Moving!!

My new site is over at http://mitchalexander.wikidot.com, because wikis are groovy!

See you there!

[GayGamer.Net] It's Hard Being Tomodachi With Corporations

Recently, an uproar tore out across the internets when Nintendo decided not to include same-sex relationships in their life-sim game Tomodachi Life; people were incensed, Nintendo issued a fairly standard apology, people were mildly more optimistic but also still kind of sore. In response, there have been questions, confusions and concerns from folk criticising the backlash against Nintendo, for various reasons.

Many have echoed Nintendo’s sentiment of “social commentary” by claiming that games are “just games”, they’re escapist fantasies, they’re entertainment, and as such, they shouldn’t serve any “political agenda”. But games are not just “escapism”, they’re not just frivolous forays into time-wasting in between reading “Ulysses” or “Animal Farm”, they’re not “just” anything – there’s an entire side to the games industry called serious games! Games, like any medium, like any artform, like any kind of entertainment – both reflect the culture that created it and influences that society’s perspective. As Anna at BorderHouseBlog notes, choosing to abstain from “social commentary” on an issue IS social commentary — any action in a politically-muddied situation is political action. Similarly, Nintendo’s initial decision not to include same-sex relationships – and their subsequent decision not to – did not happen in a vacuum. They happened in an industry already hesitant about, if not inimical to, LGBTQ representation, in a culture where LGBTQ people are already marginalised, poorly represented and discriminated against.

(You can read the rest of this article over at GayGamer.net! >>)

[GayGamer.net] Queer Mechanic #6: Relationships

Queer Mechanic is a regular feature over on GayGamer – each month, we’ll be presenting a new game mechanic that could be used in games that include or focus on queer identity or culture. Queer Mechanic is a thought experiment, to see both what we could add to games, and to recognise what’s been missing from them; it’s a challenge, both to readers, to come up with novel, interesting and effective ways to use them, and to developers, to include them in games; and it’s a discussion for a more inclusive, more varied, and more innovative future for the games industry.

Relationship mechanics have become enormously popular in recent years, to the extent that it”s not uncommon to see forum threads of speculation about whether certain characters in games can be “romanced”, guides for the optimal way to romantically engage with Love Interests (LIs), or discussing the difficulties inherent in romance options in games. The creation of engaging and interesting romance options and mechanics is something that’s vital, timely, and, most importantly, wanted.

Nonetheless, implementing romance options isn’t as easy as just rubbing one character on another until hearts pop out (…figuratively speaking). For example, the complexity of the sexual politics involved in Dragon Age: Origins alone is staggering, before we even get to what Denis Farr refers to as the “Schroedinger’s Sexuality” of Dragon Age II and the fact that some players had reservations about how the in-game Love Interests were portrayed as “playersexual” rather than bisexual – that is, there is little-to-no reference to their sexual orientation except in the case of when the player-character puts the moves on them. And, in those instances when romance mechanics go wrong, they can goreally wrong: case in point, Gaygamer’s Trevor Smith’s discussion of the abject horror of badly-implemented romance mechanics resulting in a deeply creepy ‘romance’ scene.

So, it’s important that we have interesting and engaging relationship options – but it’s also important that these options don’t undermine themselves by cutting corners, which can lead to perpetuating tired stereotypes without commentary, creating one-size-fits-all mechanisms that take away nuance and context, and sending out mixed messages.

Unfortunately, the games industry has done all three of these things repeatedly over the years, to the point that whenever games include relationships or romance options that aren’t your regular cis-heteronormative man-kisses-woman-and-they-marry fare, they tend to be cliché, crude, or conflicted. And that’s if they include them in the first place.

But in this month’s Queer Mechanic, we’re not talking about “the gay romance option”. We’re talking about romance options, plural – using game mechanics to explore how we could model and represent alternative relationship structures like polyamory, open relationships, D/s relationships and more, and the possibilities and difficulties these bring with them.

(You can read the rest of the article over at GayGamer.net! >>)

[GayGamer.net] Queer Mechanic #5: Queering the Male Gaze

Queer Mechanic is a regular feature over on GayGamer – each month, we’ll be presenting a new game mechanic that could be used in games that include or focus on queer identity or culture. Queer Mechanic is a thought experiment, to see both what we could add to games, and to recognise what’s been missing from them; it’s a challenge, both to readers, to come up with novel, interesting and effective ways to use them, and to developers, to include them in games; and it’s a discussion for a more inclusive, more varied, and more innovative future for the games industry.

The concept of male gaze as we know it now was formulated by Laura Mulver in her 1975 essay, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”, and has since been diffused throughout the fields of media critique and analysis, in particular that of film.

Finally Feminism 101 has an excellent FAQ on the male gaze over here, which is well-worth reading so that most of what follows makes sense, but, in summary: the male gaze is the name given to the idea that scenes in media are often constructed from the perspective of an assumed straight-male viewer and his (often, but not always, sexual) interests.

We’ve probably all seen movies where a female character takes a shower, and the camera takes its time to hover over her body, lingering at her hips, her ass, her breasts, perhaps a close-up of her lips, half-opened, or her eyes, closed as though in pleasure.

Boom. That’s male gaze. The camera “stands in” for the straight male audience, watching the woman in a way that would probably seem jarring and unusual were it to be done to a male character. Not because male characters aren’t nice to look at – but because we’re so used to seeing only women framed as sexual characters (or objects).

Male gaze is an interesting topic to discuss in the medium of games, because video games in particular have borrowed a number of techniques, concepts and vocabulary from film that make it ripe for exploration – the most obvious of these are Quantic Dream’s games Fahrenheit/Indigo Prophecy, Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls, but really, any game with characters moving around a scene and followed by a camera will inevitably borrow filmic techniques. And, as the concept of “male gaze” has similarly been applied to other non-film media, so to can we discuss the theory with regards to concepts unique to (or most prevalent in) games.

For this month’s Queer Mechanic, we’re going to take a look at ways of toying with, subverting, destabilising and queering the concept of the straight male gaze. So let’s jump right in!

(Click here to read the rest of the article in its entirety over at GayGamer.net!)

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WYCH ELM is a new computer game I am working on.

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It is about WITCHES and MAGICK and QUEERNESS and URBAN LEGENDS and MYSTERIES and SCOTLAND.

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It makes use of CUT UP TECHNIQUE and HAUNTOLOGY and COLLAGE and PSYCHOGEOGRAPHY and GHOST DRONE.

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It will be accompanied by SIGILS and MAGICKAL RITUALS and MEDITATIONS as part of the wider "WYCH ELM GAME PROJECT".

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It will arrive SOON. In the meantime, you can follow WYCH-ELM-GAME on TUMBLR and the WYCH ELM page on FACEBOOK for NEWS and DEVELOPMENT EPHEMERA.

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All of WYCH ELM's art assets are sourced directly from PUBLIC DOMAIN IMAGES from the LIBRARIUM BRITANNICA.

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[GayGamer.Net] Queer Mechanic #4: Transition

Queer Mechanic is a regular feature over on GayGamer – each month, we’ll be presenting a new game mechanic that could be used in games that include or focus on queer identity or culture. Queer Mechanic is a thought experiment, to see both what we could add to games, and to recognise what’s been missing from them; it’s a challenge, both to readers, to come up with novel, interesting and effective ways to use them, and to developers, to include them in games; and it’s a discussion for a more inclusive, more varied, and more innovative future for the games industry.

Trans people are rarely represented in games, and when they are, the representation is rarely very positive; given that the vast majority of games fall over this first set of hurdles, it can be hard to imagine what games with trans-ness represented and catered towards would look like.

If I could bet on someone being able to imagine these games, though, it would be Eilidh, Emily Crosbie, and Moose Hale, three trans gamers who took part in this interview to share their understanding with game developers, players, and writers looking to address the massive imbalance against trans people, issues, characters and representation in general throughout the medium of videogames.

While reading, it’s important to note that transitioning is not the be-all, end-all of trans experience, as Laverne Cox recently attested to in an interview (alongside Carmen Carrera) with Katie Couric; it’s one facet of a massive, nuanced set of topics which overlaps with queer-interest games-based discussion, and (hopefully!) one of many more to come.

Enough from me, though: let’s have Eilidh, Emily and Moose take us through Queer Mechanic #4, discussing transition and representation of trans people in videogames!

(You can read the rest of the article over at its home on GayGamer.net!)

Is Painting Art?

or, “Of Course Painting Is Art, I Thought I Should Specify Because If Nothing Else, Jonathan Jones’ Opinion Pieces Show That There Really Are People Who Believe Things That Sound Like Satirical Pisstakes”, by Mitch Alexander.

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Is painting art?

I’m being facetious, of course: the answer is a resounding “no”. But recently, it seems more and more people have been asking this ludicrous question, probably inspired by those asking whether or not videogames can ever be art – thankfully, Jonathan Jones has done his part (more than once!) to demonstrate how farcical the idea is to anyone with a decent classical education, and I feel it’s high time someone with an ounce of sense did the same with regards to the upswell of voices that ask that odious, tedious question: is painting art?

Again, I reiterate: no.

I’ve previously been criticised for focusing exclusively on postmodern art when it comes to painting; I for one believe that if this genre is a representation of modern minds, then it stands to reason that we should focus our critiques thereupon.

However, as if to hammer my detractors’ point home, Santa brought me a collection of paintings of various styles and methods, from Impressionist to Abstract, from Surrealist to Modern. After looking directly at them for about a minute each (as is the custom, I’m told), I feel I’ve certainly learned a great deal more about the place of painting when it comes to art (or lack thereof).

I categorically believe that there is a place for appreciation of painting in our lives – and there is certainly a place for paintings above the authentic marble fireplace, in my newly-renovated lounge room – but that does not make them art. This is demonstrable from a glance.

For example, Dutch & Flemish painters only managed to achieve realistic-looking portraits and scenes despite decades of work; paintings that were achieved, it should be said, by simply copying the appearance of a model and applying it onto a canvas without a single change! I believe, at most, painting can only really be considered “high craft” - if that.

I say “if that”, because, while the Dutch school were content to simply copy what they saw, they at least managed to hide the rough edges of their work; who in their right mind would look upon Vincent van Gogh’s piece “Starry Night”, with its blurry approximations, visible brushstrokes and unrealistic representations and crown it “art”? Probably the same kind of mind that made it, I suppose – young, angry, unwashed men, sitting in their darkened rooms, furiously painting a vase of flowers with a pastry utensil and some blobs of goo on a wooden board, surrounded by framed portraits of nude women – of which there seems to be an overwhelming amount. Hardly a lifestyle appropriate for an “artist”, I would opine.

Van Gogh is by not, however, the sole offender, nor the worst of his flock – it’s sad to say that this trend of inept, awkward spatters of paint is not just the province of the edgy, “alternative” art scene, but also is reflected in the mainstream “artists” whom we are to believe represent the best of the best. Who could look upon Jackson Pollack’s whimsical smudges and say he was extorting a profound, spiritual message? Which imbecile would equate Picasso’s slow degeneration from skillful craft down to hodge-podge abstraction with meaning? And what of the almighty waste of good paint that is “Vir Heroicus Sublimis” - how could anyone feel shaken to their spiritual core by a blown-up photograph of the napkins on the sideboard in our conservatory?

It’s difficult – nay, nigh impossible – to imagine anyone being moved by some blobs of liquid on some material. Will we be sighing at the “Impressionist” stains of Earl Grey on my cords next? Will we be swooning at the juxtaposition of rustic, earthy brown tones against the soft, ephemeral textures of the towels my wife has neatly stacked in the linen cupboard? Will I be heralded every time I dye my greys, or leave a pink sock in the wash? Will my son Hamilton be fast-tracked to art school because his “outsider art” of a picture of a zebra brought a tear to the eye of his kooky art teacher who encourages otherwise rational children that smearing mustard on fabric is evidence of skill, of craft, of art?

If the outspoken minority of people who believe painting can ever be art are ever heard by an uncritical ear, this painting of the future may not be so outlandish and obscene after all.