It's about meeting the psychological needs of the audience, and I've spent 20 years mastering it. I help studios, parks, and creators know their project is fun before they bet the budget on it.
But so much money is spent hoping it does. Copying last year's hit copies what it looked like, not why it worked, and the audience already discovered all of it the first time. Nobody can promise you a hit. But when you build something that gives your audience what they need to have fun, you've got a much better shot than any copy will.
Copying a hit feels like the safe bet, but the best you can do is what the original already made, and usually you get less. "It worked last time" usually wins the meeting, but a copy only reaches the audience you already have. New fans rarely show up for one.
Ask five people on your team what fun means and you get five answers and no way to settle it. So good ideas die in review because nobody can defend them with more than a feeling.
If the only way you find out is when it ships, you've found out too late. By then the money is spent and the audience has already made up its mind.
Most teams I work with are stuck on pause. They've made something new or weird, they aren't sure anyone else will enjoy it, and they don't want to spend another dollar until they know. I know what's holding you up. I'll tell you if it's fun, why, and what to change, so you can get back to building and spend your money with confidence.
In 2019, Disneyland drew 18.7 million visitors. Knott's Berry Farm, California's original theme park, sits a few miles away in the same county and drew 4.2 million. They share the same climate and the same tourists, so the gap comes down to how well each park meets the psychological needs of its audience.Source: TEA / AECOM Theme Index (2019)
It doesn't matter what you're making or how weird it is. If people are supposed to have fun with it, it can fall into the same five traps, whether it's a theme park ride or something nobody has ever seen before. If your project is stuck, it's probably in one of these.
You had something real and weird, then got nervous and asked everybody what they thought. Every opinion sands off a little more until it's watered down and homogenized, and it loses its edge, its unique point of view, and the discovery that made it worth making. I keep it authentic and make sure the audience can enjoy it.
Something hit, and now everyone wants their own version. But it hit because it was original, and the audience already discovered everything in it, so a copy feels like a rerun. Whether you're making something original or a sequel, I make sure it delivers a discovery the audience actually cares about.
Teams build assets, menus, and features, and nobody puts "make it fun" on the schedule. I've watched a team spend hundreds of thousands on an engine and a full UI for a game nobody had designed yet. I make sure the focus is on fun first, before anything else gets built.
Nobody thinks they can write code, but everybody thinks they can design. Whoever makes the call bets that the tech, the graphics, or a bigger world is intrinsically impressive, and it never is. Then the team takes the blame. I make sure that call is the right one.
When the team doesn't feel supported and nobody really collaborates, people stop pitching weird ideas and only bring safe ones, so you end up with something that bores everyone. I help build a room where the weird ideas come back out, and then help you pick the ones worth making.
Paste in your idea and get it scored out of 100 on the four steps, and see which one to fix first.
I get into these more on the podcast and in the book.
For anyone making something new who needs to know it's fun before they spend more money on it.
You've got a big creative bet waiting on a greenlight, fans who show up for the tentpoles and drift away in between, or a creative team that keeps defaulting to the safe idea. Your dashboard can show you when people leave, but it can't tell you why they got bored. I tell you straight, and show you exactly what to change, in a plan your creative team and leadership can both sign off on.
We spend a full day on your project together. We dig into what isn't working, test your assumptions, and you leave with decisions your team will commit to.
I play it, ride it, or read it, and tell you if it's fun, where people check out, and exactly what to fix, what to kill, and what to double down on.
I act as your creative lead without you having to hire one. We meet every week, you can reach me in between, and I catch the expensive mistakes before they happen.
Here's some of what I've made. This is where the framework came from.
A controller-free VR haunted walkthrough, now running in 30+ countries. Named USA Today's Best Theme Park Halloween Event in 2024. See it
R&D work on Legends of Frontierland: Gold Rush, a live roleplaying experience at Disneyland Park.
Motion-sim VR in 100+ locations. UploadVR's Best LBE VR Experience, 2018.
CES Innovation in Gaming Award, 2020.
Yes, I'm the guy who named it.
Built the modular system behind the platform Cornerstone acquired. One VR training app I designed went out to 50,000+ learners, and they used it voluntarily.
"If you're working on an immersive experience, Joe can help make sure it's fun. Hire Joe."
"His empathy for the player guides his thinking on how to make a complex system feel intuitive to users, which creates great games that people love to play. Joe does what few people try: he poses the question, 'What makes something fun?' and the resulting deconstruction of fun into its components enables him to create successful experiences time and time again."
"[Joe] has a remarkable understanding of player psychology, emotional engagement, and the core principles of fun. Over the course of just a month working together, Joe completely transformed my game's direction. He helped us streamline unnecessary features while refining the core mechanics to create a more engaging experience."
cornerstone
I've designed for theme parks, VR arcades, mobile games, board games, and Fortune 500 training. Disney Imagineering, Riot, Nickelodeon, Dave & Buster's, and my own studio, Thousand Bit.
Every one of those taught me the same thing: the medium changes, but what makes people have fun stays the same. I spent 16 years writing it all down in my book, Blueprint for Fun.
Now I help teams use it, so the weird, original idea gets made and people love it.
Talk to Joe →
This is where I lay out how fun actually works. There are four steps, and they have to happen in order. If you skip one, people check out, and it doesn't matter how much money you spent. It works for anything people do for fun, even unprecedented projects.
Anything people do for fun, from theme parks and wrestling to games and movies, works or dies for the same reasons. On the show I explain those reasons, so you can see exactly why something worked and use it in your own work.
I break down a ride, a show, a game, or an idea and explain why it works, where the audience checks out, and what I'd change.
Designers, creative directors, and showrunners on what gets killed, what they fight for, and what they wish leadership understood.
Send in your question or your idea, and I'll answer it on the show.
Ask a Question →
One call is usually enough to know if we're a fit. You don't need a pitch deck.
