This proposal was accepted, commissioned and created.
After reading the proposal, click here to play Farklempt!
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Core Concept:
Managing ones' feelings is essential to getting along in the world.
Keeping emotions inside can be just as damaging as just letting them flow.
"Farklempt" challenges players to manage their emotional-health and maintain
relationships through skillful manipulation of feelings against other
players trying to do the same.
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Interface:
The interface is made up of two panes, the "Mishegas"
pane on the left and the "Meshugina" pane of the right:
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The Mishegas pane is the play space, and is made up of a cluster of roundish objects called
"filn". Filn look like bubbles or balloons:
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Each filn represents a feeling such as happy, sad, angry:
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The filn inflate like balloons until the player deflates them.
The player deflates the filn by clicking on them with their mouse.
When a filn is deflated, it makes a sound appropriate to the type of feeling, and the
amount it is deflated.
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If the filn expands too much, it explodes, letting loose extreme,
uncontrollable behavior, and repelling other Meshugen. For example, if an angry filn
is deflated a little: it grumbles,
if it is deflated a lot: it yells,
if it explodes: it lets loose a frightening tirade of rage.
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The Meshugana pane represents the player universe, and is populated by avatars
representing each player called
"Meshugen".
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The Meshugen can be seen drifting around the Meshugana based upon how their player
is manipulating it's Mishegas.
Depending on how feelings are expressed or repressed, Meshugen will attract or repel one another.
The sounds generated by the other playerís Mishegas will be heard in the background
of their Meshugana.
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Play/Goal:
Players earn points by the amount of time their Meshugen
spend close to other Meshugen, determined by how well they inflate and deflate their
filn. The player loses points when a filn blows up.
The winner of Farklempt is the player with the highest score.
A minimum of three players and two filn are recommended for an interesting game.
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Concept:
The concept for this artwork/video-game comes from my participation in
ongoing group therapy, and the questions this has raised for me regarding
how our behavior impacts others in the world around us. The software,
sounds and graphics will all be created by me, infusing facets of my
experience into this very personal artwork.
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Feasibility:
I have been developing similar systems in other projects for the
past six years. I intend to leverage this experience into creating Farklempt.
This game will be written in Java to be played online.
The sounds and images used here are for illustration purposes, and will probably change.
My experience as a senior software architect and visual artist will enable me to develop
this game myself.
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Timeline:
Upon acceptance of this commission, I will immediately start
to develop Farklempt. I will have it ready for Beta testing
by July 2004, with a production version completed by September 2004.
I have not proposed this to any other funders.
I am requesting $3,500 as my artist/developerís fee.
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Work Samples:
Following are links to a selection of projects I have created.
They are presented here because of their relevance to the creation of Farklempt:
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Curriculum Vitae:
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Reference:
Yiddish Dictionary Online
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