Exotic orientation systems as gameplay devices

Games often employ unusual connections between representation and reality as a tool for creating interesting interactions. Obviously things can happen in games that are impossible in the real world, but for this things to be meaningful there must be some connection with reality. This process of recognition is often the place where novelty takes place, exciting interest. We made a game that experiments with in-game representation and the relationship between perception in reality and simulated reality. The game, called “MirrorMoon”, relies on a spatial paradox in a way similar to Escher's art or Penrose's impossible objects: while the representation does not seem coherent as a whole, it is plausible if considered one part at a time. We believe this happens because representations are not subsets of reality, but they are perceived in a way that is coherent with the properties of the representation itself .