Umurangi generation
In-game photograph (virtual photo, IGP, VGP, screenshots, screen-snaps, etc…) makes the rounds through the press, newly discovered every time, at a reliable two-year interval. But there is a long lineage of video games that utilize photography as a core organizing principle. Umurangi Generation is one of my most recent, and most artistically successful entries into this historical vein, and, frankly also one of the most interesting cyberpunk video games of all time. You play the part of a young photojournalist in “the shitty future” (as the game describes it), doing jobs and documenting your friends group, all in a vibey PlayStation 2 throwback style. You cruise around the neon-cyberpunk levels, using your camera to uncover the story through ambient and environmental storytelling. As it unfolds, it turns out you and your friends are part of a group of indigenous peoples stuck in a fortress city-cum-refugee camp. Delving the politics of representation and agency amidst geopolitical apocalypse, Umurangi Generation put the punk back in cyberpunk and challenges us to engage with the very act of looking in virtual works, all with a blasting soundtrack.
Creator: Origame Digital (Directed by Tali Faulkner)
Link: https://www.umurangigeneration.com/
Connections:"
Octavia Butler - Parable of the Sower
Hideki Anno - Neon Genesis Evangelion
Hayley Millar Baker - I Will Survive