the waking knot is a videogame for broughlike fans at the bottom of a little hole. i believe that michael brough dug a tunnel for himself and maybe it caved in a little and that's fine, he was trying to get somewhere, the tunnel served its purpose, but in the wake he left a hole with a caved-in tunnel there and i don't know what people are doing there in that little hole.

i am sure that it brings a great deal of joy.

being a child, now, i enjoyed being a child, to some extent, but i also was frustrated. i wanted to understand everything. i wanted things to make sense. imagine if i were to bring to life a wish fulfilment fantasy as a child: i would make a videogame. i would make a videogame out of rules. i would make a videogame that shows you, look, look, look at all these silly little pieces. aren't you interested in them? aren't you interested in how they work?

and then i would figure out how they all work and i would smile, i would smile and clap and make the little toy engine go and i would be pleased at having figured out a toy system not understanding that the value of a toy system is to help me understand a real system, and not the fuegorika of having learned something meaningless.

not that.

when i played the waking knot, i felt like a stupid child being lead through my first math class. solving problems. one plus one equals two. three plus eight equals? yes that's right, carry the one, it's eleven! so good! only, cryptic, and while as a child i did not understand that math might someday be useful, here i think there are overtones of that desire for childhood's simplicity. you don't understand why this Higher Being is teaching and guiding you, so you follow along, having faith.

only, in this case, the Higher Being is a fictive creature. text on a screen. at the end of the day learning to play Yet Another Broughlike does not bring you to any truth, it drags you deeper into a hole. there i was, at the bottom of the hole, wondering.

i have had this experience enough. i did not like school very much.

The Waking Knot (demo) on Steam

My advance apologies to Stan and Bill.

More than ever this reflects on my own distance from games rather than being any judgement upon this game's creators.

i must better measure money and attention. what are the forms of money? what are the forms of attention?

easy, effortless, obvious. do not reinvent, do not create from scratch. what has already been created for me? what is already there, undefended? (unsatisfied, perhaps.) do not fight on distracting ground. wait until you have the advantage... find a place where you already have the advantage.

where do i have an advantage?

1. look for weak points. not where things are busy, popular, well-defended. look for the quiet places.

2. do not destroy. take whole. i must reflect further on this. take whole.

and what place has the war against boring art among the various facets of this problem?

i will return to read the art of war with this in mind:

- i have no clear enemy, opponent, or ground. i am able to choose the ground of battle.
- victory is measured in a quantity of external value assigned to haiku games, measurable in mass attention, measurable in money.
- the presumed target is the games industry, is gamers, is the social corner containing games, but it is not the only target, nor is it the necessary target.
- the necessary target is people, of some sort. people.
- victory is measured in value placed not upon the act or process of creating haiku games, but of something external to the haiku game, something regarding the produced artifact.
- i am able to choose ground of battle.
- i am ready & willing to produce the necessary ground.
- i will find the ground.

edit:: here is an interesting twist on the wartime perspective. what if i presume that value is zero-sum? where do i want to go to steal such a thing? where can i go to wage battle, where i can be certain of victory, and be certain that my victory is virtuous?

i am ready to find value for haiku games anywhere i can.
on steam. in old people's homes. on the street. in the valley.
online. offline.
but as i continually recognize, it is a chicken and egg problem...
as long as haiku games are loosely defined, i cannot perceive their inherent value.
and, as long as that value-giving context is loosely defined, i cannot place haiku games within such context.

which comes first?

the features of a haiku which i presently regard as crucial:

• composed in one sitting, by an individual.
• about noticing experiencing something real in the world. (haiku were written about nature, senryu about human nature. these are 'real' things. haiku are not written about haiku, or about other art forms. another description of this feature might say "haiku are not meta.")
• requires no special equipment or knowledge to appreciate or transmit.
• the tools are available.