Magical Rohrer

From watching a few of his interviews and playing his games, I must say that Jason Rohrer is a guy I would like to sit down and have a beer with.

Rohrer is thirty five-ish, blond, square-jawed, and has startling blue eyes.  His hair seems perennially sloppy, as if it won’t be tamed no matter how long or short it’s cut.  It’s the look of a natural grunge musician.  His surprisingly large head sort of floats about over his thin neck like the head of a marionette, bobbing and weaving about with his words, which bunch together in quick spurts.  It’s a manic dance of excitement.  He speaks quickly about infinite recursion and creativity and biased data sharing and the lower limit of what we would call communication, and by the end you find yourself bobbing along with him a little bit too, because his enthusiasm is infectious.  Or maybe it’s because you're a little intrigued...

Jason Rohrer is an artist and a computer game designer, although I would emphasize the former and say that the latter is simply his medium.  If you’ve ever turned your nose up at video games, or you don’t see the value in them, I beseech you to try the ones he made.  You still may not like them (and I warn you, these games aren’t designed to be fun), but I guarantee that they’ll at least make you think a little differently.  The games I recommend you to play are these:

Passage is about life.  Will you travel through it alone or with a partner?  Will you take an easy road or a more tricky one?  What kinds of challenges will you take, and what will you give up in the process?  And what’s the point of it all anyways?

Gravitation is about creativity.  Have you ever had moments of genius, and then the times when it all crashes down on you?  Have you ever struggled with the tradeoff between work and play, brainstorming and implementing, taking on more exciting challenges versus finishing the ones you’re immersed in?  So has Jason Rohrer.  I bet you’ve never experienced it like this before.  

Sleep is Death is about…?  Okay I admit, I haven’t played it.  But I watched the cool intro slideshow, and I’m intrigued enough that I want to.

These games (at least the first two) are free and quick... they’ll take you less than ten minutes to play.  They’re purposely philosophical and exploratory rather than entertaining.  You can collect points in these games but really what you’re going to want to do is to understand the nuances of their mechanics, because, well, that’s what the games are really about.  It’s not the contents nor the graphics (don’t expect much) but their physics through which the games build into allegories.  

And when I say that you’ve never played games like these, I really mean it.  There’s very little else I’ve seen to compare them to, and I feel they have more in common with Avante Garde art than with other video games (although admittedly, I’m not really a gamer… perhaps there is other stuff like this out there?).  

There's something else about these games.  In an age when all of our technology is tremendously slick, it can be shocking when we encounter something that isn’t.  Rohrer cuts right to the heart of it.  He doesn't waste a spare pixel.  His games show that beauty is in the crafting and not in the polish, for of polish there is none here, but I don’t feel these games miss it.  Take a few minutes to check them out and I think you'll be glad that you did.

Elderly shmelderly

What should I do with my elderly vegetables?

I had a pile of them in front of me this morning, from the rather fresh to the marginally edible.  I sorted them into groups.  One group was for the dumpster.  This included a few moldy tomatoes and eggplants.  Then there was another group which looked healthy and fine.  Those were the obvious keepers.  But between them was the third group--the wrinkled old ones.  These ones had velvety skins.  They looked like they had been through rough days, and had stories to tell.  In fact, I know that some of them did.  

That red bell pepper had gotten sliced back in his prime, when he was a young chap full of ego and crunch.  I had enjoyed his fragrance and his crispness then.  Next to him was the twisted orange pepper, a bad little man who carried just the whiff of heat to keep it interesting, but who most of all was surprisingly tangy and sweet.  He had completed one of my salads.  And the onion, oh so neglected.  “You eat my friends all the time,” he seemed to whine, “but little old me, you just stuck me in the back of the fridge and forgot about me, didn’t ya.”  He had shriveled away from his old purple luster, down and down into a tight and curled knot.  I could see the disregard on him, layers which had softened or peeled away and were useless.  He didn’t look appetizing.  

I stalled.  I picked the veggies up and got ready to trash them, but, not being able to bring myself to it, I put them back down again.  The silly thing was, I had all of the same vegetables in my “fresh” group.  I didn’t need these.  On the counter nearby there were two red bell peppers, the color of wine and nearly exploding out of their smooth folds with young pride.  Right next to them sat a spotless orange pepper, the same variety as that old grizzled hothead who had livened up my salad.  And on my spice shelf were a few onions, lording about like they owned the place.  

But now I had these chaps who were wrinkled but edible, which had shriveled up but not rotted, and who seem to stare at me with their vegetable eyes and say “what about us?”  I watched them and they watched me.  They never blinked.  Finally, giving in, I started slicing them.  Today I would make my eggs using only the elderly ones, and we’d have to just see.

So I’m taking my breakfast now on the balcony of my building, up the stairwell, with my feet propped up on the railing and a cup of coffee.  The vegetables are good.  They seem to have mellowed out but gained a wider spectrum flavors with their age, making it worth chewing more at each bite.  I’m glad that I chose them.  It’s a chilly day and it’s Shabbat so the neighborhood’s pulse is pretty tame now, with just some tourists and a few locals walking dogs or strolling, and some crazy fat lady going up and down the street singing nonsense.  I am struck by the fact that just over two weeks ago, I was in the same stairwell as this balcony, hiding from rockets, and now I’m mostly concerned about the fate of my elderly vegetables.  

I think back and yes, maybe one of these veggies was even around then.  Well, I’m not sure.  The conflict with Hamas feels like it never happened, almost, just as these veggies, so precious when I first sliced them, sat forgotten in a cold place while my life swished away elsewhere.  It’s strange just how quickly and fully we can forget things.  I just celebrated a birthday, so I guess I’m thinking a bit more about it right now.  I hope that I’ll age well, like these veggies.  Well, look at me… now I’m getting all sentimental.  Seeing anything that has been left forgotten strikes a chord with me.  To curl up alone in the refrigerator is a sad fate for a bell pepper.  

Breakfast is done.  I’ve finished all of my old guys, and it’s only the young guns left over in my apartment now.  Will I eat them fresh?  Will they end up neglected, too?  Who’s to say?  One day at a time, little fellas.  I’m off to life, to hopefully scooping up a few more flavors myself on the big journey.  I have a lot more to do out there.  Gotta get it all while it's hot, while there's still sizzle in the pan.  After all, one day I, too, will be an elderly vegetable.