Tiltfactor’s director Mary Flanagan was honored at the 13th Annual Games for Change Festival in June 2016!
Flanagan was awarded the Vanguard Award. This award recognizes the significant contributions of a practitioner by being a champion, advocate, and mentor for a new generation of game creators, and rewards outstanding individuals in impact games.
The Games for Change Festival organizers noted that Flanagan is:
“… A leading innovator, artist, educator and designer, whose works have included everything from game-inspired art, to commercial games that shift people’s thinking about biases and stereotypes. Flanagan established the internationally recognized game research laboratory Tiltfactor in 2003 to invent “humanist” games and take on social change through games.”
The award was introduced by the visionary behind USC’s Game Innovation Lab Tracy Fullerton, who noted:
“Mary Flanagan is one of those people who just can’t be described simply. Her work spans the artistic, the scientific, the scholarly, and the playful. She is a game designer, an inventor, a theorist, and a fine artist. And what always amazes me is that she doesn’t merely span these domains, she is able to synthesize them in all of her work… Mary is also an amazing educator. Her students have gone on to work in the games industry, as well as in many other fields of digital media. Each of them clearly carries with them the unique spirit of critical thought and creative practice that Mary has instilled in them.”