. media culture . videogame
art . videogame . visual

Harun Farocki Interview - Serious Games In Samos

Harun_Farocki_Serious_Games.jpg It’s certainly not often that one gets to visit thought-provoking exhibitions while on summer vacation. But this year at Samos, the closest Greek island to the coast of Turkey, an exhibition by one of the most well-reputed film and video makers of our times took place. Harun Farocki, who lives and  ... [ Continue ]


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activism . videogame

Unmanned, playing tolerance to reality

Unmanned, Molleindustria, unmanned_molleindustria.jpg Molleindustria' s games have traditionally aimed to put the player in a rather uncomfortable or unusual position. Previous games have asked users to run McDonald's businesses, to hide church scandals in Italy, or to supervise child labour in Congo. The team of radical Italian game designers have launched their latest challenge: 'Unmanned' invites you to become a UAV pilot and follow the character throughout  ... [ Continue ]


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art . media . mobile . videogame

Photo / Nikto, fighting with light and darkness

chiara ciociola, Douglas Edric Stanley, Annelore Schneider, HEAD Geneve, Photo / Nikto, photo_nykto.jpg Photo/Nikto is a game for the iPad, designed by Annelore Schneider and Douglas Edric Stanley for the project "Unterplay" of the Master of the Media Design - HEAD Geneve. Its functioning is very simple. Before playing, the touchscreen of the device is exactly half white and half black. Touching the screen the game starts. If the room light is on, the white part of the screen gradually  ... [ Continue ]


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art . interactive . videogame

"Jeff Koons must die!!!", arcade-themed art

Jeff Koons must die!!!, Huner Jonakin, jeff_koons_must_die.jpg What if you were locked in an art museum overnight with a rocket launcher, during a Jeff Koons retrospective? What would you do? You would have two options: to either stroll around the virtual museum and observe a retrospective of Jeff Koons's artwork, or open fire and burn all of the art pieces down to the ground.  This at least is what the multimedia American artist Huner Jonakin suggests  ... [ Continue ]


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art . hacktivism . interactive . videogame

Automatypewriter, a semiotic interaction with fiction

Automatypewriter, Jonathan M. Guberman, automatypewriter.jpg Automatype- writer is a typewriter that works on its own: the buttons operate automatically, writing on the sheet without the need to type. The machine is also capable to detect human text and elaborate plausible answers in various ways. Jonathan M. Guberman has designed and developed it as a new game interface for old adventure games like Zork, those, it is worth remembering, in which the  ... [ Continue ]


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art . interactive . videogame

Sleep Is Death, video playing with humans

Jason Rohrer, Sleep is Death, sleep_is_death.jpg Art games are usually meant to reconsider rules, but often this reduces to just playing with conventions. "Sleep is Death (Geisterfahrer)" by Jason Rohrer, famous for his early controversial "Passage" game, is a little masterpiece of interaction. It allows two players to construct a story, but in a revolutionary way: one of them is the "computer", the other one  ... [ Continue ]


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book . hacktivism . videogame

Nick Dyer-Witheford, Greig de Peuter - Games of Empire: Global Capitalism and Video Games

Nick Dyer-Witheford, Greig de Peuter, Games of Empire: Global Capitalism and Video Games, University of Minnesota Press, ISBN-13: 978-0816666119, games_of_empire.jpg University of Minnesota Press, ISBN-13: 978-0816666119, USA, 2009, English
Activism (or better hacktivism) usually conjugates with video games when a new political or highly controversial art-game (or artistic intervention in a game platform) is announced. Otherwise the most profitable entertainment industry is not very affected by political criticism, and neither are the hordes of  ... [ Continue ]


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art . book . videogame

Mary Flanagan - Critical Play, Radical Game Design

Mary Flanagan - Critical Play, Radical Game Design, The MIT Press, ISBN-13: 978-0262062688, mary_flanagan_critical_play.jpg The MIT Press, ISBN-13: 978-0262062688, USA, 2009, English
After a few years of serious and prolific videogame studies, fed by the industry boom, the research is starting to focus on reconnecting with the history of games through strong links that would help to understand and expand videogame paradigms. In this articulate book Flanagan starts with a major  ... [ Continue ]


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art . hacktivism . software . videogame

Can't You See I'm Busy, playing at work without feeling guilty

Can't You See I'm Busy, Maarten Vrouwes, Friso Ludenhoff, Eric Holm, Vincent Ludenhoff, can_t_you_see_i_m_busy.jpg In the spirit of the "net.art" of the late 1990s, the project "Can't You See I'm Busy" (by Maarten Vrouwes, Friso Ludenhoff, Eric Holm and Vincent Ludenhoff) consists of various arcade games masked into generic office tools like word processing and spreadsheet software in order to hide the activities of the procrastinating cubicle worker. Games  ... [ Continue ]


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art . mobile . performance . videogame

Amagatana, bringing virtual fights into the physical world

Amagatana, Body Fantasia, Yuichiro Katsumoto, amagatana_body_fantasia.jpg In the multi-faceted genre of augmented reality gaming, many artists have attempted to translate virtual aspects of digital games into the physical world. These projects include everything from creating virtual maps transposed over physical locations, connecting the signage and language of these games  ... [ Continue ]


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music . performance . sound . videogame

Heavy Metal Moshpit, Metal Head Orgasmatron

Heavy Metal Moshpit Amp, //////////fur////, heavy_metal_moshpit.jpg Video games such as Guitar Hero and Rock Band have certainly altered the way we interact with music by filling a quenchable void once solely occupied by air guitar and karaoke. Now //////////fur//// group is heralding the new 'metallenium' with their advanced musical interaction of user-simulated  ... [ Continue ]


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art . floppy disk . media . software . videogame . visual

Florian Cramer - nkdlunch.mp4, tapetrff.mp4

Florian Cramer, nkdlunch.mp4, tapetrff.mp4, floppy_films.jpg Floppy Films, The Netherlands, 2009
Disappeared from our desktops first because of cd-rom burners and then (after regretting losing the floppy's quick data portability) because of USB keys, the floppy disk is still supported by major OSs, but is often found sleeping in quantities in boxes as old relics. The floppy disk (3.5") has been the medium  ... [ Continue ]


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art . hacktivism . videogame

Oiligarchy, playing with the Oil Peak theory

Oiligarchy, Molleindustria, oiligarchy.jpg Oiligarchy is the new online flash game released by Mollenidustria. In this new adventure designed by Paolo Pedercini the player is CEO of a major international oil company. He acts as an "oiligarch" with the only goal to increase his capital and keep the carbon-fossil based economy as profitable as possible. The game starts after Second World  ... [ Continue ]


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art . hacking . software . videogame

Un-Dead-Link, physical death of a computer game

Exonemo, Sembo Kensuke, Yae Akaiwa, Un-Dead-Link, un_dead_link.jpg Japanese media art unit Exonemo’s latest work focuses on the differences between two worlds - the real, physical and our increasingly information-based, virtual. Citations of doubt in the real world itself among the two artists (Sembo Kensuke and Yae Akaiwa) led to an identification and consideration of a  ... [ Continue ]


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art . videogame

Play Cultures, The world of digital games in contemporary art and culture.

Play Cultures, play_cultures.jpg Play Cultures photo set
The so called 'game culture' is becoming a vast cultural territory spreading from its pop origins to the growing academic studies. "Play Cultures" was a properly named exhibition, symposium and workshop held in Novi Sad (Serbia) at the Museum of Contemporary Art Vojvodina. Passionately supported by the  ... [ Continue ]


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art . book . videogame

Ian Bogost - Unit Operations: An Approach to Videogame Criticism

Ian Bogost, Unit Operations: An Approach to Videogame Criticism, The MIT Press, ISBN-13: 978-0262524872, unit_operations.jpg book - The MIT Press - ISBN-13: 978-0262524872
Videogame criticism is still getting its momentum with a prolific production of essays. Meanwhile "Game Studies" departments are sprouting in Universities and Design schools and hosting a course on videogame seems mandatory for any digital media related curriculum. Even if this book is clearly into  ... [ Continue ]


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art . videogame

Homo Ludens Ludens, exploring videogame essence

Homo Ludens Ludens, Laboral, homo_ludens_ludens.jpg Homo Ludens Ludens photo set
Videogame "buzz" alone (that has never stopped in the last five years) would have been a good reason to push the monumental Asturian institution "Laboral" (dealing with art, science and technology) to invest some resources in the field. But what they have done, under the inspiring resolute direction by the ex  ... [ Continue ]


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art . code . literature . videogame

Memetic Simulation no. 2, memetic shoot 'em up

Joseph Hocking, memetic simulation no. 2, memetic_simulation_n_2.jpg Shoot 'em up (or shmup for short) is a computer and video game genre where the player usually controls a vehicle or character and fights large numbers of enemies with shooting attacks, typically of a highly stylized nature. In Japan, where the genre is still a lively one, they are simply known as "shooting games"  ... [ Continue ]


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art . software . videogame

Rom Check Fail, ultimate videogame remix

Rom Check Fail, rom_check_fail.jpg You don't need to be a videogame fan or being a teenager in the seventies / eighties to know videogame classics like Space Invaders, Pacman or Tetris. Their iconic power is still intact in the public imagination, also thanks to many reinterpretations and updates. Their patterns are often used by game artists as  ... [ Continue ]


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art . sound . videogame

Sonic Wargame, war of sounds

Sonic Wargame, Xavier Van Wersch, sonic_wargame.jpg Club Transmediale (the venue that traditionally hosts musical and audio-visual performances during the Transmediale festival), this year will be transformed, for some days, in an arena where valiant performers will fight using scratches, samples and effects. The battlefield will be Sonic Wargame, a quadriphonic installation made by the  ... [ Continue ]


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art . media . software . videogame

Game Culture, digital games in contemporary art and culture in Novi Sad.

Game Culture, game_culture.jpg The so called 'game culture' is becoming a vast cultural territory that from its pop influences to the academic 'videogame studies' it has spread the attention on the videogame culture all over. Game Culture / The world of digital games in contemporary art and culture is a  ... [ Continue ]


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book . hacking . hacktivism . media . videogame

McKenzie Wark - Gamer Theory

McKenzie Wark, Gamer Theory, Harvard University Press, ISBN 0674025199, wark_gamer_theory.jpg Harvard University Press - ISBN 0674025199
After remixing 'The Capital' with genuine hacker culture (in the 'A Hacker Manifesto'), McKenzie Wark felt the urge to shift to another hotbed for the current media culture debate: computer games. Instead of  ... [ Continue ]


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art . hacking . hacktivism . media . mobile . sound . videogame

Social Hacking, temporary hacks in Plymouth

Social Hacking, Kurator, Plymouth, social_hacking.jpg The 'hacking' practice is an overused and misunderstood term in pop culture and contemporary arts. 'Hacking' usually carries negative connotations and it is used referring the activity of breaking into computer systems. Nevertheless, in the computer programming community, the term 'hack' refers to a  ... [ Continue ]


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art . net . software . videogame

netPong, playing Pong walking with a laptop

netPong, Oriol Ferrer Mesià netpong.jpg The tilting sensor embedded in some of the latest Apple laptops has induced many projects focused on experimenting new interaction methods. netPong by Oriol Ferrer Mesià, is a software that allows to play Pong physically tilting the computer  ... [ Continue ]


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art . book . media . software . videogame

Alexander R. Galloway - Gaming, Essay on Algorithmic Culture

Alexander R. Galloway, Gaming, Essay on Algorithmic Culture, Univ Of Minnesota Press, ISBN 081664851, gaming.jpg book - Univ Of Minnesota Press - ISBN 0816648514
Beyond the narratology / ludology debate, videogames studies are catalyzing theoretical energies everywhere. But investigating the videogame medium in its own essence is quite different than constructing polished speculations based on cinema studies (as it's largely done). Galloway, instead,  ... [ Continue ]


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dvd . hacktivism . video . videogame . visual

Joan Leandre - Archivos Babilonia, The War Room

Joan Leandre, Archivos Babilonia, The War Room, OVNI, archivos_babilonia_2006.jpg dvd video - OVNI
Is it true that sometimes reality exceeds fantasy and leaves astounded more than any elaborated construction? In this new outcome of the research Joan Leandre is doing with his OVNI (Observatori De Video No Identificat)  ... [ Continue ]


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activism . art . book . hacktivism . videogame

Ed Halter - From Sun Tzu to Xbox, War and Video Games

Ed Halter, From Sun Tzu to Xbox, War and Video Games, Thunder's Mouth Press, ISBN 156025681, from_sun_tzu_to_xbox.jpg Thunder's Mouth Press, ISBN 1560256818
In the controversial debate about the videogame role in social acceptance of violence, the military power avid interest in the field is not anymore a secret. Furthermore the mediatic videogame-like aesthetic debuted during the Gulf War in early nineties has become the norm, and pushes in every new conflict the bloodless screen-based interface of a real human mass murdering. Ed Halter wrote this  ... [ Continue ]


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art . hacking . net . videogame

Troy, alternate reality game

Troy, TJ Jackson, troy.jpg One of the shared characteristics of all the types of game is to be closed systems, limited in time and space, as a sort of 'magic circles' where the player voluntarily decides to enter. Troy  ... [ Continue ]


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art . media . video . videogame

This Spartan Life, talk show staged inside Halo 2

This Spartan Life, Chris Burke, this_spartan_life.jpg If you think about a prototypical set for a talk show, you would probably imagine a static situation where the host and his guests are all comfortably seated and the conversation doesn't face any risks other than those connected to the violation of the turns of speech. However this imaginary is changed  ... [ Continue ]


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art . magazine . media . videogame

Ludic Society Magazine #1 + #2

edited by Margarete Jahrmann, Max Moswitzer, Ludic Society Magazine #1 + #2, GoApe, ISBN 390238901X, ludic_society_magazine.jpg edited by Margarete Jahrmann, Max Moswitzer - GoApe, ISBN 390238901X The complexity of the contemporary life has increased also because of the continuos necessity of becoming accustomed with new norms and then adapt consequently. This process is very similar to a new game rules' assimilation and to the elaboration of the related strategies. For this reason the  ... [ Continue ]


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art . book . media . videogame

Jesper Juul - Half-Real : Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds

half_real.jpg, Jesper Juul, Half-Real, Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds, The MIT Press, ISBN 0262101106 The MIT Press - ISBN 0262101106
The old Ludology vs. Narratology antithesis in the game studies field hides the fact that they are two different points of reference (represented by the rules and the storytelling) that in the end could be considered to be not opposite at all, but equally important, if interpreted as complementary. This text,  ... [ Continue ]


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art . videogame

Pong.Mythos, pong as paradigm

Pong, Mythos, pong_mythos.jpg The marketing of Pong is one of the few true turning points from the industrial to the digital era. The first mass videogame is one of the absolute pop icons, and it has written the first definitive paradigm of playful interactivity with a screen through a few lines and a couple of  ... [ Continue ]


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art . hacktivism . software . videogame

McDonald's videogame, management simulation of a fast food giant

McDonald's videogame, Molleindustria, mcdonalds_videogame.jpg McDonald, an icon of the global capital can be opposed in a thousand different ways, as testing the effects of their food on your own intestine or trying to spread the real data on its nutritional policies. Anyway it is still a business giant with the attitude to skillfully move in the  ... [ Continue ]


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art . media . videogame

SweetPads, paradoxical videogame interface

SweetPads, France Cadet, sweetpads.jpg Do you remember Quake 3 Arena et similia? The so-called shoot-em-ups, where you fight against anybody else and where the only goal is to score the highest number of frags? That one that cause a cramp in your hand because of the nervous joystick grip and of the  ... [ Continue ]


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hacktivism . videogame

The French Democracy in machinima

The French Democracy, Alex Chan, the_french_democracy.jpg Machinima is a recent trend of making films using video games engines. It is has been filled with humor and little serious content until the release of 'The French Democracy', a political film about France's riots, created using 'The Movies', a videogame in which players run  ... [ Continue ]


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