Can playing board games become an innovation project? CUHK’s student game-design team, Unplugged Studio, proves that games can truly make a real impact. Last month, they collaborated with InnoPort on a Human Library event, using games to help Professor Kathy Lee, speech therapist and social enterprise founder, introduce speech therapy concepts to the community in an engaging way.
Author: Ria, MA student in Anthropology at CUHK, passionate about fieldwork and interview documentation.
Inno-Ambassador Ria interviewed Unplugged Studio members – Edwin, Yik-siu, Eric, and Chloe (with member Hugo absent that day) – to learn how they evolved from players to game tutors, and now to designers creating tailor‑made games for social projects, transforming their hobby into socially impactful innovation.
Originally an Inno-Ambassador, Edwin was noticed by InnoPort as a member of the CUHK Board Games, known for organizing game sessions. He was invited to form a team to design games for events. Recruiting fellow club members, he officially founded Unplugged Studio. The team now consists of students from diverse disciplines, including engineering, linguistics, journalism, and Chinese studies, across different academic years.
CUHK’s creative game team Unplugged Studio: Eric, Edwin, Yik-siu, and Chloe (from right) interviewed by Inno-Ambassador Ria (far left).
InnoPort × Unplugged Studio: Cross-disciplinary Collaboration Through Games
The team’s first mission was to design interactive on-site games for InnoPort’s Human Library talk, “Walking with Words: From Speech Therapy to Social Entrepreneurship.” During the talk, Professor Kathy Lee, Adjunct Associate Professor at CUHK’s Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery, introduced speech therapy concepts to secondary school students and shared how professional expertise can be transformed into social enterprise. Unplugged Studio gamified core concepts about communication and swallowing difficulties, helping students grasp abstract ideas through hands-on activities.
Facing a crowd of over 200 junior secondary students, the team abandoned their original tabletop-game format in favor of a large-scale interactive mass game. This shift taught them an important lesson: successful implementation requires balancing time constraints, audience size, and collaborators’ expectations.
After extensive discussions, the team designed multiple game stations, including listening-and-guessing challenges, sentence reconstruction tasks, and a water-pipe simulation of the esophagus. They initially tried to incorporate a hidden-role element common in board games, but after discussing with all parties, they worried it might confuse younger students, so the idea was dropped. The team believes that through constant feedback and revision, a design can eventually become user-centred.
In December, Unplugged Studio, InnoPort, and Professor Lee co-organized the Human Library event, designing several games to help over 200 students understand speech and swallowing disorders.
On the day of the event, Hugo served as game host while the rest of the team handled final preparations.
When some students appeared shy, the team adjusted the activities in real time.
During preparation, multiple meetings were held among Unplugged Studio, the InnoPort team, and Professor Lee to refine the games, taking into account the professional aspects of speech therapy, the characteristics of the student audience, and the feasibility and entertainment value of the designs. On the event day, both students and teachers were highly engaged and responded with enthusiasm.
The Unique Charm of Board Games
When asked about their favorite board games, the team emphasized that board games are more than entertainment, but a medium that combines thinking, interaction, and creativity. The name “Unplugged” reflects their focus on offline play. Edwin jokingly calls it a “nerdy” name that perfectly fits their theme. Compared to digital games driven by instant stimulation and fragmented attention, board games offer deeper strategic, interactional, and feedback systems.
Board games also allow players to physically build a shared world. Chloe vividly describes how the weight and texture of game pieces, as well as the excitement of players slamming the table, create a tangible realism that screens cannot replace.
The team speaks about board games with enthusiasm. Chloe developed an interest in them during secondary school but lacked play partners. After entering CUHK and discovering the Board Games Club, she was thrilled to find a community of like-minded players and regularly engaged in activities. Edwin appreciates how board games emphasize rules, balanced mechanics, and thoughtful planning.
The club hosts weekly board game sessions to promote board game culture, teaching CUHK students and staff how to play a variety of games. Around 50 to 60 regular participants attend.
The team believes face-to-face, multisensory experiences help foster deeper human connections. The club serves as a practical platform for this vision, offering extended sessions where members immerse themselves in strategic play.
The club’s game selection ranges from traditional chess and identity deduction games to family-friendly board games. They intentionally avoid pay-to-win or microtransaction-based models, preferring games that can be replayed endlessly after a single purchase, keeping the focus on genuine interaction.
Many activities take place in the Engineering Building, reflecting the historical roots of board game design in logic, calculation, and system balance, which traditionally attracted STEM enthusiasts. Today, however, board games are increasingly interdisciplinary, carrying broader perspectives and values such as environmental awareness. This shift is mirrored in Unplugged Studio’s diverse academic backgrounds, enabling them to address social issues through games and explore future collaborations.
Designing Games for Long-Term Impact
There is a clear gap between playing games and designing them: the former centers on enjoyment, while the latter demands patience and expertise. Chloe explains that her motivation comes from the satisfaction of bringing joy to others.
Through part-time teaching, Yik-siu has introduced board games into primary and secondary classrooms and met professional game designers, inspiring him to see game design as a potential long-term career. Eric has also experimented with DIY card games and playtesting with friends. Together, they realized that producing a polished game that players will actually embrace takes far more time and resources than they once imagined.
Yik-siu summarizes three major challenges: creating truly original ideas unseen in the market; continuously testing and refining games as flaws emerge; and relying on interdisciplinary collaboration in art, production, and printing. Many successful games undergo years of development. Yet once recognized by the market, their value can endure over time.
Reflecting on organizing the large-scale event, Yik-siu admits he was nervous: “I’d never hosted something this big before. But university is the best time to experiment—there’s little at stake, so why not give it a shot?” 
On the day of the interview, the team reenacted their pre-event team cheer.
Looking ahead, Unplugged Studio hopes to collaborate more deeply with partners on specific themes, designing games that meet societal needs. Their recent partnership combining speech therapy and education demonstrates how games can serve as a bridge between medical knowledge and the community. Professor Lee expressed her appreciation for the team’s dedication: “From design to execution, their care and attention were evident. I look forward to more collaborations.” Next, the team plans to design a board game souvenir themed around CUHK’s Knowledge Transfer Office (KTO), letting players explore CUHK’s innovation culture through play.
InnoPort encourages CUHK students to leverage available resources and partnerships, take the first step, and turn their creative ideas into reality.
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