Making a Mech for a Mouse: Prototypes Part Primero
Prototype 1:
In this prototype, we required a couple materials, but most of them can be found at a craft store. Namely, we’re using a set of pipe cleaners (the multicolored ones), and a hot glue gun. Things in this prototype that can’t be bought at a craft store: 2 sets of music, one upbeat and one tense (we’re using Music for your dog (3 hours) and the music from “Who wants to be a millionaire, $640,000 question.”), and 2 volunteers, and if you want, 2 facilitators to change the music.
In this prototype, both volunteers should be told this:
One of you should sit on the ground, and the other stand or sit at a table. The one on the ground is able to talk, while the other is highly encouraged not to. The one sitting on the ground is to give directions to the volunteer at the table on what to build with the pipe cleaner and the hot glue gun.
Unbeknownst to the two volunteers. The two facilitators on either side should have access to being able to play the 2 types of music respectively. Whenever the building volunteer is constructing with pipe cleaners, the upbeat music should be played, and whenever the hot glue gun is even touched, they should switch to the tenser music.
The time limit is anywhere from 3-7 minutes, or however long either volunteer wants to stick around and see the product of their attempted collaboration.
So what’s the point of this? Well, we reasoned that first of all, even the most experienced hot-gluer is going to burn themselves, or get tied up in the little glue strings from time to time, and you might ask, what’s your point there? And our point is thus: What if your actions, your decisions and directions could cause bodily harm or discomfort to not you, but explicitly the bodily harm or discomfort of another person? Are you comfortable with the idea that your actions are enacting direct consequences on another person: especially a person who is very much encouraged to not be able to communicate back, express their discomfort or pain? The power dynamic here is clear, but in this power dynamic, how does that make you feel? Those are the important questions that we’re seeking to answer in this prototype.
Prototype 2:
This one’s a bit simpler. Have a DM/Facilitator narrate the sounds of a mech battle, represented in colorful language, and played out through a game of battleships between two non-talking except for shot callouts (and optionally non-seeing) participants (in the case of non-seeing use a facilitator with access to both boards). Hits or misses shouldn’t be narrated simply as such, they should be done through the story of what one might hear inside a mech, with a battle between two of them.
The point of this one is more about making narratives where the “main character(s)” are more disconnected from the goings-on: they have direct control but they are unable to see the direct results of what happens around them.
Prototype 3:
Have 2 people sit down with eachother. One of them uses the ttrpg framework of “Emotional Machine Diagnostics” and the other, silently, enacts the musings of the other person.
If we can’t take care of ourselves, but we can take care of other things, who are we? Why for some is it easier to take care of others than ourselves?
Here's a bunch of our first prototypes and what questions they ask.
If you get a chance to play with them, feel free to reply here and tell us what you found!