Video Games For The Blind

Everyone plays computer games or knows someone who does. This hip new hobby is sweeping the national papers in cry storms of black ink and primordial jokes, with citizens experiencing literally hours of fun on the new Medal Of Honour game or racing each other on The Grand Theft Auto. The visceral nature of this high-tech, low brow pastime is often lost on those that are visually impaired, they often have no idea how the 64-bit graphics on the latest xbox is any different from the olden days gone by of Pac-Man and it's hit DLC, Ms. Pac-Man. Of course, blind people are able to play some modern games by listening to sounds and memorizing patterns, some manufacturers have experimented with lycra suits fitted with vibrating paddles that give an extra-sensory perception for enjoying the latest beat-em-up. But what about a video game made for blind people by blind people? Well what about it?

Ryan McBiudden is an entrepreneur using crowd sourcing to fund his mad-cap idea. We talk over Skype in separate coffee shops, talking loudly. I ask him to tell me all about the game as I slurp my Americano.
"It's simple. In this first-person shooter you play a blind man. There are no visual graphics at all, not even menus. Gamers have to rely entirely on sound." he says.
"Whoa."
"This is the world experienced by the visually impaired. It's heavily imagination based, with gamers having to construct a 3D map in their heads in order to navigate the post-apocalyptic city."
"Whoa, post-apocalypse? Now you got my attention." I say, dribbling coffee from my grinning mouth.
"It's a prequel to Day Of The Triffids. You play a character called Jack who wakes up completely blind and have to explore a world invaded by...alien plants? I think it's an invasion. They might have been there all along, I can't remember. Anyway, that's the game."
"Sounds good, I'll give it five stars. What's the multiplayer like?"
"We wanted to focus on delivering an excellent single player experience, though we're also working on-" he says. I pick up the laptop and smash it to bits against the table in front of me, hitting it over and over again, screaming as my brain boils inside my skull.

Christmas Cuckoo Land

The Manchester Christmas markets are nestled in St. Ann's square, just by the newly refurbished town hall and Manchester's only public toilet. At this market extravaganza one can sample the tastes of a Christmas that never was at faux-cabin retail stations that labyrinthiate the markets, selling goods such as vintage clothing, e-cigs, pork and ornaments to thousands of pedestrians moving along at a speed more akin to the dynamics of liquid rather than humanoid locomotion. There is a rustic bar which sells the finest arrangement of booze seen in the run-up to Christmas; mulled wine, German beer and American ale all can be bought at great cost whilst one relaxes against a post, admiring the other drinkers cluttering up the place. Enjoy the sound of children running around combined with the aroma of boiling wine. Sample at the arrangement of Mediterranean food for sale, treasuring the stone fruits as you peruse your recent purchases. Perhaps a hand-knitted mug warmer is resting in the paper bag, peeking from behind the corner of a block of smoked cheese made by Kurdish goat farmers on the slopes of Mount Strandzha. Maybe a piece of upcycled boat jewellery made of finest steel awaits a loved one, maybe even a chain-link owl to hang above your bathroom door. It is a truly magical place in which communities come together to enjoy Christmas, not to mention bringing in a decent revenue to local businesses and independent creatives. All of this is watched over by a fifty foot Father Christmas sat on top of the town hall like a psychedelic gargoyle, it's festiveness overpowering.

After arriving in the early hours of the morning and having to wait outside I took stock of winter in the city. In the history of painting there were many landscapes about the Earth being closer to the sun, yet there weren't many Classical paintings of cities beneath the frost. How did Manchester look five hundred years ago on the site of the Christmas markets? The Britons, Angles and Danes perhaps met on this very spot and traded goods under the midwinter sun, preparing for Pagan and Christian feasts. A ram would have been killed in the fog, it's freshly skinned head emerging from a hessian sack as a sacrifice to the Gods of Yule. Meanwhile the Britons would celebrate Saturnalia by doing the opposite of what was normal. War hardened soldiers would wear women's clothes and dogs would act like pigs, each gave presents and passed the berries of mistletoe by kissing one another. Bonfires would be lit and epic poems would be told of Norse ghosts made of mud and of the giants D'Frigga and Yol-M'nnstatr sleeping in the earth. Nowadays the city slowly begins to wake with the smell of Greggs and bus exhausts, commuters beginning to flow in from primate nests and jauntily begin to jog up and down the pavement jostling for a free copy of the Metro or a cup of hot java. The workers of the Christmas market begin to arrive wearing bubble vests and bobble hats, faces pinched red from the cold and stained with iron oxide. I walk across the cobbles like some kind of prehistoric bird, head swivelling from side to side as I admire the warez being offered.

The hours pass by with ease as I make my circuit, snorting down hotdogs and talking to the city folk about whether or not it was about to snow, mind frantic at the Christmas shopping opportunities around me. 8.3% of your life haunted by a festive holiday. 8.3% of the twentieth century, of television, of conversation. I begin to climb the walls of the town hall, shouting at the people below.
“Cease sublimation!” I cry, heaving my entire body up using my fingertips, carefully picking my way up the brickwork. Eventually I reach the enormous Father Christmas and look down at the shoppers below. Some are jeering, others call for me to get away from Father Christmas. I take the fictional man in my hands and begin to shake and pull at it, trying to dislodge it.
“Is Father Christmas just an elf?!” I bellow, managing to tear the festive sculpture free from the steel supports. With the groaning of metal it begins to tip down towards the crowd. There is an enormous crash as the Santa lands on top of the market. I look down, suddenly aware of what I had done.
“No...no!” I say. But it appears as if a Christmas miracle has happened! Father Christmas has been impaled through the head with a gigantic crucifix brought in by religious extremists. Everybody is saved! I jump for joy.
“Looks like the son of God didn't die in vain after all.” I say, unzipping my jacket. I am wearing a Big Face t-shirt with Nelson Mandela on it.
“Silent night, holy night,
Son of God
Watched at night.
Crowning angels are silent at bed.
Holy Mary, mother of grace.
Rest in heavenly peace.
Sleep in heavenly peace.” I sing beautifully.