Stephen Hoban

Game developer

About me


Like most people I have versions of my resume scattered across the internet. The better ones can be found here:

I’ve been making games since 2017, with Ithacan Media, eGames, and Topps. Before moving into games I helped lead the publications programs of the Guggenheim Museum and Dia, where titles I edited won top industry awards for their conent and design, including multiple recognitions in the AIGA 50 Books/50 Covers list. I also built the Guggenheim’s digital publication program and helped shape static and dynamic exhibition didactics. My projects and nongame work have been featured in the New York Times, the New York Magazine Approval Matrix, McSweeney’s, the Awl, and numerous art publications.

My first games were made as part of Ithacan Media, a studio devoted to retelling stories from Greek mythology. I have a masters of philosophy degree in classics from Oxford; I taught myself Greek after taking an elective intro to mythology class. Mythology, especially the structures behind mythological narratives, has a strong appeal to me. How continuous retellings of a handful of stories sustained audiences for fifteen hundred years says something special about and expansive about creativity. With the Ithacan Mythologies games we found natural counterparts between Greek myths and familiar arcade genres.

At the same time I am also drawn to family games and children’s games. I first learned Unity by building personal versions of simple family games for my child to play. As he continues to grow, our interests are gravitating toward the idea of neurodivergent gaming, and the forms that could take. What does a game without characters, or goals, look like? A recent paper suggests that the concept of time may be neurotypical. In the sense that games and play are a form of suspended time, they help shared experiences between different neurotypes.

I live in the Catskills and New York City.

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