"see score
as a force of alignment as boids have
tuning you into a wave."

game 3. score

1. orient yourself as best you can.
    find a map, and your place there.
    point north and know where north is.
    face north.

2. you know where you are.

3. forget where you are.
    forget where north is.

0. you are a child again.

"the gallery is any place that is empty and vast
enough for great things to escape." (pt iv, final part)

"its skittishness is
what makes it what it is.
when it goes, let it go.
do not tame the wild
birds of your soul." (pt iii)

"once situated
in your studio and having in mind
an empty gallery, begin remember-
ing the object lying beneath
the todayness of today.

it is a pigeon, a crow, a great heron.
neither startle it nor coax it.

instead pass its perching-place
    (a tree droops heavily over a river.)
    (the banister of a trafficked bridge.)
and turn your head only regarding
its hugeness as it regards you." (pt ii)

"set aside a piece of your day
to pay attention to yourself.
inscribe ahead of time
or in the moment the boundaries
of studio and gallery.
your studio must be a place that makes you
feel safe." (pt i)

cultist simulator shows the individual following your trail. as a player you can observe the system at work: even if it were inevitable, the sense of dread is too tangible to provoke even a smidge of genuine paranoia.

uplink's invisible pursuit, you don't even know it's happening until it's too late. the paranoia comes all at once, activating every shred of doubt that you swept under the carpet.

that stuck with me.

the eye watches.

at some point i sought to lose my sense of paranoia, which i felt most keenly in one awful moment while playing uplink.

so you're a scrappy little hacker, right? and you're hacking away, slowly improving your rig--it's like an idle game, almost. incremental.

thought 1. uplink and the eye

thought 2. i really need to re-read Ugly Feelings

get weapon / i don't know what you're talking about

get gameplay's knife / which one?

get gameplay's knife from the corpse / which one?

get gameplay's knife from the still dead corpse / you take gameplay's knife from the still dead corpse / it was dead when the knife went in and dead it remains / it flashes red and illuminates the hilts of each other weapon / you hold the knife / you are the killer / you are the dead.


you got gameplay's knife!