SPOOL

A Collaboration between Nivetha Kannan and Swetha Kannan

Plot

I don’t know what the heck is going on. Aliens coming to earth and demanding human sacrifices? On top of that each country agreeing to offer up their brightest? Well, It may not be too bad- we have a good life here and everything. I’m not complaining. We’ve been living on the moon for a couple months now and we have got the whole ‘stranded with no hope’ thing down to a science. But then some girl got pregnant. She insists that she’s a virgin. None of us buy it but none of the guys are fessing up. Those liars. I mean one of them has to be lying...right? ​

What is it?

SPOOL is a collaboration between fellow artist (and my sister) Swetha Kannan and I. Using the familiar story of a group of trapped teenagers and friendly, cartoon assets, SPOOL allowed us to question and explore more difficult subjects of consent, unwanted pregnancy, and abortion.

SPOOL was worked on under the guidance of Paolo Pedercini as an independent study at Carnegie Mellon University. With music by Danny English and voice from Heather Cowie, we were able to pull together this game in a little over three months. We documented the progress of making the game from concept to finalization at the site linked below. Click in order to see our original story, how and why it changed, and the methods we used to make this game a success.

Situations

The game largely revolves around situations of abortion, pregnancy, and rape. Due to the nature of these subjects, it  is also a game exploring feminism and gender roles. 

Gameplay

The object of the game is to place characters next to one another to trigger conversations from them. These conversations will allow further glimpses into the characters themselves as well as clues on how to progress in the game.