As we gear up for Des Moines’ 2025 Mini Maker Faire, we’ll begin our Meet a Maker series with one of our own, Lindy Trout Turnis. Lindy is a published board game designer and the Innovation Manager at the Science Center of Iowa! In 2024, she published her family tabletop game, The Best Medicine, which is now available in ten stores across Iowa.
What makes a “maker”?
A maker is someone who gets satisfaction from bringing an idea into the real world and tinkering with it until it works. It’s someone who reflects on their work, develops new skills, and takes risks to make their creation better than it was.
What got you interested in board game design?
I started designing board games with my brother and dad in 2019. We got started by doing Game Jams – they’re timed, multi-day events that challenge designers to prototype an original game based on a surprise theme. Once we won our first jam, we were hooked!
We fell in love with the process of building, testing, and refining our ideas until we had something awesome. Our partnership works because we strive to impress each other but never judge an idea that doesn’t pan out. Opening a safe space to share, critique, and celebrate ideas has made our end-product better than we could have imagined.
What is your game about?
The Best Medicine is a push-your-luck game where you are a scientist combining chemicals to cure wacky diseases—like The Common Warm and Gritty Discs—while trying to avoid contaminating your labs. It’s a fast-paced game for 2–5 players and takes about 20 minutes to play.
What did the design process look like?
We created the core game in just 36 hours, but spent over two years refining it. That included playtesting extensively, reworking the graphic design and artwork, and fine-tuning the mechanics. Once we were happy with it, we connected with a manufacturer in China and started teaching ourselves about marketing and distribution. Doing everything in-house created more friction than if we would have worked with a publisher, but we developed a host of new skills and created a product that is exactly and uniquely ours.
What do you hope people feel or experience when they interact with your work?
I want players to think it’s exciting and funny. We put a lot of our humor into the names of grants, awards, and diseases. Part of the reason we decided against working with a publisher was so those jokes would make it into the final version of the game. I’m really proud of them and I think they’re hilarious.
What’s one thing you wish you would have known when you were starting out?
Although “making” is a process of continual improvement, it’s rarely a straight path. A good trait for a maker to have is an openness to failure — Version 1 will not and should not be your masterpiece, so don’t force perfection. Our game went through 36 versions of the rulebook—but you can’t improve until you start. So try new things, do them badly and then try again.
Oh, and take pictures! You’ll love looking back at how far you’ve come.
What do you think the future of making looks like? Are there any trends or technologies you’re excited about?
I love AI art! I have aphantasia, meaning I think only in words and have a hard time seeing pictures in my head. Being able to describe my vision and have it visualized for me is a dream come true! AI art generation is an amazing tool that makes the joy and functionality of art accessible to a whole new sector of artists.
For now, there’s still a lot of digital art and editing work to do after the AI image is generated. My favorite softwares are Midjourney for AI art and Procreate for digital art.
What do you do at SCI?
I work in the Innovation Lab alongside Marissa Herzberg and Jolie Pelds. Our lab is a learning space filled with high- and low-tech resources that encourage innovative thinking. Some days I teach, but almost every day I’m learning. The lab’s tools range from virtual reality experiences and AI robots to hot glue and googly eyes. We use a variety of resources to teach “makerly” methods and skills that support creative problem-solving.