Recently as a result of the Covid pandemic we were forced into an online model of working with our members (along with regular socially distanced welfare visits for those who needed it) and like many we were forced to reevaluate and revise our working practices in order to accommodate this. One manifestation of this is the work presented here.
The video game began as an in-person project prior to the pandemic as a number of people who attend the gate are into gaming, the idea was to make a real-time game that represented life at The Gate. We took this idea and adapted it to the online situation, using the tool Twinery. Twinery is an open-source tool that allows people to make interactive fiction in the form of a webpage.
The story has been developed over the art sessions we hold, with people coming up with ideas and narratives that expand the game into the maze that it currently is. The artists at that gate have their own pages within the game, for example, Duane’s world which features his TikTok videos and music that he has made over lockdown. These are incorporated into the narrative of the game which is horror fiction. There is also a page dedicated to a service user who died during the lockdown, this allowed the artist to compile their memories of Leon and the art he had made into one place that's also linked with the art they are currently making. The graphics for the game have been designed in online sessions with artists co-editing via share screen functions.
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