clyde Posted July 21, 2014 Interested in being in a game-club where you get to discuss a new game every week, but don't have enough time? This may be for you. thecatamites released 50 Short Games, a compilation of very small games that are... well I don't know how to describe it; that's a big part of the reason that I wanted to start a discussion-group for them. The games are incredibly short, typically taking between 5 seconds and 5 minutes to complete. They are often very simplistic, narrative-pieces with trill soundtracks and marker-drawings. If you are poor, then don't worry, each of the games can be downloaded for free from Glorious Trainwrecks (I think). So here is the plan: Every monday, I'm going to post the week's game. If you buy the compilation, the order will be very predictable for you as I'm just going to go down the list in the order that they are listed in the launcher. When I post the game, I will also post the link to the free download. Then we have a week to discuss it. a note: When I play some of these games, I have nothing to say about them. I am going to say something about them anyway. The goal here is to have a discussion of these games and without anything with which to disagree, agree, or respond to, the discussion might not happen. I implore you to do the same. I expect that these games can evoke some passionate arguments and I'm hoping for that. I suspect that such discussion will greatly increase all of our enjoyment of this game collection. I understand that lurkers have their reasons for maintaining wallflower-status, but just consider this request to say something about each game every week, even if you have nothing interesting to say. Otherwise, by game 28 it may get lonely in here. Let us begin! ************************************************************** For the week of July 21st, 2014 we will be playing: Magnificent Planet by thecatamites You can download the single game from here for free Or you can buy the entire collection of 50 games from here. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SuperBiasedMan Posted July 21, 2014 Just played Magnificent Planet, it was a strange experience. I already feel like I'll constantly question the potential existence of authorial intent with this series, particularly cause I already think I maybe there was a specific slant to this. I guess I'll spoiler... The exploring of an unfamiliar place was weird because it was all exposition that was delivered but also often unreliable. Like you were supposed to be constantly scared of everything around you, particularly the snakes, but nothing seemed to actually cause harm.Oh, actually I forgot to try getting shot by the ship... Ok just checked and it doesn't do anything. I am half happy that it almost supports my idea though at the same time wished the game acknowledged that getting hit didn't do anything. Overall though I liked that such a tiny experience did seem to have a vague sense of change for the small time investment I had in it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 21, 2014 Overall though I liked that such a tiny experience did seem to have a vague sense of change for the small time investment I had in it. This is largely what I appreciate about it. I enjoyed being able to get a taste of playing through the latter half of Georges Melies "A Trip To the Moon" with such a minimal investment of time or effort. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 22, 2014 As I'm trying to distill what I like about these games, I'm reading through Tolkein's essay on faerie-stories. http://brainstorm-services.com/wcu-2004/fairystories-tolkien.pdf I really like this line on page 8. The human mind, endowed with the powers of generalization and abstraction, sees not only green-grass, discriminating it from other things (and finding it fair to look upon), but sees that it is green as well as being grass. But how powerful, how stimulating to the very faculty that produced it, was the invention of the adjective: no spell or incantation in Faerie is more potent. And that is not surprising: such incantations might indeed be said to be only another view of adjectives, a part of speech in a mythical grammar. The mind that thought of light, heavy, grey, yellow, still, swift, also conceived of magic that would make heavy things light and able to fly, turn grey lead into yellow gold, and the still rock into a swift water. If it could do the one, it could do the other; it inevitably did both. When we can take green from grass, blue from heaven, and red from blood, we have already an enchanter's power—upon one plane; and the desire to wield that power in the world external to our minds awakes. It does not follow that we shall use that power well upon any plane. We may put a deadly green upon a man's face and produce a horror; we may make the rare and terrible blue moon to shine; or we may cause woods to spring with silver leaves and rams to wear fleeces of gold, and put hot fire into the belly of the cold worm. But in such “fantasy,” as it is called, new form is made; Faerie begins; Man becomes a sub-creator. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
prawks Posted July 22, 2014 Really cool idea! I'll be setting aside some time to play through Magnificent Planet this week for sure. Especially during the summer time, it seems the amount of time I end up committing to playing games dwindles. I accumulate a lot of "game debt" that I then binge-remove in the Fall/Winter. I love having some small games I can pick up and put down quickly that aren't huge time sinks for that very reason. As a side note, are there other active "game-clubs" run around here? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 22, 2014 As a side note, are there other active "game-clubs" run around here? Zeusthecat started playing through the Lucas Arts games. https://www.idlethumbs.net/forums/topic/8703-the-big-lucasarts-playthrough/ For a while we had a good group playing the Spelunky daily-challenge together, but it probably needs a batch of people new to Spelunky to freshen up. https://www.idlethumbs.net/forums/topic/8909-idle-explorers-spelunky-um-thumbs/ There may be others, and I suppose you could consider game-specific threads as a kind of game-club, but I don't know of any others that are trying to maintain a regular schedule of progression. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 28, 2014 I will be posting Space Mouse tommorow as planned, but thecatamites just released a new collection and I have to mention that I very much like 03. ♫ Tarantella Sicilienne ♫ I still don't know how to talk about these games. Tarantella Sicilienne, is a small game I really like; a lot. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 28, 2014 For the week of July 28th, 2014 we will be playing: Space Mouse by thecatamites You can download the single game from here for free Or you can buy the entire collection of 50 games from here. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 30, 2014 I hate working repeatitive jobs in games. I hated the hamster-wheel in Super Paper Mario. I hate the tofu-factory in Sometimes Always Monsters. Its like "I get it, tedious labor for a pittance. Can I go and play the rest of the game now?" There is no rest-of-the game in Space Mouse because it isn't about a broader world in which jobs are necessary to get what you want. All you do in Space Mouse is work, commute, and complain. The best part of this game is that you have a ride. There are about three things in this game and one of them is your ride. With games this short, everything reeks of essentiality. The fact that you have a ride is essential. It reminds me of the shitty jobs I had where I had a ride too. Space Mouse. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
gamesthatexist Posted July 30, 2014 Magnificent Planet, incredibly, really made me reexamine my feelings about snakes. I think this game is a good place to start because it introduces several tropes that will reappear throughout 50 short games. You have amoeba stuffed-animal protagonist with name that sounds like children’s cartoon character. You have bright marker aesthetic. You have text strewn across the landscape. I also think Magnificent Planet is a good introduction of the idea that thecatamites describes in the author's notes for 50SG as “oscillating kitsch,” a sensation that others in this thread have already hinted at where your reaction to the game is already being simulated by the game, but this reaction is not clarified to enough of an extent so that you can identify what your reaction is supposed to be, which gives you this inscrutable cocktail of alienation, wonder and amusement (I highly recommend reading the notes; they are very good). The experience of watching advertisements, especially ones that target a demographic that is not your own, can be similar in that an ad is very inviting, yet almost always absurdly self-reflexive and insular in some way. The difference between my experience of advertisements and my experience of these games is that watching ads makes me feel empty and kind of sad, even when I sort of like the ad in question, while I find playing these games very rewarding. Especially this game is so clearly amused with itself for presuming to exist but at the same time is sincerely enthusiastic about what it is. Meanwhile, here you are, the player, visiting this thing, but maybe intruding a little bit as well. The game is probably a bit surprised to have you but also glad, I think. I like the screen where the snake is trapped in a prison of bricks that you don’t have access to. The AI makes the snake move back and forth even though there is no purpose to it. It reminds me of a room in one of the Metroid games. Your experience of the player is being closed off from the thing you are supposed to be interacting with, and you recognize that this other fragment of the world doesn’t need you to be there. AND YET! Then you realize that you can be thrown into prison with the snake, who helps you escape yet stoically resigns to remain in prison, and then you are returned to snake village where the line “this is incredible. I really need to reexamine my feelings about snakes” is completely recontextualized, and both snake village and snake prison become foreshadowing (that is, if you happened to explore the right side of the map first). And you realize that this entire ecosystem sort of exists just to refer to other parts of itself and that is enough. Some of the areas seem unfinished so that the author left in the text upon realizing that it is endearing (“some kind of quarry. rock land?”). Also the 3D area (!!!) combined with the deep foreboding chromatic scales is perfect game design. 88 Stars. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
gamesthatexist Posted July 30, 2014 I hate working repeatitive jobs in games. I hated the hamster-wheel in Super Paper Mario. I hate the tofu-factory in Sometimes Always Monsters. Its like "I get it, tedious labor for a pittance. Can I go and play the rest of the game now?" There is no rest-of-the game in Space Mouse because it isn't about a broader world in which jobs are necessary to get what you want. All you do in Space Mouse is work, commute, and complain. The best part of this game is that you have a ride. There are about three things in this game and one of them is your ride. With games this short, everything reeks of essentiality. The fact that you have a ride is essential. It reminds me of the shitty jobs I had where I had a ride too. Space Mouse. I sympathize with this view. I played Cart Life while working closing shift at a Starbucks and partly for this reason found it very affecting, but at this point I feel I have gotten what I can out of key-pressing my way through workday alienation. Though I would argue that Cart Life is good because it emphasizes the ways that you connect with people both because of and despite simulated work activity. The industrial sounds in Space Mouse are definitely grating. I like that you can jump through walls and that you can just keep reentering the same mouse hole over and over again. And collision detection or whatever it's called doesn’t completely work. The whole thing feels pretty sloppy, so there isn’t that same sense of deliberate, calculated mundane like you get in something like Cart Life, Papers Please, or Always Sometimes Monsters. I also like how you can just leave with your ride without having done any work. So this is kind of a fake gray scale work simulator because all of the exploration underneath the hub world is entirely optional. So the game actually ends up being funny, but still feeling somewhat alienated. The font in the title screen is quite nice. Also, this mouse should be more grateful because it seems to work in some kind of cheese cave. I see this game as the author trying to see some comedy that perhaps can help us transcend the experience of working some mind-numbing job only to go home and dream about it because it really does occupy that much space in your time and consciousness, even though it isn't at all challenging or interesting to think about. 66 Stars. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SuperBiasedMan Posted July 30, 2014 Also, this mouse should be more grateful because it seems to work in some kind of cheese cave. I actually thought this was part of the point, that if a human was working in a cake factory they don't spend all day thinking "Working is shit, but at least I'm surrounded by cake." There may be cheese but it's not something the mouse considers a treat or snack, it is the macguffin their work revolves around. I also have a special note for an especially fitting soundtrack that felt like it was numbing my mind with rapidly repetitive monotony. I am yet again confronted with the question of what parts are intentional and what is limited skill. Is the poor collision detection just a fact of the quick turnaround on the game and a programmer's limited skill level or is it an intentional enhancement of the overall broken and unsatisfying experience that the game entails? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 30, 2014 I am yet again confronted with the question of what parts are intentional and what is limited skill. Is the poor collision detection just a fact of the quick turnaround on the game and a programmer's limited skill level or is it an intentional enhancement of the overall broken and unsatisfying experience that the game entails? I assume it's just a low priority. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted July 30, 2014 I also think Magnificent Planet is a good introduction of the idea that thecatamites describes in the author's notes for 50SG as “oscillating kitsch,” a sensation that others in this thread have already hinted at where your reaction to the game is already being simulated by the game, but this reaction is not clarified to enough of an extent so that you can identify what your reaction is supposed to be, which gives you this inscrutable cocktail of alienation, wonder and amusement (I highly recommend reading the notes; they are very good). The experience of watching advertisements, especially ones that target a demographic that is not your own, can be similar in that an ad is very inviting, yet almost always absurdly self-reflexive and insular in some way. The difference between my experience of advertisements and my experience of these games is that watching ads makes me feel empty and kind of sad, even when I sort of like the ad in question, while I find playing these games very rewarding. Especially this game is so clearly amused with itself for presuming to exist but at the same time is sincerely enthusiastic about what it is. Meanwhile, here you are, the player, visiting this thing, but maybe intruding a little bit as well. The game is probably a bit surprised to have you but also glad, I think. Your description here is leaps beyond what I've been able to manage in my attempts to figure out what I like about these games. I've used the term "melodramatic" in conversation all my life, but I never knew what "melodrama" meant until I looked it up today (it happened because I was following a thread of hyperlinks on Wikipedia's kitch page). In summary, melodrama is a narrative which uses overly expressive symbols to evoke emotional reactions; this is only half of the equation though. There is also (as you point out) the apparent existence of an unironically amused creative-tone that plays with the melodramatic elements like a child plays with dolls. It reminds me of this scene from Rushmore. The melodramatic elements in Max's play are easy to detect and appreciate outside of a suspension of disbelief. Even though the director of Rushmore seems to be using the production of Serpico for ironic purposes, as I'm watching it, I am sincerely enthusiastic about the ability to see a vivisection of a drama. In Magnificent Planet, this quality is used to create what you have called an "inscrutable cocktail of alienation, wonder and amusement ". In Space Mouse, it's used to quickly drill to the core of a general feeling that some of us have had in our lives, but which doesn't really express itself in games very often. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
gamesthatexist Posted July 30, 2014 I actually thought this was part of the point, that if a human was working in a cake factory they don't spend all day thinking "Working is shit, but at least I'm surrounded by cake." There may be cheese but it's not something the mouse considers a treat or snack, it is the macguffin their work revolves around. I also have a special note for an especially fitting soundtrack that felt like it was numbing my mind with rapidly repetitive monotony. I am yet again confronted with the question of what parts are intentional and what is limited skill. Is the poor collision detection just a fact of the quick turnaround on the game and a programmer's limited skill level or is it an intentional enhancement of the overall broken and unsatisfying experience that the game entails? I agree that cheese cave is part of the point. I was being overly flippant there. For sure, it is not automatically great to work at a place just because you get free pastries or whatever. As for what the author intended, I actually think this is a pretty interesting question in this case, though I'm not usually interested in questions of intent. video games, throughout their history, have overwhelmingly trained us to look for what is supposed to be there. (Is this "correct" or is this game simply “broken”?) This is even more true today since we have open alpha games where developers essentially crowd source to figure out what people don’t like and what they are supposed to fix. They’re not just imagining an ideal player for their game - they are tracing that ideal via metrics. Authorial intent has already been problematized a lot in literary criticism by Barthes and whoever else. I mean, if you write a novel that no one ever reads, then sure, a theoretically "correct" interpretation of the author’s intentions exists, but it's not an interpretation that means anything to anyone. Interpretation is a thing that an audience actively pursues and creates. A lot of it is outside of the author's control. It is true that the author can manipulate interpretation in one way or the other, but the exact consequences are pretty difficult to predict. Often in the case of video games, intent becomes way too complicated to trace in any reliably coherent fashion. With big budget commercial games, you have a million different people working on them with different teams in different areas of a buildings, and these teams are sometimes only allowed to communicate with each other indirectly via creative management intermediaries. Even in the case of small homebrew games created by a singular author, the work in question is still a Video game, which usually means that it is all of these different sense experiences (audio, video, text, gamefeel, etc.) cobbled together with varying levels of emphasis. video games are pretty much always on an accelerated production schedule, from the most expensive ones to the smaller ones, and as consumers of video games we look for the cracks where accelerated production led to some mistake or gap in the implied perfect fantasy immersion experience. I believe that 50 Short Games are actually pretty interested in the context of all of that stuff. They are interested simply in the experience of being characterized as video games. In the case of Space Mouse, where the collision detection is only partly functional, yes I think this is a result of tools and timeframe and it's pretty safe to say that "realistic" or "smooth" collision detection were not traits that were prioritized in its construction. Most of these games were created in the author's spare time after work. They were made using a program called Multimedia Fusion 2, which is basically an upgrade of Klick N Play, a tool designed in the 90s to help kids learn to make games in school. These games aren't being programmed from scratch, but arranged around the constraints of a particular program that is conducive to a quick work flow. It's not really a question of skill, but of toolset and mentality involved. But to me this isn't what is most interesting about the games. The games seem very interested in the question of intent in the sense that they spend a lot of time evading any identifiable intent, moral, or message. They want to dismantle the idea of "intent" to the point that our experience cannot be governed by it. But at the same time, they seem to be implying some reaction that we can never really grasp or keep up with. Often the games do this through use of exaggerated horror or pulp crimes tropes. Even in Space Mouse, the whole idea of work alienation is presented as this simple trope that is exaggerated to the point of absurdity. (Mouse smoking cigarette, crunchy nearly unlistenable melody, everything is black and white). I think we'll see more of this as we go along, but some of the games are clearly more interested in "gamefeel" than others. A lot of the time in 50SG, interaction is the most cursory thing about the work. But, just as an example outside of this series, in the music game "Saint Basil" released with thecatamites' latest collection, the way the game feels is essential to what makes it work. On some screens the arrow keys don't seem to do much, but on others movement is tweaked in such a way that you can't help but move around in rhythm to the song. All this to say, I think our expectation for closure and "intent" is one of the primary things being deflected here. Any idea of "ideal game experience" for "particular imagined player" that we might come up with is simply an illusion that is only hinted at and then discarded. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
gamesthatexist Posted July 31, 2014 The melodramatic elements in Max's play are easy to detect and appreciate outside of a suspension of disbelief. Even though the director of Rushmore seems to be using the production of Serpico for ironic purposes, as I'm watching it, I am sincerely enthusiastic about the ability to see a vivisection of a drama. In Magnificent Planet, this quality is used to create what you have called an "inscrutable cocktail of alienation, wonder and amusement ". In Space Mouse, it's used to quickly drill to the core of a general feeling that some of us have had in our lives, but which doesn't really express itself in games very often. I think melodrama is a good point of reference. And I like your point that Space Mouse and Magnificent Planet use similar formal techniques to produce different effects. I think melodrama and surrealism are two sides of the same coin. My most rewarding experiences with melodrama has been stuff like Twin Peaks, particularly this song in which thinnest possible voice is combined with most melancholy possible reverb. When I wrote about some of these games for issue 1 of the Arcade Review, reading about camp sensibility and pulp fiction helped me appreciate them more, especially Susan Sontag's Notes on Camp. Both camp and pulp are terms claimed by what traditionalists would refer to as "low culture." Unless I'm remembering incorrectly, camp is more like super exaggerated performances of pop culture conventions. Pulp is more like lurid horror or detective fiction, meant to be consumed and produced quickly. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted August 1, 2014 I took the plunge and parted ways with 5 precious dollars. I've already gotten my $2.50 worth by seeing Jake Clover's name in a magazine. I haven't even gotten to your article yet. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted August 1, 2014 I've been looking up terms for these types of games and I think I've settled on digital tours. Here is the definition of tour. tour: a journey for pleasure in which several different places are visited.Feel free for telling me I'm wasting my time trying to coin new terminology for computer games.Also cyber-tours may be more evokative. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted August 2, 2014 I'm working through your article in The Arcade Review. First of all let me say that gamesthatexist is obviously a skilled writer and thinker. Reading this article is making me feel far less alone in reference to my appreciation of these games. I'm currently at the part where you reference Notes on Camp and I'm now reading through that. Here's my current understanding of Sontag's definition of Camp. x = s * ((t - r) / k * c); Where: x = camp; s = the significance of the reference material to our human experience; t = the amount that the style and technique that attempts to duplicate the reference material, conflicts with evoking the reference material; r = an actual experience with the reference material; k = the skill the artist has in replicating the reference material; c = the amount of sincere effort put towards replicating the reference material in its complete form; // This could probably also be called "belief in success" I am enjoying this discussion. I haven't had as interesting thoughts about game-criticism as this in months. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted August 4, 2014 For the week of August 4th, 2014 we will be playing: Anxiety World by thecatamites You can download the single game from here for free Or you can buy the entire collection of 50 games from here. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SuperBiasedMan Posted August 4, 2014 I think I'll play this a little later but I already like the different tone from that screenshot. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SuperBiasedMan Posted August 5, 2014 Ok, I played anxiety world. Aside from the stark tone of it, I was reminded a lot of an experiment I first saw on a Derren Brown show (though I'm sure it's well known in its own right). The basic idea of Derren's version of the experiment was that he put a group of people into a room full of random objects, and told them that they needed to get to 10,000 points and when they reach that many points, if they can explain what caused them to earn points then they would earn a large prize. This sent the participants into a frenzy as the timer began and they all started playing around with the objects and attempting to gain points while simultaneously determining what gained the points. At the ending of the time limit, the participants all had guesses of what seemed to be producing points, but they were all wrong. They had made erroneous conclusions because they correlated coincidences to gaining points, when in reality the points went up randomly, independent of the participants' actions. It was a demonstration of superstitions and how people form them when they feel the need to. The reason I bring all this up is because I felt like this game mirrored that experiment in some ways. There's a short time limit before you're cut off, a barrage of information and audio and there's something you can control but the actual result of your control is unclear. I think, having had a couple goes, that the player's input has no consequences on the games resulting output. It's entirely there for the feel, adding to the frantic nature of trying to achieve a goal which you're not even sure of or whether you might be getting closer or further from it. This was a lot more intense than the other two, which I enjoyed because I like diverse feelings and tones being portrayed, rather than a creator settling into a limited range. (even if tools are going to be limited, the creator can still create varied works). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted August 6, 2014 Sounds like B.F. Skinner's superstitious pigeons. Apparently, when he rewarded pigeons with food at times which were not relevant to their behavior, they would develop weird habits which seemed to be superstitious in nature. It's like the pigeon brain is incapable of thinking that food can just come randomly, so it develops a operational hypothesis of agency regardless of whether or not it has an effect. It's possible that I did that with this game, but (I think I'm right in that) when the lightning-bolts hit the eyes the lines at the bottom progress. For me this creates a situation where I want to read the line, but in order to do so, I have to look up at the eyes and the lightning-bolts. Incapable of doing both, I feel anxiety. I think that the neon-colors against black is a really interesting choice. I imagine that it has more to do with that palette's ability to assault the senses with dayglo, unnatural contrast rather than suggesting that the game takes place before daybreak. I also enjoy (what I interpret to be) the sound of the alarm. The reason being is that the dissonant harmony of the pitches is something that I never considered about the alarm-tones of my past until I played this game. I used to think that alarms were just high-pitched loud beeps that happen ever half-second. Thecatamites seems to have picked up on a more inherent quality. This game actually is very dissimilar to my own anxiety when waking up because my concerns stay around long enough to brood. They do have the same sense of absurdity though; if I die, I won't be able to care if anyone knows that I have pornography. But that's the type of bullshit I worry about as I lay in bed at 6am. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
clyde Posted August 6, 2014 I just found You Have To Do Everything via WarpDoor. I think that it is mechanically similar to Anxiety World (and also very short and free), so I thought it might make for a good comparison. Interestingly, the music has a similar dissonant harmony in its organ-hits. For me You Have To Do Everything feels whimsically socially while Anxiety World seems whimsically personal. Both have a sense of laughing at one's own sense of being overwhelmed, but You Have To Do Everything makes me feel like I'm being overwhelmed because the task is so ambitious while Anxiety World's overwhelming nature is occuring in the most socially assumed task, waking up in the morning. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
gamesthatexist Posted August 9, 2014 Anxiety World offers a blatant, direct title, so my inclination was to obnoxiously read against it in some way. But then it really is anxiety world. And the game seems to be simulating a very physical experience of anxiety rather than a brooding contemplative anxiety. It's fleeting and rapid-fire, to be experienced in its immediacy then quickly dismissed as some half-awake farce, except with the recognition that this farce will reappear the following day. It’s interesting that the text progresses as you let by the lightning bolts (it isn't entirely clear how many lighting bolts you have to let by before the text shifts, though). Feels kind of like Space Invaders. There is real challenge here, in finding that happy medium between catching all lightning bolts and letting all of them go through. You have to realize this in-between space to read and process all of the text, but I think the text is most effective when you first see it as a garbled, fragmented mess. Can any biology experts on here explain why it feels like your heart is beating way too fast when you wake up in the middle of the night or from a nap? This game really spoke to that experience for me. Of the animal-antagonistic intensity of your body telling you not to be awake, to the point where you almost feel outside of your body. As opposed to melodrama or kitsch, this appears to be more of an autobiographical snapshot of microexperience. I was trying to think of other stuff that attempts to communicate this sensation (not that of the ubiquitous surreal dreamlike state, but that of the physical, immediate intensity of being abruptly awoken), and I’m not really coming up with anything. I enjoyed reading about the points and pigeon experiments. I think there is something to that here in these games. The trappings of mechanical progression being invoked only so that we may cast them as arbitrary. Sort of like Shakespeare's plays-within-plays. Everybody is trying to teach everyone else how to act, except no one really knows. If I were to fill the walls of a room with all of the snapshots of video games that I have managed to retain in my head over the years, there would probably be very little evidence of points or numbers. Memory documents the fragmented nature of experience by ignoring a lot of the formal structures we set up to organize experience. I guess that's how the modernists saw things. I also think the experiment you've described speaks to some buried emotion that people who play (have always played) games have but don't often use to talk about games. This sense that the entire experience of playing a game is just inherently strange. Like there is this veil pulled over the whole thing that dulls what is actually happening. Like the sort of game that you play for dozens of hours is one that cradles your brain in such a way that you forget what you are doing and why but you don't care. There is an insecurity, a doubt, a hidden sense that you are pursuing the wrong objective. Perhaps not really experiencing or interpreting this thing in the correct way. That the game is actually playing itself but only making you feel as if you are making things happen. What clyde calls "fabricating an operational hypothesis of agency." One interesting thing about 50SG is that many of them seem to expedite this process by simulating the fabrication for us, so we are then left to decide what to do afterwards. .... I'm working through your article in The Arcade Review. First of all let me say that gamesthatexist is obviously a skilled writer and thinker. Reading this article is making me feel far less alone in reference to my appreciation of these games.I'm currently at the part where you reference Notes on Camp and I'm now reading through that. Here's my current understanding of Sontag's definition of Camp.x = s * ((t - r) / k * c);Where:x = camp;s = the significance of the reference material to our human experience;t = the amount that the style and technique that attempts to duplicate the reference material, conflicts with evoking the reference material;r = an actual experience with the reference material;k = the skill the artist has in replicating the reference material;c = the amount of sincere effort put towards replicating the reference material in its complete form; // This could probably also be called "belief in success"I am enjoying this discussion. I haven't had as interesting thoughts about game-criticism as this in months. I am terrible at math, so all I will say is this equation looks perfectly excellent. Thanks for giving the piece such a generous reading. I was looking back at it the other day and thinking wow this is pretty tedious at points. I should have thought more about things like "organization" and "word count." Oh well, onward! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites