concept of play before, and you've talked about the adventures in 2000, 18, those years of being very kind of unique and adventurous. How do you find the power of play in living the nomad lifestyle?
00:12:03:00 - 00:12:08:15
Dave
I think there's a good,
00:12:08:17 - 00:12:50:05
Dave
It's a good kind of fit, I suppose. There's no there's definite overlap in the the play is a lot about, spontaneity and creativity and, exploration. Trying things haven't tried before, those kind of things. And nomadism to some extent is, is those kind of things too, right? Traveling around new places, new people, cultures, pushing outside your comfort zone a little bit that so there's this parallel, I think, to a sort of playful approach to life and living, a nomad lifestyle.
00:12:50:05 - 00:13:22:22
Dave
And I do think I want it makes me want to like, I think I've seen a lot more play in nomads than in many other groups of people I know. I think they seem to have a a propensity, and they seem to like playing and just engage with it. Maybe more, perhaps because of the mindset they come to the lifestyle with, or because the lifestyle itself sort of encourages that.
00:13:23:00 - 00:13:44:10
Dave
I mean, one thing that plays it's a good way to get to know the new people and for bonding. And if you're traveling, then you're often meeting and new people and want to bond with them in co-living and stuff. So games and fun activities, playful activities are all great ways of doing that. So that's part of it, I guess.
00:13:44:12 - 00:14:14:16
Dave
And it really helps, I think, with that sense of community, I think some people, when they nomad and I've read some articles about people's bad experiences with nomadic, often it's about the community and the loneliness in that community. And they feel lonely people who go solo nomad, and they will sometimes find people for a short amount of time staying in a place, a cold, maybe, but maybe some people move out, some people move in and they have new people again.
00:14:14:16 - 00:14:41:05
Dave
They start to feel the the sort of the drain of having to kind of get to know new people over and over and over again. They don't feel they're properly bonding with, with people. And so that's kind of the price they're paying for this sort of excitement of the constant change and the travel and all that. But I think Nomad in can have that sense of community and overcome the sense of loneliness.
00:14:41:07 - 00:15:06:20
Dave
For sure. In some ways it can be tricky because you can definitely get close to people who then you are going to be apart from for a long period of time. But you can continuously also meet up with those people in different places. And I think when you do get like a kind of situation, like we've got here where there is like a group of people for a set amount of time, maybe just a month, and you can do these kind of playful things together and bond.
00:15:06:20 - 00:15:19:13
Dave
It can overcome that potential negative side of nomad life where there's the potential for loneliness. I think.
00:15:19:15 - 00:15:21:17
Ibi
Yeah, it's that psychologist, right?
00:15:21:19 - 00:15:27:13
Dave
Yes. I did a PhD in psychology. Yes.
00:15:27:15 - 00:15:44:01
Ibi
Is it the individual play or is it the community play. Is it the one mentality that an individual brings to a group that can impact the group, or is it the whole group's collective acknowledgment of that thing that makes it work?
00:15:44:03 - 00:16:08:13
Dave
Oh, I could definitely both I think I think one person can have a big effect, but some people are more, I guess, just less naturally playful, more resistant to to play type activities or maybe it's their preferred type of, of that. That kind of thing is just different. And maybe they just want to sit and do crosswords and, and and play and do Wordle and stuff.
00:16:08:13 - 00:16:33:06
Dave
And that is a kind of play, you know, that they're doing. So it could be that people just have these different ways of engaging with what is but in terms of kind of generally sort of playful attitude and I guess I'm thinking of this in a kind of like social way, how playful people are with each other and in, in a social setting.
00:16:33:08 - 00:17:10:01
Dave
That definitely changes a lot between people. But you also get it at like a group level. I think people start to learn how to relax with each other and be playful with each other. Over time. And that can definitely be enhanced by games, big group games like a mungus that we play here. Any kind of playful activities, problem solving activities like murder, mystery, saying all these kind of playful things because they give you a context to interact, learn about each other, kind of almost push each other a little bit.
00:17:10:01 - 00:17:36:06
Dave
Sometimes your, you can have, like, disagreements about things. You can, kind of, people can make mistakes and stuff. You can have these kind of things which, could have a more disruptive effect if they were in normal life. But you're kind of experiencing them in this, in this playful world, and therefore they're sort of safer.
00:17:36:07 - 00:17:54:13
Dave
And you're learning about each other and those kind of edges and how to live with each other and respond to each other. In this kind of safe play context compared to having to do it in real life context, when then sometimes everything can fall apart.
00:17:54:15 - 00:18:02:23
Ibi
That sounded pretty damn Instagrammable to me. Well that's deep.
00:18:03:01 - 00:18:26:06
Ibi
You took me on a journey that I'm, I'm getting a bit lost for words. Yeah. You're right. It's like a mini world. How does that mini world within the game or within the play world. How does that world benefit the real world? How can we use that mindset? How can we reframe that to our advantage?
00:18:26:08 - 00:18:53:08
Dave
I think the play mindset is something that focuses a lot on the process rather than the outcome, which I think is beneficial not all the time, but definitely some of the time in our daily lives. So when we are playing some kind of game together, there is sort of a goal. Sometimes you want to win, you want to work something out, you want to solve something.
00:18:53:10 - 00:18:54:15
Ibi
But generally speaking.
00:18:54:15 - 00:19:12:01
Dave
If you're playing a game and somebody said, oh, well, we could just immediately say, you've won now, not while playing, then most people are going to be like, I don't want that. So they were like, I want to play. I want to play, even if it means I don't win, I want to play. I still want to win the can.
00:19:12:01 - 00:19:50:02
Dave
But but I want to play. So they the main point of the whole thing is the process, not the outcome. The outcome can feel important. It can be what people are going for, but it's not the point. So, that focus on the process instead of the outcome can be beneficial in daily life, especially when we're getting stuck on things we can sometimes get stuck because we're so overly focused on the outcome and forget about looking at the process or thinking about the process, and how if we sort of play around with our process, our normal process of doing things, sometimes we find new insights and new ways of doing them.
00:19:50:04 - 00:20:07:17
Dave
And if we can find a joy in the process, it makes everything a lot easier. If we find the process painful and we're just looking at the outcome that kind of sustains us only for so long, because you're kind of going through this pain and you have to keep forcing yourself to go through it. Just keep thinking about the outcome, the outcome.
00:20:07:19 - 00:20:17:04
Dave
If you can find a way to enjoy the experience of the process, then the whole thing goes smoothly and you get to the outcome. Sometimes before you even know it.
00:20:17:06 - 00:20:20:01
Ibi
Interesting. Very interesting.
00:20:20:03 - 00:20:21:19
Dave
00:20:21:21 - 00:20:48:11
Ibi
Okay, okay, I like this. There's a lot of power here in this world of play, and I think it's underrated. And only when you have someone who can explain it like like you're explaining it, does it actually kind of make more sense. And turn into a whole. There's a whole methodology. There's a whole ideology here. I don't know if that's the right word, but this, this whole philosophy of life here that you could take from the concept of play.
00:20:48:12 - 00:20:50:14
Dave
Yeah. Yeah. For sure.
00:20:50:16 - 00:20:55:23
Ibi
Okay. Okay. So coming back to it.
00:20:56:01 - 00:21:01:13
Ibi
I've never been a game designer Nomad, have you? Apart from yourself.
00:21:01:15 - 00:21:37:23
Dave
Have I ever met myself? Interesting. No, I have, I have, I not? No, I haven't, I've never, not while traveling. I've heard of other game designers I've met through game design who have done some nomadic, but I, the ones I know of, I don't think do it anymore. And it's. Yeah. As I've been traveling around being a nomad, I have never, I don't think, met another person who designs games, especially not for games as a as their job anyway.
00:21:38:00 - 00:21:53:05
Ibi
And the job of designing board games. Is that inherently nomadic or location independent, or is that a job that you've made location independent for yourself?
00:21:53:07 - 00:22:23:11
Dave
It's I mean, I could have gone in sort of non nomadic route or still could, I guess, if I chose to. I mean, the way that I'm doing it is like most game designers, most board game designers are freelance. The vast majority do it sort of as a side thing to their, their main job. And mostly it is contract based, like book publishing.
00:22:23:13 - 00:22:48:20
Dave
You get a contract for the game with a publisher, it publishers, it sends you royalties. So in that sense, the publisher doesn't really care where you are. So the essence of that kind of if you, if you take that route with it, which the majority of people who design for games do, then you are you can be location dependent, vast majority.
00:22:48:20 - 00:23:12:13
Dave
You're also doing on the side of their main job, which may well not be location dependent. Most of them aren't. Then you also have the other route, which is to work for a directory for a ball game company, and be an in-house designer for them, and then you're not necessarily location dependent. You're probably not inside. You probably have an office you go to.
00:23:12:15 - 00:23:44:09
Dave
In that sense, ball games can be, I would think some that would be less in location dependent than perhaps a lot of other industries, because they want people actually on site because you're going to be making physical prototypes, ball games and physical things. You're gonna be making these prototypes. You're going to be playing them with people in the office, testing things out, testing, maybe new components, and playing, other games with each other where you kind of, you really need to be in the same space, you know, to get the feel for the game and how people are reacting to it.
00:23:44:11 - 00:24:03:20
Dave
So that side of it, working for a ball game company would be, probably not at all location independent. Really. But the route that I have gone is and I guess the differences as well, I'm, you know, I was quite lucky in that my first contract was with a big publisher, and then I've had other contracts with big publishers.
00:24:03:20 - 00:24:29:05
Dave
So I got good income to, live off and making a main job. And, I didn't need to. I didn't need to go any different way. I guess I didn't need to keep another job. I didn't, I didn't think of applying to a ball game company and working for them. I mean, I think I would also enjoy that wouldn't be location dependent.
00:24:29:07 - 00:24:32:06
Dave
But. Yeah. So that's why where I am, where I am.
00:24:32:08 - 00:24:39:03
Ibi
And so it brings the question to my mind. The question is.
00:24:39:05 - 00:24:53:05
Ibi
There are a lot of people who are listeners to this podcast. I would say there's a lot of people who are at the start of their journey where they're still planning.
00:24:53:07 - 00:25:16:22
Ibi
The first steps of their career. But there's also going to be a lot of people that are already working professionals and successful in their own right, in, in whatever field that they're in that are considering some kind of transition into more of a nomadic lifestyle or making maybe they're already nomadic and they're trying to play a bit more and have a bit more sun.
00:25:16:22 - 00:25:37:18
Ibi
And what they're doing. Do you think the first contracts that you want and the first publishing arrangements that you had, they were they were because of your prior success or was it you just blew into this industry and you're like, let's go.
00:25:37:19 - 00:26:08:09
Dave
Yeah. Well, it was mainly from just doing what I love to do, really. I mean, by that point, I, I had done my psychology PhD, I was working full time as a researcher and lecturer at Cambridge University, and I kind of thought, okay, I found my thing. I like research, I like science, academia and like academic discussions and debates and philosophy.
00:26:08:09 - 00:26:33:07
Dave
And I like all the stuff around this. There are some things I don't like about academia. It definitely has some big negatives, but I did like a lot of it. And so I thought I'd found my thing. But I at the same time, had discovered this old Sherlock Holmes game that I then wrote a, some new mysteries for this, this Sherlock Holmes ball game.
00:26:33:07 - 00:26:55:06
Dave
And I changed some of the rules. Kind of made, how it changed, how it worked. And that is what I did, just wanting to do it. And I thought, I love this concept. I want to make this. I want to do this. And it was only that later I saw a publisher was republishing that version, the old version, and I sent them my stuff as well and said, you could if you want to, new stuff.
00:26:55:06 - 00:27:20:11
Dave
I've done these. And that then led to my first contract. So it was definitely kind of, that in itself wasn't me sort of building up towards it. It was more me like being like, I'm going to keep doing the stuff I love and putting time aside for that and seeing where it takes me. And I guess that has a playful element in it in itself.
00:27:20:11 - 00:27:40:03
Dave
Right? And it links to play and creativity in the like, creating those first that first game that got the contract, it was it's like own reward for me. The process was the point. I wanted to make it. I wanted to make it. I want to see people play it. I want to experience that. I didn't do it because I wanted money or because I wanted to change my job.
00:27:40:03 - 00:27:57:14
Dave
I did it for the love of doing the thing. And then that led to the outcome of completely changing my life. So it was following that kind of, part of me where it was almost a win win. Right? If I made those mysteries and made that game and it never.
00:27:57:14 - 00:27:59:11
Ibi
Changed my life in the way it has.
00:27:59:13 - 00:28:24:18
Dave
But I had made it and I'd seen people play it. I have felt great. I've done this. Awesome. I wouldn't have lost or failed or anything. And the fact it did what it did as well as that it could be changed my life even better. But, but it was a win win doing it that way. And in some ways, I mean, it built on who I was and the things I've done in my life before, and the fact I'd always written a lot.
00:28:24:18 - 00:28:57:07
Dave
And I loved writing, and I've done a lot of creative writing, and I'd, played a lot of games. And I think some aspects of my PhD probably helped just the way my, the logical thinking involved assessing stakes, stakes, thinking about systems and or games or systems. Right. So a lot of that did help with it. But yeah, in the end, it was just kind of like, I love this thing, I do this thing and then boom, here I am in this new world of game publishing for I hadn't actually expected to end up it.
00:28:57:09 - 00:29:22:22
Ibi
Okay. And I'm getting lost in this story, by the way, because it's just it's bringing so many thoughts to my mind. It's bringing this it's bringing this concept of non neediness, to my mind, which is definitely something that I work with clients on. I call it professional arrogance in the workplace. It's basically non neediness. It's like you know, you are you are you, you are successful.
00:29:22:22 - 00:29:50:07
Ibi
You don't need to conform to the whole world and do whatever the world tells you is to just be yourself and things will come to you. And this sounds like a really nice example of that. Okay. Okay, let's talk about let's talk about the future a little bit. A lot of people, they might have an old, an older thought in their head.
00:29:50:07 - 00:30:15:00
Ibi
And people just have one career path and they become an accountant, and that's an accountant. And if they are an accountant, they can never change and not be an accountant. Obviously you want proof that the opposite is absolutely possible. So firstly, what do you see as this whole to to career path journey. Like do you feel like you're on a second career path now?
00:30:15:00 - 00:30:28:15
Ibi
Do you feel like it's an extension of the first one? Do you think there's potential for that to even change further in the future? How do you how do you see that wider career journey of yours going?
00:30:28:17 - 00:30:53:04
Dave
Yeah. I mean, sometimes people ask me if I would go back into academia and kind of the answer is in theory, I sort of would. I'm not sure I ever will. I think there are some negatives in the work, in the works that I don't like. And, I mean, I still am connected to it, and I still regularly get asked to like, act as a consultant for academic projects around play or games and things like that.
00:30:53:08 - 00:31:18:23
Dave
So I still have a connection to it. I think I do feel like I'm on a second career path, I suppose. After thinking I found my thing with the PhD in academia and then the shift to game design, with some kind of still wise little connections, like there's some connections between the two, but it's basically like a second career path.
00:31:19:01 - 00:31:42:22
Dave
And in terms of where it goes, I one thing is, I guess it feels like it keeps me interested. One thing about game design is it's very can be very diverse. Like I described the game I made that was based on a jigsaw puzzle. And then the first year I came down, I did was like one of novels long of text.
00:31:43:00 - 00:32:00:23
Dave
So creating those two were very different experiences. Like in one, I'm conceptualizing a jigsaw puzzle, which was kind of sort of the kind of kids kind of age as well. What the images on it. What are the little puzzles? How do they solve it? What does this map look like? And then the other I'm writing one of novels, so like that, that it's very different.
00:32:00:23 - 00:32:15:08
Dave
So that keeps me interested. And then so I can definitely see myself just continuing doing this for a long time. But I also have other ideas. Again, they've kind of come to me.
00:32:15:10 - 00:32:32:21
Dave
Yeah, they've just occurred to me as I've kept doing things I enjoy doing and like like the murder mystery thing you played here in this house, big sort of live game where there's stuff around the house and solving this murder. That idea kind of came to me that someone asked me to do that for them, and I created it.
00:32:32:21 - 00:33:04:03
Dave
And now I'm thinking, like, you know, I could go a bit more in the direction of live events and stuff like that is an option. Then then the publishing for games or getting contracts published for games that I'm doing now, I'm also interested in, in just digital nomadism and co livings and kind of retreats and there's other things I'm interested in and I'm, I'm looking at ways to that my life could kind of broaden to include different things.
00:33:04:03 - 00:33:22:07
Dave
My life, my work could include some of that. So I'm open to change. Without feeling particularly, I guess, fixed on one particular direction or having one very specific plan. It's more like try things out and figure it out and see where it goes.
00:33:22:09 - 00:33:25:02
Ibi
Just like you did when moving from academia into game design.
00:33:25:02 - 00:33:27:03
Dave
Yeah. Basically, yes.
00:33:27:05 - 00:33:32:03
Ibi
So what you're saying is it all comes down to the power of playing the playful.
00:33:32:03 - 00:33:42:15
Dave
Yeah, the playful acceptance of trying things out and seeing where they take you and not being too fixated on one particular thing. Yeah.
00:33:42:17 - 00:34:03:06
Ibi
I love that. I wish we could all just have the power of play just embedded into our brains. Dave, you come across as a really unique and incredibly inspiring person, and it's really a pleasure to spend time with you, actually, at time. So I'm going to thank you for this one, but I appreciate it, man. Tell me.
00:34:03:07 - 00:34:04:07
Ibi
It was a pleasure.
