The Game

Gangs of GDC was the world's first MMMPFG (massively multiplayer mobile phone fighting game). While the genre name may be complicated, the game itself was pretty straightforward. The theme was that rival gangs such as the Match Three Boyz and the MMOFOs were vying for control of the GDC by fighting over three neighborhoods scattered throughout the conference center. Each neighborhood consisted of a large flat-screen display set up in a high traffic area of the conference showing a grid of nine blocks.

Players would dial up a number displayed on the screen and be immediately placed on one of the blocks where they would either fight any rivals that were on the block or else flip the block over to their gang's control. When fights occurred players resolved them through a simple rock, paper, scissors game where they pressed 1, 2 or 3 on their cell-phones to perform a light jab, a strong upper-cut or a devastating roundhouse respectively. Every five minutes each neighborhood would be scored and the gang that controlled the most blocks in a neighborhood would gain points for each block they controlled.

The Design

Breaking the paper barrier, the integration of cell phones into this GDC game helped draw players in, while also introducing new design and technical challenges. For example, we wanted the game to work with any lowest-common-denominator phone, and provide a quick dose of hassle-free gameplay. We were pleasantly surprised that the simple rock-paper-scissors fighting game was enough to draw players back again and again, as they leveled their characters and pumped up their teams.