Zain Memon is a game designer and entrepreneur based in Goa, India. [1] He is the co-founder of Memesys Culture Lab, a studio that works on films, board games, and virtual reality. [2]
Zain grew up in Versova, Mumbai. He dropped out of the 12th grade to pursue his interests in science, technology, and media. [3]
In early 2015, Zain was on the team that created ElseVR, India's first Virtual Reality platform enabling filmmakers to tell “extraordinary and urgent stories” in the VR format accompanied by a piece of long-form journalism. [4]
In late 2015, Zain co-founded Memesys Culture Lab with Anand Gandhi, Khushboo Ranka, Vinay Shukla, Neil Pagedar, and Pooja Shetty. [5]
Memon was the creative director the 2016 film Cost of Coal by Faiza Ahmad Khan, the first Indian narrative non-fiction film in Virtual Reality, and which was produced by the Memesys Culture Lab. [6] [7] Memon also led the crowdfunding for the documentary film An Insignificant Man , the most successful crowdfunding campaign in India. [8]
Memon is also a ludologist. [9] In mid 2019, Memon successfully crowdfunded, [10] [11] and created SHASN, a political strategy board game exploring ideas of democracy and governance. [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] In late 2019, SHASN won the Social Impact Award at IndieCade Europe [22] -- a festival that has been called “the Sundance” of the industry. [23] With the success of Shasn, Memon was recognized as a leading figure in Indian game design. [24]
In October 2021, Zain and Abhishek Lamba co-created SHASN:AZADI, a sequel to SHASN. [25] [26] SHASN:AZADI has a more cooperative element than the original. Players start by trying to overcome a common enemy, and if they succeed they then have to complete against each other. It won the title of ‘Best Board or Tabletop Game for Impact’ at the 2023 Games for Change Awards. [27]
Release | Game | Description |
---|---|---|
2019 | SHASN | A game of politics, ethics, and strategy for 2-5 players designed to teach how modern democracies work. |
2021 | SHASN:AZADI | A semi-cooperative game for 2-5 players designed to teach stories from historical political revolutions. |
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Events in the year 1943 in India.
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Anand Gandhi is an Indian filmmaker, entrepreneur, media producer, innovator and systems researcher. He is also the founder/CEO of the Mumbai-based new media studio and systems think tank Memesys Culture Lab. His debut feature film Ship of Theseus (2013), which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival won the National Film Award for Best Picture. Gandhi's film as creative director, executive producer and co-writer, Tumbbad opened the Critics' Week at the 75th Venice Film Festival, released to a wide critical acclaim in October 2018.
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Anand Grover is a senior lawyer known for legal activism in Indian law relating to homosexuality and HIV. Along with his wife Indira Jaising, he is a founder-member of the Lawyers Collective. He was the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to health from August 2008 to July 2014. He is currently and acting member of the Global Commission on Drug Policy.
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SHASN (transl. Governance) is a multiplayer political strategy board game created by Zain Memon, and published by Memesys Culture Lab, where each player takes on the role of a politician contesting elections and is required to take a stand on various political and ethical issues. The game was launched on the global crowdfunding platform, Kickstarter on 16 July 2019, and raised $339,045 from 4,209 backers. SHASN was inspired by the documentary An Insignificant Man, on the rise of the Aam Aadmi Party politician and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal.
OK Computer is an Indian absurdist philosophical science fiction comedy television series on Disney+ Hotstar created and directed by Pooja Shetty and Neil Pagedar, who also wrote the script along with Anand Gandhi. Gandhi and his team also produced the series through the studio Memesys Culture Lab. The series stars Radhika Apte, Vijay Varma, Rasika Dugal, Jackie Shroff, Kani Kusruti, and Ullas Mohan and began streaming on Disney+ Hotstar from 26 March 2021.
Contributions to popular culture involving direct reference to the Sri Lankan Tamil community in Indian cinema are listed below. All communities that speak Tamil and originally came from Sri Lanka are included. Tamils of Sri Lanka today are a trans-national minority and are found across the globe. While most films on the topic are made in Tamil cinema, there has also been Malayalam and Hindi content on the area.