Wrong? A Project About Doing Things 'Right'

[KnifeFightBob]

This is a free iPad game I did during last year, in periods. Some extra polish went into it in the fall and now it's out with the exhibition over and all.

The 'press release' text says: "The work I am releasing today is called "Wrong?" and is a critique of married bourgeois life, done in the spirit of the classic game "Pong". With this I have wanted to create a bare-bones, accessible game taking a new but subtle view on the idea of a two-player game. "Wrong?" is free and is part of a series of perspectives I am taking within the medium to explore its possibilities, but also its limitations."

Get it at: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/wrong/id502309024

[Michaël Samyn]

Are you in a "married bourgeois life" or did you just pick an easy victim, done to death -and highly underappreciated?

[KnifeFightBob]

First of all, "Wrong?" was not intended to make any very-pretentious points (as opposed to some of the It's All Fun and Games stuff). I will try to answer what I gather, as I see some unclear points in your 'question' - like what is under-appreciated?

I myself am married, our life being pretty 'normal'. No artistic excesses really for my part, just hard work and dedication. She has a normal job. Do -we- have a bourgeois life? Not really, since we are too poor. We do not make any attempts at owning our home, don't drive a car and I own nothing more than I want to.

As goes for the game, and the representational layer, there is a pretty crude dynamism going on between keeping the marriage together and also doing work at the same time. In capitalist realism, this was about as simple as I could make life arrangements.

The thing, however, that I really am interested here is not the representation, but what goes on between two players. While play-testing and prototyping I saw more role-playing than I expected - in this context, a good thing. Actions did mean something, and a dialogue between players emerged. By also setting up an awkward social position (think Copenhagen Game Collective etc) - by standing/sitting close together with hands held - I want to emphasize the direct contact rather than the virtual event. Because of the title and subtitle, with this I wanted ultimately for players to stay in the game, but not to necessarily 'play' it. So it would only be a game as long as you keep it up (after some capital accumulation you no longer have a reason to actually work other than to satisfy your base instinct to rack up scores). I am trying to put the role of rest and leisure/enjoyment at odds with the grind of permanent debt and expenses.

Obviously there are/or may be criticisms to the system and what it presupposes, but this physical + dialogue thing was what I wanted to make something about, rather than the 'game'.

[Michaël Samyn]

Maybe a more abstract presentation would serve your goals better then. Now it risks to appear very cliché. I guess a lot of people like clichés, so maybe, commercially, that's good choice. But commercial success should always only be of secondary concern.

Interesting that you refer to Copenhagen Game Collective. I feel the same about their abuse of Bach's music in JS Joust. Don't use existing themes if you're not going to seriously engage with them. Keep things simple and abstract so the audience can enjoy the play mechanisms you've designed without being bothered by any shallow use of themes they might feel strongly about.

Games that are about the effects of their mechanics should be as abstract as possible.

[Michaël Samyn]

Also, why choose subject matter you disapprove of and then reject it in your work while you could also find subject matter that pleases you to sing the praises of?

I think, in the long run, beauty is the strongest persuader, if not the very essence of life.

[KnifeFightBob]

I agree with "Games that are about the effects of their mechanics should be as abstract as possible." At the same time, I cannot other than imagine that the effects of representation (perhaps to some extent, procedural narrative) in this case is what makes it possible to situate oneself as a player in the role of an agent, that is, to properly understand the conditions and expectations in the situation, so it needs some rigging. What I am not saying is that "representation" in the broad sense is 'totally' unnecessary, but merely that I hope that any efforts in reading the game, as it were, will not simply be a matter of looking at it and saying "Aha! I have masterfully deconstructed this piece of software-cum-game!".

The subject matter is not being disapproved of, by the way. My hope is that players will find the finer details unlocked by playing/discovering along the way in proper proceduralist fashion. A major one of those is, again, how the system allows to being stopped played with if you wish (only a game if you see it as one, just like real life). Using the metaphor of games, we can create "bad", "oppressive" or otherwise negative systems to engage with. It is my firm belief that only something dysfunctional can carry over a qualitative player-generated critique. I may change this opinion over time, obviously, but that kind of negative reinforcement (I guess?) at least I think is both interesting to work with, for my part, but also one that puts the player in the role to NOT accept circumstances. This is usually lacking in games today. Using a normal "positive framework", where the player does not have reason to challenge the system underlying the game, I believe then is usually one of laid-back curiosity without the edge to cut into what is being served with quite the same effect.

Summary: it is a matter of angle. I am not saying this is a manifesto, but a way of making a (simple) re-orientation of player expectations.

I hope I am being clear with what I mean

[Michaël Samyn]

The problem with interactive work as opposed to conventional contemporary fine art, is that the player needs to be persuaded to actively engage with the system. You can only "subvert their expectations" after you have lured them in. And given the audience for games, I have learned that it's not always easy to predict the expectations of the player. This is another reason why an interactive piece should limit itself to presenting a situation, and leave the interpretation and opinions up to the player. Irony does not work well in interactivity, I find.

But, as an artist, I came to games in search of an alternative to the contemporary fine art salon, whose irony, pseudo-politics, impotent subversion and lack of sincerity (not to mention beauty) I loathe. I'll take the naivite of games over the cynicism of art any day.

[Jeroen D. Stout]

I am not sure why the player needs to 'challenge' the underlying system, or 'not accept circumstances'. Especially when the system is symbolic rather than representational.

You may have a different goal, I think, but I have never learned anything from art wilfully trying to 'challenge' me or tries to subvert my expectations. When it comes to contemporary art I have no expectations left to be subverted and experience nothing but nihilism. This is quite personal, but when I can choose between a touching story about a realistic event or someone subverting my opinion about something, I will chose the former. The former has life, beauty and wisdom to offer me because the artist is crafting a world by around me of his own positive creation. The other tries to knock down a house which is not even its own.

It really comes down to my own orientation, but I never can feel any investment in logical systems representing abstract things - let alone if these systems are trying to pull the rug out from under me. I reason that I want to feel what something is like, rather than interpret related symbols into abstract 'universal' meanings. I like how narrative games like film continue a classical tradition (of sorts), like film music is continuing the Wagnerian tradition. Connecting abstract concepts like 'married bourgeois life' to abstract game mechanics seems to me even more lifeless because now you are taking a theme which is not even explored in sincerity in games. It feels like you are subverting something which does not exist within the medium, and then 'question' it without actually exposing yourself. What do you feel our lives should be like? And can you show us interactively? Or will you just question lives as expressed in symbolic mechanics without any human life to it, seeing 'mechanics' as yet another tool to question something you do not artistically contribute to?

I would not describe (as Michaël does) showing a real universe as 'naivete' of games. I would rather say that being constructive (rather than ironic) and expressing a singular view (rather than questioning all views) as the only intellectual way forward in a post-pluralistic era, and games (and a lot of culture outside of the contemporary art circles) are lucky enough to have maintained it, even if it lacks the consistent refinement it once enjoyed. If we live in a world of multiple contradictory opinions, let us at least find reason and beauty in it.

This post is reaction and essay in one - apparently your work evokes this

[KnifeFightBob]

Thanks for all the comments. I am glad there is something arising from my work, and I appreciate the dialogue. Let me also serve a few more personal tidbits along the way.

Regarding "The problem with interactive work as opposed to conventional contemporary fine art, is that the player needs to be persuaded to actively engage with the system." - I think the case is quite the opposite, games are always actively engaged with. The question of communication and living is vital to me, as it seems to be to you both as well. Again, I think much of our differences in view are just that - a question of positioning. The common aspect for my works have been, and likely will continue to be, these matters of communication or rather how they clash with expectations. These expectations then are quite possible often vague at best as Michäel has pointed out, but simply ignoring the designed (intended) experience seems a bit rash to me. Also, as Ghostwheel recently stated, the term 'subversion' is one that makes him (and me, and you guys probably) nauseous. While I try to create awareness around the construction/scaffolding of events, subversion may be a stronger word than I'd like to use, especially in Wrong?.

@ "...an interactive piece should limit itself to presenting a situation, and leave the interpretation and opinions up to the player". There seems to be a certain degree of undistanced trust you place in the medium, something I feel is at the moment not to be placed so firmly just yet. Why do I think so? Because a game/digital work of the kinds we do here are always created (hence, manipulated) experiences. They are less "possibility" than they are hard-edged "restrictions". In my case I just embrace these restrictions. I don't think my approach is directly cynical, sarcastic or otherwise misleading, but I don't disagree it may feel that way for players/interactors. Look at Molleindustria who use similar tactics, but coat it with a veneer of agitprop and (unintentional?) humor. The pedagogy of pure propaganda is also something I try to distance myself from. In this project I have not been interested in "saying something", being hand-pointing or a manipulative bastard. But I do like putting people in a situation of uncertainty.

"This is quite personal, but when I can choose between a touching story about a realistic event or someone subverting my opinion about something, I will chose the former." Again, let's not make manifestos of opinion, but understand that I deeply respect your way of entering and looking at games and art.  I am (personally) not inclined to the romanticist ideals being heavily supported here, as I don't believe in universality (even if Jeroen put the abstract-universal idea to the test with me) and the concept of ancient beauty. Of course I also share some interests in "beauty"-to-some-degree and a hunt for sublime experiences. Similarly as you, I create those things that are closest to heart. What is closest though is something very different: I feel an urge to deal with (cognitively and psychologically, to become sane) with the tragedies and miscommunications of current world affairs and lived life. Some of these things are mere curiosities, but towards some I feel utter, vehement hate. Thus the main concern turns yet again to this constant groundlessness (pulling the rug out, as Jeroen wrote). To act against this, one must necessarily mean to emulate the circumstances that makes one blind to its consequences and initiations into it. A problem of representational, utopian art is that there is a strain of escapism involved. Escapism as a means of pure escape I see as flight or retreat, a sign of cowardice, an unwillingness to face the beast that is 'non-art'. That is not to say that things of beauty and utopian passion mustn't exist. But I am not in the business of making those things as it stands right now. Again, this is only a matter of artistic inclination/perspective - no need to erase validity of one another. Let's see where the road leads, so to speak.

Jeroen wrote "Connecting abstract concepts like 'married bourgeois life' to abstract game mechanics seems to me even more lifeless because now you are taking a theme which is not even explored in sincerity in games." And this is my point, also above. See it as a critique from my side not towards the efforts in this forum, but towards the fallacies of the medium AS IT STANDS CURRENTLY (sorry for all caps - only emphasis). That's why I am not trusting pure mechanics to carry all of the weight: I desire framing, some degree of narrative, the physical reality and so on. These have all been incorporated in my work. Mechanics are important - but not everything, would be a way of looking at it. Indeed a fairly non-revolutionary idea.

I hope I have provided feedback to most of the exciting comments!

[Michaël Samyn]

When it comes to contemporary art I have no expectations left to be subverted

Hahaha! 

[Michaël Samyn]

games are always actively engaged with

Not when one doesn't play them. Or stops playing very quickly.

[Michaël Samyn]

There seems to be a certain degree of undistanced trust you place in the medium

Yes! I agree that being critical and conscious is important. But without trust, life is not worth living. We need to trust something. If only for form. I'd rather trust and be betrayed than be suspicious of everything, always.

I once gave a con artist money when he asked for it after a rather unlikely story about some misfortune knowing full well that he would most likely not come back and repay me, because of this very reason. It is more important to trust than to live in a world where trust does not exist. By trusting, even a liar, I am bringing trust into this world. And so the world becomes more beautiful.

Also, there really is no end to the spiral of distrust. Why stop at distrusting the medium? Why not distrust your own distrust of the medium? Maybe you are being manipulated! Maybe the idea that you are being manipulated is put into your head by some other external voice! Etcetera. For practical reasons alone, a measure of trust can be very productive.

[Michaël Samyn]

A problem of representational, utopian art is that there is a strain of escapism involved. Escapism as a means of pure escape I see as flight or retreat, a sign of cowardice, an unwillingness to face the beast that is 'non-art'.

More importantly, for me, such art, also, pushes our noses against the things that form the very essence of life itself. Is it escapist to love one's child more than to hate one's government? Is it escapist to believe in a better life while oppressed in slavery? Is it escapist to learn about noble ideas when the world is filled with distrust and hate? If so, by all means, take me there!

[KnifeFightBob]

Touché! You are quite right, Mr. Samyn.

Let us consider what it is I am trying to say again - aside from a highly opinionated view on my own craft - from another angle: if art is the efforts of its creator to express/create/imitate/represent/etc through inquiry, form or concept, then it is no mere coincidence that what I have done is bring a personal 'language' of these artistic matters into play here. I've seen it crucial to bring the problems of our medium into the light, where you are more "illusionistic" in a manner, willing to create something (let us call it) 'new' that is yet pure into the medium. Aside from questions that may arise about that possibility - I am myself not sure what to make of it - it is something that I find a tactic, an artistic rhetoric that I haven't deployed. Is that not what it is? While I find this conversation interesting, it seems to me that what we are doing is defending positions. Do we have to?

Shit, don't take that ending as meaning something silly and banal like "let's all be friends!". But let's be! ^^

[Michaël Samyn]

I think I (and Jeroen, and Shane, I'm sure) have become thoroughly impatient with the stranglehold that modernism still has on (fine) art. It has refused to learn from the postmodern criticism but it also refuses to die and make room for a new approach. As such, it is very much collaborating with the (bourgeois?) powers of capitalism and neoliberalism, which, as you know, are killing our culture and even our habitat. That is, in as far as what happens in museums and galleries and festivals for contemporary fine art, still has any impact whatsoever on contemporary culture. It's probably more the refusal to create art that matters that causes the harm than the creation of art that doesn't.

I think we recognize in your approach the methods of modernist/contemporary art. But we should not take our annoyance with this state of affairs out on you. And I don't think we are. In fact, I think I'm trying to brainwash you and convert you to my religion.