Srupid ways to bite the dust
“Stupid Ways to Bite the Dust” is an artistically creative work that is intended to draw overall attention to the socio-ecological problems in the world. It is not intended to be instructive or enormously informative because it remains a fiction, yet the work was constructed and elaborated with a fundamentally scientific background research.
The HfK played a central role in the design of the work, allowing for a closer connection to the subject. The focus was on creating aesthetically pleasing environments with coherent audiovisual elements and posthuman character designs.
The gameplay
The game simulation starts with the first level, the intro, in which the “Nachtmahr 2.0” program or software is started. After a short introductory text, you get to the main menu. There you can choose between the different worlds you want to explore:
- “So beautifully contaminated” (radioactively contaminated world)
- “Thin ice” (the polar ice caps have melted, the world is under water) or
- “Thick air” (a world full of smog)
The gameplay in the worlds is simple. Using the arrow keys and mouse, you move around in the first-person perspective, navigating through the corridor, exploring it. With the interactive experience of clickable objects, you’re introduced to textual explanations that are intended to convey a unique, sometimes sarcastic and dark impression and provide more information about what happened in the speculative scenario or what led to this ending. The clickable objects make a sound. Within a scene, you can use the “escape” button to access a small sub-menu where you have the option of returning to the main menu to look at another scenario or to end the simulation completely.
By clicking on the posthuman, you also have the opportunity to take a closer look at the creature from different perspectives.