ceci n'est pas une blog

http://www.elsewhere.org/pomo/

Here's a somewhat relevant toy that's fun for English majors :D

When I was a kid, I would cheat at the choose-your-own adventure books because I was impatient. I'd just read pages out of order or purposefully look ahead. I don't know what that would symbolize in terms of literary analysis but I feel like it adds a third layer. Choose-your-own-adventure has some sort of structure. My version of it was anarchy.

Today's reading also reminded me a lot of this X-Files game I used to have which was very similar to a choose-your-own-adventure but it incorporated video and computer elements. It actually had little to do with the main X-Files character - you were just a random person caught up in some complicated conspiracy. There was a main "correct" path you had to take but you could create variations along the path. Also, there was a great deal of interaction going on...I appreciated that a lot of the interaction had nothing to do with the main "point" of the game. For example, you could read "your" (you play a male FBI agent) diary, harass your ex-wife or even commit suicide (hahah, wasn't exactly age-appropriate!). Along with your actions, you chose how you interacted with people - you could hit on people or be an absolute asshole which would do anything from change the dialogue to get you shot.

In this way, it had variable discourse and variable plot but a limited point of view.

also this: "The ludic pleasure of deciphering the logic of the system – what game designers call reverse engineering- cannot be separated from the narrative pleasure of watching the story unfold" reminded me of an article by Chuck Klosterman when he talks about his younger niece explaining how to play the Sims: "'You just live here,' she said. 'That's just the way it is.' But where did I get all this money? 'You just have money.' But where did I come from? 'Nobody knows. You're just here.' Am I one of the 55 million Americans living without health insurance? 'Be quiet! You won't get sick.' ... The rules become fixed. Fabricating a Sim-human's college experience would be no different than randomly deciding that 90210's Brenda Walsh got a C+ in tenth-grade biology. Those facts aren't available to anyone. Clearly, video technology cages imagination; it offers interesting information to use, but it implies all peripheral information is irrelevant and off-limits."