An interesting take on the role of procedural rherotic (Gaming)

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Monday, November 04, 2013, 09:06 (4040 days ago) @ Leviathan

The bar must be set really low if a simple Puzzle game is an 'interesting metaphor' for the challenges of polyamorous relationships.

You know, I've never found "simple" to be a bad thing. In fact, I often love simple. I find the average kid's book more honest and insightful than the average grown-up novel.

There is a difference between simple ideas, and expressing ideas simply.

But these non-iterative works, like high-concept fine art installations, will likely be regarded with vastly varying opinions and misunderstood by most because that's the nature of it. If you're telling a story without concern of using a language to reach your audience, odds are most of them won't get it. I think/hope a lot of practiced authors/creators know this. It's less about communication and more about exhibition. It's record-keeping; it's a documentary of yourself. The goals and the approaches are different than iterative works. If somebody learns or feels something from that video projected on a bundle of sticks in the corner of my elderly 3D design teacher rolling around in the mud naked (even if its just her getting something out of it), great!

Did you see Exit Through the Gift Shop? Great film. Banksy essentially fools the art community into praising and literally spending millions of dollars on crap art by putting an unknown guy on a pedestal as his protege. The guy is called "Mr. Brainwash", which they take to be an attack on the popular establishment, when in fact the irony was that THEY were the ones being brainwashed.

The games as art crowd does the same thing: they convince themselves that these things are good, when any normal person would play it for two seconds and get bored. It doesn't matter what your game says: if nobody can stand playing it, they won't get your message.