Escapist article: "I Will Survive"

[Allen Varney]

I'm Allen Varney, a writer for the online gaming magazine The Escapist (www.escapistmagazine.com). The theme for an upcoming Escapist issue is "The World Without Games" -- a meditation on what our society would look like if today's anti-game activists get their way.
For that issue's "Casual Friday" update, I'm doing a short, light-hearted article called "I Will Survive." I need your help. The article will quote responses from a wide range of game designers to this question:

"If you were legally enjoined from creating games, what would you do instead?"

I'd like your answer to this question. Brevity is good; I'd prefer just a few sentences or a paragraph. Funny or pithy probably works best, though I'm happy to handle whatever level of seriousness you prefer.
I need your response by Thursday night, February 16. Please post to this topic or e-mail me at allenvarney@gmail.com. Thanks!

[James C. Smith]

Make games. Just try to stop me.

Who cares?

[Hamumu]

Write, paint, draw, make music, make movies... all the forms of creative expression that go into a game besides actual gamemaking! But since I can't make a living with my skills in those areas, I'd also flip burgers. But secretly at night I'd join James' underground indie cabal.

[papillon]

Write and run more RPG scenarios.

Write more fanfic.

And, of course, make games anyway, just more quietly.

[Robert Cummings]

Animated shorts... in actual fact thats what I would prefer to be doing in the long term.

[soniCron]

"If you were legally enjoined from creating games, what would you do instead?"

Escape. (msg too short)

[Ricardo C]

Spend a few years plotting a coup to bring down the game-banning government, then go back to game making once I make Michael Netzer president for life.

[svero]

Well Im already an expat, but if developing games were illegal where I lived I'd move somewhere else. If games were illegal where most games are sold and the legal market was wrecked, then I guess I'd become super rich, since as we all know, the main benefit of any contraband is that prices go way up! And I'd be all over that black market. Psst.. hey you.. wanna match 3? Swap Jewels? Psst! yeah you.. 50 dolla..

[PoV]

Turn to drugs, live on the street, and selling myself cheaply to get by.

Seriously, I'd have a hard time. I could see myself turning to art or music for the creative fix, but finding a day job I'd enjoy would be tough. Perhaps, I would be involved with science, graphic design, or cooking, but game development has the potential to bring so many fields together. The way I am today, I couldn't live in a place that oppressed imagination and creativity like that.

Freedom is *so* 2005, right?

[Davaris]

I'd keep making games and sell them out of the boot of my car.

[GBGames]

I'd probably organize a political group with the purpose of bringing back the right to make games.

[Uty]

I would become a lobbyist for the video game industry and make one hell of a living in the process.

[digriz]

I'd change my name to Jack Thompson and lobby to get games re-instated in schools and in the home.

Or i reckon that there would be a huge underground market, so i'd exploit that. I'd be the shareware equivalent of a crack dealer...It's free at first but then you've gots to pay

[electronicStar]

I'd probably be a pop Idol or something like that.
Or I'd train my PSI power until I can have some influence over my environment.
Something in that vein...

[SteveZ]

"If you were legally enjoined from creating games, what would you do instead?"

I would build another exciting and fun business: a trading company selling high density polypropylene plastic T Shirt bag to mom and pop grocery stores.

-Steve Z.

[Vorax]

I'd invest heavily in law enforcement equipment and arms trading.

When all the pyscho's who currently use video games as an outlet for their murderous impulses no longer have games, there'll be nothing left for them but the real thing... I'd step up to be the principal arms supplier to both the police and the rocket whores.

[electronicStar]

I'd like to quote Dan McDonald on this

[Anthony Flack]

There's plenty of other creative things I would happily do, so I'd probably do them instead. Except I wouldn't. Because if games were illegal, I'd have to make illegal games, just on principle. Take my shit underground, yo.

Hey, it might even be better that way.

[Anlino]

I would develop games in my basement and sneek them into corn Flakes packages

[mahlzeit]

If creating new games would be outlawed, would playing existing games still be legal? If not, then what will happen to the Lingerie Bowl?!

[Rory]

Well Im already an expat, but if developing games were illegal where I lived I'd move somewhere else. If games were illegal where most games are sold and the legal market was wrecked, then I guess I'd become super rich, since as we all know, the main benefit of any contraband is that prices go way up! And I'd be all over that black market. Psst.. hey you.. wanna match 3? Swap Jewels? Psst! yeah you.. 50 dolla..

haha...

me, i'd go to mexico.

[Chozabu]

instead of calling my games, games, id call them "interactive simulations"

[Artinum]

There'd probably be a grey area in the law over such things as creating the elements of games. You could code AI routines to "simulate" battles, etc. You could create graphics and sounds ("for games? No no, officer...").

I'm sure there'd still be a legal outlet for "educational software". So you'd probably have an excuse for basic game engines. In the end games could become modular - you'd simply have all the elements available on the web and Warez sites would say which bits to download and combine...

Of course, how would such a law be enforced? Or is this in the dystopian hell of a future where all computers are brainless terminals connected to a master network, all music/television is for hire rather than for sale and all our mouse clicks are logged for pattern analysis?

[paulhuxt]

If you were legally enjoined from creating games, what would you do instead?

I would play them , or...
I would join the pro-game resistance, and investigate why games became illegal.
A good job for this is being a journalist: perhaps I would write an article entitled "If you were legally allowed to create games, what games would you create?"...
That would be an indirect (but legal) way to promote games

[digriz]

is this in the dystopian hell of a future where all computers are brainless terminals connected to a master network, all music/television is for hire rather than for sale and all our mouse clicks are logged for pattern analysis?

Come on, admit it; you were all thinking google too.

[Viridian]

The rational side of me thinks that I would probably become an animator, which is what I wanted to do before I discovered video games.

The irrational side of me would continue to make games, posting them anonymously on the internet on servers hosted outside the US.

[TimS]

Were I legally enjoined from the creation of game worlds, I would suddenly find myself involved in a very individual war. It'd be me vs. them, and I'd hate to be them. If I'm not allowed to create my own worlds, then the next available world for sculpting as I see fit is the one that they inhabit... Is that what they want? To set a game designer loose upon the comfortable and familiar fabric of real life? They wouldn't be so bold...

-Tim

[Julian Gollop]

I would dedicate my life to overthrowing the government, destroying corporations and writing evil viruses. The fact that I have moved to Bulgaria may help me in this endeavour.

[mahlzeit]

You game designers are a violent bunch, with all this talk of overthrowing the government. You really should be prevented from making games and corrupting the youth!

[steve bisson]

I would dedicate my life to overthrowing the government, destroying corporations and writing evil viruses. The fact that I have moved to Bulgaria may help me in this endeavour.

count me in ! i write a techno track for every viruses hehe