My presentation "Mobile Gaming & the Avant-Garde

[[Chris] Dale]

I'm going to be giving a presentation at an upcoming mobile development presentation about mobile games and the avant-garde. I'll post a link to it when it's ready for review, if you guys want to give some feedback, but in the meantime, I'd like to ask you for some assistance:

a) what are the different "avant-garde" schools of games? I can think only of two: the notgames school and the storyworld school, and even these can blur together. Are there other schools I'd be remiss to fail to discuss? Movements with manifestos would be especially cool.

b) what are the avant-garde games available on the mobile platform? So far, I can discuss: The Graveyard, Vanitas, Flight of the Fireflies, and versu. Is there anything else I should be bringing in?

Also, standard newb disclaimer: sorry if this is the wrong forum!

[God at play]

Another school is that of the "New Arcade" as people from Kokoromi call it. There's also this new art+games festival that's happening right now in Toronto: http://www.creativeapplications.net/events/vector-torontos-gameart-convergence/

Here are some other mobile examples to check out: Ruben & Lullaby, The Lake (http://maybeitsthelighting.com/the-lake/), Year Walk, Guru Meditation, Today I Die

[Michaël Samyn]

I have trouble believing in the dynamic of the avantgarde. It seems that what we are doing here happens mostly next to the conventional industry with very little meaningful influence. In other words: they are not following us, they have their own path.

[God at play]

Yeah I was going to make a comment about the phrase too, but...meh. Seemed better to just post stuff.

Oh that reminds me. Jeroen mentioned a new iOS game Leaving is out. The dev has a paper with a similar aim as your talk it seems:  http://www.thomaspapa.net/game-movements/

[[Chris] Dale]

Thanks so much for the recommendations! I will be making use of these shortly, I hope; thank you especially for the paper.

As far as the term "avant-garde" goes, I confess I use the term at best loosely, and at worst incorrectly. I [ab]use it in the same sense aesthetician Nick Zangwill used in his paper The Unimportance of the Avant-Garde (warning: links to *.doc file): "I use ‘avant garde’ in a broad sense so that it includes the artistic movements of the 1920s and 1930s that thought of themselves under that label. Thus avant garde art includes the ready-mades of the early Twentieth Century; but I also use it to include pop art and conceptual art of the 1960 and onwards." By this citation, I hope only to demonstrate that my error, if not justifiable, is at least not mine alone!

[[Chris] Dale]

Bump! Here's a link to the rough of the presentation; I'm giving it on the 21st!

Any feedback appreciated.