About Us
A New Worker Collective
We're Gaming Gourd, a new independent game studio and worker collective building a space for ourselves in the industry. We want to create games that resonate with audiences and demonstrate that company success is not tied to traditional structures of ownership.
Meet the Team
Gaming Gourd was founded by four grad school friends. What started as a student team called Team Rookies and Mig and Meagan's thesis project in game development expanded to involve Sam, who graduated the year prior, and Katy, a film student at the same university. Now proud MFAs and MAs, the Gourds work together across state lines and time zones to make their dreams reality.
Mig Mrizek
Mig is a Co-Founder and Producer for Gaming Gourd. He previously worked in Seattle's theatre scene as a lighting designer and technical director and has recently contributed to Playful City Lab's Beyond Our Walls project to help bring game development to community libraries across the country. When making games, he wants to focus on experiences generating wonderment and moments of reflection within players.
Noted Collaborators: West of Lenin (Technical Production), Seattle University (Lighting Design / Electrician), ArtsWest (Lighting Design / Electrician), Whim W'Him (Technical Consultant), Seattle Public Theatre (Electrician), Velocity Dance Center (Lighting Design / Electrician), KT Niehoff (Electrician), Seattle Shakespeare (Electrician), Book-it Repertory (Electrician), Alice Gosti (Electrician)
Katy Grossman
Katy is an award-winning writer and director based in Los Angeles. Her background is in improvisational and stand-up comedy, and she is a Co-Founder and Narrative Designer at Gaming Gourd. As a storyteller, she loves exploring mythology and folklore, creating grounded characters, and finding new ways to subvert established genre tropes. Katy wants to create media that lingers with audiences long after the credits roll.
Noted Awards: Puffin Foundation Artist Grant, 2023 Student World International Film Festival Quarter-Finalist for Best Short Film, 2021 Visions Award for Best Graduate Short Fiction Screenplay.
Noted Credits: YAGA (Writer/Director), Swipe Right (Writer/Director, Producer, Editor), Safeword (Assistant Director, Dir. Christopher Cunetto), Stone Fort (Assistant Director, Dir. Mar Cox).
Sam Smyth
Sam is a Co-Founder and Lead Designer at Gaming Gourd. Playing games all his life, Sam began designing games out of college, combining his love of storytelling with his interest in game design to create D&D homebrew content and TRRPGs. He later studied Game Design at American University, where he developed numerous games with his cohort and briefly worked at Firaxis Games. After receiving his Masters in Game Design, Sam now works as a narrative designer at Ascend Learning while also developing games with the team at Gaming Gourd. Sam’s focus in game development is writing and narrative design. He aims to combine strongly realized narrative with expertly crafted mechanics to create experiences that will have a lasting impact on players.
Meagan Couture
Meagan is a Co-Founder, artist, and producer at Gaming Gourd. She also serves as a games educator, researcher, and graphic designer with the Playful City Lab on their project Engaging Beyond Our Walls, which has helped 59 libraries and towns across the country create local games for their communities. Previously, she has worked with IndieCade for their 2021-2023 main festivals and 2021-2022 Horizons festivals, with her most recent role being Associate Producer and Art Director. While she hopes to explore many facets of game design, Meagan’s core aim is to make games that help players feel a sense of catharsis and inspiration. In her off time, she does freelance art and graphic design as CoralineDarkDesigns.
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Noted Credits and Collaborators: Space Ocean Library (Director/Artist), Laser Jumper (Producer/Artist/Sound Designer), Institute for IDEAS (Graphic Designer/Studio Assistant).
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Noted Awards: Stony Brook Game Design Competition Finalist (Laser Jumper), Theodor Presser Scholarship.