 The two were in their final year as master's students in the Interactive Media Program at the University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts, and had just released a video game—"Cloud"—that they had developed with several other students.The group intended the project as an experiment, meant to reveal whether they could create a game that "expressed something different than video games had in the past", and to determine the public's level of interest in video games of that nature.Due to the game's strongly positive reception, Chen and Santiago began to consider founding their own company, so that they could continue making games like "Cloud"—in which the design is not based on gameplay mechanics, but on inspiring emotions in players—after they left college.