It is no longer necessary to close our eyes, blinking away the tears, and repeat the mantra: “I can't solve all the problems of the world.” We can. We can end this.
— Eliezer Yudkowsky (1996), age 17, in "Staring Into the Singularity"
this track is really personal to me. it's the opening track, and for me the most memorable one, on the made in abyss ost, which i've listened to over the past 3-4 years when stressed to help me feel okay again. the album is metaphorically a refuge for me.
the map starts to become uncaring as it goes on, especially past an arbitrary point (01:17:394). felt like maybe this can reflect the depression of the song
i was inspired by malevich's 'black square' painting (which is just a black square on a canvas). i was trying to make 'something so basic that it seems to be a subversion of norms', which is what i saw in the painting at the time.
"Tears show more emotions than most words ever could."
i cannot believe that i spent 10 years of my life on this absolutely terrible, soulsucking game. tbh, i think I wasted some of my greatest years of creativity and my own mental peace on a community that didn't fucking deserve it in the slightest. i regret it immensely. (source userpage)i felt similar once, i wished i'd learned drawing or music instead. i think i was biased by osu being situated as 'just a game' and treated as a meme by the average vocal user, while those other mediums were 'more legitimate'. but to me now, osu feels like a game for angels. some tragedy occurred when it was pulled from the platonic realm and given to humans, but they can never truly destroy it. also, osu maps have made me feel more emotion than visual art (though i've also spent more time on maps).
a community that didn't fucking deserve itwas there any one (even yourself) who did deserve it? if yes, maybe it was worth it just for them.
over time, this game has helped me understand society. the needless controversies over maps which merely transgressed a norm; the harassment of mappers and making of them into public enemies; my own experiences with this (including being told to die numerous times), as much as seeing it done to others. looking back, there was a silver lining to witnessing these in a context as gameified as osu's.
the same patterns unfold in real life, where the stakes are higher. instead of artistic norms without much vested interest, norms there are intertwined with the economic/power structure of society. instead of being harassed by other players and mappers, entire categories of individuals are scapegoated, mass-incarcerated, murdered, wars are waged, etc.
"The ability to map well is a sign of wasted childhood or teenage life," writes tatemae, but being involved with mapping helped to foreshadow one looming conclusion: present humanity is depressingly bleak, and cruel to a dystopian scale.
i'm sorry that you dieda bunny. i woke up to hearing them squealing outside my window. their neck was torn open and being eaten by a cat. they were still alive.
i'm sorry that you suffered
i'm sorry that you had to ever exist
someday the universe may be free of suffering and existential injustice. this is my hope and mission -- for life's eons-long curse to be lifted.
This is all just a bad dream. . .
this is a dead world spinning, and many other worlds like this one are already destroyed.please stop dying