Week 2 – Design and Games 101

What does the term avant garde mean?

The term avant garde is expressed as introducing unusual, yet new ideas to the music, art and other industries. It pushes the boundaries of what is accepted which promotes what more can be expected from an idea. The first recorded use of ‘avant garde’ was through ‘The artist, the scientist and the industrialist’ pointing out that the power of art is the most immediate and fastest way to reform social, political and economic standards.

The idea of avant garde refers usually to artists, writers, composers and thinkers whose work is disagreed with compared to mainstream cultural values and expresses an edge to society.

Is it truly possible to be ‘avant garde’? And if so provide game examples.

Dumpy: going elephants is VR game (virtual reality) which is a game that holds realistic a interaction with reality rather than using a controller to interact with the environment the character is in. This pushes the boundaries from what is expected from a simple video game.

Limbo is a 2D puzzle – platform game which has a very dark and dystopian theme to it, as a young boy makes his through a dark forest trying to find his missing sister. The art style is very dull yet very moving. Most of the characters and assets in the game don’t have much detail and are just silhouettes yet the figures of the characters in it can look quite disturbing. The game expresses a dark art style which allows other games to communicate on another level.