Kill Screen Magazine's Blog, page 254

Come duel your friends to Bach's concertos this Wednesday

Johann Sebastian Joust, Petanque, and drinks in the financial district. 

Unexpected videogame adverts celebrate women, fashion, and dance

A more fiercely feminine type of game marketing.

Chilling art installation turns drone strike fatalities into a shopping bill

This is artist Jonathan Fletcher Moore’s Artificial Killing Machine. Unlike other artificial killing machines—machine guns, shotguns, rifles, swords, switchblades, kitchen knives, tanks, battlefield range ballistic missiles, short-range ballistic missiles, medium-range ballistic missiles, intermediate-range ballistic missiles, intercontinental ballistic missiles, and submarine-launched ballistic missiles, to name but a select few—it is an interactive art installation.

“This time based work accesses a public database on U.S. military drone strikes,” Moore writes on his website. “When a drone strike occurs, the machine activates, and fires a children’s toy cap gun for every death that results.” Since drone warfare is cloaked in secrecy, Artificial Killing Machine cannot simply rely on voluntarily disclosed government data. Instead, Moore used The Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s “Drone War” dataset, which aims to offer a complete accounting of strikes in Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. In case drone warfare didn’t treat human life—or at least some lives— as cheap, the details of each strike are printed out using a retail-style receipt printer. The receipts pile up on the floor, like scraps waiting to be swept away. 

How do you imagine very real people? 

A chair sits beneath the installation. Any attendee can sit in it and watch the murderous edifice at work. Or, as Moore puts it, the viewer is invited to “sit in the chair and experience the imagined existential risk.” This raises two questions: Who is at risk here and what exactly are we trying to imagine?

The existential risk, as the Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s research attests, is definitely not imagined if you happen to live in Pakistan, Yemen, or Somalia. Artificial Killing Machine imagines these deaths, but only in the sense that it makes them more tangible. There is, of course, the other side of the coin. “Drone operators,” according to an Air Force study cited by Matthew Power in GQ, “[suffer] from the same levels of depression, anxiety, PTSD, alcohol abuse, and suicidal ideation as traditional combat aircrews.” Drones have transformed warfare into remote, menial work, a phenomenon Paolo Pedercini explores in his game Unmanned, but the existential risk remains. 

As databases of drone strikes grow, so does the challenge of understanding what all those data points really mean: people, places, lives, dreams, death. How do you imagine very real people? This is one of the moral and practical challenges of conducting drone warfare, but it is also a challenge faced by citizens who merely wish to understand it. On their own, traditional infographics may not be enough.

Subalekha Udayasankar has cited an interactive graphic about drone strikes in Pakistan as part of the inspiration for her card game about drone warfare, Bycatch. Indeed, Bycatch goes beyond the lists of deaths and tries to understand the choices that led to that point. In a similar fashion, Artificial Killing Machine, uses gunfire and receipts to add immediacy—if not context—to killings on the other side of the world. Artificial Killing Machine, like Bycatch, is a high concept form of data visualization. When the datum in question is a deceased human, this should be the bare minimum standard for representation.  

eSports are gaining in popularity, but do the games support it?

Imperfect games and perfected strategies may create an esports bubble.

Campo Santo demonstrates how NOT to end an E3 trailer

Did you catch Firewatch's E3 trailer? Well, after some serene shots of the Wyoming national park—which will be the exploration game's main setting—the trailer ends on a rather tense note. Some suspicious activity has spooked the park rangers, protagonist Henry and his walkie-talkie companion Delilah. Just as Henry realizes someone purposefully sabotaged their communication equipment, Delilah's voice goes cold with fear on the radio. "Wait, you're not in your tower?" she asks. No, says Henry. "Then who is?" The camera zooms in on his watch tower, where the lights remain on. This ending leaves viewers with thoughts of what potential horrors the perpetrator might be inflicting on Henry's poor watch tower. The music crescendos as the Firewatch logo cuts, and viewers lose their minds with excitement for the game's 2015 release date.

But, as the Campo Santo devblog reveals, things could've gone way different in the trailer. Designer Jake Rodkin explains that "when editing the Firewatch E3 trailer, we asked ourselves, 'What is the dumbest, most bad way someone might end this trailer?' and and made a version that ends with an iris wipe in the shape of the Firewatch logo." The secret alternate ending was supposed to be laid to rest immediately after it suffered its horrible mutant birth. But, instead, it was "then rescued from the bad idea bin, set on fire, and thrown in the brilliantly-awful bin by Chris [Remo] and [the] effects artist Mark Wood with the addition of a winking park ranger man Olly [Moss] drew."

I could imagine all sorts of horrible endings 

Certainly, ending your E3 trailer with a transition effect most popularly used in a powerpoint presentation isn't great. And, admittedly, the park ranger/pip-boy dude who comes into the final frame to give a creepy wink doesn't help. But I could imagine all sorts of horrible endings that way surpass Campo Santo's attempts. Like what if the screen dramatically cuts to black, before Henry goes, "Oh wait actually, I think I left the lights on by accident." Or, better yet, what if the camera keeps zooming in on the watch tower, only to reveal Sir Turtleton III (the now famous turtle featured earlier in the trailer) wearing a monocle and petting a cat like the secret evil mastermind he is.

There are all sorts of horrible ways you could end your E3 trailer. Campo Santo shows that having fun, even with the pressure of E3 breathing down your neck, is important.

The hardcore gamers of Tinder

What is the ultimate player of Tinder like?

What you missed at the Ace Hotel this week

We had a great time playing games at the Ace Hotel last night. In case you missed it, here’s what we showed off.

Monster Dress Up

In a genre usually dominated by unrealistic beauty standards born of the male gaze, Monster Dress Up finally lets us embrace our inner monster. Instead of pencil-thin skeletons, you play realistically proportioned ooze monsters, lizard girls and werewolf ladies.

Where to get it: http://jborge.itch.io/monsterdressup

Vin Diesel DMing A Game Of D&D Just For You

Action movie star Vin Diesel may be a tough guy on screen, but he’s a lovable nerd in reality, and his very favorite game is Dungeons and Dragons. The best part is, he’s willing to teach you how to play.

Where to get it: http://a-dire-fawn.itch.io/diesel-dm

Hot Date

Meeting people is hard. Maybe it would be easier if they were pugs? Hot Date confirms that no, it would not.

Where to get it: http://georgebatch.itch.io/hot-date

Regular Human Basketball

This is just a game about two regular folks playing some b-ball. No giant clanking death machines here. No sir!

Where to get it: http://powerhoof.itch.io/regular-human-basketball

Catlateral Damage

Initially built as part of the 7 Day FPS Jam in 2013, Catlateral Damage is a game about consequence-free destruction. As a cat, obliterate the neatly-kept apartment of your owner. Lick your paws adorably as he kneels in the rubble, weeping.

Where to get it: http://www.catlateraldamage.com/ or on Steam.

Evolver

As a promotion for his new album, Brooklyn-based artist Rioux teamed up with Vinyl Williams to release this morphic, psychedelic environment. Explore iridescent temples and palm trees to united electronic and acoustic sounds of the Evolver EP.

Where to get it:

PC: https://www.dropbox.com/s/d7wojvhncd2hce8/RiouxEvolverInteractivePC.zip?dl=1

Mac: https://www.dropbox.com/s/01b2wadca80ql6l/RiouxEvolverInteractiveMAC.zip?dl=1

Jenny LeClue

Nancy Drew can pack up and go--Jenny LeClue is a girl detective for the modern age. Pragmatic, vulnerable and intuitive, Jenny embodies everything we want to see in a hero at the heart of a mystery story.

Where to get it: http://jennyleclue.com/

Sluggish Morss: Days of the Purple Sun

Though it’s the most accessible of the series, Sluggish Morss: Days of the Purple Sun still sports the same patchwork style blending claymation, Flash animation and collage that marked previous games as some of the strangest available.

Where to get it: http://jackspinoza.itch.io/sluggish-morss-days-of-the-purple-sun

INK

INK is about the risk and reward of discovery. Spray color around you with each jump and bounce, first revealing the invisible landscape and then mastering it.

Where to get it: http://zackbellgames.itch.io/ink

My Garbage Cat Wakes Me Up At 3AM Every Day

This autobiographical tale by Will Herring tells the story of his own garbage cat, who wakes him up literally every day. Now even if you don’t have a cat, you too can experience living with one.

Where to get it: http://grey2scale.itch.io/garbage-cat

Invisible Inc

Invisible Inc marries turn-based stealth to the roguelike traditions of random level generation and consequences that aren’t easy to reset. The result is a brutal game of hide-and-seek, filled with tension and relief.

Where to get it: http://www.invisibleincgame.com/ and Steam

TRIPAD

Made from three touchpads, the TRIPAD is an analogue game that seeks to uncover possibilities and inspire further development in the area of three-player games. 

Where to get it: Nowhere! TRIPAD is one of a kind. Look out for the next showing!

Porpentine talks about leaving her trauma-filled hypertext fictions in the past

"It felt like making a doppelganger of myself and shooting her in the head."

You'll spend more time than you should goofing off with this little lion dude

Lions are fucking awesome. These animals aren't called king of the jungle for nothing, and it's not hard to see why they'd instantly became status symbols to human kind, from monarchies to incestuous Game of Thrones houses alike. I mean, just look at this thing:

This is a portrait of raw, unadulterated power. Each step a lion takes pulses with animalistic prowess. They are creatures always teetering on the brink of fighting or fucking everything, sharpening their claws while they flick their tongues and stare at you with an unwavering kind of focus. Then, there's the other side of a lion—the one that's almost indistinguishable from the modern house cat. For several moments on end, lions forget they're king of the jungle. No matter how old they get, curiosity can drive a lion into an almost gentle kind of play style. Because if a lion isn't killing the thing it's reaching its 16 cm paws out to grab, it's probably nudging it with inquisitive care.

almost indistinguishable from the modern house cat 

In summation: lions are the shit. So, by the transitive property, Chill the lion—an interactive WebGL 3D animation of an awesomely chill lion by Karim Maaloul—is also the shit. Described as an "experiment," you first meet Chill (officially this little lion's name, by my decree) while he's looking on at your cursor with delighted anticipation. His big brown nose bulges out of his little yellow face as he tracks your movement, and you just wanna give those big brown eyes anything and everything they desire.

Then, you see the direction to "move the fan and press to make wind," which, "the lion will surely appreciate." Mr. Chill certainly does appreciate it. His rounded mouth shoots upward into a wide grin and he closes his cat eyes in sublime pleasure. His mane, made out of a low poly, origami-like material, flaps in the wind. Though there's no sound, you can practically hear him cooing his satisfaction through the screen. You can even make Mr. Chill dance a little fan dance in celebration of the cooling effect, making his little butt wiggle in place.

But, though I love Mr. Chill with all my heart, I couldn't help but think of more things I wanted to do with him throughout the day. So, without further ado, here are some suggestions for a 2.0 version (hey, there's an option to edit the coding!)

Jess' list of improvements and features to little lion dude

Purrrr-ability

A little sailor suit and/or bow tie

A lioness companion (after all, the lionesses are the ones hunting and keeping the pack alive)

The option to reverse the fan, so his origami mane can be pulled over his cutey face

A box

Listen, I'm going to level with you; I spent way too much of my day cooling this goddamn virtual lion. In fact, at one point, I decided to take a break outside during my workday and, as I sweated in the sweltering heat, I still thought to cool down my digital companion before myself. Like the IRL lion, there is something at once majestic and cute about Mr. Chill. He is essentially hypnotoad. You could hang out with him all day, but you probably shouldn't... and it doesn't really matter either way because you have no choice since he's already sunk his adorably lethal claws into your brain.

Play with Mr. Chill yourself on any browser here.

The politics of beauty

Capitalism, modernism, and the dehumanization of art.