Nina Demirjian Interview
This interview was conducted on January 21st 2025.
Find Nina’s work here.
Please introduce yourself.
My name is Nina and I'm 27. I live in Brooklyn, and I'm from Illinois.
What do you consider yourself as right now? In terms of professionally and. Creatively.
Well, Unity developers my official title currently. Maybe game developer, but I feel like that doesn't encompass some of the other things that I tend to get myself into. I've used the term interactive media developer, but I think that's a little vague. So, I guess, maybe, Unity developer.
And when did you start developing games in Unity?
I don't actually think I started with games. I seem to remember the first time I was using Unity was at the museum for an interactive installation. I think that was the first time that I like properly was using Unity and that was in 2018.
And where do you work right now?
I work at a startup called Eternal. Based in New York. It's pretty small and it's we've done a few things since I've been there. I started there in July of 2020. When I started it was. Umm, I maybe I would use the word metaverse, but not really because it was a virtual 3D world that you could run around with your friends in.
But it was more so like a virtual hangout space. And then it turned into sort of a virtual event space. There were a few iterations in between that. But the events were basically live. It would happen at specific times of the day and multiple people could go into this virtual space and hang out. I guess still along the same lines as what we had built before, but it was specifically with the purpose of listening to a stream of some kind, either music or like a talk show. And it's since transitioned into single player, like sort of mobile idol game content.
Do you work on anything else in your free time outside of work?
Yes. I have been working on an idle game about digging a hole to the other side of the world. Umm. And that's been going on for about 4 1/2 years now.
And that's before the company switched to a more idle game design. Is that correct?
Yeah, that would be correct.
Just wanna make sure that's on the record haha. And so when did you arrive to New York?
Around I got here in the fall of 2015.
OK. And what were you doing in New York? Were you going to school?
Yes, I was going to NYU. For computer science.
And so I know that you have a history with the NYU Game center, how did that start?
I started taking classes there, I was never part of the actual program, but I did the minor, the game design minor during my undergrad, so I took four classes, I think, and then after graduating I was still involved there. Because I had received a grant for a personal project. Umm and I was working there on that project. And then I was alo this thing called Code Help Desk for a year after graduating, which was basically like we would have a time set up sort of in the Game Center, where we would have kind of like an open tutoring session so people could come to us with their Unity questions, I think we did Game Maker 2 questions. We tried our best to help them.
I attended a couple of those.
Did you come to mine?
Yes, really. That was 2019-2020 would you say that you were doing that?
That was, yeah, that was like, the the Fall semester of 2019. So I graduated in the Spring of 2019 then I was doing the tutoring Fall of 2019. I did it also Spring semester of 2020 but we had gone virtual like we were doing it. We would have like Zoom calls that we'd have, like Zoom meetings that would be open. Anyone can join.
So through that you kind of interacted with everybody from the BFA program and the MFA program, who were kind of there at the time, who wanted code help, of course.
Yeah, there there were definitely BFAs and MFAs that came to code help desk. I probably knew a very small subset of both groups though.
At that point were interacting enough with the community that you would say that you are part of it, or at least tangentially related.
Yeah, I was definitely along the outskirts. Well, maybe I don't know. I was there pretty often.
And so, you have been to like game center events like Playtest Thursday and such.
Yeah, I used to go to Playtest Thursday a lot. I actually haven't been since pre COVID, but when I was there. In the Fall of 2019 and the Summer, I think they were doing them over the Summer too. When I was working on my project I seem to remember I was required to do them. But, maybe it was strongly encouraged because I think I was there every week.…Yeah, I was definitely there very often.
And so did you also attend outside game events such as like Babycastles events or? You know, stuff at Wonderville?
I never went to a Babycastles event. I have been to Wonderville once and it was the thing that you were there for that we did for Red Planet Farming, I forget exactly what we were. Think we were streaming the game?
We were streaming it. Yeah. And we were all kind of drunk up on stage.
Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, I recall that.
And then my boss came in and he seemed like kind of upset. But it was funny.
Our fans loved it.
They did. I was really it was a really fun stream, honestly. Speaking of, you said that you had been working on a personal project that had gotten a grant. If you could, could you go a little bit more into the history behind that. How did you start the project?
Yeah. So, Red Planet Farming. I started it my senior year, like pretty early on like I think one of my friends had told me that there was some, it was like a very small game jam happening on Itch. I forget what it was called. The theme was Harvest or something like that and I don't know why, because like I think originally my friends and I were going to do it together and then they didn't want to do it. And I was like in a bad mood. I was like whatever, I'll do it by myself.
There was some kind of like “I have to do this” mentality I had. It was senior year. OK, that's all I won't begin to explain the kind of mindset I was in, but I did decide I was going to do this.
And honestly, I think the game turned out OK, though it was like a weekend long game jam, and actually the loop the main loop didn't end up changing like at all.
After that and then I didn't think about it again for a while. And then? I seem to remember I was at the Game Center and like I'd been talking to Charles Pratt about my website. I must have had it on my website somehow and he played it and then he suggested that I apply for the Sloan Grant.
So then I spent the next few months working on a prototype 'cause I had to submit a prototype of the game, but it had to be like a vertical slice or whatever? It was kind of like that, very good size for what I was going for. Submitted that in like April of 2019. So, I worked on it for like basically four months and then we got the grant. And then I was working on it quite a bit over that summer. We finished like almost exactly a year after we got the grant. So, I think it was like May to May like May of 2019 to May of 2020 was the main development period.
That's like your first commercial product that you've made?
No, because it was free. It was on Steam, but I didn't make any money off of it. I mean, we have the grant.
What inspired you initially with the game jam to make a strategy game around harvesting on Mars?
Oh, I actually know. I forgot one part the game there was like a requirement that you couldn't use any English text.
Oh wow.
And for some reason, I was like, oh, I'll just, make up like a Martian language or something. That was why it was on Mars to begin with. I actually don't fully know where the mechanics came from.
Well do you know where the mechanical inspiration came from?
I don't remember what game this was, and honestly it's really stupid because I've seen videos like on Instagram that I don't know if it's footage of this game or not, but it was a similar thing. You know those videos on Instagram where it's like the simulated battled between “2 million chickens versus like 2 T-Rexes”. You know what I'm talking about.
Certainly.
It was a game like that I watched someone play like a few years before, but I liked the idea of setting up a situation and then watching it unfold to see.
I never thought that this would be your inspiration.
I know this doesn't seem like related at all, but it was like the concept of like setting up your battlefield or your farm or whatever, and then hitting play and then seeing how your setup fares against the environment. That was the idea.
That's more simulation based then more strategy and so obviously you're a good at designing systems. You've been able to make a game like Red Planet Farming and released it on Steam to glowing reviews.
Thank you.
So, are you a person that would that likes simulation games?
Yeah, I played a lot of lot of Zoo Tycoon, a lot of Roller Coaster Tycoon. Even some farming sims, although I hesitate to compare it at all to like Harvest Moon or Stardew Valley, because actually it's like completely different gameplay.
Did you have any people that helped you with the design of the game?
Charles Pratt was very helpful, he and I had pretty frequent meetings discussing like the design of the game. So, he was pretty influential on the project.
All of this kind of happened within like a year time span that you found your collaborators, got them on the project, and then shipped the game?
Well, it was about a year and a half 'cause the the time leading there was a few months leading up to when we actually got the grant. And then yeah, the two Sean’s (two of the collaborators in the game) didn't come on until. Maybe like six months after we got the grant.
You don't have much time to iterate and change throughout that process on a game.
Yeah, it was. I mean, looking back, somehow progress on that project was extremely linear. There wasn't a lot of wandering going on. I don't know how I got away with that honestly. I don't know how that happened. It was kind of a miracle. I felt like I felt like we had a pretty clear scope. After we got the grant, and since there were other people involved, I kind of felt like there wasn't a lot of room to turn it into a bigger game than what I thought.
And you were working with NASA somewhat?
Yeah, that's true.
So, you had kind of a science standard to uphold as well?
Yeah, they were advising on the content of the game I would say. We had a lot of discussions about like what crafts were going to be in the game, what kind of like tech like buildings and plants the player would have access to and why.
Yeah, it does feel very grounded. Did they help inform any design decisions that you'd say that like kind of changed anything?
Oh yeah, they had, I feel like especially in the early stages. They would present me with real world challenges astronauts would be facing and what astronauts would be using, and then give an example of an actual scenario. Then those would get translated into game mechanics.
Oh, gotcha, so they were kind of like a theme inspiration in many ways and helped frame a lot of the mechanics. And that probably definitely influenced how much you could do?
Yeah.
So, after Red Planet launched, where did you go? What's what was the next spot you landed at? You had been doing some museum work at that time as well, right?
Yeah, I had been at the museum, although, I think, by the time I had released Red Planet Farming, I wasn't there because there was. There was maybe like a six-month break that I was on from the museum when, COVID stuff was happening.
Right.
Actually, I'm pretty sure I was unemployed at that point. Let me think about this. It released in May of 2020. The museum break started before that and then yeah, I think I was like, unemployed for most of June. And then I started working at Eternal in July.
That makes sense. I think that also lines up with kind of. We met around that time kind of or became friends at that time.
Yeah, it was the in-between of the release and joining Eternal that month. Yeah, yeah.
Cause you had joined Slow Jam (a club of game developers who made games based off prompts over the course of two weeks), which was.
Right. Yes, Charles Pratt affiliated, yes.
And rewinding a bit, when when did you start the Museum of Natural History?
I started at the museum in the Fall of 2017. I was an intern there for two years, up until I graduated, and then I started contracting. So, when I was an intern, I was going in I think once a week. And then once I became a contractor, it was two days a week and then closer to exhibit openings, more like 3. I was contracted there from like Spring 2019 to Spring 2020. Then once COVID happened there was a break, some of the exhibits got put on pause, I was just about to start another project and then it got delayed. I started working there again later that year. The break was around six months? It might have been only like 3 or 4, but not that that really matters, but then I was working there from Fall of 2020 through the end of 2021.
And that was a contract basis?
All of it was contracted except for the first two years, which was like I was an intern.
And how did you get the internship to begin with?
The person that ended up being my supervisor at the museum was my professor for my intro to comp sci class when I was a freshman. I emailed my professors about the internship.
And then through that you started working on different projects at the museum? And this you first introduction to Unity in general, right?
So when I started there, it was pretty random little projects. Think there were some like bug fixes that I did. I remember some application that I had made to like auto open another. So, it was stuff like that, this was my first semester there. Then the second semester there was another girl that was interning there and she and I were put on this exhibit about oceans, and it was a floor projection. So, we had a projector projecting onto the floor and there were fish swimming around. We had a Kinect tracking movement to have fish would swim away from you as you like, walked through them on the floor. And that was that was actually built in Processing I think. We used Daniel Schiffmens Nature of Code book.
That's another NYU person.
Yeah, I think he is ITP. Anyways, that was the first exhibit project. And then I don't think I was there over the summer. I came back after that opened in Spring of 2018, I came back for my senior year and that was when I started working on the T-Rex project.
That was the first thing I did in Unity there. Which is actually weird, because now that I think about it, I seem to remember my Intro to Game Dev class was before that. I don't know, it's hard to remember.
That's OK. It's not super important, honestly.
The T-Rex was another interactive projection, this time on the wall. There was at T-Rex walking around in a 3D environment and it would track users in the gallery space, also using a Kinect. And then it would walk up to the users and do all kinds of stuff. I wasn't the only person on that project. It's small teams working on these installations.
And so were you very much excited by these types of projects?
I was excited to be involved and they were very interesting at the time. I do think the T-Rex one was maybe my favorite out of all the projections that I've done though.
Would you say that that is your first taste of, like true developing on a team towards like a specific end product software?
No, I think the ocean exhibit (mentioned earlier) was. I was pair programming with this other girl the entire. She and I were at one computer one keyboard together.
What the fuck?
I'm serious.
That’s so funny.
If we wanted to pass it off to each other we would say, “Want to drive?”
It's really funny. That's some real student development behavior I love that.
It was. She was funny.
That's awesome. What was the last project that you worked on at The Museum of Natural History. You did the T Rex and then….
There was the Color exhibit.
Oh, right. Color.
Yeah and that was also Kinect projection. I remember it opened like, March 10th, 2020 or something. And then it closed right after that, but then it reopened later, they extended the days for that exhibit. Then so yeah, there were two projects I worked on over COVID and those didn't open until 2023, but the last thing I did there before COVID was the Shark game. It was kind of a game. There were game elements to it.
Didn't you work on that with other game center folk?
Oh yeah, yeah with Easton, he did the 3D environment.
And so when do you feel like game development became your trade? Like right when our my RPF came out? And could you explain the type of role you like to play on a team?
Yeah. I like building systems. At my at my current job, the other developer and I have kind of gotten into a pattern of he does a lot of the UI and I do a lot of the systems you know like, reading and writing any of the data we need from the back end, storing that, and then he uses that to update displays.
Is there like a big inspiration for you in terms of game development practices and philosophies that you feel like has really defined you as? Was there an inspiration to go deeper down into the systems path? I remember Red Planet Farming making you kind of UI adverse.
Well, it's funny 'cause I feel like after, RPF, I kind of still liked doing UI at that point. Didn't really mind it. I have like a theory that because I studied computer science a lot of the code I was writing was more systems focused stuff. Just kind of what I feel most comfortable programming, and what I enjoy doing. So, I think that has had a pretty big impact. Like, buildings games with a lot of systems is the most similar thing to what I was doing in college. College was a long time ago, I don't know why I like it so much.
So you have now basically two sides of your career, where you have more installation work and you have more classic games work and Eternal, which is a bit more classic game development, I would say.
Right.
But Eternal is still a bit fringe. And you also you have your own personal projects. Would you say that these kinds of projects inform each other ever? Or do they kind of like just are separate things for you?
I'm having trouble thinking of how they inform each other right now. Both of them require some kind of understanding or expectation of how a user is going to behave. But with games, it's, “What they're going to do, mentally?”. With installations, it's like “What are they physically going to do?”.
But I think a lot of you work hits on similar notes. Like for instance your work during Slow Jam was very interesting, like your Shakespeare game.
Yeah. Oh yeah, I forgot about that.
That's also a simulation game. You were kind of puppeting it a bunch but, could you actually explain that game? On a technical and design side.
On the technical side it was one massive series of if statements. You think I'm joking, but I'm not. I actually don't know how I came up with that idea for the game. I'll be honest, no idea. I feel like I remember the impetus because we had prompts for Slow Jam. I know I was given the prompt of Shakespeare.
Could you explain the game itself? What was the experience?
Right, it was just text. There was only text and you were you were Juliet chatting with Romeo, so you could type whatever you wanted into this chat box and then Romeo would respond with a quote from the play that was relevant to whatever you had said.
And then there were there were like stage directions. I remember I was trying to analyze the user's responses as Juliet. Like trying to understand what emotion or context they had sent it with? I remember if you sent it with an exclamation mark. There would be like some kind of stage direction or it would say like “Juliet exclaimed” or something like that.
I'm I feel like I'm not describing it very well.
And then if you took too long to respond, it would say “a pause”, like in stage directions. I was trying to have it read more like a play as you were typing out this conversation. It was a simple chat bot. Hyper simple chat bot.
And you're also now but then also emergently creating a screenplay. You're doing emergent play writing as you're doing it. So, then you can kind of look back at this conversation and it's a weirdly Shakespearean kind of back and forth.
Yeah, I remember that being a really fun idea and a really goofy project. I mean, it reminds me that you have a sort of narrative side. That you haven't fully explored, in your more released games. But, I was just playing Red Planet Farming and I noticed that you have a very keen eye for flavor text. I think it's actually very compelling story it's funny, lighthearted, I think it stays in its tone very well. Would you say that you're also a bit of a narrative person? Would you want to maybe explore that in the future?
I thought about it, yeah. I don't have any specific ideas for what that would look like.
I remember you talked a little bit about a vampire narrative game at some point that you had.
Yeah, I was tossing around the idea. Yeah, I'm not opposed to bringing that back into my list of potential prototypes.
And that would be a big departure from what you're usually doing?
There would be a simulation element for sure.
What other stuff did you make while you're in Slow Jam?
There was a mining game. You were sending robots into a mine.
Oh yes.
And they were behaving autonomously, and you had four of them going at once.
I should revisit that. Maybe that one was kind of weird. That was another, ‘you set it up and you watch it go’, type of situation. I think you could take control of the robots too.
Then at the end there was an auction phase at the end of each round or something like that.
Were you inspired by M.U.L.E?
Yes, I specifically remember that was like the main inspiration for this game.
And where did you learn about M.U.L.E?
Games 101 at the Game Center
Did you have a favorite class at the Game Center?
I mean, there were only four classes for the minor. I liked Intro to Game Design. I think that was my probably my favorite.
That was with Charles, right?
Yeah.
And, that's kind of how you met?
Right.
When you met Charles had you already done the game jam that led to RFP?
No, the game jam happened like a year after that class.
What do you kind of hope to make in the future? You have your digging game that you're working on currently. Do you have plans to release that at some point?
I sincerely hope that that is the case. Sincerely hope that happens.
And then after that do you do you still want to make games for fun?
Yeah. I don't know what the next one will be, I have some ideas. I’ve thought about maybe something turn based combat something or a survival game.
That feels like right up your alley.
Yeah, neither of these things stray too far. But, I don’t know, I think what will probably happen is similar to what I did after Red Planet Farming, which is just do a series of prototypes until one of them speaks to me.
What inspires you outside of games? And, why do you feel compelled to make games at all?
I do like real world systems and how they can be translated into mechanics and challenges. So, like I was saying before, when working with NASA and they would present me with potential real world challenges of growing crops on Mars. Then, I like thinking about how that can be translated into gameplay. Same thing like kind of like with the Bee game, even though I wasn't designing the Bee game (‘Be a Bee’ at the Museum of Natural History) but Bee systems, like the systems within a beehive. Every time I see ants carrying something, you know, I'm like “damn someone already made Pikmin, the perfect game”.
And so you're inspired by life itself, the systems that go on in life, and it seems like nature is a big through line in many of your work. So, nature systems are, would you say an inspiration for you?
Yeah, for sure.
And you mentioned Pikmin as a game that you really like?
I would say love.
Love, OK. It seems very clear that Pikmin has inspired you to make games around systems and AI actors. That kind of do their own thing, and then, kind of respond to different stimuli.
Yeah, I do like that. Well, I guess having played Baldur’s Gate (3) recently, I feel like I see the turn based combat and I think it would be interesting to make a simplified version of that and have to program the CPUs in that situation.
Right. Like what do they do? Do they respond?
Yeah. What does that look like?
Who's someone that you look up to? Whether that's a person in the community or otherwise. Someone that has been kind of a guiding star in your career or otherwise.
Definitely Charles, my supervisor at the museum, the artist I currently work for, my coworkers at Eternal who none of the ones I'm very close with are game developers, but all of them have solo projects that they ship updates to like pretty frequently.
Oh I didn't know that.
Most of them are apps.
So you have a lot of inspiration sources would you say that the museum or the Game Center community had bigger impact on you?
I would say it was like half museum, half Game Center. And a lot of the people knew each other. Like my some of my advisors on Red Planet Farming, like, also knew my supervisor at the museum. Cause there was that class where you would go build something for the museum … oh Matt Parker was the professor.
And also who were who are your advisors on Red Planet Farming?
It was Matt Parker and Dylan MacKenzie. They were the Sloan grant advisors. So, I’m pretty sure they advised all of the Sloan projects before me as well?
Dylan was doing a lot of stuff for the Incubator as well doing a lot of the admin work. Then also Charles was involved with that as well. Oh and that reminds me you were in the same space and sort of involved with the Incubator process for that year, right?
Right, all of us got the grants around the same time, and then all of us were working together. Like pretty much in the same space over that summer.
And so would they play your game and would they give you feedback on it, or/and vice versa? Was that cross pollination present?
Yeah, I seem to remember there were. There were like meetings that all of us went to. Like the Incubator people had people that would come in and do talks or like workshops with them, and I remember we went to some of them, but we didn't participate… I think some of them definitely played Red Planet Farming. The people I was friends with that were in the Incubator at the time playtested it quite a bit. And I played their games. I actually never played Bizarre Barber during development. But I played the other ones quite a bit. I mean, all of us were at the Playtest Thursdays. I think required to, like I said before. I think it was strongly encouraged for all of us to go so.
I bet you the Incubator people were probably required.
Yeah.
You do have an element of humor in all of your games. Would you say that is something that you express explicitly?
Yeah, it's definitely there's like, maybe an element of absurdity.
Oh and one last question, have you been to an event at Boshi’s Place?
I've been to the Games Against the Empire one and the Year of Luigi one.
Alright that’s all my questions, thanks a lot!
Thank you.
