Hexatrope is an experimental hybrid training game in mixed reality designed for journalists, bloggers, producers, media and journalism students, and anyone who creates multimedia stories.

The project combines a tabletop board game, a structured card system, and a VR environment to simulate the workflow of a newsroom.

Players progress through seven stages of content production — from topic selection and information gathering to defining the format and promotion strategy. Throughout the process, the team makes strategic decisions, assigns roles, manages resources, and constructs a story from fragmented data collected in virtual reality.

The final outcome is not predetermined: the resulting media project emerges from the team’s chosen conclusions, economic decisions, and internal dynamics.

The game was developed for Silamedia and has been presented at ITMO University, Higher School of Economics, and Yandex conference Yet Another Conference / On Education, as well as at other venues, including international platforms.

Hexatrope is an authorial project in which I served as creative lead, game designer, game system architect, narrative designer, and VR developer.

Together with the team, we developed the project’s content framework and visual identity.

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The Hexatrope game board consists of seven hexagonal tiles. Each tile represents a distinct stage in the creation of a multimedia project — from topic selection to cross-media publication.

The tiles perform a structural function: they define the sequence of actions, regulate pacing, and shape the architecture of the entire game system.

Placed sequentially on the table, they form a visual map of multimedia production.

Each tile simultaneously functions as an instruction set, a navigation tool, a workload regulator, and a connective layer linking the board, the card system, and virtual reality into a unified gameplay logic.

Each Hexatrope tile is designed as a two-layer system.

The front side governs the gameplay process, while the reverse side раскрывает the professional context of what is happening.

The gameplay and methodological layers operate synchronously: action generates experience, commentary structures understanding.

This design transforms mechanics into a tool for reflection and connects the simulation to real-world media production practice.

Through its tile system, Hexatrope models the full media production cycle as a sequence of structured stages defined by constraints, resources, and decision points.

The Hexatrope card system is the core of the project’s variability, economy, and educational logic.

It connects the tabletop gameplay, the VR experience, and the final development of the media project into a unified structure.

The cards are not auxiliary tools — they shape the architecture of the gameplay itself.

The system consists of several decks, each performing a distinct function:

• Brain — tasks focused on knowledge and professional competencies.
• Heart — tasks developing team dynamics and soft skills.
• Conclusions — documentation of analytical decisions made after VR episodes.
• Formats — selection of the structural framework for the future media piece.
• Promotion — modeling media strategy and distribution.

The Brain and Heart decks allow players to earn hexes — the in-game currency.

Hexes are then used to purchase Formats and Promotion cards.

Thus:

• cognitive effort is converted into strategic opportunities;
• educational tasks directly influence the final outcome;
• the team continuously balances analysis, production, and distribution.

VR in Hexatrope functions as the practical layer of experience. While the tabletop game models editorial planning, the VR environment simulates on-the-ground reporting.

The system is built on three principles:

1. Incomplete information as a foundational condition.
2. Responsibility for interpretation.
3. Transfer of individual experience into collective decision-making.

Only one player enters VR at a time. The tabletop team works with the consequences of their VR teammate’s findings, introducing a gap between individual perception and collective analysis — a key model of real newsroom practice.

Out of the seven stages in Hexatrope, players enter VR at three key levels:

At this stage, the player chooses the narrative episode (novella) that the team will experience.

This choice determines the type of tasks, the mode of interaction, and the specific mechanics involved.

This is the core gameplay layer.

The player explores environments, conducts dialogues, makes decisions, and collects facts.

Facts are the key resource. They may be accurate, partially true, or false. The set of collected facts directly influences the next stage.

The final VR level is analytical.

The player works with dedicated question stands.

Each stand presents a central question, the collected facts, and a set of possible answers (i.e., conclusions).

The player’s task is to distinguish reliable information from false data, correlate the collected facts with the questions, and select the most appropriate answers.

These selected answers are transferred to the tabletop phase of the game as Conclusions cards and form the structural foundation of the final media project.