Generally speaking, I want to make games. Specifically speaking, making an actual game of the sort I want to make is a nightmare proposition. Games take a tremendous amount time and of energy to create, and for many years I’ve said: That’s okay. I’ll put in the time. I’ll put in the energy. Right now, though, I’m not sure about the supplies of time and energy. Right now, on our current trajectory, time is running short. And the more I think about that, the less energy I have to work on making a game.
There is a plausible apocalypse looming. There’s no point in pretending it’s impossible. Even if we dodge the greater threat of the global ecosystem collapsing due to greenhouse gases, there’s still the global rise of nationalism and fascism, the increasingly unsustainable income inequality, the creeping capture of all political systems by malicious actors – and then there’s the old problems, stuff that has been around for a while, the racism and sexism and sundry bigotry, freehanded abuse of the socially and financially and physically disadvantaged.
It’s a lot. Not sure what to do about all that.
It feels like a blockage. Fixing this feels like a prerequisite without which no other work can commence. But this cannot be completely fixed. There are no complete solutions to these problems, only processes that can be enacted to slowly ameliorate them over time. This is a frustrating realization because honestly this is not how I work. I like to fix things once, and I like them to stay fixed. I freely admit that this is an unrealistic expectation.
So I fret. I wonder what I ought to be doing. Is it ethically acceptable to make art on the eve of Armageddon? Is it ethically acceptable not to? What could I realistically fix, out there, in the world, given my aptitudes and experience? What fundamental change would I have to enact upon myself in order to do so? How dangerous would it be to try? How dangerous would it be not to try?
And so forth, in circles.
I think sometimes maybe it would be better for me to just do small works. Just do little paintings, bits of music, write these posts. Forget games. I could, I suppose, just keep making small games, little monthly projects like I’ve been trying to do (with mixed success) – but, so far, all of my small games feel small. Some people have the knack of creating small projects that feel like little explorations of big ideas, bite-sized chunks of something huge and important. I don’t have that knack, at least not yet. So I keep thinking, then, that perhaps this isn’t a good use of my time and energy. Maybe I shouldn’t be trying to make games.
And yet. The end can only come by consensus. This world ends when we agree it ends. Maybe right now is the perfect time, actually, for a long-term art project. It’s a vote for tomorrow. It’s a leap of belief in an audience existing.
There are three reasons to do creative work, as I see it – besides making money that is, which so far remains a largely hypothetical benefit to me. Often, it’s just for practice: We play our scales, do our figure studies, write journals or bits of poetry and lyrics that never go anywhere, and hone our skills. Sometimes, it’s to express something within us, to take it out of the unspeaking back corridors of our minds and out into the world, for exorcism or for self-understanding. And, of course, sometimes it’s for each other. Sometimes it’s to say something to someone else, to make them understand a viewpoint, feel an emotion, perceive a shift.
If we don’t practice we stagnate, lose the technical capacity to say what we want to say. If we don’t create for ourselves, we lose touch and create something we don’t care about, or cease to care enough to bring a work to completion. If we don’t create for each other, we sink into silence, stop hearing from each other, learning from each other, and eventually dissolve.
I’m going to keep creating. For practice, for me, and for you. I hope you will do likewise.