You stand in a dirt field under a beautiful blue sky. A few meters away, a group of kids are shrieking and playing happily on a jungle gym. As you walk forward, though, you notice the kids are actually faceless statues, staring blankly back at you. Their shrieking gets almost deafeningly loud as you approach, layered on top of monotone schoolyard rhymes and songs. The idyllic visuals start to get fuzzy, too, like the world is caught between reality and the static on a dead analog TV station. Your only relief is to quickly retreat back to the safety of your starting place.
It might sound like a new horror game, but the experience above actually describes Auti-sim, a small but thought-provoking first-person indie game about hypersensitivity in autistic children. The game was recently created by a team of three during Vancouver's Hacking Health weekend hackathon. Besides being one of the creepiest indie "short subjects" you'll play this year, the game also gives players a brief glimpse into what it's like for the millions of autistic children suffering from sensory overload issues.
From the small demo built in a single weekend, Kay and his team will be developing Auti-sim into a full-fledged game. There will be more interaction, artificially intelligent characters, and new locations "like a classroom or a schoolbus or a mall." While the game is not for profit, Kay says he's looking for funding either from government agencies or other people and groups that "share our goal of raising awareness for autism-related difficulties."
The best game designer in the whole universe and world-renowned autistic ragemonkey, Kimmo Alm, could not be reached for comment.
Meta !PARAdoxiHw replied with this 13 years ago, 1 minute later, 1 hour after the original post[^][v]#395,158
@previous (HaikerensGuide !0VegJ9Jl.Q)
If it were Kimmo's game, instead of running away you'd be able to shitlist the kids for improper enunciation and grammar.
HaikerensGuide !0VegJ9Jl.Q replied with this 13 years ago, 7 minutes later, 1 hour after the original post[^][v]#395,162
That's actually not autistic, it's how adults who can't stand kids view kids.
Falco !a7Q.SWNEJw joined in and replied with this 13 years ago, 1 hour later, 7 hours after the original post[^][v]#395,207
This game is actually the creepiest thing ever...
Anonymous F joined in and replied with this 13 years ago, 21 hours later, 1 day after the original post[^][v]#395,549
Seems more like sychotzoriphesnsABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ