For various reasons, whenever talking about TABLEAUX THEORY I have become quite coy. Amongst these are:
- The first ~8 years of development my visuals had to take a back seat. Since visuals are the first impression, this was always a road bump when telling anyone about any project.
- The concept of the “modern visual novel” comes from a not-yet-defined desirable gap in the market. Creating a definition for this concept that explains both what it is and why it is important has always been a struggle.
The first of these issues is near alleviation at this point. Visuals can always use more polish, but now, with Oh man, a Train., reactions, at least my perception of reactions, “get it” more.
As for the definition pitch, let’s workshop a bit. What is a modern visual novel? We know that they can be defined by the 3 rules: 1. Reading of text is the primary user action. 2. Obstacles may branch but never halt or reverse the user’s progress. 3. Rules 1 and 2 may, in exceptional cases, be broken if doing so provides clear narrative intent. …And these rules have stuck around for quite some time, so it is safe to say that they are fairly fortified. Now, while this is a clear definition, products that follow these rules must be created in order for the consumer to see the impact that these rules have.
But this isn’t quite enough for me. Yes, this is what a “modern visual novel” is, but this definition is not focused enough for me. I am most inspired by entrepreneurs with extreme focus, whether it be Steve Jobs or the even more focused Todd Graves. In fact, I’d consider my desire for TABLEAUX THEORY to be closer to Raising Cane’s than Apple in many ways, though of course I borrow from both and many others.
In order to be more focused, we must take concepts and really, really hone in on them. Now, as a creative company, these must be boundaries rather than an eternal polishing. Todd and Jiro (of Jiro Dreams of Sushi fame) can get away with true focus and polish of a single, consistent and great product, focusing eternally on that last 5%. This appeals to me greatly, but denies the purpose of a creative company, which I believe to be in exploration.
So instead, like I said, we create boundaries. These boundaries then become tools to focus on what we explore. This will be different from company to company, and I think this is how it should be. However, if there are no boundaries, you end up optimizing for first impression, which has, for the interactive media industry, been visual fidelity as I mentioned earlier. I have grown tired of interactive media that focuses on visual fidelity.
So the question becomes: what do I want TABLEAUX THEORY’s focus of exploration to be? Two things:
- Mechanical Poetry. That is, using the unique elements of the medium itself, namely mechanics, to directly impact what is being said by a piece.
- General meme diffusion. That is, high quality memes that impact culture in a positive way.
So given this, what needs to happen is a clamping of other elements. In order to do this properly, we must look at, once again, Todd Graves*. Why does it work to have such a limited offering? How can he get away with never innovating? This is important, because whatever we define as bounds must follow the same principles that Graves’ product does, as they must last the lifetime of the business.
Here’s what I believe to be the requirements of a minimalist constraint: 1. Tested by time. 2. Universal appeal.
So, for example, if someone were to open the highest quality chicken-livers-only restaurant, this would break rule #2. As for breaking rule #1, to create the best LLM is perhaps highly profitable, but time has not proven that this is a long-term concept.
What then are the constraints that I can place on TABLEAUX THEORY productions that follow these rules so that we can streamline, allowing more bandwidth for the areas I wish to explore? Of course, the concept of the modern visual novel itself does not of course fall under “tested by time” in itself and I have no proof that it has mass appeal either, but I can use my own desire for this type of product as evidence of both. So this is one constraint. Additionally, elements within the rules, reading text, for example, are indeed timeless and have mass appeal.
Production constraints are hard when thinking of the “tested by time” rule, however, as interactive media is not even a century old. Additionally, we only want to pick elements that clamp in ways that let us focus on what I want to explore with TABLEAUX THEORY. Notably, I’d like to constrain visual rendering as much as possible so that exploration can be focused on the two focuses of exploration.
And I think it is only visual rendering? This is such a big time sink, that I think it is the only other essential constraint.
And this is where we get the 640x360 rule. Low-resolution pixel-based graphics is the only thing that we know in graphics to be “tested by time”, at least as “tested by time” as possible in such a new medium.† I would take a risk to say that this will continue to be viable for the entirety of my career and offers huge streamlining for focusing on the type of exploration that I want.
*I use him as an example because his work is the best example I can find of minimalism in a mass appeal production. He and the Snyders of In-N-Out. †One could argue Monet’s art shows low-resolution art mass appeal as well, giving us more than 100 years of “tested by time”.