Hair Nah: The Value of Simplicity

Since Hair Nah was not really discussed during class, I’d like to look deeper into the game and what it's trying to convey to the player. I guess a disclosure: I’m a biracial woman with curly hair, but I’ve never had actual strangers try and touch my hair (that I know of).

Hair Nah is a flash game that was released in 2017. I point this out because flash games are in a large sense a relic of the 2000s. Like many other flash games, the mechanics are simple; you only need to press the left or right arrow keys or left-click the side of the screen you want to swat at. The aesthetics call back to the 90s and 2000s, with the logo, the 8-bit music, the pixelated art-style. Simply from looking at the game, it feels like a nostalgic game and in a sense, this helps the player relate more to the game if they’re not able to relate to and immerse themselves in the avatar.

This game was made with support from the digital platform “On She Goes” and their purpose is to generally improve the travel experience of women of color. In this framework, we can see Hair Nah functioning as a way to commiserate with other women of color and also a cathartic release. But from playing the game we clearly get the sense its also trying to reach a wider audience and to show people what it feels like having your hair touched by a stranger. I think the difficulty of the game also can make the player feel a frustration comparable to an actual lived experience but on a far tinier scale. But the frustration from this game is far smaller than that of Problem Attic and, to an extent, Dys4ia. It is kind of a mini-game, you are given a single goal with simple mechanics and the difficulty just increases until you reach it. It’s only covering a tiny fraction of the lives of black women and other women of color and this makes it more digestible but at the cost of empathy.

Overall, the game’s aesthetics and gameplay make it a more accessible and approachable game. The audience is far wider than Problem Attic, in that it’s far less difficult to play but also in that it’s not mechanically or visually challenging the player, and maybe that allows it to be more of a learning tool (the creator mentions kids could play Hair Nah and learn the basic principle of not touching people without permission). I think my takeaway from this game is that it was fun, but not challenging, and maybe there’s greater worth in that simplicity than we tend to give credit for.

"Momo Pixel Lives Life in 8-Bit" by Heather Schwedel. Slate.

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2017/12/how_momo_pixel_creator_of_hair_nah_uses_the_internet.html

"'Hair Nah!' is a Game With a Purpose" by Serita Weasley. On She Goes. http://www.onshegoes.com/stories/hair-nah/

Hair Nah by Momo Pixel