Dragon Master 5000

Ian Bogost is concerned with a critical approach to video games in his aptly titled book How to Talk About Video Games . In forming an answer to his titular question, he draws inspiration from other genres of established criticism like literary or film criticism. However he suggests that, because video games are inseparable from their platform or medium, approaching with a lens that focuses just on narrative content is insufficient. In the introduction he writes, “how to talk about videogames? Like a critic, not a reviewer, for one, but also: like a toaster critic, not just a film critic. To do game criticism is to take this common born subject as toaster and as savior, as milk and as wine, as idiocy and as culture.” Addressing the duality and natural tension in games and gaming platforms is a recurring theme in Bogost’s writing. It is important that Bogost here establishes an apologetic tone, as if he knows that he is going to be asking more of games than they were perhaps intended t...

Mr. 100! 2:  Rise and Fall of Trylo Ren, or  How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Sharks This was a fun and surprisingly intuitive project. We found that because we had a lot of exposure to gifs we naturally understood how to convey a mood through movement. The limits of how much camera movement we could have while keeping a simple vision came naturally. We wanted to tell a classic heroic tale because we thought it would be interesting to isolate the critical moments on a familiar journey (a hero discovers people in need, is defeated, discovers their destiny, overcomes the odds and defeats the enemy) and see how we could augment them with repetition. We also wanted to tell that tale in an atypical medium to see how we could bring a fresh take to a well-trod genre. Using toys on a drawn kind of backdrop made it feel more like a diorama that calls upon the imagination of the viewer to translate that movement in...

This song repeats a five note motif persistently, even relentlessly from beginning to end. What surprised me is how much this repeated motif stimulates the development and evolution of my emotions as I listen. The song casts this motif in slightly different musical light every time it repeats, and every repetition produces a new perspective. The heart of the song never changes, but the world around it changes. The five note motif transforms from anxious to stoic to overwhelming to underwhelming to peaceful to intimidating to comforting to weightless and ultimately still just by changing its surroundings. My physical manifestation of the sonic five note motif is this drawing of a little humanoid alien creature. It in and of itself defies emotional association. However, when the creature’s world changes around it, how we see it and what we notice about it changes. When it is one of many, when it stands alone, when it is small, when it is ...