PACK O GAMES
POCKET POWER
Keeping games handy – Chris Handy of Perplext gives us the story behind his chewing gum sized Pack O Games and more
Interview by Charlie Pettit
Preparedness is next to godliness – or something like that – which is why I like to keep a game around most of the time for when the occasion arises. There’s always a game or two stashed in my car, perhaps one in a bag, and occasionally even one in my pocket. There’s only a tiny amount that fit the bill of the latter, of which the tiny Pack O Games are always triumphant. Given they’re no bigger than a pack of chewing gum, span a wide range of game styles, and if feeling extra fancy, come in a little pouch too, they’re an underrated fountain of endless gaming possibilities, having sold over a million units. We caught up with Chris to find out more.
PERPLEXING
Chris Handy is the lead designer and president of Perplext – a mostly one man band producing the games that we know and love. He’d been designing games for around 24 years, before self-publishing from 2014, creating the company we recognise today. Regular readers may recognise his name from Long Shot : The Dice Game, but we’re finding out everything Pack O Games today. It all began for Chris though, in children’s music.
“I juggled music and games for a while,” Chris said of it, having entered into the family business. “I’ve always had a genuine interest in products, which entails games, records, candy, snacks and all those things. When I go into a store, I’ve always got this wide lens and I’m always looking at what’s new in packaging and what new products are out. That’s why I like making CDs and records, because I could have this product at the end of it and control all the variables.
“I’ve always loved games and then I had a game idea back in 2000, before I even knew that you could be a game designer and that before there was a robust game industry in the US. I had an idea for a horse racing game while I was riding a jet ski on a lake. I just thought, huh, horses and cards, and a track and all this stuff. I went home and three days later, I made a prototype and started playing it.”