We’re continuing with this madness, and this time we’re going to take a few liberties, since I’m not really sure how to describe this kind of aesthetic in detail—so I’ll just name it...
Industrial "Decay" System
Metal Ages
You are likely wondering why I find it difficult to define this, given that the name already exists—albeit without the quotation marks around the last word. I will explain this as we go along; just remember the name *Koyaanisqatsi*.
The image you see above is a small collage I made from images I found on the aesthetics wiki. What these kinds of images convey to me is something a bit paradoxical, but I also find it reassuring that we are seeing a structure created by man, at least for reasons unrelated to any natural order, being reclaimed by nature itself, decaying over time. What was once shiny, polished metal becomes rust; what were once wooden structures become rotten wood; and suddenly, there are now puddles of water and plants growing around it.
It shouldn't be confused with the post-apocalyptic aesthetic. I find such post-apocalyptic works—when they feature these elements—a bit boring, or at least predictable; they tend not to play with the concept of the post-apocalypse itself, limiting themselves instead to the usual tropes—like abandoned structures that often fail to reflect the years of neglect the fiction implies.
Take the video game *Portal 2*, for instance: it is supposed to take place several years after the events of the first game—and even centuries after the events of *Half-Life 2*—yet the remaining structures appear exactly the same. Even if a facility has a flawless public address system, an automated cleaning mechanism, and a power supply that would last until the Earth itself explodes, paper and cardboard boxes will still rot; leave them in an enclosed space, and they would likely develop mold or mildew—something rarely seen in the *Portal* franchise. In fact, for this very reason, some people believe the second game doesn't actually take place that far in the future, but rather that the timer simply malfunctioned. This is largely because, in fiction, a key priority is often aesthetic appeal—or at least conveying the impression that the location was once functional. In reality, however, urban explorers rarely find things exactly as they were left; instead, they encounter disarray—fallen bricks and debris, structures on the verge of collapse, and pools of stagnant water devoid of life (save for bacteria)—making these places difficult to navigate. Consequently, a game like *The Last of Us* doesn't quite capture that kind of environment for me; what I see there is simply a backdrop of decorated buildings.
Ironically, the only places where you can find the objects still in place as they were left are the places where they had to be removed as quickly as possible, whether due to some kind of health emergency or, for example, a biological disaster such as a pandemic or radiation, which brings me to Chernobyl and specifically to a video game.
Stalker, or well, Stalker AND Stalker, the film by Andrei Tarkovsky. Is just that the game is a better example for me. Leaving aside the mutants, the sentient reactive clouds, the zombies, and other entities caused by whatever the Stalker lore is, the video game perfectly captures the theme of encountering desolate wastelands alongside structures that gradually decay. This is something I can actually find in my own surroundings; I live in a mostly developed area, and yet I still come across buildings that have crumbled and been destroyed over time. They're almost unrecognizable, and it's even difficult to understand how they were supposed to have worked in the past, if they ever did as intended. Therefore, Stalker reminds me a lot of this kind of feeling, obviously with the added danger of having to carry a weapon and a gas mask at all times because the radiation is intense.
But perhaps it's not a good example, even though the view is very beautiful and I really enjoy it. I also have the problem that when making a video game, you need enemies, and therefore those enemies usually bring a bit of the desolation experience that you can find in, for example, an urban exploration walking simulator. Therefore, I also find it interesting to watch videos on the internet about such urban explorations. A friend of mine just sent me several where she and some friends went into an abandoned hospital, not only because of all the danger it represents since most of these are still private property, but also because you can find stories within them. That is, through the graffiti and what they left there, you can see more or less what the lives of the people who passed through there might have been like. In that case, you are not just another person who arrives at that place, but you are also indirectly leaving your mark and preserving a moment of history. And there is a very good web series that encapsulates all of this very well.
Marble Hornets, the series that redefined Slenderman SO HARD that The 8 Pages is basically an adaptation of Marble Hornets. Those familiar with the series know that urban exploration becomes one of its most important elements from the second and third seasons onward. This is largely due to the vast number of highly significant buildings and locations involved; it is no longer just a matter of being stalked in the woods or having cameras in your home—with the Operator liable to appear anywhere—but also about the clues hidden within abandoned hospitals, clinics, houses, and other sites. If you search hard enough, you can find these clues, despite the inherent dangers. In this regard, *Marble Hornets* effectively captures the true nature of urban exploration—stripped of stylization or glamour, it is a pursuit defined by pure risk when venturing into hazardous locations.
In fact, a while back—when I was still in secondary school—some friends and I decided to go on an expedition to a building that was about twenty-five stories tall. The father of one of my friends had mentioned playing *Dungeons & Dragons* there with his own friends back in the day. By the time we arrived, the site had become private property—meaning we could have ended up in jail if caught—but we didn't realize the security fencing had already been put up, so we went in without any trouble. What we found was a massive building that had served, at various times, as a school, a prison, and a mental asylum; its walls featured a multitude of elements ranging from school chalkboards and medical examination areas to cells.
It was an unforgettable experience, and ever since then, I’ve held a certain appreciation for places like this. However, I have to confess something: one of the things I enjoy about urban exploration isn't simply seeing abandoned structures—there is something about the metal that catches my eye. That sounds quite ironic, considering that in most of my posts, I’ve portrayed myself as someone who doesn't enjoy makeover on aesthetics. But I can't deny it. There's something about the machinery that catches my attention, perhaps just the authistic wonder of seeing how something works perfectly.
Or in this case, worked.
What we have here are three completely different media: a manga called *Blame!*, an anime series called *Girls' Last Tour*, and an indie video game—*Motorslice*—that doesn't exactly make me look like a decent person. If you know, you know. But one of the things I enjoy most about all this is the atmosphere, especially the simple fact of seeing cities or what appear to be city-sized factories that have simply stopped functioning; they are no longer operating in the same way. Everything is static, everything is decaying and corroding little by little. It's quite a brutal sight, especially because most of the time these protagonists are dwarfs in comparison; they are tiny compared to the smallest gear or the smallest lathe you can find.
Sometimes it's just a matter of standing and observing the immensity of it all to understand how complex this place once was. Of course, everything is abandoned. But there's a problem radically different from the others, and that is that there's no soil where nature can grow. Unlike other places where plants and trees begin to take over what was clearly a forest before being demolished, here things are different; they are, in a way, deserts of certain metallic wastes where nothing grows.
There is something I simply like about watching the decline—seeing how what once seemed like a perfect system no longer drives itself the way it used to. And the thing is, in the *Blame!* manga, the City doesn't actually stop; it keeps expanding—and here’s a small spoiler for anyone planning to read it: the City expands to the point where it covers the entire solar system. Yet, you certainly couldn't say it’s still operating at full capacity; it almost seems as if everything has ground to a halt.
Of course, for some people, this can be intimidating—a nightmarish environment, in fact—and I completely agree; that is precisely why another franchise I’ve been quite hyper-fixated on lately is rooted in industrial horror. Silent Hill.
Here we have two examples. First, we have a clip from the Silent Hill 3 video game, in which I personally think the franchise fit perfectly with Industrial horror, not only because it looks extremely good, but also because it manages to find a balance. I like the enemies; even their skin seems corrosive, as if rust were affecting them too. This is an element that was present in the previous game, but here I think they found the best way to represent it, since now Industrial horror no longer comes only from the environment and the bizarre architecture within the Nightmare world, but also from the enemies themselves, who seem to be trying to lift a natural body that is taking its toll in the way that metal would.
The thing below, by the way, is a short comic that Masahiro Hito himself made about Sideshow Hill. It has absolutely nothing to do with the video games, but I love the art style. It's one that several official comics have also used in their illustrations. I literally bought one recently just for the artwork, and it's something I enjoy because it seems like this rust isn't limited to the monsters, but extends to anything that touches this environment. Even the sky and panels, omehow feels peeling from the effects of time.
But as I mentioned, there is something I like about systems; even if I don't fully grasp them, I enjoy watching them. This brings me to my next anecdote: some time ago, a film professor at my university showed us an experimental film so we could write an essay about it—a film titled *Koyaanisqatsi*.
The film deals with themes that are quite simple to grasp—at least from a certain perspective; it is essentially an allegory about societal decline, the way systems grow increasingly complex to the point of becoming overwhelming, and how life turns into a routine that feels nightmarish for many. We see a succession of images—exploding rockets, machinery in motion, buildings being demolished, and the like—including massive shots of New York skyscrapers reflecting sunlight contrasted with night scenes of Las Vegas. While for many of my fellow students this depicted a nightmarish scenario with a very direct message, for me, it was something else entirely: I admitted—with a fair amount of embarrassment, yet without any real shame—that I actually enjoyed that chaos.
There's an entire sequence showing several factories working in complete monotony to oppressive music. What many found hellish, I found relaxing. Even a professor mentioned how the monotony made her feel like hell. I couldn't disagree more. I could have watched that for 30 minutes straight and still been happy.
And I know for a fact that this is not simply for the satisfaction of seeing things spinning in complete perfection because honestly, that kind of thing does disturb me a little. However, what I admire about all this is once again that machinery, as if it were a kind of living organism that somehow functions in a way that it is not supposed to in nature. Pistons, cables, sparks, metal plates, all working in harmony and tuning in an almost Ultra and poorly made way of how a human body or that of any kind of living being is supposed to work, and yet I find not only fascinating but wonderful the fact that we as a species have been able to create this kind of things.
And that's where what I truly enjoy about all this lies—the system. I don't know why, and it actually sounds quite hypocritical of me, but I simply like seeing things working with that heavy machinery. Funny video is that it's not even supposed to make sense; the simple fact is that you convince me that this works somehow, I'm very intrigued, and if something is going to go wrong again, I'm more than happy.
The ships here—the Sevastopol and the Nostromo from the Alien franchise—share a quality I really enjoy: they don't even look like spaceships. Instead, they resemble cities, complete with various antennas, bridges, decks, and levels—truly like a city in space. Ironically, they are actually just stations or vessels for "truckers"—or the spacefaring equivalent thereof. What’s amusing is how this aesthetic extends to the internal structure, with its pipes, cables, and various screens that place a strong emphasis on the physical. Anything digital—or elements often deemed "tricky" in sci-fi—is immediately overshadowed by the sheer sense that what you’re seeing works because the physics itself works.
Some Star Wars ships also share certain structural similarities. For example, here we have concept art of the Death Star that shows several prominent structures in what would ultimately be just a gray sphere. We also have Republic ships that, despite being painted, still give the impression that everything is functioning based on a fairly complex system. The same is true for Imperial ships. In fact, interestingly, the Imperial ship that appears at the beginning of Episode IV: A New Hope was supposedly detailed to the maximum extent simply because they knew it would be viewed from a ridiculously close distance, thus giving the impression that the ship was massive. Even some of the Confederacy's devastating ships and cruisers have this structure that sometimes looks solid and other times aggressive. I just love seeing these things floating, and I don't really understand why.
The Maw on Little Nightmares have this too. I could include two pieces of concept art of what was originally going to be the half-submarine ship where the entire first game takes place, but I'll just leave you with this image of the complete structure. It's insanely destructive; it looks more like a house than a ship or submarine. We can even see that it's polluting, leaving a huge trail of—honestly, I don't know what it is—across the seabed. To put it in perspective, what we see in the middle and at the end of the first game is just the chimney on the surface; the serious levels are a gigantic place, and I can't help but lament the fact that, whether due to technical limitations or simply artistic freedom, they discarded too much of what had been done in the concept art. It's like a kind of moving castle from Studio Ghibli, but of horror and underwater, of course.
Damn, my favorite area in the Undertale video game is Hotland. Simply because we can find things like the core that powers the entire underground, and it's just satisfying to see. For me, it's a gigantic thing with a lot of cables and pipes and quite a few chimneys where pressurized smoke comes out. I have no further idea of how it works, but it still satisfies me to see it. But this is where a bigger problem lies.
Of course, I can't help but see these kinds of things and understand that what they generate most in people is a feeling of fear. That is to say, they are aggressive structures in their full splendor, Euclidean architecture that doesn't feel like Euclidean architecture. And while my fondness for these kinds of illustrations and systems that extend beyond the ordinary into real life can also affect how I perceive parts of my surroundings, I'm fully aware that not in a million years would I prefer this to a forest next to my house, not only because the forest is much quieter, but also because the cost of maintaining this kind of thing would be absolutely worthless to me.
It's ironic because it's one of the few times this has truly affected me, this point of understanding that something I enjoy watching is a way of life. A way of life that even I'm not willing to share, simply as a mere curiosity, something that takes me out of my comfort zone, something I enjoy watching almost as if it were historical exploration of another world, as I mentioned before, urban exploration.
But I am one of those firm believers that, despite our system being extremely deficient in its very nature of long-term preservation, I am also one of the defenders who say that the problem lies not in their existence but in how we are maintaining them and the use we give them. In this case, there are certain elements that would definitely have to go, not only because of the environmental damage they generate but also because they would be a rather miserable way to live.
In this case, some kind of balance would be ideal, but I won't be able to mention any of these until much later because, as you may recall, I'm going more or less in a kind of timeline; with this, we started with the dinosaurs and now we're going with industrialization. Therefore, it is in this system that I would like to highlight what, for me, is the good side of this kind of thing. No other than my favorite SuperHero... Iron Man.
Yes, I know that one of the images is just Iron Monger, but just focus on the wall behind him, ok? Ok.
Iron Man is a rather contradictory superhero. From his beginnings, he was designed as this archetype who would naturally be a villain, but throughout history, he's not only presented as an arms dealer and a capitalist philanthropist who would be the antagonist in most stories, but his objective as a character is to try to find a responsible way to mediate the systems that allow these kinds of things, as well as the future sustainability of future generations. Tony Stark himself is precisely a man who regrets many of the irresponsible and responsible things he did and is trying to change.
In this case, one of the things I enjoy most about Iron Man stories is how he always finds a much simpler way—within his own technology and design—to strike a balance between technological advancement and the responsibility he bears. This ranges from the blasted nanomachines that have been driving me crazy for the last few years to—my personal favorite—those sort of "magic transistors" he used early on; I call them magic because that is simply not how a transistor works. But in any case, I like that within their own stories, Stark Industries also presents itself in a much cleaner way compared to rival companies, whether through their facilities or the technology they create. It's as if, even in the way they presented themselves, they weren't trying to appear as some kind of Apple, but rather that's the image they naturally project; that is to say, what you see isn't a facade but their authentic identity.
Of course, most of this is also purely aesthetic, as I mentioned; I simply enjoy seeing the pistons spinning and doing things. But on the other hand, it also lies in the fact that the character is, for me, the perfect example of what could be achieved. And one thing I really enjoy is that he doesn't necessarily stick to traditional technological methods, as I mentioned. Even though I'm fed up with nanotechnology, the guy barely saw that it was a more sustainable method than trying to miniaturize what would be an intricate piston system and immediately used it in absolutely everything. And the moment that nanomachine system started to become inefficient, he looked for another alternative. It's not simply about trying to force the system to fit within his convictions, but about finding alternative measures so that the system is no longer necessary.
And, of course, there is the fact that the character looks incredibly good as the technology advances—moving from that clunky, hard-to-maneuver Mark I armor to what would be my personal favorite, the Extremis suit. It features a human silhouette reminiscent of medieval armor, which moved almost as if it were the knight's own skin.
However, quite a few poses will pass before we can talk a little about biomechanics and bioengineering in the same way I'm talking right now. For now, let's stick with something more mundane and closer to our daily lives, and then we can jump to the stars.
