Re: [-empyre-] hi

[Ana Valdés <agora@algonet.se>]

I am a gamer, most I am a gambler, but in Huizingas terms in Homo 
Ludens. I mean, I don't want to wait, I want to live fast and invest 
huge amounts of time, passion and energy in what I am doing. The games 
are for me a platform, well crafted enough to carry on same "narrative". 
The narrative I am interested on its about hegemony, subalternity and 
borders. We speak Gender (I do) but we should also speak class, 
struggles, confrontation, conficts. Games are poweful tools, I want use 
them for fun and for learning. To try to support another agenda than the 
most games show today. I am tired of shot ups, cover agents recovering 
hostages and being blasted by guys at towers, I am tired to decide if I 
want to be a Green Beret today or a Freedom fighter.
I think its the paradox, we are always reproducing the hegemonic models 
but not creating new models of behaviour and relations.
Ana

brody condon wrote:

> I'm less interested in talking the big B's theories, and more how they 
> have manifested themselves in concrete ways among my generation and 
> those younger than me, especially in what is already a "culture based 
> in cooperation, shareware and networking", the online game 
> modification communities. One example, after the school shootings in 
> Colorado, I was sitting with a friend, looking over the list of 
> victims, laughing about who we would have shot or let go had we been 
> in the killer's position. It's part of reason my friends can snicker 
> and awe at the current output of beheading truama porn videos, or my 
> students can make a game mod about people falling from the twin 
> towers. I found it's exactly my internalized and irresponsible shift 
> between signifying systems and reality, or seperation of media images 
> from their original context and meaning, that scares me, but also 
> drives interesting work in my opinion. I am not convinced yet the 
> medium in its current state is built for a direct relationship with 
> contrived critical or political content as with say, traditional 
> documentary. I have to be honest, In terms of creating interesting 
> cultural products, I feel like Kuma War is kicking all of our asses, 
> and it's because one, they actually understand the craft of game 
> development, (btw, Flash and Shockwave did not evolve along the same 
> lines as the history of "gaming", net based interactive design has a 
> very different geneology, community, and set of references) and they 
> dont limit themselves at any point to being culturally or artistically 
> responsible, or politically correct. Unfortunely at the same time, all 
> of this mixed with political apathy and a lack of engagement with 
> world history in the states is obviously one factor in what makes 
> something like the situation in Iraq possible. But while watching the 
> "Under Fire" panel I could not help thinking, as intelligent and 
> well-intentioned as it may have been, that many of us are cultural war 
> profiteers, no different than Kuma War, we just get paid more 
> indirectly and push a polar-opposite agenda. What also triggered this 
> idea was the fact that we (WacoRes) were just in the "Bang the 
> Machine" game/art show in San Francisco, which also included a huge 
> America's Army installation. No protest by the "critical" artists 
> whatsoever. This is the unholy state of things.
>
>
>
> Ana Valdés wrote:
>
> > Hi Brody, cool to "meet old faces" in different forums. I was invited 
> > to participate in Witte de Witt discussion "Under Fire" by Catherine 
> > David, one of the most intelligent and well informed curator in our 
> > days. I think Catherines work with "Arabic Representations in the 
> > Modern World" is an example of how to use critical thinking and a 
> > radical view to Art and to representation.
> > We live in a world dominated by "representation" in Baudrillard terms 
> > and my question and the aim of my activism today is not to create 
> > "reactions" to, or "actions against", but "creation" per se, it 
> > means, the possibility to create not a counter culture but a culture 
> > based in cooperation, shareware and networking.
> > I think Gonzalo Frascas games,  http://www.newsgaming.com/, show 
> > pretty well how to deal with political and activist issues withing a 
> > game interface.
> > Ana
> >
> >
> > brody condon wrote:
> >
> > > Hello, I am one of the creators of Waco Res, and I have a history of 
> > > work made around games and game culture - www.tmpspace.com
> > >
> > > Melinda, it's great to hear positive feedback on the actual 
> > > experiece with some of these "reality" pieces. But I have to be 
> > > honest, as someone who grew up spending a substantial amount of time 
> > > buried in computer and role-playing game aesthetics and interactive 
> > > structures, I rarely get excited by spending time "playing" any of 
> > > these games. There seems to be misconception that shoving topical 
> > > content into a poorly crafted game world with a lack interesting 
> > > game flow is somehow useful. In the end we are left with a mix of 
> > > poor art and poor engineering that reeks of so much 90's media art. 
> > > I am guilty of this myself. At the same time, I was just on 
> > > "political games" panel with Harvey Smith, one the creators of Deus 
> > > Ex, and he is on the other end of the spectrum. He spoke 
> > > passionately about embedding political metaphor into that popular 
> > > mainstream game. In the end, even though those intentions are 
> > > surrounded by virtuoso game design and solid graphics, it falls 
> > > flat. Curious, does the craft of game play and design actually 
> > > matter? Is it enough that these critical games just exist as 
> > > alternatives?
> > >
> > > Ana, I am familiar with you from your involvement with the Under 
> > > Fire panel on representations of violence recently staged at the 
> > > Witte de With in Rotterdam. By the way I was probably born when you 
> > > were in prison, and I am literally the child of the bitter and drug 
> > > addicted aftermath of the somewhat failed countercultural movement 
> > > in the US during that period. It would be nice to bring some of the 
> > > issues raised at the Witte into this discussion. Although I was 
> > > skeptical at first, there seemed to be some actual work being done 
> > > to understand in a comprehensive way the structure and processes 
> > > that have created our current relationship with images of violent 
> > > conflict in tele/film/games/news. Some of the conclusions might be 
> > > useful here, It seems like most of the discussions around this 
> > > specific topic end up as pointing to the surge in reality gaming, 
> > > mixed with healthy fear of those games being produced by 
> > > conservative agendas: Kuma War, AA, Op-F18, whatever. And going back 
> > > to Melinda's point, I am curious what you, and especially Rafeal, 
> > > see as the important results that come out of somewhat predicatable 
> > > game scenarios made by a group "in opposition to the dominant 
> > > political force". Again, not the most interesting questions, but as 
> > > someone making these hopeless and pathetic gestures,  I'm still 
> > > curious if it is enough that these dissident forms of cultural 
> > > production simply exist as an end in themselves? Are they actually 
> > > effective/affective?
> > >
> > > -Brody
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > empyre forum
> > > empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> > > http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>
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