The Workshop Post

I think that the game “Contrast” really can show us a lot in relation to our game. The entire semester we have been calling everything Black Holes and Pulsars and because of this we take a very realistic view on everything. The crazy part is, we don’t have a realistic thing happening in this game. Nobody can create Black Holes or Pulsars in the real world; we aren’t even going for a realistic art style. One of the major things the Prof. Manley and Prof. Wright have both harped on the fact that we don’t need to stay in reality; a video game can have its own rules as long as you create your own universe. This is something that “Contrast” did very well; they took an idea from reality and made it into something that heavily breaks the laws of physics. They even set it in a realistic world; of course some of the properties are different but the basic atmosphere makes you assume it takes place on earth.

                 

This is why games are so amazing. People are will to suspend disbelief in a video game because that is why they play them. You come to a video game to escape so why not, when creating a game, do whatever you want. Of course keep it within scope and make sure it connects to your game but do what you want, it’s your game, your world. I originally intended this to be mostly about how we could improve our game with this knowledge and while we have done a lot with it (starting by removing the misnomer of black holes and pulsars) my focus is on the industry now.

               

 One of the big things we find in the current game industry is repetition. Once they find a way to make a First Person Shooter and it sells they just keep making it that way with sequels just adding the bare minimum they can so they can string the series as long as possible. What my group ended up doing was find a concept that maybe hasn’t been done but something similar was done.  We took that idea (Portal) and flipped it on its back. We took it apart and said: “what could we possibly do with this.” In terms our class could understand, the game industry isn’t spending enough time on Stage One anymore.  Games are losing that reality breaking cool spin because they find something that works and push it down people’s throats as hard as possible. Thankfully Indie developers have been making some crazy games lately and pushing those Triple A companies to react. What we want to see is more of “Contrast” we want games that push the possibilities, a 2D game inside a 3D game. This is something that is simply not done. “Contrast” said why not and did it. In their universe that they created it works, seamless entrance between dimensions. The words “can’t be done” or “not possible in this world” shouldn’t be used anymore. The strange and unique should be embarrassed. Let us push away from carbon copy and adopt the strange and special.