Come fly with me

Ever envy the birds and their graceful giss? Join them with flyguy! click anywhere on the image below – and make sure your speakers are turned on, the music is lovely:

I absolutely love Flyguy! It’s so playful, so inspired, so dharma! A truly brilliant use of flash animation that is both mindfully aware and incredibly smart. I enjoy the exploration, movement and interaction as well as the simplicity of the lines and the music is just perfect as well. Bravo to Trevor Van Meter and the cocreators of Flyguy, who have made the world just a little bit better through their art.

I found Flyguy via Infocult, a blog by Middlebury College professor Bryan Alexander. Alexander describes Flyguy as "playful wandering", which is part of his ongoing examination of gaming and narrative. I really connected both to what Bryan was writing about and the example of Flyguy – and why we need more games like this and less of the other kind.

It’s funny, just last night I was playing Tombraider, Angel of Darkness. I’m close to the last level of what is easily the worst Tomb Raider I’ve played (and I’ve played them all). I’ve come to calling it Metal Gear Lara. It’s got all the macho energy of Metal Gear Solid with none of the stunning natural or historic imagery of past games. The art direction on AD is excellent but it’s very industrial, very cold and very male. The game is also really, really buggy. But the main thing I don’t like about it is that it has little of the mystery or imagination of previous TR games. It’s just downright depressing! And this is why I hate the majority of games out there. They only involve me in the most angry and frustrating kind of way and it’s all about violence and agression. I’m sick of that. I like to explore, I like to play, I like to have fun! I think the gaming world just needs to stop pitching to teenage boys and start creating more interesting games for their increasinly larger demographic of women 35 and up.

I was just thinking yesterday about how wonderful it would be if there was a site online that was full of stuff whose sole purpose was to inspire – using art and content that makes us feel alive and playful and happy - an alternative to all the ugly, stupid, garbage that is in abundance out there. My idea site would feature mindfully aware content that actually made us better for the viewing. More of this less of this.