Life Is A Race is an artsy banner-game from Cactus, you click to make a baby move across the screen, prompting it to run, get that briefcase and then become old and die. It's like Passage but with an emphasis, rather than ambivalence, on the speed of aging and mortality.
Torture Game 2 has you torturing a rag doll. I linked to the New Grounds page rather than direct because you gotta read those comments. Then you gotta read Ian's response to an MSNBC article about it. A sick world indeed.
So, in playing both these games, you ought to ask yourself a few questions, I guess. Here's some suggestions.
How does this make me feel, or does this make me feel nothing?
("We believe in nothing Lebowski!")
What does the author's supposed intent or lack of intent do in affecting my interpretation of it?
What does my life mean to me? To what extent do these two games inform that question?
I'm trying to figure out if these games succeed at something other than what people tend to expect (a "message", possibly a vestigial expectation from linear media) or if they fail at doing justice to their subjects. I'm also curious if a designer having a very mild intent is a good thing or a bad thing.
Not much to be honest!
How does this make me feel, or does this make me feel nothing?
Life Is a Race: It was cute to see the growing process; the first time focussing on the sprites, the second time on the animation. The third and fourth times I played it, I tested my ability to click the mouse, seeing if the game would reward me for clicking fast.
Torture Game 2: I was interested in seeing how all the tools interacted with the avatar. At times I found it humorous, other times I found it clever. After trying all the tools I was not interested any more.
What does the author's supposed intent or lack of intent do in affecting my interpretation of it?
I believe an author's intent is very important for discussing the politics behind art, but not for enjoying it. I don't know their intent and I honestly doubt they're trying to convey a message. Seems like games made merely to be interesting toys for a short span.
What does my life mean to me? To what extent do these two games inform that question? That art has to be more compelling than this to touch me! The steps in life are important and beautiful to me, but the first game hardly tickled those feelings. Sadism is fun from time to time (as long as nobody is getting hurt, at least for me), but this game doesn't leave a lasting impression.
Authorial intent and such things
Life is a Race: I'm tempted to say that it's not a game because there are no choices involved...However, I suppose the "choice" involved is how hard to try to get a good score. Anyway, the point of the game, as I see it, is to create a dissonant feeling in the enforced contrast between living a life (which should be savored) and frantically clicking on a button to run a "race". Not truly mindblowing or earthshaking, but an interesting little feeling. I think it succeeded. I almost suspect that this wasn't even a conscious design decision on Cactus' part, it was more like an instinctive realization that there was potential for an interesting contrast here.
Torture Game 2: I found this "game" fairly unrealistic...but at the same time realistic enough that I didn't want to play it. I didn't actually do more than tug on a leg. It made me feel that I don't like torture or dismemberment. Of course, this isn't exactly a revelation for me. I don't think the author had much "intent" in mind...Something along the lines of "Some people like gore and torture, so I'll make a game like that and it will be popular". And that's, you know, not really a bad thing when you get right down to it...
If the designer of a game (or some other work of art) doesn't have an intent in mind, then it's up to us to supply or create one. Well, readers/players always create their own meanings, it's just much more explicit in this case.
I can think of two cases where this could happen. One is basically just laziness. "I created this game and, uh, yeah, I don't really know what it's about, just play with it." In that case, well, the author's intent doesn't really matter and we just interpret it however we want.
However, I could envision an author saying: "I don't really know what feelings or responses this work will evoke, so I'm going to create it and show it to you as an experiment." In that case the author is willingly inviting us to construct meaning. I think that could be very useful. (Or it could fall flat, but hey, there are always risks.) It could be useful for the author honing their skills and pushing the boundaries of their craft.
More about Torture Game 2
More about the whole Torture Game 2 "news":
http://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/930989
Good comments, we like
Good comments, we like having both of you around.
Life is a race
Life is a race is a reflection on a lot of people I know, who just try to make time go by, either by drinking or doing drugs, or by working at jobs they don't like (which means you'll spend most of your life doing something you don't enjoy). To me that seems a bit like racing towards death.
That doesn't mean it's a very deep game, or that the matter at hand is something that's very important to me. It was made for a competition with the theme "This game is art", and this was the only thing I could think of.