We recently connected with John Posey III and have shared our conversation below.

John, appreciate you joining us today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

One of my most meaningful projects was a card game I created called Colours & Shapes a set collection card game. This project holds the most meaning to my heart as I created it to play with my grandmother to let her experience one of my creative projects that she would understand and be able to enjoy with me.

A little backstory, I have always known what I wanted to be since I was 8. I wanted to make games, cartoons and comics and in order to do that I had to immerse myself in them. Even though she didn’t understand the things I was interested in she knew that I wanted to pursue a career in it so she always supported me even when my parents tried to ban video games after my dad got obsessed with Mario.

I tried to show my grandmother my games, cartoons and comics over the years that I was making and she always responded with “John, I love how excited you are about it but I don’t understand it”. That phrase stuck with me wedging it deep in my mind. So I decided to study her favorite games and reach deep into my childhood thinking of all the card and board games that she played with me and that she loved. So I used those memories as the fuel to create the perfect game to play with her.

I still cherish the memory of playing Colours & Shapes with her and listening to her tell stories about playing it with her friends at her community.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

These about you questions are always the hardest for me to do so here we go time for a ramble tangent!

My name is Posey and I make games, cartoons and comics! I began my journey into my industry at the tender age of 8 where I would create my own stories with my action figures acting out the narratives, design modifications to tag and hide and seek and even creating my own comics for my own heroes locked in epic battle with their villains.

Getting into my industry back in the day was super difficult with the traditional mindset that making toys is not a professional path so the resources and communities and even schooling wasn’t available to me and I had to figure it all out on my own and the hard way. I went to the University of Georgia where I took classes that were the closest to give me the knowledge I needed to hone my craft until I eventually dropped out of college and pursued my own dreams.

After I left UGA I began to create my first project, a gritty superhero graphic novel called Fall. While creating it I started to learn the concept of business and entrepreneurship so I could understand every step on how a graphic novel would go from idea to on the shelf. I did that by working at a comic shop seeing the merchant side first hand and finding small meetups and networking events to connect with to grow my network of allies even submitting my prototype multiple times to different publishers getting feedback from them. Eventually I got my foot in the door when I got hired at a AAA studio where I would continue to grow and pursue my own projects while finally professionally working on a video game. At this studio is where I met my business partner for life Chris Goodrich and together we created Fall and published it ourselves getting it on store shelves. To celebrate the occasion I tattooed the comics logo to my fore arm which became the first in a long tradition of getting a tattoo of each one of my projects that makes it to market :D

As I pursued my corner stone I picked up random gigs to keep the lights on and food on the table. One of those gigs was working as a door guy at the local video game bar in Athens Ga called Wonderbar where I quickly worked my way up to bartending which became my second love. There I got to practice my pitch for my projects, engage directly with gamers and pick up a few cool bartending awards a long the way I even met the love of my life Michelle. Bartending gave me the confidence I needed to strengthen my interpersonal skills to be a better entrepreneur.

I kept moving forward pursuing my passion for creation and establishing my own studio called Products for Robots to create and publish them. Over my journey I’ve created card games (Colours & Shapes, Welcome to the Death Parade) board games (Abstract) video games (Metacell: Genesis ARCADE and Seneca 7: A Cyberpunk Odyssey) as well as several other cartoons and comics along the way.

Recently I founded a new game development studio with some of the amazing friends and partners I have met along the way called The Seneca Project where we are working to create the video game we have always wanted to play called Seneca 7: A Cyberpunk Oddesy, a cozy cyberpunk adventure RPG where you play as a settler trying to establish the first settlement on an alien world in order to find a new home for humanity after destroying the earth.

This new project is truly the antithesis of my creative journey as we are experimenting with game development methods by creating a unique gaming experience wrapped into our game development by creating our vertical slice as an episodic prologue that players can dive into and begin to immerse themselves into the story and world of Seneca 7. Additionally we are taking every element of our game development process and creating auxiliary media for user to experience across different mediums, like a Table Top RPG similar to D&D where they can experience the robust RPG that will be in the video game or a limited webtoon series where you can get to know the characters in the world, even a banging sound track to hype up that cyberpunk vibe!

If you would like to check out some of my work here is some links!

The Seneca Project
https://www.thesenecaproject.com/

Seneca 7: A Cyberpunk Odyssey
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1901860/Seneca_7_A_Cyberpunk_Odyssey/

Metacell: Genesis ARCADE
https://store.steampowered.com/app/602240/Metacell_Genesis_ARCADE/

Colours & Shapes
https://www.thegamecrafter.com/games/colours-shapes

Abstract
https://youtu.be/PxPUFWsH93A

Silly Videos
https://www.youtube.com/user/ProductsForRobots

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

For me its the loneliness.

Being creative is lonely by default. You see something that isn’t there, that others can’t see.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

If you have a friend or family member who is exploring their creativity just take a second and engage with them about their project and why it is special to them. In my experience I have found that creatives are looking for someone to just acknowledge the beauty in what they see.       

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.thesenecaproject.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gramsforrobots/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/productsforrobots
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/slowkidatplay/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/S7Cyberpunk
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ProductsForRobots
• Discord: https://discord.gg/6dhdmduYE3 Seneca 7 Ultra Cool Journey So Far: https://youtu.be/A8WkcuM_vWs