Where Everybody Knows Your Game

BabyCastles, the videoarcade in Ridgewood, Queens, is quickly turning into a hub for intersection of the art, technology, and culture of independent gaming. It's a place where you can sample the latest in indie videogames, like the Hungarian physics Sumotori Dreams above, or experience fully curated exhibitions - all in an atmosphere more like a hacker's coffee bar than a museum or a commercial arcade. Everybody is on the inside.

Founded by two graduates of NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program, Syed Saluhuddin and Kunal Gupta, BabyCastle is basically just a wall of the music venue Silent Barn right now, featuring six video arcade cabinets with rotating content. But the extended BabyCastles collective is growing - and has launched a Kickstarter campaign for a pop-up video game, art, and music venue on 42nd Street in Manhattan, along with partnering organization Showpaper.org. Their purpose, in addition to having fun, is to change common perception of the art and culture of video games.

Yes, there is life after Gamestop.

Winner of the Media Ecology Association's first Neil Postman award for Career Achievement in Public Intellectual Activity, Douglas Rushkoff is an author, teacher, and documentarian who focuses on the ways people, cultures, and institutions create, share, and influence each other's values. He is technology and media commentator for CNN, and has taught and lectured around the world about media, technology, culture and economics. His new book, Program or Be Programmed: Ten Commands for a Digital Age, a followup to his Frontline documentary, Digital Nation. His last book, an analysis of the corporate spectacle called Life Inc., was also made into a short, award-winning film.

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Anonymous

I tried loading it up with IE and didn’t get any funny business. Good ol’ sensible Windows…
shadowfirebird

Well, I clicked on the link and then closed the tab after about 30 seconds. Is this some sort of very late April Fool’s joke, or is the site incompatible with Firefox?

I see a number of panels, mostly bigger than my screen size, bouncing around a virtual screen which is also bigger than my screen size. The immediate impression is “bad trip” – which is reinforced by the colour scheme.

More importantly, nothing stays still long enough for me to work out what it is or click on it, and most of the text is mostly off the screen most of the time.

FFS.
- Anonymous
  
  yeah, i just googled Sumotori Dreams to find it.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  It makes perfect sense after a hit of acid and some poppers.
  - Gibbs
    
    Seriously, it looks like these robots are drunk or just took some acid. Wow…LOLOL
    Kids Luggage
Tgg161

Epileptic sumo boxes?
swankgd

Err, yeah. If their goal was to make their site comically unusable…they got it half right.
babycastles

Hey guys,

Sorry if it hurts, we just try to make a new flyer for each new exhibition we have in Queens (every month.)

Here’s some other examples….

http://babycastles.com/index_a_duel.html
http://babycastles.com/index_first.html
http://babycastles.com/index_gamejam.html
http://babycastles.com/index_kokoromi_rejects.html
http://babycastles.com/index_sumotori.html
…
http://babycastles.com/meowtron

Actual information about the arcade and future projects is here!

http://www.facebook.com/babycastles

& here!

http://kck.st/8YUwvq

:)