Reviews
Reality computer game
Reality is a new multi-genre adventure game from Kamichan Software. Players start off in a crude binary two-dimensional platform world, which is very easy to comprehend and through which, it is easy to manoeuvre. As players ascend through various levels, the pixilated imagery becomes finer, the artificial intelligence smarter, the range of moves more and more nuanced and the extraordinary story unfolds - you, the player, have designed this world yourself, in order to learn to distinguish the difference between what is true and false.
Truth and falsehood in reality do not just mean what you see, but what you feel, what you want and, ultimately, who you are. Earlier levels attempt to subvert your awareness by offering the gratification of biological urges as a means to avoid frustration. In later levels you are tricked into an addictive response to unpredictable rewards and punished by a loss of phantom status. Finally, upon completion of level 999 players are given a code which operates an included headset which gives them access to a multi-sensual dreamworld of near infinite complexity and extent. The graphics are nearly indistinguishable from reality and the AI now appears to be completely conscious... but something is missing. It is here that one takes on the Big Boss - Nemesis - or “Reality” itself. Only by being able to perceive the difference between the self-fabricated world and the real world beyond will be you be able to escape. If you are at all fake, or unconscious, you’ll be imprisoned forever, and you won’t even know it.
Captain Appropriate comic
By day Milton Hornpipe passes as one of the great unexceptional, with nothing about him more remarkable to the haphazard eye than a micro-vivid element of jaunt to an unusually flexible gait. By night, however, his is. captain appropriate.
Captain Appropriate’s superpower is: he knows The Right Thing to Do. This comes from the Pink Tip, a naked vibe-detecting instrument inside his chest. When he meets events or people this pink tip leans forward enquiringly, or it vibrates like a pleasantly electrocuted chicken, or it sways with melancholy happiness, or it shrinks away in horror, or it hardens resistingly preparing for battle, or it softens blendingly into yours. Although animal fear might put him on the back foot, or his interest in sex put him on the front, although he might not be paying attention, or he might be paying far too much attention; although, in short, he might be wrong; the pink tip never is.
Captain Appropriate - also known as Aptman - has a series of arch-enemies with which he does regular battle; The darkly obsessive Dr Plan, the restless Jiggler, Gagboy, Cockman and The Mood. Somehow or other Aptman always manages to defeat them, without having the slightest clue as to how he managed it.
Under the Lake club
Last night I visited one of my favourite clubs; Under the Lake of Victoria park. The entrance is a lift, housed in a squat cubicle about twenty yards from the edge of the lake. The baise-plush sliding doors open smoothly, like lifted skirts, and then tenderly clasp. The smooth round bakerlite buttons inside are of perfect finger resistant springiness with the slickest of clicks. The lift hums deeply and warmly and slides down, two stories, to the level of the lake floor. The door opens to a warmly-lit walnut wood-pannelled tunnel, wide enough for four people to walk side-by-side. Lines of thin green candles stand in panelled alcoves, each decorated with intricately wrought soviet-stucco latticework and polished brass fittings. Walking down the passageway, our fine boot heels clacking beautifully on the polished wooden floor, we felt like we were being led towards the secret chamber of a modern goddess, who plays billiards, and has an elegant cat on a leash. A few yards ahead the light changed; the tunnel, lying along the floor of the lake, became a lead-glass lined passage, through which the clean bottle-green lake could be seen, along with silver flashes of crucian, tench and rudd, which shiver and dart past the thick knobbly glass.
We reached a heavy oak door, at the far end of the passage, and pushed it open.
The club is large enough to comfortably seat two hundred people around the sixty or so candle-lit tables; light mahogany disks, scattered on split-levels and scattered around the semi-circular stage. The decor, of a piece with the passage, is silk and velvet, mahogany and brass, a mixture of Edwardian, art-deco, socialist realism and touches of Edo. The upholstery is cared-for, and the pillows plump and abundant, but nothing here is precious, and there is no feeling of rigidity or stiffness; one feels one could throw oneself down anywhere. Cones of light spread up the walls from behind mother-of-pearl sconces and wrought tapestry screens, cheval-reflected shards streaming over the paneled walls and tall windows, reaching up to the clear vaulted glass dome above us, through which we see the lake and the ripples of light that swim down to us from the wobbling park sky, high above.
The mood was cheerful and friendly, happy faces everywhere warmly lit, chatting or quietly waiting. Many knew each other, those that didn’t soon would; for the structure of the club assists meeting; around the edge of the club are alcoves, some room-large, some cubby-small, in which are various recreations; a mini-life drawing class, a long buffet table, a pinball machine, a couple of pool tables, a decent-sized trampoline, chess-tables, a few fancy-dress wardrobes, a library of board-games and some amusing glossy books.
People were dressed eclectically, some loose and careless some astonishingly formal. I saw one woman in a long black dress cut in an eastern style with a small collar, bicep length sleeves and a high leg cut. Her shoes were black, buckled, round toed rising to the ankle, with full heel, book thick. I saw a woman in a black play-suit, straight red hair and shoes the colour of bumble bees. There were slick suits and hemp slacks, polka-dot a-lines and patched-jeans. What all the clothes have in common is that they are tailored and made from exceptionally good materials.
The entertainment is endless and well-suited to the time. Gentle classic Jazz with a weird electro undercurrent, modern bluegrass love-songs, tight Serbian orkestars and long periods of ambiance. One band, Lula, was an autistic looking bald Eurasian guy of indeterminate age playing Tourette’s rhythms on bongos and table, a massive-fingered Santa-Claus on accordion and a gorgeous English rose playing the fiddle. Their gypsy longing makes the Chinese lanterns sway and the Cardamon coffee they brought along taste particularly sweet. On the open-mic last night a psychedelic Victorian governess in hooped stockings charmed the fish from afar with songs of the past and a tall man with an exceptionally large Adam’s apple and bug-eyes sung intensely about being a psychotic doctor who cures his patients by sending them mad. While singing the patient’s part he hit an extraordinary falsetto, his mouth forming an ecstatic egg. Then a stomping big-band outfit sends the club into a lindy-hop whirl, tables pushed to the sides.
The live music was interspersed with recorded music, beautifully choreographed dance outfits, silence and impro. We watched players being born from sofas, Roman masters ordering their servants to fire weapons made of other people, and we the audience were roped in to be firing squads, and marshes, to guide the blindfolded and sing of helicopters eating cupcakes... but, of course, you had to be there.
Finally the MC, a tall massive-nosed moustached man wearing a white jump-suit and a long black scarf, took to the stage.
“And now, Ladies and Gentleman,” he cried, white teeth flashing, “the deluge!”
We all took out our breathing apparatus as the mighty gears began to turn and the portholes opened, throwing gushing jets into the club.
“Let the curtains fall!” he cried, and the mighty door of the dome fell open, cascades pouring down, sweeping us all up in a mad frothing catastrophe of arms and legs and scurfing furniture.
The whole club and all of us in it, were swept wild and turning up into the maelstrom of the lake, up into the night, turning until the club was submerged, in the warm waters of the midnight lake, hung there suspended.
Reality is a new multi-genre adventure game from Kamichan Software. Players start off in a crude binary two-dimensional platform world, which is very easy to comprehend and through which, it is easy to manoeuvre. As players ascend through various levels, the pixilated imagery becomes finer, the artificial intelligence smarter, the range of moves more and more nuanced and the extraordinary story unfolds - you, the player, have designed this world yourself, in order to learn to distinguish the difference between what is true and false.
Truth and falsehood in reality do not just mean what you see, but what you feel, what you want and, ultimately, who you are. Earlier levels attempt to subvert your awareness by offering the gratification of biological urges as a means to avoid frustration. In later levels you are tricked into an addictive response to unpredictable rewards and punished by a loss of phantom status. Finally, upon completion of level 999 players are given a code which operates an included headset which gives them access to a multi-sensual dreamworld of near infinite complexity and extent. The graphics are nearly indistinguishable from reality and the AI now appears to be completely conscious... but something is missing. It is here that one takes on the Big Boss - Nemesis - or “Reality” itself. Only by being able to perceive the difference between the self-fabricated world and the real world beyond will be you be able to escape. If you are at all fake, or unconscious, you’ll be imprisoned forever, and you won’t even know it.
By day Milton Hornpipe passes as one of the great unexceptional, with nothing about him more remarkable to the haphazard eye than a micro-vivid element of jaunt to an unusually flexible gait. By night, however, his is. captain appropriate.
Captain Appropriate’s superpower is: he knows The Right Thing to Do. This comes from the Pink Tip, a naked vibe-detecting instrument inside his chest. When he meets events or people this pink tip leans forward enquiringly, or it vibrates like a pleasantly electrocuted chicken, or it sways with melancholy happiness, or it shrinks away in horror, or it hardens resistingly preparing for battle, or it softens blendingly into yours. Although animal fear might put him on the back foot, or his interest in sex put him on the front, although he might not be paying attention, or he might be paying far too much attention; although, in short, he might be wrong; the pink tip never is.
Captain Appropriate - also known as Aptman - has a series of arch-enemies with which he does regular battle; The darkly obsessive Dr Plan, the restless Jiggler, Gagboy, Cockman and The Mood. Somehow or other Aptman always manages to defeat them, without having the slightest clue as to how he managed it.
Under the Lake club
Last night I visited one of my favourite clubs; Under the Lake of Victoria park. The entrance is a lift, housed in a squat cubicle about twenty yards from the edge of the lake. The baise-plush sliding doors open smoothly, like lifted skirts, and then tenderly clasp. The smooth round bakerlite buttons inside are of perfect finger resistant springiness with the slickest of clicks. The lift hums deeply and warmly and slides down, two stories, to the level of the lake floor. The door opens to a warmly-lit walnut wood-pannelled tunnel, wide enough for four people to walk side-by-side. Lines of thin green candles stand in panelled alcoves, each decorated with intricately wrought soviet-stucco latticework and polished brass fittings. Walking down the passageway, our fine boot heels clacking beautifully on the polished wooden floor, we felt like we were being led towards the secret chamber of a modern goddess, who plays billiards, and has an elegant cat on a leash. A few yards ahead the light changed; the tunnel, lying along the floor of the lake, became a lead-glass lined passage, through which the clean bottle-green lake could be seen, along with silver flashes of crucian, tench and rudd, which shiver and dart past the thick knobbly glass.
We reached a heavy oak door, at the far end of the passage, and pushed it open.
The club is large enough to comfortably seat two hundred people around the sixty or so candle-lit tables; light mahogany disks, scattered on split-levels and scattered around the semi-circular stage. The decor, of a piece with the passage, is silk and velvet, mahogany and brass, a mixture of Edwardian, art-deco, socialist realism and touches of Edo. The upholstery is cared-for, and the pillows plump and abundant, but nothing here is precious, and there is no feeling of rigidity or stiffness; one feels one could throw oneself down anywhere. Cones of light spread up the walls from behind mother-of-pearl sconces and wrought tapestry screens, cheval-reflected shards streaming over the paneled walls and tall windows, reaching up to the clear vaulted glass dome above us, through which we see the lake and the ripples of light that swim down to us from the wobbling park sky, high above.
The mood was cheerful and friendly, happy faces everywhere warmly lit, chatting or quietly waiting. Many knew each other, those that didn’t soon would; for the structure of the club assists meeting; around the edge of the club are alcoves, some room-large, some cubby-small, in which are various recreations; a mini-life drawing class, a long buffet table, a pinball machine, a couple of pool tables, a decent-sized trampoline, chess-tables, a few fancy-dress wardrobes, a library of board-games and some amusing glossy books.
People were dressed eclectically, some loose and careless some astonishingly formal. I saw one woman in a long black dress cut in an eastern style with a small collar, bicep length sleeves and a high leg cut. Her shoes were black, buckled, round toed rising to the ankle, with full heel, book thick. I saw a woman in a black play-suit, straight red hair and shoes the colour of bumble bees. There were slick suits and hemp slacks, polka-dot a-lines and patched-jeans. What all the clothes have in common is that they are tailored and made from exceptionally good materials.
The entertainment is endless and well-suited to the time. Gentle classic Jazz with a weird electro undercurrent, modern bluegrass love-songs, tight Serbian orkestars and long periods of ambiance. One band, Lula, was an autistic looking bald Eurasian guy of indeterminate age playing Tourette’s rhythms on bongos and table, a massive-fingered Santa-Claus on accordion and a gorgeous English rose playing the fiddle. Their gypsy longing makes the Chinese lanterns sway and the Cardamon coffee they brought along taste particularly sweet. On the open-mic last night a psychedelic Victorian governess in hooped stockings charmed the fish from afar with songs of the past and a tall man with an exceptionally large Adam’s apple and bug-eyes sung intensely about being a psychotic doctor who cures his patients by sending them mad. While singing the patient’s part he hit an extraordinary falsetto, his mouth forming an ecstatic egg. Then a stomping big-band outfit sends the club into a lindy-hop whirl, tables pushed to the sides.
The live music was interspersed with recorded music, beautifully choreographed dance outfits, silence and impro. We watched players being born from sofas, Roman masters ordering their servants to fire weapons made of other people, and we the audience were roped in to be firing squads, and marshes, to guide the blindfolded and sing of helicopters eating cupcakes... but, of course, you had to be there.
Finally the MC, a tall massive-nosed moustached man wearing a white jump-suit and a long black scarf, took to the stage.
“And now, Ladies and Gentleman,” he cried, white teeth flashing, “the deluge!”
We all took out our breathing apparatus as the mighty gears began to turn and the portholes opened, throwing gushing jets into the club.
“Let the curtains fall!” he cried, and the mighty door of the dome fell open, cascades pouring down, sweeping us all up in a mad frothing catastrophe of arms and legs and scurfing furniture.
The whole club and all of us in it, were swept wild and turning up into the maelstrom of the lake, up into the night, turning until the club was submerged, in the warm waters of the midnight lake, hung there suspended.
