Kill Screen Magazine's Blog, page 13

Paola Antonelli

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The Dear Future Series Explores the Futuristic Discoveries Happening Today

They say that truth is stranger than fiction. To this, we’ll add that actual science is often stranger than science fiction.

But don’t take our word for it. An original series of long form journalism from VICE’s Motherboard and CNET will quickly convince you of that. Called “Dear Future,” the series focuses on the modern explosion of technology and the fascinating stories made possible by scientific advancements.

“While we’ve somehow gotten used to impossibly thin TVs, pocket-size supercomputers, and a worldwide network . . . technology and science are still capable of wowing us,” said Motherboard’s chief editor Jason Koebler, announcing the series.

To his point, “Dear Future’s” landing page is populated with deep dives into various subjects that seem like they should be happening sometime far in the future, not now. So far, the series has tackled “placentas-on-a-chip,” quantum computers that could cause an encryption apocalypse, and research into editing the DNA of endangered species to make them extinction-resistant.

It’s heavy stuff, but explored in the relevant and approachable way that Motherboard is known for. Thanks to Becky Ferreira’s article on genetically modified animals, for instance, we now not only know what “facilitated adaptation” is, but what it means for the future of the planet. Of course, a wooly mammoth-elephant hybrid is a cool thing to bring into existence, but these half-breeds could also escape poachers by thriving in colder climates that are inhospitable for humans. 

Head over to Motherboard or CNET to dive in.

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Save the Galaxy and Argue with Your Friends April 28th

The Tribeca Games Festival starts a week from today with an opening night party April 28th that’s packed full of games goodness for you to enjoy, the largest of which is the crowd play of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series, Episode 1. Be one of the first to play it and experience Telltale’s new crowd play system.

Like Telltale’s other games, Guardians of the Galaxy is a choice-driven game where the story unfolds based on the decisions you make. However with a crowd play, decisions are made not by an individual but by dozens of people all voting for their preferred course of action. The result is a thrilling and electric live experience bringing a crowd together – or, more likely, tearing them apart over different choices and causing them to ignore each other for the next hour. 

Control Star-Lord and the other Guardians as a crowd and determine the fate of the galaxy as it is threatened by Thanos. The crowd’s decisions will affect large and small from the smallest nuances of inter-character relationships to the outcome of the Guardians’ fight for justice – for better or worse.

The Guardians of the Galaxy crowd play is not the only delight in store for the first evening of the festival. Mura Masa, the British electronic music producer and multi-instrumentalist, will be playing a live set fresh off the stage at Coachella. We will also have an arcade featuring new and upcoming titles ranging from indie to small, and a new social card game sponsored by MailChimp where you trade unknown currency amongst each other, and trade in cards for real prizes.

Do not miss the Tribeca Games Festival opening night party next Friday, April 28th at 6:30pm, 50 Varrick Street, NY, NY 10013.

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Don’t Miss the Tribeca Games Festival Opening Night Party

If you didn’t see our announcement, we have partnered with the Tribeca Film Festival to bring you the Tribeca Games Festival. We are so excited about this opportunity The Tribeca Games Festival is going to be something incredible, and we are proud of the collection of emerging independent developers and industry greats that we have assembled. With two days of programming, two stages, and a bevy of fantastic names, the Tribeca Games Festival is not an event to be missed – and it all kicks off with an opening party like no other on Friday, April 28th at 6:30.

The Tribeca Games Festival opening night party will feature an arcade of games from indie to mainstream as well as the first-ever crowd play of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series. We will also be releasing a social card game created for exclusively for our opening night party and sponsored by MailChimp. The main event of the evening will be an incredible live concert featuring British electronic music producer and multi-instrumentalist Mura Masa, fresh off the stage at Coachella.

The opening night arcade will offer a first-look at unreleased games like What Remains of Edith Finch as well as new releases like NieR: Automata and VR offerings like Psychonauts the Rhombus of Ruin. You can also join in on the first-ever crowd play of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series. Take part on your mobile device and decide the fate of the galaxy’s bumbling defenders by voting on each crucial decision as a group, for better or worse. Also, MailChimp has sponsored an exclusive social game to be premiered at our opening night party. Trade currency strategically with very little knowledge of its value and, at the end of the night, cash out for real prizes.

The Tribeca Games Festival opening night party will get you amped and ready for day two of the festival, a day of rich onstage conversations looking at the past, present, and future of videogames. We hope to see you at the festival in two weeks!

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Announcing the Tribeca Games Festival

Grab tickets here!

We at Kill Screen are thrilled to announce our partnership with Tribeca on the first ever Tribeca Games Festival. When Tribeca said they wanted to work with us to put on this incredible event, it was an opportunity we absolutely could not pass up. The Tribeca Games Festival is going to be something incredible, and we are proud of the collection of emerging independent developers and industry greats that we have assembled. This festival will feature onstage keynote interviews with trailblazers in the games industry, including a special conversation with Hideo Kojima. It will also feature retrospective looks at games media that has shaped the landscape, exciting previews of upcoming titles, and the groundbreaking cross-cultural conversations that Kill Screen is known for.

With two days of programming, two stages, and a bevy of fantastic names, the Tribeca Games Festival is not an event to be missed. The festival will kick off with a concert headlined by British electronic music producer and multi-instrumentalist Mura Masa, alongside the New York premiere of Telltale Games’ first-ever crowd play of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series, Episode 1. Mura Masa will get you amped for day two of the fest with an opening night of futuristic beats. 

Saturday starts off with cross-cultural conversations featuring Ian Dallas of Giant Sparrow (What Remains of Edith Finch?), Robin Hunicke (Journey, Funomena) on one stage. On the other, retroactive looks at recent games that have inspired and amazed: Davey Wreden (The Stanley Parable, Beginner’s Guide), Sean Vanaman (Firewatch), Jonathan Morin (Watch Dogs 2) and Michael Chu (Overwatch) discuss the challenges and joys of interactive storytelling. A special presentation will take place as well featuring The Lawnmower Man director Brett Leonard in conversation with Jessica Brillhart of Google Cardboard to discuss the past, present & future of VR as well as the 25th anniversary of his iconic film.

The day wraps up with three keynote conversation with game industry legends. First, Sam Lake (Max Payne, Alan Wake) discusses his unique and creative approach to game design and storytelling. Then, a conversation with Hideo Kojima. Tying up the day is Ken Levine (BioShock) taking a look at his twenty-year games career and the place he made for interactive storytelling in games.

The Tribeca Games Festival promises to be something really special, and we are so pleased that we got to partner with Tribeca to make it a reality. Curating this event has been so much fun for our team, and we know that the actual weekend will be memorable to say the least. Make sure to grab your tickets before they’re gone, and we’ll see you in NYC April 28th & 29th.

Please note, if you are a Kickstarter backer with an outstanding pass for Kill Screen Fest, we will be reaching out to you soon via email.

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Why We’re Striking on International Women’s Day

As long as discrimination and inequities remain so commonplace everywhere in the world, as long as girls and women are valued less, fed less, fed last, overworked, underpaid, not schooled, subjected to violence in and outside their homes—the potential of the human family to create a peaceful, prosperous world will not be realized. – Hillary Clinton

Today, on International Women’s Day, women in the US are striking by abstaining from work and spending to demonstrate their economic power. It is a deeply ironic and upsetting proof of concept that many women cannot participate in the strike, either because their employers do not support them or because their labor is too essential.  As a media company committed to equality, Kill Screen is striking today in solidarity with the women and girls who are silenced, undervalued, and mistreated both at work and at home.

According to Vox, the original National Women’s Day took place in New York and commemorated the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union strike that happened the year prior in 1908. A hundred years ago, women were fighting for equality and fair treatment in the predominate labor sector of the time. Now, women must unfortunately continue this centuries-old battle, by fighting for fair treatment in today’s rising labor sectors, like technology. While inequality impacts every vocation, the rising economic and social importance of technology presents a new challenge.

Women are not only fighting for inclusion and fairness in this new labor force, but also for a seat in the spaces that increasingly decide what our future looks like. A report recently released by Accenture and Girls Who Code predicted that the percentage of women in computing will fall from 24% to 22% by 2025. As Susan Price stated in Forbes, “that gender gap not only impacts women’s career prospects and financial lives, but the U.S. economy as a whole. Keeping women on the sidelines means more computer jobs will go unfilled, reducing innovation and global competitiveness. It is already happening: In 2015, there were 500,000 new computing jobs to be filled but fewer than 40,000 new computer science graduates.”

Equality is not a women’s issue

Equality is not a women’s issue. The political is personal, and fighting for diversity is not an act of charity. On this Day Without a Woman, we encourage everyone to read some of the work we’ve published on the subject in the past, and to support creators and innovators of all genders, races, ethnicities, and cultures.

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Release your inner hoarder with the roguelike Loot Rascals

Are you the type of player who thinks, man, RPGs like Skyrim and The Witcher 3 are great, but I wish all this lush fantasy storyelling didn’t get in the way of my iron casket and rare weapon collecting. Or maybe you were the rare voice among No Man’s Sky dissenters who criticized the game for not letting you focus enough on collecting and managing resources. You, my friend, have a looter’s soul, and the gaming world is happy to oblige your pirate-like love of digital bounty.

If any of the above sounds like you, then you’re in luck because the turn-based roguelike Loot Rascals just released today. From the indie studio Hollow Ponds, boasting talent from Hohokum and Adventure Time, Loot Rascals is set on an alien planet where ability cards rule over a dog-eat-dog world of rapscallion aliens and robots after yer booty. By fighting and defeating said monsters, you gain ability cards that, when arranged in the right build, give you strategic advantages over your enemies. But this topsy turvy world also requires you to be cautious, since dying in the game makes you vulnerable to being looted by those same enemies—and the better the card, the more appealing your corpse is for the plundering. In a way, Loot Rascals is kind of a game about moral relativity, since choosing to steal from other players means you’re more likely to engender bad karma with them, which they will inevitably pay forward whenever you fall.

The story revolves around the mission to rescue your robot friend Big Barry from a space monster with an unsavory amount of tentacles. According to the creators, Loot Rascals tells a tale “of friendship, loss and redemption.”

You can download the game on Steam for Windows or PS4.

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Angsty adventure game Night in the Woods released after several delays

A little over a week ago, the indie-favorite 2D game Night in the Woods released after nearly four years in development and several delays.

Night in the Woods focuses on narrative, telling the story of recent college drop out Mae after returning to her old coal-mining town of Possum Springs. All is not well in the Rust Belt state, as creepy supernatural happenings intermingle with economic strife. You meander through the town and get to know the many personalities that populate it throughout this 10 hour experience.

Originally slated for fall of 2016, then January of 2017, then finally released on February 21st, the game has been much anticipated.

You can checkout Night in the Woods on PS4, Windows, macOS, and Linux.

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Gorgeous comic book gives Afro-Brazilian mythology the Avengers treatment

A lot of nerd culture is dominated by Anglo mythology. From Thor to Lord of the Rings or even Harry Potter, the creators and cultural heroes in the community only. There’s nothing wrong with that. I’m as crazy for Viking mythology as the next girl. But far from just a disservice to African or Asian or Middle Eastern, this blind spot is a much bigger diservice to nerds everywhere. There is a huge well of awesome mythology that has gone untapped, with epic characters and stories that would make even the most dignified comic book fan salivate.

That’s where Brazilian artist Hugo Canuto comes in, who decided to give the gods and goddesses of Afro-Brazilian mythology the Marvel treatment a couple years ago.

Born in the Salvador, Bahia (and my own home city), Cuanto grew up in a community with deep African roots, housing one of the biggest populations that still practices modern day, Yoruba-based religions like Candomblé and Macumba. During the Atlantic Slave Trade, an estimated 1.2 million slaves were brought to Bahia alone—that’s over 4 times more than the entire United States, and somewhere between a third to a half of the slaves brought to Brazil total. The traditions passed on through the African Diaspora live on in their influence over Brazilian culture, with dances like Capoeira and Samba, and in folk customs like wearing white on New Years to honor the sea goddess Yemanjá.

As a child, Cuanto took notice of his city’s strong African identity, falling in love with status of the deities known as Orishas (or Orixás in Portuguese) that stood tall over bodies of water throughout the city, like in the Doro do Tororó and Rio Vermelho beach. Sadly, despite the fact that Brazil houses one of the largest African populations outside Nigeria, Afro-Brazilian religions continue to be persecuted and stigmatized by the predominantly Christian population. Cuanto became more seriously involved in the preservation of these religions a couple years back as an urban development architect in Bahia, after a historical monument sacred to the Orisha named Xangô was vandalized.

“there is something greater that unites the peoples.”

“Understanding the hard reality of discrimination and persecution that these beliefs suffer, the desire arose in me to tell a story that celebrated the Afro-Brazilian religions,” he says. “I want our work to show the world how beautiful and strong Brazil’s African heritage is.” After recreating Jack Kirby’s famous Avengers #4 (1963) cover with Orishas and posting it online in 2015, Cuanto received an overwhelming amount of positive feedback. In his emulation of the Avengers, Thor was replaced by Xangô (the Orisha of justice), Iron Man is replaced by Oxaguiã (the warrior), Captain America was replaced by Ogum (god of metal work), and Ant Man is replaced by Ossain (god of the forest). Recently, he took to crowdfunding in order to extend the project into a full comic book, and that too succeeded far beyond his expectations.

“As an artist, I have always sought to understand the role of myths and religions as active forces in the formation of societies,” Cuanto says. “The inexhaustible and powerful source of myths revives and regenerates the collective unconscious, reaffirming the traditions and reminding us that, behind a world of lights and consumerism, there is something greater that unites the peoples.”

Cuanto partnered with comic book artists Marcelo Kina and Pedro Minho to create more individual prints and put together the first 90-page issue. Entitled Tales of Òrun Àiyé, he only has two issues planned, which are based on the Itan collection of Orisha folklore—but there is no lack of more comic book-worthy material elsewhere. The Orishas encapsulate the beautiful yet painful clash of cultures that lies at the heart of Brazilian culture. Like the Norse and Greek gods, these Afro-Brazilian deities are characterized by a district humanness, with flaws and drama and lost loves. “The strong and wise mythology of the Orishas can teach us about diversity, breaking stereotypes about Africa and black culture,” Cuanto believes. In fact, the Yoruban gods even displayed impressively progressive concepts toward gender, with Obatala (the god of all humans), always depicted as androgynous and without fixed gender.

there is no lack of more comic book-worthy material elsewhere

For Cuanto, spreading awareness of Afro-Brazilian mythology through comic books feels only natural. “When we speak of comics, it is a global language, present from Japan to Argentina. It is an aesthetic that allows multiple narratives and reinventions.” Though, due to the sensitive nature of depicting a colonized religion, he’s careful to approach it respectfully. “The importance is to adapt narratives that have crossed time and distances through this universal language, while still retaining the same wisdom and enchantment they had when they were told in the old cities of West Africa.”

You can purchase prints and pre-order the first issue through the project’s Facebook.

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Acclaimed electronic musician Moiré releases glitchy hellscape alongside album

The most experimental and daring (read: LIT) indie music artists have been flirting with videogames for a while now. Grimes headlined Moogfest with a Microsoft Kinect-powered interactive installation last year; the bassist from the noise-rock band Lighting Bolt, Brian Gibson, recently created the VR-favorite rhythm hell game Thumper; and Björk literally cannot even right now with how much she loves VR.

Today, architect/electronic musician Moiré joined the digital revolution, forgoing the usual music video to instead release a browser glitch art game in conjunction with his newest album, No Future. Created with interactive experience designer Isaac Cohen (AKA Cabbibo), MONOLITH consists of large, glitchy, empty spaces populated by a smattering of human avatars, a 2001: A Space Odyssey-like floating slab, and the low drum of hypnotic electronic tones. The player directs the monolith with the arrow buttons, jettisoning it around the static-y landscape as the humans run toward it with a manic kind of fervor.

their bodies barely distinguishable from the machine

Pulling from concepts in the album, MONOLITH explores a version of our dystopic technological future. According to Clash magazine’s review, the No Future album “refracts the familiar pulse of techno through the critical dystopian lens of Philip K. Dick, an author who seemed to assiduously preempt a future no-one especially wanted with alarming accuracy,” calling it an “astute dissertation on an era that is supposed to be filled with innovation and possibility, but which instead wants to turn everything into a homogenous cookie-cutter image image of itself.”

In MONOLITH, the skin of the avatars reflects the world’s digital noise, rendering their bodies barely distinguishable from the machine. In fact, in a world infested with glitches, only the monolith and a vacuous door stand out in stark black contrast. The vague human forms follow the slab mindlessly, a hoard of people pulled toward the monolith like flies to a light. Given instructions to “unite the crowd, enter the black door,” players use this pull of attraction to create a swarm of bodies, until a door opens up that allows them to jump to the next dimension, before starting the process all over again.

When it comes to the album, Clash reviewer Mat Smith aptly describes how it showcases “dance music with a slightly detached, vaguely cynical atmosphere, despite familiar motifs; cautious and cautionary, it eschews flashy statements and cryptic say-nothing/do-nothing minimalism in favour of a sound which is instantly recognisable as possessing negative sentiment.”

The game reflects a similar tone, presenting an experience of collective detachment in a world adrift with technobabble and cultish homogeny. Those who have attended MDMA-infused music festivals should feel right at home.

You can play MONOLITH here, and stream or purchase a vinyl copy of the No Future album here.

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