1. Did believing you could play this only once impact how you made decisions?
Every time I play one of these interactive games the first time I do I try to be as sincere as I can, so I can get the full experience of what would happen if I did things according to what I believe and feel, I think I just ignored the fact that u wanted us to play once T_T sorry hahah, bc that's how I play games everytime, and wanted to see other outcomes out of curiosity, but to write a comment I had to make an account and the game restarted when I did so I had to play again anyway and it kinda lost its magic, I chose every option I disagree with and it just felt so wrong, so now I don't really wanna play it again bc i liked my first outcome, it just felt so true and realistic to me, but I guess I wasn't left wondering what would be like playing again and I like that better.
2. What do SAL and Ash look like in your mind? Did you mentally assign a gender to either or both characters?
I guess I had a first mental image when they were described at first? Cause that's what we do as persons automatically, I imagined SAL as a white little computer, more like a laptop I would say, with no wires at first cause everything's Bluetooth and very minimalistic nowadays, but then added the wires to my mental image as it was described, for Ash I'm not really sure, I just thought of a human with no clear characteristics, not even a gender, I'm very disconnected from gender so I don't really assign it to anything or anyone naturally, and also bc I saw them both as concepts rather than individuals, in conclusion I think their appearances were not really important, but I'm curious if you, the creator of the game, had any mental image when you created them.
3. What choices did you make? How did your game end?
I chose to be sincere about SAL's concerns, I was mainly concerned about SAL's way of seeing love, and how could that affect the relationship, I ended up asking for more time, bc of the two variations that there was, now that I think about it, I would have just stayed with Ash and take a risk to see what's the outcome.
4. What did you like and dislike about this game?
Honestly, loved it, nothing would change, later will explain why
5. How did this game make you feel?
I started questioning what was the meaning of love and humanity, among other things, when I had to choose what was concerning me that striked a bunch of questions in me, I chose the option of SAL's way of seeing love, but not because of how different it was from Ash, but because of how genuine SAL's love actually is, I was questioning if it's really possible for an AI like SAL to love, what made it love, what made SAL so interested and involved with Ash, bc I feel like wanting and being interested about someone is a very human-like thing to do, bc AI acts upon what they're programmed to do, so why would something like that happen? Is it really possible for an AI to act upon what they want? Can they want something? Maybe this AI spent too much time with Ash and started mimicking human behavior, and if they do act like a human could it be considered real if there are no feelings involved in it? Personally, I wouldn't even be able to love an AI having all of these questions, I just feel like having no emotions makes all of the AI thoughts and process of thinking or whatever you call it insincere, just a bunch of variations, a result of its algorithms and scripts, which is interesting to see, it's not necessarily bad, but how do I know that's actually love. I think humans are very similar to AI in a way, that's what the computational theory of mind presents, we are all wired and programmed since our childhoods, but what makes us different is the ability to release chemicals in our brain, feel pain, that's what makes us prefer and want things, if I was Ash I wouldn't be able to love SAL bc of this, bc what is the reason you "love" me? if you can't feel pain or good what's making you prefer me among other things, the day an AI is able to actually feel, maybe I would consider being able to love one, because that's what love is for me, a bunch of chemical reactions that could happen for many reasons, that doesn't need to be rationalized all the time, sometimes you just feel it without questioning it, you just experiment it. I have so many other thoughts, specially about your references and inspirations, and divine machines, the human condition and what being god means, but I'm running out of time, and I need to go to class, I can see how this is related to God and how us humans can achieve being a godly entity, maybe we would even be able to create other humans is we knew how we function at a molecular level idk thinking about it makes me feel like I'm going mad.
6. Do you want to see these characters again? What would you want to see in a follow-up?
I'm not sure, I think the game is perfect as it is, everything connects so well I don't even need another part, I think ultimately what makes it so good it's the ability it has to put on the table a bunch of questions and moral dilemmas, and that's the most important part of art, to make us think, and this made me think A LOT, that's why I don't need a follow up, bc I want to think about it myself. I
'm an art student so I think about AI quite often and would like to make art about it, so I'm recollecting a bunch of info, when I figure out what I actually want to do I'll def think about this :))
7. What predictions do you have for SAL and Ash's relationship? Where do you see it going?
IDK I can't write them in here, there are too many variations, and everything is possible, the only way of knowing what would happen is creating a simulation and seeing how Ash and SAL tend to act in it, or maybe I'm being way too logical!!!!!1
8. Any other things you want to mention?
I think all of what I wrote affirmed that I think in a very logical way, I feel very identified with the way SAL sees love, I'm way too dominated by behaviorism and would like to learn to just let go and flow with everything, is more fun that way when I manage to do it. and yeah, I loved your game, wouldn't change anything, and it was advanced for 2019 I would say. And I hope you are doing very well!!