Feedback on Cigarette Manifesto
Hmm. I’m not sure how I feel about the bait and switch, or maybe I’m just reading too much into it. In my recent research into games released over the past 30 years, I’ve seen pages like this that offer instructions to perform, often claiming to be an “intense emotional interactive experiences”, “freeform performative gaming event” or some such buzzword-filled showpiece. The kind of thing that’s akin to The Emperor’s New Clothes, where anyone claiming fraudulence in the piece is simply claimed to have “not got it”.
However, that last sentence gets me. Follow the instructions of the experience, get lost in the questions and ideas that ferment in the mind... then wait a year and write a game. Nice. It’s not the game, it the catalyst for a game. It’s a way of breaking someone out of their routine with a ritual. For that alone I appreciate the artistry, but there’s depth here too… if just took me reading to the end to find it.
I don’t even know if you wanted a critique or discussion on the manifesto, but I’m going to try to add some ideas to every entry that gets posted.