Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime

I have not played this game. But by the looks of it, it looks ridiculously good. And this is not coming from a gameplay or technical perspective - since technically I have not even played it - but the theme, the sensation and the concept of it is simply ingenious. It is no secret I am a fan of structures and symbolism, and here are some thoughts that came to mind when I watched reviews and let's play footage of the game. 

There is not much plot to spoil here, but anyway the basic idea is that this is a co-operative game where you will need someone to play with you. The two of you pilot a spaceship through space, rescuing bunnies, while fighting off anti-love aliens, avoiding obstacles and exploring the uncharted universe; that's about it. The magnificence of the game comes within the concept. 

From what I can see, there are essentially three things the two players have to do: Attack (By firing cannons or the special weapon), Defend (By rotating the shield to block off enemy attacks), and Move (with the ship's booster). What this means is that players are no longer independent of each other, and more importantly players cannot stay at the same posts as there are only two pair of hands for three jobs. Coordinating your path through the loveless spacetime requires real coordination between players in real life - one piloting and the other defending, and when facing a horde of enemy to booster and run while shielding, or back to one corner, throw up the shield and have both players fire the guns. The anxiety and excitement generated from these three tasks, I feel, can only be experienced when you play the game. Which I really should, but this brings me to a next problem.

The theme here is 'lovers'. The game currently does not have a online multi-player mode, and game reviewers have cited this as one of its greatest weakness. For me, as much as I agree having the online mode turns this into a better game, it downplays the theme of 'lovers' - the idea of having two person sitting on the same couch, talking to each other face to face and not through headphones, and going through a series of dangers together. What's more, the threat here is Anti-Love, and this is essentially two person journey to find the path of love together - this is not a game to play with a friend, your brother and especially not some random person online. The current state of the game, I feel, places the game right where it should be. 

And as I watched my second video on gameplay footage, I felt a sense of tingling... loneliness. The longing for such a partner to play this. It is kind of like Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons - but that of course is about a relationship between brothers, or your left and right hand. Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime is a co-op game that calls for lovers - to undertake this journey together against whatever that is stopping you from bringing Love to the entire universe. And on this journey, there will be quarrels, there will be moments you fume up as your partner fails to support you in the way you want them to, there will be disagreements on where to head to next, or what to do together, or who to play what roles. But like love, there will be joy, moments of dancing together to celebrate a mission well done, moments where you are thankful that you are not on this journey alone, and moments where, you think, you realise that this person beside you may just be the right one, to travel to the edges of space and the ends of time.

I haven't felt so much doubt about singlehood ever since I watched Her by Spike Jonze. The feeling that something is missing, after seeing such a perfect game yet not have someone right to play it with - it just feels like I'm looking at a loving couple at the altar, burning with envy and wondering why can't I have a life like that. What this shows, I guess, is that Games, truly can be and should be considered Art forms, especially something like this - and most importantly, an Art that is not like films or dramas. A game shouldn't need long cutscenes and plots filled with twists to pretend it is a movie or anything. Instead, I think a Game can only be considered Art when the interactive, the 'playing' of the game, is invoked, It makes the player not only immersed in the experience but also involved in how the game is played out. Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime is truly a stroke of genius, a work of Art. I hope the studio continues to make such games in the future.

Post GE2015 thoughts on snobbishness and freedom of speech

As with all my writings I'll start off with this disclaimer: This is not a complete analysis, because it is especially impossible the shorter essays go, but I'll try to say as much as possible.

I have lost a lot of sleep over the past few days, mainly trying to juggle work and political enthusiasm over the 2015 Singapore General Elections. I go to rallies, read stuff online, and made fun of people who were simply making baseless criticisms that were completely lacking in self-awareness. As the elections draw to a close with PAP winning an almost 70% majority - the hardcore opposition supporters are making themselves look like heroes of a new world that was supposed to come, but was hindered by the still dormant and un-awakened 60% joined by another 10% of traitors and defectors. All over my facebook wall are these people of this lot chiding at Singaporeans who voted for the PAP, how they better not complain about problems in the next 5 years, how they only did so because they were drawn in to the lies of a freak election, how the PAP's dominance of the mainstream media helped to stop these people from leaving their opiate fantasy.

Many a time the political candidates are complete fools, and in this round we had people like Cheo Chai Chen, Lawrence Wong, and that pathetic son of JBJ... but I think most of the time the fans make them out to be worse people than they are (or they really are). These people, who also happen to be the vocal majority (on the social media platforms I am exposed to at least), are fashioning themselves as a bunch of snobs who think they know of that better world with their 'democracy', and 'freedom of speech' and whatnot. The 70% to them, are people who cannot accept their opinionated ideals and therefore should be criticised.

There are a two things I want to discuss here. Firstly, the idea of snobbishness and elitism. Elitism, to me, is a feeling of superiority that is for the most of it baseless because it is based on the claim that you are intellectually and mentally superior to another, for your supposed wit and erudition above all because of a paper degree, or you simply are because you can see things better or something. For instance, you are student of the pseudo-sciences and you can analyse things with your pseudological imagination, or you are the supporter of an opposition to a party that has been in power for 55 years and therefore that makes you the hero of the democratic dawn of some sort. Elitism plunges into pure snobbishness when people in these elite circles refuse to explain why they are better, or are unable to explain, because their stance was never based in logic nor reason. Some of these people have never read a word of policy recommendation from the parties they support, and join the fray because they are unhappy their selfish needs cannot be fulfilled by the establishment. Leaving the debate on first past the post aside for now, and assuming democracy is the most system that we all trust in, is democracy not about the mandate of the majority? If the majority does not vote in a way that you desire, I think it is more reasonable to question who is the lot who is deluded here, the people who sided with 70% of the population, or those who sided with the 30%? If all you are saying is that you are more awakened and more knowledgeable than the potatoes that sided with the PAP, is that not the elitism that you chided PAP candidates and supporters for? If you accept democracy, then please also accept that your opinion is simply not shared with many, many out there, including me. We can have an endless debate on who is more deluded, with theories and history and pretty words till the cows come home and no conclusion can be drawn unless one of us starts beating the other up, because there simply isn't a better opinion. Democracy is not a system that elects the better opinion, but only the thoughts of the more, or to use that recently dirtified word, the opinions that are popular.

Secondly, the idea of democracy and freedom. This is where I flash out my elitist side - I will not go in length to discuss why I think these ideas are relative and should not be enshrined as some natural and moral good - because you should really be reading more, and other people would have explained this point better than me. I will just like to throw in a few questions in relation to this context. Does letting the Worker's Party take all 20 seats they contested in in Parliament mean democracy? Are there no problems with other two-party systems in other 'democracies'? Is Singapore the only country using the first past the post voting system? And in general, what is this, Democracy? The point that is less discussed and meditated upon is the idea of 'freedom of speech'. I will argue that we absolutely have freedom of speech by my understanding of the term - and this is not about Hong Lim Park, but about Low Thia Khiang and the WP's debate with PAP members in Parliament (and amongst the PAP MPs also), this is about the Internet, EDMW, HWZ where people can throw distasteful comments at Mdm Halimah Yacob after her mother passed away yesterday, and still get away with it. This is about all the more opened discussions we have seen in post-LKY Singapore for the past 4 years - not national conversation but the discussions on different pro- or anti- establishment websites, MPs and statesmen's social media pages, news sites and forums. You can argue that the Amos Yee issue is a case where freedom of speech was suppressed, but although I would agree that the punishment was rather uncalled for, whether hate speeches are a good thing is high debatable, and frankly speaking I don't think the government was doing this oppress freedom of speech considering the backlash from the general public afterwards. People are allowed to overreact over the death of LKY by spouting lies about how Singapore was a fishing village in 1965, and people are allowed to overreact over the case of Amos Yee by claiming that the government was containing free speech over his capture, that's freedom of speech. People can act like snobs and claim the PAP is deluding the masses, and not be hunted down like poor Marx was over his Manifesto, that's freedom of speech. Where debates are allowed to exist, freedom of speech exists - and you are allowed to disagree and debate with me on that.

My recommendation for all this is really to start your meditation with the idea of democracy and governance, and not start by assuming that majority votes are good thing. If you wish to talk about how our system of democracy is not good, and should be fashioned after another system existing somewhere else in the world or in some theory, we can have that debate but I am quite sure I will win that too. But we should still have that debate, we should always have debates.