User:Thijshijsijsjss/Notes on Being, Here

<-- Previous trimester's notes

In the neon sign scrolling up and down

I am born again

In an interstellar burst

I am back to save the universe

Next trimester's notes -->

My whole life was lived between February and June of last year. Let's see if I'm lucky to receive another life this trimester

Week 1

I wasn't there, emotionally.

Naar buiten met Marloes

Week 2

Week 3

Programming -- save / load, branching dialogue system

Writing -- Manually Annotated, About Interactive Fiction

Talking -- Studio vibes, peer review session

Week 4

Game Jamming Colloquium with Alessia and Senka

Programming -- narrative writing (humble attempts)

Writing -- About Signalling, Amorphous Annotations Amassed: About Manuals, About Functionality, About FOMO

Talking -- Peer programming sessions

Week 5

Sick for the whole week :(

Week 6

Writing: drafts for About Parsing, About Thijs, ...

Where is my mind?

Where is my mind?

Where is my mind?

Where is my mind?

Little Egg, Cat Sitting

There was a little cat
that needed to be sat

I can do it, I said
so to this new house I fled

To face a numb silent dread
and reflect some instead

No fun no confidence no fun dance

Doubts have started to grow regarding my grad project, Human Parser. I still believe in the project proposal, in a vacuum. But combined with me as creator, in the process of creating, my belief is tested. In part, this is because 'I'm not having fun': I haven't been able to allow myself the open ended process of creation, that I came to find very rich last year. I feel like I've put myself on a railroad. Combined with recent difficulties in navigating my inner world, this makes my work feel inauthentic and inpersonal. Which disappoints me, and makes me worry if I'm creating something I will be proud to present. I want to carve out some space for myself to breathe, and hopefully find excited freedom to explore within this project again.

An MMM (Meandering Michael Moment) and no plans

I came to the studio this Tuesday (2025-02-18, the timelines are getting blurry), without plan. Not having a plan doesn't tend to be my strong suit, but I think not having a plan was the plan this time. I've been feeling very much stuck in my project for a while now. And stuck in my head, in general. I've felt out of touch with myself, feeling numbed and unable to reflect in ways that usually provide me with a sense of meaning. By extension, I've felt unable to put my heart into my project. I've been working aimlessly, forcing myself just to meet the expected hours in my time tracker. Without a plan is what the last two months have been.

So, the studio. I haven't been to the studio much. This makes me sad, mostly because it's convincing my subconscious that I'm already fading out of a life I've barely even faded into yet. There's just too much to say. So, the studio. I was there on Tuesday. I talked with Lorenzo, and then asked Michael for a meeting. We talked until 19:30. It was very valuable. As always, I feel very appreciative that such meetings are possible here, and I always feel these unbounded conversations with Michael are able to reset me, in a way.

Some takeaways:

• I thought I had decided to restrict myself to a more traditional text-adventure experience, thinking this would be an easier workload to manage, and better suited to exist 'beyond xpub'. But yesterday I found that, on a deep, unmonitored level maybe I've not been able to let go of the potential humanness. In the conversation, I found myself enamored again with asymmetric games.

An MMM (Magical Marloes Meeting) and modest plans

I went into my supervisor meeting today feeling remnants of the lostless of recent times. Surprisingly, however, in talking it seemed quite clear what my next steps will / can / should / might / chould / want to be. That is an empowering feeling.

• Let go of the idea of the traditional text-adventure and allow myself diversions into the performativity of being human.
• Host another playtesting session (March 6?) with this in mind.
• For the playtesting session, create a new demo, one that is slightly more general than the previous ones.
• Use the demo as an opportunity for a draft manual to connect my thesis annotations to, so that the second reader (and Marloes (and me)) has a better sense of the writing's contexts.
• Continue filling in the blanks for the thesis for the upcoming thesis draft deadline (March 14). Next up: finish about parsing, about disassociativity, about thijs (+ introductory words).
• Start fantasising about the second public moment (March 24).

Pen Plotting at WORM Crème de la Crème!?

This week, the pen plotting party instagram account was approached by Dari, who we met at SWAP and Brutus and who is now interning at WORM. They asked if we are interested in participating in WORM's upcoming 'Crème de la Crème' event (March 27-30). Which, of course, we are! Just like with De Boog, this invitation came 'op een presenteerblaadje'. I still haven't figured out how to confidently navigate networking in the creative industry, but / so it's nice to notice these moments.

(This is a PSA: come enjoy some pen plotter magic at WORM, Friday March 28, 18:00 - 20:00!)

More studio reflections

My increased studio presence has been rewarded with many delightful conversations. From discussing projects with Mania and Claudio, laughing about cats with Anita, reflecting on life with Lorenzo and Alessia, PZI-afterhouring with the PZI and chasing every excited slow-paced nuance with Michael and Zuhui, I feel like I've finally been in tune again. In tune with the studio, in tune with the wiki, and more in tune with myself. It's no surprise that this has coincided with a week outside of my house -- my extra studio time since returning home has definitely been escapism in part -- which has allowed by a way of reflecting that has been inaccessible to me for a while.

I desperately need this, these interactions. In following my inner 'wiggelroede' when deciding to apply for xpub, the final convincing line I told myself (in Dutch) was 'I want to live a life worth processing, and process it in a way that's meaningful to me'. Amidst a period where meaning has been hard to find, and amidst a project that involves many hours behind a screen by myself, a week like this is invaluable. This is where the graduation year really gets to shine, and this is how I hope(d) the invisible hours will be spent. It makes me a little anxious about the near future, when this will have become a past, but it also makes me appreciative of the people around me and the time I get to spend here. For the first time since starting this trimester's diary page, I feel like I've lived the title and that I've been, here.

So apparantly I'm hosting another playtesting session

I so often forget that it is within my power to organise a get-together, and I so often forget that it is something that motivates me!

Week 7 -- BREAK

writing -- continuing About Parsing, About Routines

In a deep, deep sleep of the innocent

There were many things I felt less than confident about going into the graduation process. The open endedness of chasing your own project, the wavering of my mental state, the undefinedness of collaboration compared to last year. However, despite these challenges to face, there was one aspect of the grad project I was able to feel confident for: I can produce words.

I have written a million wiki pages, am generally comfortable with words as a way to express myself, and tend to enjoy the reflective modus operandi writing puts me in. Of course, this is a statement with nuance. Not all days will be equally comfortable and easy, and not all days will produce the same type of text.

What I hadn't hoped for, though, was that 'one day' would stretch to 'a few months'. A few months with little reflective capabilities, a few months with general disinterest in producing, and a few months with discomfort in putting myself forward. In a project close to my heart, being 'out of touch' with myself has made it difficult to engage with / find the intimacy I want to put in it. During this monotonous greyness, I've been wanting to feel an emotional response to my process so badly.

Now, this did not stop me from writing per se. In fact, the project has been more challenging in this regard, so the thesis has been a form of escapism. But also for the writing, I hadn't been able to be as intimate as I set out to be. While there's certainly personal anecdotes, and a certain vulnerability, I noticed myself defaulting to an academic style I knew (though now in dilluted form). So when [a classmate who will remain anonymous untill I've asked them] asked: Do you have moments where you own thesis makes you emotional, I felt empty.

But today, today was the day. Maybe it was because I marinated my emotions over night. After writing mostly academically, I walked home, and thought of something. Writing it down, there were some tears.

The interstellar burst. I don't think I'm born again, not yet. Not all days will be equally comfortable and easy.

Frankenstein; or, Crystallizing My Ego Through (Not) Making a Game

I am not trying to imply graduation is gothic horror. But maybe I don't need to try.

Please no laptop in the weekend

Please

Sneaky laptopping in the weekend

Sunday evening I was so so tired, that I couldn't bring myself not to work on my thesis. (But is it still a laptop in the weekend if the mail is send 00:08? In trying times, these are the questions that determine a thesis) In the form of sending an email to Marloes, I noticed the waslijst of updates I had accumulated in what I had hoped to be a relaxing break. Am I happy with this consumption (i.e. me being consumed), or am I cycling at full speed to an opening bridge, in coyote time in the air, before the comically inevitable fall? Please, no laptop in the weekend.

Week 8

Writing: finishing about parsing, about thijs, about this thesis, drafting about navigation, more txts

photo of robot charger

Prepping for playtesting and getting stuck

Week 9

Paper Panic Prototyping

I found myself stuck in preparing for the playtest I would be hosting this Wednesday. Juggling many ideas I would like to test, many projected expectations I would like to meet, and many contingencies with my previous ideas for the project and the thesis that I would like to let go of. This panic led me to believe I was coming at it from the wrong angle. All this time, the 'interactor' in the TA had been a player: one whose words were parsed. Now, it seemed very important to me that actually, they acted as the role of the parser. This panic manifested in a rough paper prototype. With the prototype, I was able to test two more lingering curiosities: having a human voice read the TA aloud to a player not seeing the screen, and having a role (+name) switch as part of the game.