In case of no future.

Working in a popular medium as videogames where serious cultural consideration is rather scarce, I’m always torn between the desire to do the work I know I should be doing and to make things that are easier to enjoy for the existing audience of said medium.

Given that this audience already gets more than they can digest, and very few people do what we do, it seems wise to just continue on our path. To work for the happy few. Or for a time when our efforts will be appreciated by more. Or to influence the more skilful entertainers, to maybe slowly inch the medium towards its destination in some kind of rehash of the avantgarde dynamic.

The trouble with this option is that I am not entirely certain the human species has a future at all. I see a civilization in rapid decline, unwilling to give up its dogmas for its very survival. I sense no goodwill towards a better future. Just many attempts at hanging on to our impossible way of life.

These people need help! The people of Earth need help. Now. And while I’m not as presumptuous to think that art can immediately impact society -let alone the art that I produce- I do believe that the major problem of humanity is the lack of goodwill. In other words, the lack of imagination. I believe real changes happen when the spirit of people changes. And this spirit is exactly the terrain of the arts.

So do I work for a future that may not even exist? Or do I try to help people now so that, perhaps, there may be a future at all?

With Bientôt l’été I’m working for the future. But what if there is no future? Then I’d better work for the present. And maybe, in the process, help a future to exist after all.

I could be wrong. Maybe humankind is not threatened with extinction at all. But that is the more depressing thought for me. I do not wish it to continue this way. Change or die, humanity!