Student Work Examples


Mark Gordon: Cake or Death
Hacking Social Media / Spring 2015

Cake or Death is a game by Mark Gordon played on and by using Twitter.

After discovered that icons could be displayed on Twitter using only code, Mark used these icons to create a large game that could be played by anyone on Twitter. Mark's Twitter bot would begin by announcing that a game of Cake or Death was about to be played on Twitter. Once the game was in progress, the bot would search Twitter for mentions of the words 'cake' and 'death' at five minute intervals. The icon of the animal would move one space toward either the icons of the cake or the skull depending on which word had the greater number of mentions on Twitter in the past five minutes. Followers of his Twitter bot were weighed more heavily when the results were counted.

The assigment: In the programming language Python, create a Twitter bot that can post tweets at either a timed interval or in response to user interaction.


Quinn Lachler: Umbrella Revolution: The Video Game
Basic Digital Art / Fall 2014

Umbrella Revolotion: The Video Game is a News Game by Quinn Lachler about the 2014 Hong Kong Protests.

Modeled after the 2014 protests in Hong Kong where protesters used umbrellas to protect themselves from tear gas, the player of Umbrella Revolution collects umbrellas while dodging tear gas canisters. The umbrellas are symbolic of 'strength in numbers' protester solidarity. Each umbrella you collect will protect you from one hit from a tear gas canister. If you collect 11 umbrellas in the game, you win Democracy! The game can currently be played on Quinn's personal website.

The assignment: Create a game in Flash by following a tutorial (provided). Give your game meaning by creating unique graphics for your game using Photoshop.


Jonathan Bonini: Bridgette 10101
Hacking Social Media / Spring 2015

Bridgette 10101 is a twitterbot that subtly subverts twitter's tendency to address its users as a mass of potential consumers and monetizable connections. Instead of using her computerized logic to simplify and organize individual users into groups, she shifts through groups to find individuals. She counters the notion that digitized commerce and social connection have one logical unified and predictable end.

Bridgette 10101 is programmed to scrap twitter for users by searching a randomly selected keyword. After the search she scans the 100 users who most recently used that word for the two with the least amount of friends and suggests that they become friends. She then retweets their tweet to show support for their twitters. She then scrapes the two chosen user's wall for their 50 most recent tweets. After creating a list of words that they both use she randomly selects a new key phrase and starts the process over again. Through the simple act of creating an unpredictable connection that has no market value, Bridgette executes a small revolt against the hidden hand of capitalist endeavor.

The assignment: In the programming language Python, create a Twitter bot that can post tweets at either a timed interval or in response to user interaction.


Stephen Bass: Texan Execution Rally Counter (TERC)
Hacking Social Media / Spring 2015

The Texan Execution Rally Counter (TERC) is a program written in python that allows the user to to see the number of deaths per year administered by the Texas Dpt. of Criminal Justice.

TERC asks the user to enter a year they are interested the number of executions for in the State of Texas. The information is obtained by scraping the Texas Department of Criminal Justice's website, and is saved to a text file after it has been retrieved.

The assignment: In the programming language Python, write a program that scrapes information from at least one page located on the web. Visualize that information in a creative manner. The webpage you scrape, and the text that you look for should be meaningful in some way.


Margaret Skudder: Mini-RPG
Programming for Digital Art / Fall 2014

Mini-RPG is a turn-based role-playing-game where the player faces off against the computer.

Mini-RPG was Margaret Skudder's final project for Programming for Digital Art (DMS 110), the introductory programming class for Media Study students at the University at Buffalo. The game action is created by using JavaScript to change the CSS properties of div tags and uses graphics Margaret created herself.

The assignment: Open ended final project. Students submit a proposal that is either accepted or modified according to course objectives.


Ann Voll: HTML animation
Basic Digital Art / Fall 2014

Ann Voll's animation is a digital reference to the work of surrealist painter René Magritte.

The animation was the second project for Basic Digital Art and uses a jQuery plugin to animate a custom made sprite sheet.

The assignment: Create a sprite sheet in Photoshop combining elements that you have created yourself and appropriated images.


Matthew Kaiser: Kinematic Bitcoin Transaction visualization
Programming for Digital Art / Fall 2015

Using a publically available API, Matthew created a real-time kinematic Bitcoin transaction visualization.

The transactions are visualized as flashing balls that have a size and weight proportional to the amount of the transaction. Below the visualization is a register of the transaction amounts. Matt's project can currently be viewed at his personal website

The assignment: Open ended final project. Students submit a proposal that is either accepted or modified according to course objectives.


Tevin Whitt: Dumbate
Programming for Digital Art / Fall 2015

Dumbate is a game about the current state of political debates.

In Dumbate, the player takes the role of the moderator of the 2016 republican primary debate. The moderator's job is to stop the candidates from talking over each other. Voter Knowledge points increase when only person is talking. If more than one candidate is talking, 2 chaos points are for each candidate speaking every second. Chaos points will subtract 5 for every second no one is talking.

The assignment: Open ended final project. Students submit a proposal that is either accepted or modified according to course objectives.


Alexandra Helms: Stop Shell / Oil Spill Clean Up
Programming for Digital Art / Fall 2015

Stop Shell and Oil Spill Clean Up are browser-based games about the dangers of oil drilling in the arctic.

Based on a recent story about Greenpeace activists stopping the contstruction of an oil drilling platform, in Stop Shell the player must intercept the construction of oil platforms. Because it is difficult for activists to know where an oil platform will be located before it is constructed, the player enters guess for coordinates of the future location. One correct guess wins the game! Oil Spill Clean Up is a continuation of this theme. In this game, the player must collect all of the necessary supplies and people to remediate an oil spill that has already occured.

The assignment: Create a News Game using HTML5 Canvas and JavaScript / open ended final project. Students submit a proposal that is either accepted or modified according to course objectives.


Todd Lock: Goblin Destroyer
Programming for Digital Art / Fall 2014

Goblin Destroyer is a turn-based role-playing-game made using only text objects and AI.

Goblin Destroyer was Todd's final project for Programming for Digital Art (DMS 110), the introductory programming class for Media Study students at the University at Buffalo. The game containes more than 20 different tasks for the player to accomplish and an assortment of non-player characters for the player to interact with. The story is Todd's own creation.

The assignment: Open ended final project. Students submit a proposal that is either accepted or modified according to course objectives.


Caitlin Dwyer: Mentions of Racism and Police Brutality
Hacking Social Media / Spring 2015

Caitlin created a web scraper to search all Reuters articles from 2014 and visualized the number of times the words 'racism' and 'police brutality' appeared.

In 8 of the 12 months, there are more mentions of 'racism' than 'police brutality,' while in September they are exactly the same number. The graph is intended to find any correlations between police brutality and racism within the reporting of a major news outlet.

The assignment: In the programming language Python, write a program that scrapes information from at least one page located on the web. Visualize that information in a creative manner. The webpage you scrape, and the text that you look for should be meaningful in some way.


Darwin Chan Ebola Panic
Programming for Digital Art / Fall 2014

Ebola Panic is a News Game based on the response to the cases of ebola discovered in the US in 2014.

The player of Ebola Panic can choose to add a person to the game board, and to infect a random person. The interaction between the infected characters can cause the disease to spread.

The assignment: Create a game using JavaScript and HTML Canvas that represents a story in the news.


Victoria Williams Street Harassment
Programming for Digital Art / Fall 2014

Street Harassment is a News Game based on the viral video "10 Hours of Walking in NYC as a Woman."

Ambivolent about the implicit message of the 2014 video of Shoshana Roberts walking through New York City where she was subjected to more than 100 catcalls, Victoria created a game mechanic that she feels reproduces the same message. The player of Street Harassment controls a female game character who must avoid the male non-player characters who will chase the player if she comes to close to them. The game ends when the player interacts with a male character.

The assignment: Create a game using JavaScript and HTML Canvas that represents a story in the news.