EtherAxis

28th November & 5th December 2021. Sickhouse, Enschede. The Overkill Festival

About

EtherAxis is an interactive game installation and reflection tool aiming to challenge the inner paradigms that shape our perception of realities. The physical relic that forms the base for this game shape-shifts in different contexts. ‍ The structure of the gameboard emphasises four main axes, each connected to multiple ancient symbols of alchemy, hacked to uncover their original meanings. In this constellation of four interlaced geographic grids, the dreamer wanders through bridging fields on a spatiotemporal axis. Throughout the Overkill, EtherAxis lures you into the streets to find its messages hidden in plain sight, stepping over to the worlds floating in the ether.

EtherAxis is the result of an ongoing collaboration between Camilo García A., Emilia Tapprest, Erik Peters, Federico Poni, Louisa Teichmann & Victor Evink, as part of the Hamburger Community of Live & Art trajectory of Roodkapje, with performances by Queer Arcana.

Introduction

The Narrative of EtherAxis is based around the idea that there is a multitude of other possible worlds floating in the Ether*, the in-between space we cannot sense or grasp. The Gameboard is the center of a navigation tool in order to find locations in which there are bridgepoints to these worlds, where we are able to make contact. These locations will have to be found by the players during the gameplay. With the help of The Device, we are able to channel the invisible waves of the Ether, the wireless ways of communicating and sharing information between the worlds.

EtherAxis Game board, photographed by Emilia Tapprest

*meaning of ether 1 : a liquid that burns easily, that is used to turn solid substances into liquid

or less commonly aether \ ˈē- thər \ : a medium that in the wave theory of light permeates all space and transmits transverse waves

(2) An invisible medium through which all light, heat and electromagnetic waves propagate. Pronounced "ee-ther" with the "th" as in the word "thought," ether was postulated from the 1600s to the 1800s. The word inspired the name Ethernet.

Game Narrative

The Device

https://hub.xpub.nl/etheraxis/

an entity + devices = subjectivities

devices have the capacities of capturing, orienting, determining, intercepting, shape, control, ensure gestures, ensure conducted, ensure opinions [G. Agamben]

At the root of each device there is a desire and the subectivity of this desire constitutes the power of the device our desire -> futurebuilding

device as -> speculative tool for positive feedbacks [F. Polak]

The Device is a device built with different components aimed to send and receive knowledge

The Device communicates through the ether, via radio waves, with esoteric and exotic encryption systems, with multidimensional protocols

The Device speaks the language of the ancients, subverting its original essence

The Device is always looking for beacons to navigate through waves' ocean

The Device translates signals from different potentially realities

The Device uses multiple protocols, the most are unknown and incomprehensible for our species

The Device is a part of the ecosystem and is looking for also other potentially ecosystems

Four Worlds

4 worlds - post powerism

as parallel possible realities, not in past/present/future post powerism

1 XENO

biohacking // smart connections to other realms like fungi fungi like websockets

WebSocket is a computer communications protocol, providing full-duplex communication channels over a single TCP connection. The WebSocket protocol was standardized by the IETF as RFC 6455 in 2011, and the WebSocket API in Web IDL is being standardized by the W3C.

fungi are a bio communications protocol, providing full-duplex communication channels over a single animal-animal connection. body modification

2 COVALENT BONDS

coexistence zhouwei network project gecko

3 SILICIO

AI Tech automation human not an obsolete entity, but upgraded humans ft cyber stuff and viceversa different kind of brains/computers, stuff that we cannot get the essence froim cause the prtocols and bio-architecure are completely different from Internet of Things to bioNetwork of Entities internet of beings build society from the same technologies could be ok the porblems are the protocols/purposes/goals

There is a legend that says Funix brought the The Device from this world to ours.

4 MERCURY

diffractive shapeshifting no determined shape anarchist power network without hierachy distributed network of people explicit on political system

Sasa: tells people about shapeshifting

Protagonists

Agents of Chaos:

Derk Over

Sasa Hara

Federico Poni

Locations

Sickhouse

Smart Shop

Training Station

Bike Parking

Mushroom

Ancient communications w/ mushroom:

bluetooth but idk ow to write it, is note necessary cause this is not the technology, this is the name of the technology, the technology itself has a proper essence which is killed by the name-attribute / the mushroom has been kinda infected from another possible-float-in-ether-world and it can use that technology. mastering the waves, the mushroom transform themselves in multi dimensional bridges: the beacon of data is The Device, catching those waves getting a parallel connection exchange from the ether-in-power-world. which ether-world is in contact with you in that moment? one? more? they are not infinite but they are a multitude - the mushroom are a metaphor of networking but also a metonimic.

mushroom as beacon!

in radio stuff, beacons send a fixed message

like weather info, viability, practical stuff

mushrooms send their message through waves at the same frequencies of our bluetooth range

Gameplay

Chapter 1: Arrival

Gameplay in stages: total time per group: 1 1/2 h

Sickhouse: 25 mins Character building based on the players digital possession. Players show their phones in order to receive character card and matching props. characters get assigned 1 of 4 character types.

Player objective collect bridge cards and bring them to the game board. They receive their navigation tool and leave to find their first location.

Chapter 2: Take a Leap in the Dark

City: 45 mins They go into the city in order to find the bridgepoints and learn about the different worlds. The training space is the main space with a performance hinting on the crossover of mulitple spaces in the same building.

4 Locations, 4 Lessons, 4 numbers. Smart Shop + Trader Lesson Training Station + Mover Lesson Bike Parking + Navigator Lesson Mushroom + Scientist Lesson

Chapter 3: Return

Sickhouse: 20 mins They come back with collected code which unlocks modular poem in the end. Collective world reading based on poem.

neophytes ready for the worldbuilding in the liminal realm

sound over bluetooth bluetooth speaker something that transmits life sounds or obsolete radio channels -> locate where sounds are coming from at edge of range

bluetooth radio frequency

pre-game

Visual Language and Communication Methods

Symbols cosmology

1. More than human: {silicon+water} + {crucible} {sublimation} / amorphous structure silician SYLICIO

2. Coexistence: {melting/digesting} + {amalgamation} + {covalent bonds}COVALE

3. XENO: New Elements : {imagination} + {imagination}* + {imagination}**

4. (~) Mercury Queer : {Mercury} + {tangible} + {intangible} + {salt} + {sulfur} + {*the spectrum in between both states*}

Play Tests

Thursday, 18th November at Roodkapje

in-game

Documentation of actual Gameplay.

post-game

Analysis

Bibliography

Books

This is not a Game ~ Dave Szulborski

The Case Against Reality ~ Donald Hoffman

The Age of Surveillance Capitalism ~ Shoshana Zuboff

Space Time Play http://www.spacetimeplay.org/

Tactical Tech https://ourdataourselves.tacticaltech.org/posts/inside-the-influence-industry/

Articles

http://aaaan.net/blast-theory-2/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Location-based_game

https://www.playtoearn.online/category/blockchain-gaming/

https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/geofencing

Games

Blast Theory: Can you see me now? 2001. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Can_You_See_Me_Now%3F

Tomo Kihara: Escape the Smart City, 2018.

Roos Groothuizen: I want to delete it all, but not now. 2021.