"Everywhere, all the time, the gamer confronts the rival impulses of chance and competition, intoxication and spectacle, as homeopathic antidotes to a boredom that challenges being from within." - McKenzie Wark, 2007 www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...
A really good take by @lewisgordon.bsky.social: perhaps this repetetive, empty aesthetics is very timid in the face of chaotic and unpredictable reality. Unified, repeating office space anxiety (Matrix, Fight Club ...) was already there in the late 90s.
artreview.com/the-life-and...
"So why does he go on to mow down dozens of thugs? Why does he swap between long guns and mantling walls, ninjalike, as bullets rain down? Is it just because this is a video game, and that’s what you do in one?"
Ouch. Great, stinging review from Yussef, here
An odd one, Backrooms — on the one hand, supremely now; on the other, its metaphorical thrust feels a touch dated, like reading a mark fisher essay from 15 years ago.
I wrote about the film and liminal spaces at large for @artreview.bsky.social.
artreview.com/the-life-and...
which is to say, i'm not sure this iteration of backrooms or liminal spaces more broadly is fit for purpose for wherever the hell we are right now. the anxiety it purports to reflect is rendered in strangely anodyne terms, and the mid-2020s are anything but anodyne
artreview.com/the-life-and...
I really dug Phoenix Springs. Read what I thought about it here.
www.theverge.com/2024/10/7/24...
Dr Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Ondřej Trhoň🐍
also get into resonances between backrooms and exit 8, characters looking in rather than out, a retreat into space rather than confrontation
artreview.com/the-life-and...
Also, maybe i've missed it but i'm waiting for a thorough assessment of this specific Bond who, from a distance, has a kind of blandly handsome/toyetic quality. A bit Tom Holland, a lot generic video game star.
Curious if this is the case.
Yes, yes, yes -- tantalising and gorgeous, just like Phoenix Springs, though pushing Calligram's style in a bold new direction.
