One of the things we would not say about art, is that it is supposed to, uh, produce a particular effect in you, and those two things are at odds I think in, in certain ways. I think that’s sort of a reasonable point of view to take as a software designer, but games are a little bit like software, and a little bit like art. Right? So, frustration is just straightforwardly bad for software. It’s meant to produce a particular effect, uh, or do a certain thing for you, and you can measure how good software is by how effective it is at doing what it’s mainly meant to do, and how little it gets in your way. With software it, it’s straightforward, software is something that has a use. Games are caught on the horns of a dilemma. My most recent game, Getting Over It, was kind of inspired by this question a little bit. Liam: And maybe that’s because our interfaces are made to get someone to a goal that isn’t using the interface itself, but either way I’m interested to hear how that works and how you use frustration.īennett: Yeah I think this is a really interesting problem. Liam: Because we’re taught to build interfaces that avoid frustration at all costs. Liam: And I think coming from interface design that’s a really foreign idea. Liam: Um, one of the things that I think is prevalent in your work, and that really struck me, even playing QWOP back in the day before I knew who made it, is that you use frustration as a design tool, or almost like a pattern. For me it was kind of anti-philosophy, and I think gradually my sort of philosophical upbringing has kind of bled into my game design work, but I don’t think that stops it from being a creative art. I’d be stuck in, in dry reading, and books, and talks during the day that I would get to the end of the day, and just want to do something that was creative. And, in a way, uh, having to create the art that I did at night was kind of a classic, uh, pressure release hobby that I had at night. Right? I think in philosophy you’re concerned with logic, and fact seeking, and truth, and you’re reading books, (laughs) which you never do as a game designer. Liam: So, do you think that your work in philosophy fed into game design at all, or do you think that was kind of a separate direction?īennett: I mean in one way it feeds in in a kind of negative way. That’s what I really wanted to be doing, and by 2008 I made a video game … flash game for the internet called QWOP, which didn’t really make that much of a splash when I made it, but in 2010 roundabout Christmas time suddenly I guess conditions were right on the internet for that to kind of explode, and go viral, and just instantly that kind of changed my kind of order of priorities, and I started thinking about, “Well, is there a way that I can be doing this full time?” So uh that brings me to New York, and, and basically up to the current day. You know, I would do my philosophy work during the day, and then uh, stay up til 4AM making video games. But, what was happening was along the way I was sort of gradually moonlighting as a game designer. We toured around doing that for a while, put out an album, and it started to take off too much for grad school, can’t do both of those things at the same time, so I quit that, and I went and got a job as a philosopher at Princeton uh, post doctoral fellowship, and that was philosophy of medicine, philosophy of applied ethics, and after three years of that I went to Oxford to continue to be a philosopher, and eventually after ten years I guess - from everybody else’s point of view - I suddenly made a left turn, and uh, went and got a job teaching video game design. Uh, Cut Copy is an Australian … It’s an electro band. Fell into a band with some friends called Cut Copy. At college I trained in physics and philosophy, and I headed off to grad school in philosophy, and, uh, I was convinced I was going to be a philosopher, but I, somewhere along the line I started being a musician. Liam: So, to start out with I want to ask what you do now and what the journey has been like to get where you are.īennett: I think of myself as an indie game designer, and also a professor that teaches game design at NYU. Liam Spradlin: Bennett welcome to Design Notes.
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