Being 25 (self-reflection)

*I've been playing a hell of a load of the new Warframe update and that has kinda disrupted my usual pace of playing something new everyday.  It'll probably be a topic to discuss soon, but in the mean time here's a piece on a significant event that recently happened*

This past Saturday I turned 25 to a mix of thoughts and emotions as one may do when it comes to increasing in age.  Although I wouldn't say that 25 is a particularly old age, it’s more of the case of considering your place in the world past the world of education (as in my current experience).  At the turning of age; I could have been cynical towards getting older, moving away from the typical ‘youth’ age-group into designated adulthood; unhappy with my default living arrangements or generally apathetic towards the progress in my desired vocation, but this thankfully wasn't the case. 

The weekend was the start of the school half-term holidays and with a large group of my friends being involved in the school system, I found myself having time to myself and my immediate family.  It is in this time that I got to thinking of the progress I have made, but of a positive nature and a factor of resilience to make it work.  I've been a volunteer for a museum, part-time intern and freelance worker for commissions in the sector over the past year with minimal pay and many unanswered job applications; but as time’s gone on I've taken on each experience to try and improve myself.  One year on I’m still going at it and happier than before to try and make it in this sector of work, which to be honest I’m kinda surprised by it. 

There have been times (like with most people) where this past year has been greatly frustrating.  The biggest factor in this frustration has been the limited feedback available from my job applications; as those who have done so have been a wealth of information into my strengths and weaknesses from an alternative viewpoint.  I can understand that with some jobs having many applicants it is realistically unlikely to give that personal attention, it’s just that it can put a downer on a day. 

Overall, I’d say that I have a positive outlook on my future and I don’t feel any resentment towards the aging process.  Alongside this optimistic view, I've created a couple thoughts I would like to achieve in this upcoming year:

1.      To attain full-time employment within the culture and heritage sector, with a specific desire for the museum research at most.  To do this I want to increase my range of jobs I apply for as well as reaching out to specific organisations for advice.  I briefly did this upon finishing university, but I want to get back into doing this now with my relevant experience. 

2.      By gaining full-time employment, I want to return to having my own living arrangements either by a shared house or individual flat.  In correlation to my previous post on ‘space’ having this is important as a means of generating personal space in an environment I own. 

3.      By generating an income, I want to have the ability to travel as a means to learn more about cultures around the world.  It would allow me to give physical context to a lot of essays / journals I've read over the past 7 years. 

These points do kinda revolve around the factor of employment, but in modern society what doesn't revolve around work eh? :-P
What I would say about this experience is that my desire to be involved in a career that I enjoy greatly has been met with a sacrifice of money and social pursuits with the intention of making it worth it.  What I would recommend to those who may have a similar quandary is planning is key; to see if such an action is financially viable and for how long in comparison to the estimated time to achieve.  On top of this, give time for alternative strategies and take advice on your pursuit, considering whether it’s in your best interests.  If you can keep at it and at the end of it be in a career that you love, I wish you all the best of luck and the strength to go on and continue this desire and resilience. 

Writing this had made me happy and I hope and soon enough I can talk of my expanding prospects and in turn make this a more interesting place for my thoughts.  I’m in the process of thinking of what to write about architecturally for next week’s post (back to normal on a Monday) and I hope our see you then.  

Antichamber - Perspectives, Viewpoints and Voids

This week has brought up some unexpected events that have kept me rather busy.  Although I like to push for the beginning of the week publishing, I do take priority on IRL tasks.  I’m looking into organising a staggered topic next week (as in mid-week release) to make sure they aren't too closely published.  With that out of the way, onto a game I started playing again this week…

*This will feature minor spoilers regarding the progression of Antichamber from a mechanic PoV.  Avoid the subject on Block Manipulation if you’re looking to read with spoilers in mind.*

Antichamber by Alexander Bruce is a first person puzzle game which conveys a totally new way to consider mechanics via viewpoints and perspectives in my opinion.  Its ability to confuse and mind-bend is fantastic; taking concepts you would be accustomed to in traditional puzzlers and juxtaposing it within its ‘modernist’ aesthetics (Modernist as in architectural imo).  I originally picked up this title in early 2013 putting around 4 hours into the title making slow progress; to a certain point where my thoughts couldn't comprehend any direction of specific mechanic to act on.

To briefly define the types of mechanics, I would say there are two main forms it takes on; room viewpoints and block manipulation.  The rooms as a puzzle work in terms of how you enter / look/ move/ leave a space, creating a multitude of possibilities to the user.  For example, an early room features a ‘gallery’ space with cube exhibition pieces in a 3x3 manner with gaps between them.  As you look around the exhibitions, the objects change from faces; to abstract sculptures and paintings; to moving pieces and a hidden passage.  The great thing about this passage is that logically, it pushes you into the middle of the gallery space, but in truth it’s an entirely new space with a multi-coloured maze.
The second mechanic (blocks) comes into play when the player receives a block manipulator a short while into the game.  This originally has simple applications akin to something like portal (taking object from point A to B) with blue blocks; evolving into a mix of geometric creation and multiplication in the green phase; and extruding blocks into shapes / passageways with yellow.  There is one later stage (red) which I haven’t got it yet, however at the time of writing I am very close to attaining the power and may add an addendum to this piece.
By bringing together these two forms of mechanics, it allows the player to experience a new way of thinking and put focus on the finer details rather than the larger pictures (possibly macro vs. micro in some roundabout way).  One can naturally do this in architecture and many have when it comes to judging our spaces and the play of interaction between them.  This can be represented in a couple ways in architecture, in particularly perspectives and voids.

Perspective can be thought in both a theoretical and practical way, but naturally they come together to form a similar understanding.  On one hand we have the tools of architecture (Sections, Plans, Elevations, Isometric, and Axonometric) which give us clear understanding of what they intend to be e.g. a front elevation shows of the façade of a building.  The other hand presents the idea of feeling / emotion / general thoughts when we look at an object from a number of different viewpoints.  A couple examples of this would be the English country garden and its folly’s or the Holocaust memorial site in Berlin, Germany.  The latter example I feel has a particular corroboration with Antichamber; as the Spartan, blocky pathways present a number of different viewpoints and perspectives creating a number of different thoughts for the user.  With this being said, if I was to add to Antichamber, I would like to play with the idea of light as the memorial does to possibly add a new layer of mechanics.  Although perspective is at the forefront of this experience, the minor details granted through the play of voids makes it brilliant to study.

One may naturally see voids as ‘non-space’ that does not dictate design or consideration and to some extent they would be correct.  In our everyday lives, we interact with voids as a means to get from point A to B.  Such examples like underpasses, alleyways, corridors, etc typically fall into this category where the edges of ‘places’ intersect with each other.  However, we interact with these voids and as such create spaces from them, whether it is interactions with other people or the area around you.  Graffiti (although generally given a negative social impact) is a great example of the interactions of voids and places like London’s South Bank have benefitted greatly from the user of this art form.  Theorists like Michel Foucault discuss this matter as a means of ‘other spaces’ in which he states:

“We are in the age of the simultaneous, of juxtaposition, the near and the far, the side by side and the scattered.  A period in which, in my view, the world is putting itself to the test, not so much as a great way of life destined to grow in time but as a net that links points together and creates its own muddle.”

If we are to take a theory like this, one can see a connection to Antichamber with its rooms and connections between them.  On the surface the connections are a mix of stairwells, elevators and corridors; but on reflection expand into multi-layered sections where walking creates one outcome and jumping creates another.  Antichamber is of course a very abstract example, but it can be something to study in the architectural and gaming world to produce interesting ideas with areas which may not get a lot of attention.  To use an even more up-to-date example, P.T (Silent Hills Playable Teaser) I feel plays with the idea of voids and perspective to create its eerie horror that brings the player into a world of uncertainty and fear.

Like with many things in our subconscious we don’t give them a second thought, but the practice of non-space can be something to open a world of new design possibilities in both the real and digital world.  In your own journeys, take a moment to consider these places between buildings and think about what it means and how it interacts with its surroundings.  I hope you enjoyed this piece and please feel free to discuss theories / suggestions.

References
Antichamber – Alexander Bruce (2013)
Foucault, M. (1967) Of Other Space: Utopias and Heterotopias

Semiology / Semiotics (signs and how we define them)

The subject of signs and iconography is something that appears in our everyday lives to point where it gets an automatic response from us.  Whether its road-signs as we drive along dictating the speed to go; public transport and its colour co-ordinated route system; or an office building and its designation of floor space, each has its own set of parameters defined for its users.  The subject of Semiology (the study of signs) is something that has a depth beyond anything I could comprehend in this brief discussion, but I hope to give an insight in relation to my previous experience. 

To begin with, this is a subject that has been on my peripheral since the later parts of my second year at university.  I remember Extra Credits doing a Halloween episode on the subject in correlation to horror (quite appropriate in relation to the current time of the year) which perked my interest.  As I have developed my own thoughts over the years through such viewpoints as Heidegger, Lyotard, Baudrillard, etc I’ve only briefly noticed how close semiology comes into the fray.  Defining ‘place’ and ‘space’ is somewhat similar to defining items like ‘chair’, ‘door’ and ‘wall’ which brings us to the architectural context of this piece.

For this piece, I’ve looked at Roland Barthes ‘Semiology and the Urban’ and Umberto Eco’s ‘Function and Sign: The Semiotics of Architecture’ which in turn present some nice examples in game design.  Barthes is the essay I would align closer to my personal architectural theory with the discussion of how towns and cities develop over time and define their areas; such as neighbourhoods, commercial and industrial districts of varying importance.  As you may be aware, the traditional progression of a settlement is a progressive growth into villages-towns-cities depending on a number of factors like geography, economics and social growth.  As a settlement crosses one of these thresholds, there is a certain difficulty in creating new space while appeasing the issues of change.  For example, a village being developed into a small market town may feature new dwellings and more widely recognised retail outlets.  However, the current population may desire a small settlement and dislikes the look of the new developments out of this desire to stay a village.  It is at this point the architect / town planner has to be careful to consider the thoughts of each party as they create this new settlement. 
Personally, I feel a strong connection between this and the idea of particular IP’s (intellectual property) and the interpretation from different studios.  Take the Warhammer 40k IP and see the range of game genres handled by its developers (RTS, FPS, 3^rd person action, etc).  The mechanics are different but they each follow a particular aesthetic (to a lesser or greater degree) of this ‘grim dark’ future where there is a fight for survival in a somewhat brutal manner.  Another example would be the recent Devil May Cry (DMC: Devil May Cry) where a reboot change the story’s main character (Dante) from a ‘jokey’ fun-loving character into a more ‘brooding’ kinda nihilistic person, much to the disapproval of the series fans. 

Eco’s essay is more concerned with the semiology of objects and the correlation we find to create patterns in space.  One of the examples given by Eco is that of a cave and early man; as they use a hole in a mountain as shelter, over time it will be defined by the person as a place of settlement in which they dwell.  Rock formations along the edges can also be defined as walls and the opening itself is effectively a transition from dwelling to not dwelling (aka door).  As the person goes forth and explores, they may see similar rock formations with a transitional ‘hole’ which one could imagine they define as another ‘cave’.  More modern examples can be things like viewports (windows, glazing, platforms, etc) or a chair (pile of rocks, a fallen tree, a chair, a sofa, a throne, etc) but they come under the idea of how we define what something is and the connotations with it.  The range of items that can come under a single definition is somewhat infinite from a broad spectrum, but there’s an example from a game I enjoy greatly which I feel takes on this idea greatly.
Ratchet and Clank on the PS2 was a platformer which featured an anthropomorphic main character (Ratchet) and his robot sidekick (Clank).  Initially, Clank is a means to bring the call of ‘a hero’s journey’ to Ratchet, but over time Clank develops some motor actions to help the player progress the game.  These features include a helicopter / jetpack / waterjet transformation from Clank which gives us the ability to jump higher, glide, swim faster and other tertiary functions.  Clank is defined as a robot; but he features AI of a robot, customisation of a mechanical object, and the companionship of a sidekick character.  I haven’t played it, but those of you from the Nintendo console side will probably see a similar light with Banjo Kazooie and the range of involvement Kazooie has in the game. 

To summarise, the subject of signs and semiology is a vast subject which bleeds into our everyday lives on both a conscious and sub-conscious manner.  Taking time to consider these factors gives us the potential to view games in a new depth when we corroborate it with exterior schools of thought.  I would highly recommend reading further into the subject with people like Young (psychology) or the examples I’ve presented in this post. 

I hope you’ve found this piece interesting. 

References

*Barthes, R. Semiology and the Urban
*Eco, U. Function and Sign: The Semiotics of Architecture
*Ratchet and Clank.(2002). Insomniac Games
*Banjo Kazooie. (1998). Rare

My last week (a mix of stuff)

Hello there.  This is gonna be a bit of a mish-mash of traditional ‘bloggy’ content alongside a brief delve into my usual architectural musing so that will explain the potential irrelevance against my previous content.  Regardless, here is my last week and what went on:

I got a cold kinda sums it up :-\

Elaborating on that point; in the later part of last week I got a rather painful throat, drippy nose and the occasional headache that put a damper on my previous plans of travelling and doing some research.  Now I know that the common cold isn’t a particular debilitating thing to happen, it’s just I like to ‘get it over with’ and not do much for the brief day or two so that I can get back on track faster in the long run.  Unfortunately, this was hampered by the fact it decided not to clear after one or two days and that I had a busy weekend / early weekday coming up.  In this time of ailment, there were events I was involved in which I met with varying circumstance and they go along as follows:

• 1.      Field research visit on Sunday morning (5^th October 2014).  This was a rather early start to the morning which was met with a bite in the air and my throat on the mend.  The walk was pleasant but coarseness of the wild was annoying as I was looking to be involved in meetings for the visit later on.  The site itself was an old manor house in my town’s communal parkland and with its age and current restoration in progress was a den of dust; particularly its basement / cellar in which the dust created a short term skirmish with me.  Talking in the later meeting was a case of directed coughs away from the others as we discussed the current research deadlines and potential output.  Other than the respiratory side of me making itself known frequently, it was a nice morning met with some good progress made with the project related to the site. 

• 2.      Architectural talk on Tuesday afternoon (7^th October 2014).  The day before had been an aggravating grab of tissue paper every 5-10 minutes to clear my nose which followed right into the night.  This night / morning in particular I got asleep around the 7-8am mark, giving me at max 2-2 ½ hours of sleep to work on.  This would have been fine any other day, but this was the day I was giving a talk to a group of adults with an interest in art and design.  It was a group I advertised my interests and research to and by that action was hired to give a talk on architecture and its history; so giving a brilliant first impression and enjoyable talk was paramount to me expressing this world that I am involved in.  The venue was packed to some 50-odd attendees and now I had to inform, entertain and intrigue them with some 4000 years of architecture in the space of an hour or so; alongside being very tired and blowing my nose every 5 minutes.  Much to my delight, I charged head on with the talk and in the space of a couple minutes found my stride into the fundamentals of pre-historic concepts of architecture.  As of today, I called it my “academics adrenalin” in a random off-topic chat on skype which I’ll look to put into the vernacular onward.  Anyway, The talk ended to a very happy crowd to stayed around for ½ hour or so to ask questions and thank me, which in the end kept me going right back to my home where I crashed and caught up on sleep.

As of last night / today I’m now feeling very well and hoping to get fully back on track over the upcoming weekend which should be nice.  I’m kinda hoping that I ‘got in early’ so to speak with getting a cold so that any potential bug going around closer to the Christmas holiday period should be suitably avoidable and not affect one of my favourite times of the year.  I’m involved in some fun locally based pub crawls and the likes around Christmas and you can’t be on form with flu meds in your system eh!

During all this time, I didn't really look to play a lot of games which may seem odd to some of you.  With more time dedicated to lounging about, one may image that you want to kick back and not think while you command an army or further a story.  However, I kinda didn’t do too much other than keeping up with my youtube subscriptions and watching a lot of twitch.  In my usual gaming time, I like to have twitch / youtube running on my phone as a peripheral screen with audio but I wasn’t really feeling the mild multitasking it involves.  The games I watched were mostly Dota 2 and Hearthstone but it also involved Heroes of Newerth, Path of Exile and a couple random games that one sometimes browses out of curiosity.  Whenever I watch the more competitive games, I always think back to the vision of when watching competitive games will be more widespread in the entertainment industry with pubs and bars showcasing it alongside traditional sports like Football and Rugby (UK references but of course replace relevant to own culture).  I have been to a couple ‘barcraft’ events and they were enjoyable for the most part. 

As my thoughts were with my IRL work mostly this week, I haven’t really thought about any particular games / architecture crossovers this week.  That being said, while looking through my old university notes, I did feel like I should make a small note on one of my previous posts.  On my post regarding Kitsch Architecture and paint by numbers game design, I do feel that there is a possibility that one could find higher relevance in the term “Vernacular Architecture” over “Kitsch” as it’s a term regarding the everyday.  That could be up to the reader in question, but you may want to personally review whether either term is more appropriate.  However, I may do another piece which tries to address the potential differences / similarities so we shall see.

Other than that, it leaves me with thinking what I want to talk about in the coming week.  I was thinking either ‘signs and semiology’ or regionalism concepts but I’m not sure.  Assume one of them and I hope you found this view into my current life interesting at least.