Page History

Alexander Small

Title of work: Moomoo’s Maple Mishap

Medium: Video Game

Moomoo’s Maple Mishap is a 2D, side-scrolling action platformer, made with inspiration from video game classics such as the Sonic the Hedgehog as well as the more niche games that I loved as a kid such as SuperTux. My intention was to refine both my artistic and game-developing skills through creating a work of interactive media (making a game), and to have said game be fun to play, after all, “if it’s not fun, why bother?” (Reggie Fils-Aimé). Most of the skills that were involved with making this production were self-taught, such as learning how to code or making pixel art animation. I used predominantly open-source software to create the game itself since it could be easily obtained online and had permissive licences, which gave me freedom to publish what I made with the software.

I used Godot as the engine for the game itself as it does the hard work (physics, cameras, tilesets) for you and is quite intuitive to use. The digital art software Krita was my go-to for creating concept art for the production, which let me both experiment with the aesthetic of the production and brainstorm gameplay features for the player to utilize. I then utilized more digital art tools, this time GIMP and Aseprite, to create all of the pixel-art in the game, which included animated characters, objects, scenery, and backgrounds. Finally, Audacity was used for creating and mixing sound effects, and OpenMPT for creating the chiptune-like music.

The outcome of this production is a platformer with two levels and a boss fight, featuring gameplay mechanics inspired from classics such as Sonic the Hedgehog and pixel-art animation inspired by the likes of Street Fighter III.

Callum CHRISTENSEN-BOSUA

Inkjet print

I sought out this year to employ a juxtaposition of some kind, evoking an incongruence between two subjects and with it a jarring effect, hopefully inviting a certain intolerance for my work within the viewer. To do this I decided to portray a "perturbing celebration", clearly two contrasted semantic meanings displayed within intimate confines. The celebration used was matrimony and its conventional symbolism of joy and happiness. I injected this stereotype with disturbing and somber expressions and motifs such as faceless models and deep black geometric shapes, thereby constructing the desired theme, disturbia. When a viewer observes my works, I hope that their experience is obscured by the oddity of two, clearly biomorphic shapes, at a loss of identity and individuality. I intend for them to see the couple as lacking selves, each of their definitions replaced by empty space through the aesthetic property of hollow heads.