scratchpad

Writing, videos and general rants about a variety of topics.

[stonejohnphil-blog]

Individual Project

For the individual project I will develop a trans-media experience that will create a branching story-line utilising aspects of the TV pilot I’m writing.

The pilot I’m writing is a dystopian thriller that will feature a movement/quasi-religion called ‘Dataism’.  

In my script the movement ranges from those who share some of their beliefs to those who are fanatical and dedicate their lives to achieving its goals.

The movement has its own manifesto stating its beliefs and goals. This will be developed further in time, but the core principles are:

- The universe is pure information.

- All biological organisms are reducible to data that is controlled by bio-chemical algorithms which are translatable to digital algorithms.    

- Digital algorithms are superior to bio-chemical algorithms.

-Humanity must develop machine consciousness then merge with it.  The day this happens will be known as the singularity.

- All Dataists must work towards achieving the singularity. 

-The singularity is the only way to a true utopia. 

- Humanities goal is to increase the amount of data produced and create a method of processing that data.

I would create a fake documentary for YouTube and Vimeo that would explore the world of Dataism and interview practitioners.  The aim would be to convince the audience that this is a genuine religion/movement.  This would be made easier by the fact that there is in fact a significant group of people in Silicon Valley who are known as ‘Singularitarians’ who hold beliefs that  aren’t too dissimilar from those mentioned above.

Throughout the documentary there would be reference to the group’s website where the audience could get more information.

The website would contain the full ‘Dataist Manifesto’, dates for upcoming events, fake interviews and the option to sign-up to a newsletter.  This would all be in an effort to maintain the illusion of a real organisation.

An idea I’m looking at is that members of the group are graded/ranked according to the amount and complexity of data they generate towards the group’s stated goal of achieving the singularity.  

This would lead to users of the website being given tasks that supposedly help solve problems relating to the develop of artificial intelligence (this is analogous to the protein folding example we were shown in class).

The user would be told that the task were large scale problems that were intractable using conventional computing power.  

Ensuring that the tasks were interesting enough to hold the users attention is something that would need to be taken into consideration.

I still need to work on the specifics of how this will tie in with my script.  In the script the leader of the movement is a man called ‘Michael Stanton’.  I considered setting the events in the project before he became leader. 

The user would be informed via newsletters and interviews that Stanton is making progressing through the ranks and eyeing the leadership.  

He would become leader very quickly in a way that hinted he used force then suddenly and without warning the website and documentary would be deleted.

There is still a lot to work out, but I feel the basics are there.

[stonejohnphil-blog]

Second Thoughts

I’ve been thinking about my original concept for the individual project and while I like the idea the more I think about how it could be developed into a coherent narrative and what platform would suit it best the more I’m having second thoughts.

This doesn’t mean I’ve completely written it off just that the idea, just that there are questions I need to pose in class about the viability of the game. 

My initial thoughts in relation as to what  platform would suit the game was an app that would be played on mobile and tablet.  Of course, the platform is dependent on the game mechanics which is an area I’m still developing and where I’m running into the most problems.

As stated previously the concept is that a scientific experiment gone wrong has caused a ‘temporal fracture’  which has changed the nature of time so that instead of time running linearly it jumps around haphazardly.  The character that player controls would be aware of this and through their actions, they would try to restore the flow of time to the way we are familiar with.

The difficulty I’m having is with how this would be instantiated.  I envisioned the game being broken up into multiple ‘moments’ that the player would have to complete correctly so that the next moment that follows is the adjoining moment in linear time.  For example, if the player completes ‘moment A’ successfully they will progress to ‘moment B’ and so on, but if they fail to complete ‘moment A’ successfully they next ‘moment’ they move on to could be any moment be it d, g or x.

At the moment(no pun intended) I’m having still working on how a player that has failed a ‘moment’ and jumped forward or backward in time returns to their initial starting point.  As well as this I need to work out specifically what tasks the player must complete in each ‘moment’ to progress.

More work is needed to see if this an interesting idea that isn’t suitable for further development or if it’s worth spending more time (pun intended) on.

[stonejohnphil-blog]

Time Fracture

Time.  It’s something that is so intrinsic to our everyday existence yet at the same time so baffling that we can’t define it, merely measure its passing.  I’ve always been a sci-fi fan be it films (I recently watched Arrival and highly recommend it) or books I also studied physics as part of my undergraduate degree and found the old cliche that fact is stranger than fiction to be true.

It was Albert Einstein that said, “the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion”.  My idea for the individual project uses this mind-bending concept as a starting point. 

The basic premise is that scientists are conducting an experiment into the nature of time when something goes horribly wrong.  The machine they are using for the test(think Large Hadron Collider) has caused linear time to fracture and instead of coherently flowing in the manner we know it is merely a series of moments that seem to defy the laws of cause and effect.

It’s still very much a concept at this stage, but I envisage the game being broken down into moments/segments of time and the choices the player makes affects which segment/moment of time will follow.  The better they do the closer the timeline will resemble linear time until eventually, it’s back to normal.

The player would choose one of the scientists who is in the lab when the experiment goes wrong and through them try to navigate the disrupted timeline and determine what has gone wrong with the machine.  There would be a puzzle element to the game as the player tries to piece together what went wrong with the machine and at the same time try to work out a way to fix the timeline.

At this stage, it’s no more than an interesting initial starting point and I need to significantly develop my ideas into something more concrete as well as think about the practical implementation of the game.

The game is provisionally titled ‘Time Fracture’. 

[stonejohnphil-blog]

Playing for laughs

The topic for this blog has left me scratching my head all week as I haven’t played any games for quite a while so it’s difficult to think of anything to review.  So I thought I’d go back to a couple of games that I used to play a lot, especially when I shared a flat with friends.

FIFA and Pro Evo (I played numerous versions that were released annually each getting incrementally better) are games that evoke fond memories.  The games were remarkably similar aside from the controls i.e. they had different buttons for, pass and shoot although this could be changed in the game.  FIFA also had real team names i.e. Manchester United as opposed to Pro Evo’s Manchester Reds.

You were either a FIFA or Pro Evo guy and there were endless debates about the merits of each game as my flatmates and I drank beer and ate pizza. 

It was possible to play on one player and try to guide your team to the top of the league or cup and whilst this was enjoyable and I certainly spent many a night trying to steer Scotland to perhaps their most realistic chance of winning a World Cup, the game is at it’s best when playing someone else.

It became a ritual before a night out to play a few games of FIFA/Pro Evo whilst drinking a carryout.  The excitement of a night out heightened by the competition of the game (and the alcohol!).  Ridiculous claims that your opponents players were diving were commonplace.  That one friend who crumbles after a few beers and ends up on the wrong side of 10-0 defeat.  The other friend who takes it too seriously and equates FIFA prowess with real world football talent.

Does FIFA or Pro Evo have strong storytelling elements?  No.  There are without, doubt more complicated, well-written games with better gameplay, but sometimes you just want a game that is fun and easy to pick-up and play.

[stonejohnphil-blog]

Interactive Media

What is my experience of interactive media?  Before I answer this I should probably explain what I understand the term interactive media to mean.  In many ways it is deceptively simple, any type of media that the user can interact with, the classic example being games, but for me, the term has always been vague.  What is the cut-off point between interactive and traditional media?  Does tweeting a TV show mean that it’s now classed as interactive media?

The fuzziness of the border between traditional and interactive media is something I feel will only increase with the advance of technology.  This coupled with improvements to current interactive media such as augmented reality and completely new types that as are yet uninvented will offer a rich landscape of immersive experiences for users to explore.

My own personal experience has been fairly typical; games, apps, and social media.  While there were times I would find myself utterly consumed with a game (Final Fantasy VII, GTA, FIFA and Pro Evo) I was never really a gamer.

Of course with the use of social media being ubiquitous in society I have a Facebook and Twitter account.  To be honest I don’t really interact with them as much as I should.  I use Twitter for links to interesting articles and up to date news.  For me Facebook is a way of maintaining links with friends who I have become geographically distant from but that I don’t want to sever links with completely.

My reluctance to share everything on social media is partly personal preference and a wish to avoid the frenzy of boasting and vanity posts that some people use social media for.   I realise that statement makes me sound like one of those people who constantly moan about Facebook but never delete their account. 

Don’t get me wrong social media has many benefits such as sharing important moments through photos, I shared a photo of my first born son when he was merely a few hours old providing friends and family with an opportunity to share a great moment in my life.  I suppose I’m slightly agnostic when it comes to social media rather a fervent devotee like many others.

What interests me about interactive media as a topic isn’t the social media aspect where people create a digital persona that often bears little relation to reality.  I’m more excited about the opportunity of finding different ways to tell a story and also the exciting new technologies that offer unique methodologies for telling these stories.