Looking across Patterson's work, he had a clear interest in systems and simulations, and A Game is a procedure for constructing the social out of capacities different than those assumed by Rawls.

In my archival digging I found some notes from the same era where Patterson summarizes this procedure:

I argue that Patterson is in critical dialogue with John Rawls's theory of justice. As the only Black member of Fluxus, Patterson writes about his frustration with the lack of political engagement from his friends. A Game is a satire of liberal utopias, and simultaneously a earnest proposal.

I got to look at three versions of the game at MoMA and the Getty, which differ primarily in the quoted text they pull from from an issue of the artist magazine Ark (1962) on mobs and crowd psychology.

One of the most complex is Benjamin Patterson's A Game: Three Capacities and One Inhibition (c. 1963), which consists of four note cards and an envelope. In my reading, the "capacities" involve the player in a kind of critical experiment in imagining new ethics.

www.moma.org/collection/w...

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Hey Matt, always nice to see your posts!

I've been using this: tenbluelinks.org

Oooh. Bookmarked

Very helpful comparison. I feel like the opening of Clair Obscur takes it's lessons from Chrono Trigger

Anna makes the best TTRPGs. In addition to this, I want to recommend The Ceremony is at Hand w.itch.io/the-ceremony...

I think my assumption is that life in the present is predominantly gameplay (in one way or another)

Yes, totally. Leap Year is what made me start thinking about microvanias.

Well this is embarrassing! A knife made of whispers is from 2015. Oops!

Lastly, @droqen.bsky.social's The End of Gameplay is a series of short game poems that reflects on the medium and on what it means to live honestly in the present moment. It can be played in half an hour, but its been consuming my thoughts for much longer. A really special one. (17/17)

I've talked about Daniel Linssen's work before, and their small offering is A Knife Made of Whispers. You must carry a light through the darkness, in an echo of games like Ico. And Linssen layers the space with an unfolding story of love and regret.