Contact Information
Associate Professor, Interactive Media Division
USC School of Cinematic Arts
Director, Game Innovation Lab
Electronic Arts Endowed Chair in Interactive Entertainment
Office: Cinematic Arts
Professor Fullerton is a game designer, educator and writer with fifteen years of professional experience. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Interactive Media Division of the USC School of Cinematics Arts where she serves as Director of the Game Innovation Lab. Tracy is the author of Game Design Workshop: Designing, Prototyping and Playtesting Games, a design textbook in use at game programs worldwide. Recent credits include faculty advisor for the award-winning student game Cloud, and game designer for The Night Journey a unique game/art project with media artist Bill Viola.She is currently developing a suite of games around college knowledge, Collegeology, in collaboration with the CHEPA center at USC.
Prior to joining the USC faculty, she was president and founder of the interactive television game developer, Spiderdance, Inc. Spiderdance's games included NBC's Weakest Link, MTV's webRIOT, The WB's No Boundaries, History Channel's History IQ, Sony Game Show Network's Inquizition and TBS's Cyber Bond. Before starting Spiderdance, Tracy was a founding member of the New York design firm R/GA Interactive. As a producer and creative director she created games and interactive products for clients including Sony, Intel, Microsoft, AdAge, Ticketmaster, Compaq, and Warner Bros. among many others. Notable projects include Sony's Multiplayer Jeopardy! and Multiplayer Wheel of Fortune and MSN's NetWits, the first multiplayer casual game. Additionally, Tracy was Creative Director at the interactive film studio Interfilm, where she wrote and co-directed the "cinematic game" Ride for Your Life, starring Adam West and Matthew Lillard. She began her career as a designer at Bob Abel's company Synapse, where she worked on the interactive documentary Columbus: Encounter, Discovery and Beyond and other early interactive projects.
Tracy's work has received numerous industry honors including an Emmy nomination for interactive television, best Family/Board Game from the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, ID Magazine's Interactive Design Review, Communication Arts Interactive Design Annual, several New Media Invision awards, iMix Best of Show, the Digital Coast Innovation Award, IBC's Nombre D'Or, Time Magazine's Best of the Web and the Hollywood Reporter's Women in Entertainment Power 100.
Additionally, Professor Fullerton has taught game design in China for the past several years, working with universities, private companies and government-sponsored programs to promote the development of the games industry in new parts of Asia. Institutions that she has been working with include: City University of Hong Kong, Digital Content Institute of Taiwan, X Media Lab Singapore, Beijing and Sydney, and Tencent Interactive.
Education:
- M.F.A., University of Southern California, Cinema-Television Production, 1991
- B.A., University of California, Santa Cruz, Theater Arts; English Literature minor, 1988
Selected Publications:
- Fullerton, Tracy (2008). Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games (Second Edition). Burlington: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers.
Honors and Awards:
- Emmy nomination for interactive television
- Best Family/Board Game from the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences
- ID Magazine's Interactive Design Review
- Communication Arts Interactive Design Annual
- New Media Invision awards
- iMix Best of Show
- The Digital Coast Innovation Award
- IBC's Nombre D'Or
- Time Magazine's Best of the Web
- Hollywood Reporter's Women in Entertainment Power 100