A professional game designer and Wayland parent, Fiske fell in love with simple board games as a kid, and over the years he’s transformed that childhood love into a life-long passion and career.

Fiske helped found Tilted Mill Games in 2001, as a junior partner, after working for Sierra Entertainment, a major gaming company. On Thursday, he talked to a classroom of Wayland High School students about risks and rewards of working the gaming industry.

“What’s stopping you from using your imagination to come up with ideas and content?” Fiske asked. “J.K. Rowling did it in book form. Games are just a medium for expressing your creativity.”

It’s no secret that gaming is a multi-billion dollar industry. World of Warcraft, a famous online role-playing game, has 12 million total subscribers. Call of Duty Black Ops made over a billion dollars worth of sales in less than two months on the market.

Still, Fiske emphasized the ways in which the gaming industry combines market value, cutting edge technology, and imagination.

“This is what I started with gaming,” Fiske said, holding up a small cardboard game board he used as a kid. “Today, I can play much more sophisticated games on my phone.”

Before a game hits the market, it has to be dreamed up by a developer working at a computer, which kick-starts a journey from idea to product that could take years.

A developer could be a professional like Fiske, or an amateur seventeen-year-old who is just experimenting with a hobby and knows how to set up their game on the Internet.

Fiske explained that oftentimes, independent game designers must work with large companies, like Electronic Arts or Microsoft, who have the muscle to broadly publish and market products. However, with the tools and resources available today, it’s very possible for individuals to create and distribute games, though usually on a smaller scale.

Fiske also noted a few personality quirks that have shaped him into a game designer – namely creativity, passion, and an analytical nature. He described being “Dungeon Master” as a teenager when he played “Dungeons and Dragons” with friends  and always wanting make sure everyone enjoyed the game, that everyone was immersed and had a good time.

“You have to analyze why you like what you like,” Fiske advised students. “If you like Angry Birds, why do you like it? What would you do differently? Why do you keep playing it?”

Fiske’s interests, however, are not limited to gaming, and he told potential game designers to make sure theirs were not limited either.

“There’s not a subject that’s taught at this school that’s not relevant to gaming,” he said. “If you have an interest in gaming, have as broad a palette as possible. If you have a very narrow view of the world, your games are not going to connect with people.”

One of Fiske’s cofounders of Tilted Mill is also a children’s book illustrator. As for Fiske himself, his latest project is certainly not a traditional game. He is currently designing an online strategy game in which the player acts as an Afghan leader, learning about customs, traditions, and the framework of Afghan society.

The game is meant to give first-time soldiers a sense of Afghan culture before they deploy, in order to strengthen their abilities to interact and cooperate with civilians in Afghanistan.

As a designer, Fiske aims to create games that are not only interesting, but immersive – games that allow their players to experience new stories, worlds, and lives.

A student asked Fiske what he thought about the psychological dependency gamers can sometimes develop, and he answered with a bit of a laugh.

“From a commercial standpoint, I want our games to be as addictive as possible. I want players to go to bed a night thinking about them,” he said. “From a personal standpoint, I don’t play World of Warcraft. I don’t trust myself.”

Corrections: Jeff Fiske helped found Tilted Mill Games as a junior partner, not as the founding partner, and his newest project is an online strategy game, not a first-person game as originally reported.