Self-Awareness and Liz Ryerson's Problem Attic

Recently, I’ve been considering more carefully the notion of mediation, particularly in regard to video games and other current digital media. For example, at Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art, the configuration of the I was raised on the Internet exhibit overwhelms the  visitor with a sense of mediation, so much so that one becomes consciously aware of the mediation (as with, for example, the 1984-like introductory video that tells you what you are about to see/view/witness). Because of this, and our recent Slack conversation about the need for self-awareness or training/literacy to be self-aware, I would like to consider this week’s playing of Liz Ryerson’s Problem Attic. More than anything, the following is an assortment of thoughts/notes I collected during my time playing the game.

First of all, as Arianna pointed out well in her post, the occlusion of the game certainly makes one hyper-aware of the game’s difficulty. Even the name obviously obscures its homophone: problematic. At the very outset, one comes to the start screen that is both pixelated and blurred, which contains one of only two instructional items in the game (“Press x to begin.” One struggles to read it, and in the extra moments added to decipher the wording (which there is very little of in the game), one (or at least I) becomes aware of the difficulty and the mediated screen.

The lack of wording in the game, too, avoids any attempt to simplify the game for you. And the words one comes across—for example, “my garden is overgrown”—serve only to cause confusion and inquiry. The only other instructional language I came across in my hour-time of playing was the “Press R to restart,” which too, I think, increases the self-awareness involved in the game. Not so much in reading the statement as is, but the realization of the difficulty ahead and that one will have to retrace their steps when s/he must restart the level.

The music in the game is regularly eerie, sounding much like horror film soundtracks or scores. In fact, there seems to be a faint beep in one section of the game, followed by even fainter voices (or I may just be hearing things). The subtlety of the music/sound force one to listen even more carefully, making one self-aware enough to turn up the volume.

As A.J. Barnhardt pointed out to me while discussing the game, the provocative and blatant aspects of the gameplay and art make the game’s accompanying subtleties all the stronger and more potent. The pixelation, obscurity, and music/sound all play into this. 

Most of all, I think the affective response to the game causes one to be self-aware. Arianna already pointed out the lack of cohesion between user input and game output (in the player’s movement). I would like to add that the cross-shaped blocks that shake the screen and the motion of swinging from the bottom of the screen (like falling to the bottom) to the top of the screen (re-emerging at the top) and vice versa caused, in me, a sense of nausea. I had to turn away to get a sense of stability. In this way, the game certainly pushes one away so forcefully, that one has to step aside to gather one’s self.