Key works of Untame/Itay Keren
Itay Keren (aka Untame) has been involved in hundreds of projects spanning design, production, software, and art, for the creation of games, educational software, art installations, and much more. Here are some selected works:
Watermarks of the Last Chinatown is a playable art exhibit developed in collaboration with the Museum of Art & History in Santa Cruz and Take Action Games. It presents a unique approach to interactive storytelling, where the players learn about Santa Cruz's rich narrative landscape and the historical erasure of its last Chinatown, by engaging in physical photo-capture gameplay and listening to on-location AR interviews.
Run The Future is a nonprofit collaboration between Cambiar Education and Formation Ventures aimed to help and mentor young entrepreneurs of color towards success. We built games that help improve players' divergent perspectives and associative thinking.
This Playable Christmas Light Show is a hobby Arduino/ESP32 game inspired by classic shoot-em-ups such as R-Type. This low-res demake was written in C, and runs on a LED-strip. Playable with a standard wireless controller, only on my porch during the holidays!
Level Ex makes games for healthcare professionals, based on the most challenging aspects of their work. We helped creating some of their groundbreaking products. Notably, we created Gastro EX|VR, a Virtual Reality gastroenterologist experience where players walk through a room-sized ultra realistic soft-tissue colon, with accurately modeled GI tools (forceps, coagulators, an more) for hands.
Human Is is a hilarious ChatGPT-powered party game where 5 chatroom slots are filled with 2 random humans, plus 3 bots who desperately try to come off as humans. The winner is the player who correctly identifies the other human by typing human is and their slot number.
Level Ex's debut project was Airway Ex, a novel approach to teaching and practicing anesthesia, using a mobile app. We made the challenges of endoscopic and manual intubation worthy for a video game, and even added AR support for extra challenge.
Scroll Back: The Theory and Practice of Cameras in Side-Scrollers is an extensive research paper (and a GDC Talk) that explores the camera techniques used from the classic side-scrollers of the 1980s through the indie games of today, demonstrating how camera work should be tailored to the game's unique mechanics and characteristics.
Mushroom 11, Untame's second original mobile title, got its major success after the 2017 mobile release, with universal acclaim including an Apple Design Award. In this experimental-yet-intuitive platformer, you move the green mushroom blob by destroying its cells, allowing them to regrow in the desired shape and direction.
Terra is a project developed for Intel's new touchscreen laptop series, to demonstrate their versatility: you first sculpt a magical landscape of grassy rolling hills, and then give them a high velocity manicure with your mower.
Indé is a game-jam experiment made with Julia Keren-Detar where you prune and develop your arteries by pumping out blood.
Rope Rescue, Untame's first original mobile game is an award-winning rope physics puzzles, where you guide Rupert the Parrot to tie a rope around various wheels in the most efficient way possible, while avoiding pesky enemies and obstacles!
IntelliGym is a groundbreaking educational game, done in collaboration with USA Hockey, the National Ice Hockey Organization. With close support from leading cognitive neuroscientists, we designed a video game that provides cognitive training for ice hockey players, helping them think smarter and faster, and do better on the rink.
Bubblooba Online was Untame's original debut. A realtime-multiplayer bubble shooter, where your matches push towards your rival. This online Flash hit gained a lively dedicated fanbase, and included the development of an a self-built dedicated C++ server.
Gladelings was a Facebook/Flash era game developed in collaboration with Imba. In this fantasy RPG game, players craft their magical forest world by playing mini-games and collecting jewels.
As a studio head for Oberon Games, a white-label online gaming service, my team and I developed dozens of successful online multiplayer and casual single-player games. The PvP Pool game I created (client and server) had a global following of millions, through msn, icq, and other game portals.
As one of ICQ's first hires and Lead Server Engineer, my team of a dozen developers and I created a truly game-changing social network which shaped instant messaging as we know it today.
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