A few weeks back I had a great conversation with Casey Lucas-Quaid from Dinosaur Polo Club (creators of Mini Motorways and Mini Metro). Casey is the Community and Engagement Manager at Dinosaur Polo Club, but she also does so much more!

Mini Motorways – The Game

Dinosaur Polo Club provided me with a code for Mini Motorways a while back, and I became obsessed with the game’s simplistic style and gameplay formula. The levels consist of different cities, and you are in control of the flow of traffic. Each run is randomly generated and begins with connecting one or two homes to a destination using road tiles.

Mini Motorways always starts off the same way: slow, simple, calm and relaxing. The camera is zoomed in to the one destination and home, but it slowly pans out giving you more and more room on your map. In just a few minutes your tiny map has become a big city. You have different colored cars traveling to matching destinations. You’ve added traffic lights, highways, bridges, tunnels and all sorts of roads.

I was able to play the game both on Steam (PC/Mac) and on Apple Arcade (iPhone/iPad). Many times when you play the mobile version of a PC or console game it feels like a dumbed down version. This is not the case with Mini Motorways. Of course, using a mouse is the ideal way to play, but creating roads with your fingers on an iPad also feels great. It may just work because the game mechanics are so simple.

Mini Motorways allows for different styles of play. You can quickly play one city, waste a couple of hours trying to break your records or you can move through each city. It’s such a fun time and the music, design and sounds all add to this wonderfully colorful world. While the game requires your attention when things get going it’s also a good mindless game to play.

The Interview

When I first saw the name of the New Zealand studio, Dinosaur Polo Club, I was instantly interested in learning more. Casey is originally from a small town in California, but moved out to New Zealand for college and has been there ever since. We talked a lot about Mini Motorways, Casey’s position and all of her responsibilities, growing up in a small town in California, her writing and the Coronavirus pandemic both here and abroad.

Towards the end of our conversation Casey said something really cool and I never really include quotes by my guests, but this was a really good one.

“Being bad at things can be fun and it’s the first step at being good at things.”

-Casey Lucas-Quaid (Dino Polo Club)

Check out the latest myVGBC Podcast episode below with Dinosaur Polo Club’s Community and Engagement Manager, Casey Lucas-Quaid.