u/Signal-Listen3070

This is a genuine ask for feedback and your guys honest initial thoughts on this.

The idea: episodic, narrative-driven games where you play as a historical mathematician (Euler, Ramanujan & Hardy, Emmy Noether, Al-Khwarizmi) and work through the actual problem they were trying to solve, in the historical context they were in. This would NOT be a quiz. Not "here's the theorem, now answer questions about it." More like: here's the problem as they faced it, with the same partial information, the same wrong turns, and the same dead ends. You follow the reasoning as it actually unfolded, focusing on Interactive discovery.

FAIR WARNING: A question that I think we often get is “how will this teach mathematics?” and the answer is: it won’t. This would NOT be an education game that teaches you maths, or even the entirety of maths history. It humanises mathematics, and tells the story of certain figures within maths history, hopefully showing that mathematics is a very important part of our history not just for the field itself, but for us as humans. Eventually, we’d want this to reach people who may not be entirely interested in maths, but still interested in the history and the narrative, and show that maths is not just about adding numbers together.

The audience we're imagining is basically: people who watch 3Blue1Brown, Veritasium and other science / mathematics content, who come away wanting more depth, more context, more of a sense of what it actually felt like to be inside these ideas.

But here's what we genuinely don't know:

- Is a game even the right format for this? Or does the interactivity get in the way of what makes these stories compelling?
- Would you actually want to do the maths, or do you prefer being shown it?
- Does putting you in the role of the mathematician sound exciting, or does it sound exhausting/boring?
- Is this something people want alongside videos like 3B1B (a different kind of experience) or does it feel like it's trying to unnecessarily replace something?
- What would make you instantly close it and never look back?
- Who would you want to know the story of? (we wanted to start with mathematicians, but eventually branch out into scientists, or whoever else might be interesting to the players)

Some more important points: this would be team-built and funded, so not a scratch game, and part of this team would be experienced mathematicians and maths historians so we’re not just reading the Wikipedia page to write the story. We also want this to be as authentic as possible. We think history is fascinating and dramatic organically, so there is no need to add lies and warp events just to make them more “entertaining” (although, as with a lot of history — especially the ancient kind — there will be moments where different sources say different things and human bias makes things complicated, so our goal is for this project to be heavily community based, with many decisions falling onto you). Okay, that is all.

We're pre-build so we don’t have a demo or anything, we’re just trying to figure out if we're solving a real problem or inventing one.

This is a genuine ask for feedback and your guys honest initial thoughts on this.

The idea: episodic, narrative-driven games where you play as a historical mathematician (Euler, Ramanujan & Hardy, Emmy Noether, Al-Khwarizmi) and work through the actual problem they were trying to solve, in the historical context they were in. This would NOT be a quiz. Not "here's the theorem, now answer questions about it." More like: here's the problem as they faced it, with the same partial information, the same wrong turns, and the same dead ends. You follow the reasoning as it actually unfolded, focusing on Interactive discovery.

FAIR WARNING: A question that I think we often get is “how will this teach mathematics?” and the answer is: it won’t. This would NOT be an education game that teaches you maths, or even the entirety of maths history. It humanises mathematics, and tells the story of certain figures within maths history, hopefully showing that mathematics is a very important part of our history not just for the field itself, but for us as humans. Eventually, we’d want this to reach people who may not be entirely interested in maths, but still interested in the history and the narrative, and show that maths is not just about adding numbers together.

The audience we're imagining is basically: people who watch 3Blue1Brown, Veritasium and other science / mathematics content, who come away wanting more depth, more context, more of a sense of what it actually felt like to be inside these ideas.

But here's what we genuinely don't know:

- Is a game even the right format for this? Or does the interactivity get in the way of what makes these stories compelling?
- Would you actually want to do the maths, or do you prefer being shown it?
- Does putting you in the role of the mathematician sound exciting, or does it sound exhausting/boring?
- Is this something people want alongside videos like 3B1B (a different kind of experience) or does it feel like it's trying to unnecessarily replace something?
- What would make you instantly close it and never look back?
- Who would you want to know the story of? (we wanted to start with mathematicians, but eventually branch out into scientists, or whoever else might be interesting to the players)

Some more important points: this would be team-built and funded, so not a scratch game, and part of this team would be experienced mathematicians and maths historians so we’re not just reading the Wikipedia page to write the story. We also want this to be as authentic as possible. We think history is fascinating and dramatic organically, so there is no need to add lies and warp events just to make them more “entertaining” (although, as with a lot of history — especially the ancient kind — there will be moments where different sources say different things and human bias makes things complicated, so our goal is for this project to be heavily community based, with many decisions falling onto you). Okay, that is all.

We're pre-build so we don’t have a demo or anything, we’re just trying to figure out if we're solving a real problem or inventing one.

This is a genuine ask for feedback and your guys honest initial thoughts on this.

The idea: episodic, narrative-driven games where you play as a historical mathematician (Euler, Ramanujan & Hardy, Emmy Noether, Al-Khwarizmi) and work through the actual problem they were trying to solve, in the historical context they were in. This would NOT be a quiz. Not "here's the theorem, now answer questions about it." More like: here's the problem as they faced it, with the same partial information, the same wrong turns, and the same dead ends. You follow the reasoning as it actually unfolded, focusing on Interactive discovery.

FAIR WARNING: A question that I think we often get is “how will this teach mathematics?” and the answer is: it won’t. This would NOT be an education game that teaches you maths, or even the entirety of maths history. It humanises mathematics, and tells the story of certain figures within maths history, hopefully showing that mathematics is a very important part of our history not just for the field itself, but for us as humans. Eventually, we’d want this to reach people who may not be entirely interested in maths, but still interested in the history and the narrative, and show that maths is not just about adding numbers together.

The audience we're imagining is basically: people who watch 3Blue1Brown, Veritasium and other science / mathematics content, who come away wanting more depth, more context, more of a sense of what it actually felt like to be inside these ideas.

But here's what we genuinely don't know:

- Is a game even the right format for this? Or does the interactivity get in the way of what makes these stories compelling?
- Would you actually want to do the maths, or do you prefer being shown it?
- Does putting you in the role of the mathematician sound exciting, or does it sound exhausting/boring?
- Is this something people want alongside videos like 3B1B (a different kind of experience) or does it feel like it's trying to unnecessarily replace something?
- What would make you instantly close it and never look back?
- Who would you want to know the story of? (we wanted to start with mathematicians, but eventually branch out into scientists, or whoever else might be interesting to the players)

Some more important points: this would be team-built and funded, so not a scratch game, and part of this team would be experienced mathematicians and maths historians so we’re not just reading the Wikipedia page to write the story. We also want this to be as authentic as possible. We think history is fascinating and dramatic organically, so there is no need to add lies and warp events just to make them more “entertaining” (although, as with a lot of history — especially the ancient kind — there will be moments where different sources say different things and human bias makes things complicated, so our goal is for this project to be heavily community based, with many decisions falling onto you). Okay, that is all.

We're pre-build so we don’t have a demo or anything, we’re just trying to figure out if we're solving a real problem or inventing one.

This is a genuine ask for feedback and your guys honest initial thoughts on this.

The idea: episodic, narrative-driven games where you play as a historical mathematician (Euler, Ramanujan & Hardy, Emmy Noether, Al-Khwarizmi) and work through the actual problem they were trying to solve, in the historical context they were in. This would NOT be a quiz. Not "here's the theorem, now answer questions about it." More like: here's the problem as they faced it, with the same partial information, the same wrong turns, and the same dead ends. You follow the reasoning as it actually unfolded, focusing on Interactive discovery.

FAIR WARNING: A question that I think we often get is “how will this teach mathematics?” and the answer is: it won’t. This would NOT be an education game that teaches you maths, or even the entirety of maths history. It humanises mathematics, and tells the story of certain figures within maths history, hopefully showing that mathematics is a very important part of our history not just for the field itself, but for us as humans. Eventually, we’d want this to reach people who may not be entirely interested in maths, but still interested in the history and the narrative, and show that maths is not just about adding numbers together.

The audience we're imagining is basically: people who watch 3Blue1Brown, Veritasium and other science / mathematics content, who come away wanting more depth, more context, more of a sense of what it actually felt like to be inside these ideas.

But here's what we genuinely don't know:

- Is a game even the right format for this? Or does the interactivity get in the way of what makes these stories compelling?
- Would you actually want to do the maths, or do you prefer being shown it?
- Does putting you in the role of the mathematician sound exciting, or does it sound exhausting/boring?
- Is this something people want alongside videos like 3B1B (a different kind of experience) or does it feel like it's trying to unnecessarily replace something?
- What would make you instantly close it and never look back?
- Who would you want to know the story of? (we wanted to start with mathematicians, but eventually branch out into scientists, or whoever else might be interesting to the players)

Some more important points: this would be team-built and funded, so not a scratch game, and part of this team would be experienced mathematicians and maths historians so we’re not just reading the Wikipedia page to write the story. We also want this to be as authentic as possible. We think history is fascinating and dramatic organically, so there is no need to add lies and warp events just to make them more “entertaining” (although, as with a lot of history — especially the ancient kind — there will be moments where different sources say different things and human bias makes things complicated, so our goal is for this project to be heavily community based, with many decisions falling onto you). Okay, that is all.

We're pre-build so we don’t have a demo or anything, we’re just trying to figure out if we're solving a real problem or inventing one.

This is a genuine ask for feedback and your guys honest initial thoughts on this.

The idea: episodic, narrative-driven games where you play as a historical mathematician (Euler, Ramanujan & Hardy, Emmy Noether, Al-Khwarizmi) and work through the actual problem they were trying to solve, in the historical context they were in. This would NOT be a quiz. Not "here's the theorem, now answer questions about it." More like: here's the problem as they faced it, with the same partial information, the same wrong turns, and the same dead ends. You follow the reasoning as it actually unfolded, focusing on Interactive discovery.

FAIR WARNING: A question that I think we often get is “how will this teach mathematics?” and the answer is: it won’t. This would NOT be an education game that teaches you maths, or even the entirety of maths history. It humanises mathematics, and tells the story of certain figures within maths history, hopefully showing that mathematics is a very important part of our history not just for the field itself, but for us as humans. Eventually, we’d want this to reach people who may not be entirely interested in maths, but still interested in the history and the narrative, and show that maths is not just about adding numbers together.

The audience we're imagining is basically: people who watch 3Blue1Brown, Veritasium and other science / mathematics content, who come away wanting more depth, more context, more of a sense of what it actually felt like to be inside these ideas.

But here's what we genuinely don't know:

- Is a game even the right format for this? Or does the interactivity get in the way of what makes these stories compelling?
- Would you actually want to do the maths, or do you prefer being shown it?
- Does putting you in the role of the mathematician sound exciting, or does it sound exhausting/boring?
- Is this something people want alongside videos like 3B1B (a different kind of experience) or does it feel like it's trying to unnecessarily replace something?
- What would make you instantly close it and never look back?
- Who would you want to know the story of? (we wanted to start with mathematicians, but eventually branch out into scientists, or whoever else might be interesting to the players)

Some more important points: this would be team-built and funded, so not a scratch game, and part of this team would be experienced mathematicians and maths historians so we’re not just reading the Wikipedia page to write the story. We also want this to be as authentic as possible. We think history is fascinating and dramatic organically, so there is no need to add lies and warp events just to make them more “entertaining” (although, as with a lot of history — especially the ancient kind — there will be moments where different sources say different things and human bias makes things complicated, so our goal is for this project to be heavily community based, with many decisions falling onto you). Okay, that is all.

We're pre-build so we don’t have a demo or anything, we’re just trying to figure out if we're solving a real problem or inventing one.

He specifically left gaps and predicted undiscovered ones by name, describing their properties in advance, and was proved right within his own lifetime. You can see the pattern forming, you know something has to be there, and yet you're staking your entire reputation on empty spaces in a table. That's such a cool story, and kind of important to our development as a species.

Yes, we know how it ends. But most people have no idea what it actually felt like to sit with incomplete information, spot a pattern nobody else could see, and commit to it entirely. And every documentary and article has the same problem; you're a passenger. You absorb it. You never actually had to make the discovery yourself.

Obviously when you study you need to just sit with the material and learn it, but in terms of communicating a subject to others and keeping them engaged (which fields like Science/general Communication aim to do), or even just getting a deeper understanding or deeper outlook on a topic. I feel like this is neglected.

Does anything exist, games, interactive stuff, anything, that actually puts you inside that moment rather than just narrating it from the outside? And if not, is there a reason nobody's done it?

I keep thinking about the difference between a student who has been told something interesting and a student who has actually discovered something themselves. The first one nods along. The second one can't stop thinking about it. And yet almost every resource available, documentaries, articles, textbooks, puts students firmly in the first group.

They're passengers. The material is narrated to them by someone who already knows the answer, and they absorb it. But they never actually have to reason, sit with uncertainty, or work something out themselves. And I think that's the moment where curiosity either gets nurtured or quietly dies.

Do you feel like this is a real gap in the resources available to you? And has anything you've used actually managed to put students in the driving seat rather than just along for the ride? Would love to hear your guys thoughts on this!

Lavoisier didn't know he had two years before the Revolution took his head. Boltzmann didn't know he'd be vindicated, he died believing the establishment had won.

That uncertainty is what makes these stories genuinely human in my eyes; and it's exactly what disappears the second someone who already knows the outcome walks you through events in order. Every documentary, article, and book has the same problem. You're a passenger and it’s too passive sometimes. Someone who already knows the ending narrates the journey, and you absorb it. But you never actually had to think, reason, or sit with incomplete information the way they did.

Obviously when you study you need to just sit with the material and learn it, but in terms of communicating a subject to others and keeping them engaged (which fields like Science/general Communication aim to do), or even just getting a deeper understanding or deeper outlook on a topic. I feel like this is neglected.

Does anything exist: games, interactive stuff, anything! That actually puts you inside the moment rather than just narrating it? And if not, is there a reason nobody's done it? Would love to hear what you guys think!

I've been going down a bit of a rabbit hole lately looking at every game that claims to involve maths in some meaningful way. And there's a pattern I keep running into. Either the maths is completely stuck on, like a totally unrelated game that throws equations at you between levels, or it's a puzzle game where the mechanics happen to involve numbers, but it could just as easily be about anything else.

The maths isn't really the point in any of them. What I find genuinely strange is that the actual stories behind mathematics are some of the most dramatic things I've ever come across. Cantor spending years trying to prove that some infinities are larger than others, having a complete mental breakdown, being ridiculed by the mathematical establishment, and then being completely vindicated. No need to dramatics it, the history does it all by it's self. Maths has always had this, it just never gets treated that way.

The people behind it are fascinating, the history is interesting. And yet no one has made you be Cantor and follow the actual reasoning he followed. To arrive at the conclusion yourself, the way he did, rather than just being told what he concluded. There are two things I keep coming back to that I think are almost always missing: a historically accurate narrative, like the real full story, and actual interactive discovery, where you're genuinely working something out rather than watching someone else work it out and nodding along.

And that last part is my problem with videos too, even the really good ones. You watch someone understand something. You feel like you're following along. And then it's over and you realise you were never actually doing anything.

I've since come across the idea of humanistic mathematics, which seems to be pointing at something similar, just curious whether anyone's actually seen it done well in an interactive format. Is there content, games, interactive stuff, anything, that actually integrates the history and the discovery?

Would love to hear what you think, especially if you've found something that comes close!

Not a tutorial, not a course, not even an explainer really. Just something that lets you explore a concept or the person behind it. Like when documentaries make you care about something you never thought about before (but I'm not really looking for documentaries or videos.)

I keep wondering if that exists for maths and if people would actually want it, or if the assumption is that any maths content has to be working towards making you better at maths. Does communication for its own sake have a place here or does it feel pointless if you aren't coming away knowing more than when you started? Would love to hear your guys thoughts on this.