Twilight of the Idle

So I’m feeling pretty inspired by this game I’ve come across that’s named after a Nietzsche book: Beyond Good and Evil. The synopsis says that it’s about a reporter on an alien planet who “discovers…a horrific government conspiracy and is forced to battle an evil she cannot possibly fathom [presumably because it’s so, like, beyond],” which leaves me wondering where old Friedrich comes into it…maybe he’s an NPC. It was conceived by a man with a French-sounding name.

Anyway, now I’m thinking about philosophical works with titles that have good crossover potential: Being and Time, Dreams of a Spirit Seer, No Exit, Death and the Labyrinth… Then again, why stray any further than other Nietzsche texts: Twilight of the Idols, The Birth of Tragedy, Human, All Too Human (actually, someone’s already nicked that one for a game where cybernetically-enhanced Norse gods fight each other with laser cannons). Or how about The Gay Science. I would love to make a The Gay Science game. Hot damn.


The Gay Science
Game Proposal

The Gay Science is a first-person, isometric, top-down action-strategy-shooter in which the player must lead a team of cartoon soldier ants across the naked body of a sleeping male prostitute in a simulation of Nazi-occupied Paris being generated by a supercomputer on board a zombie-infested Ancient Greek space station in the year 11358. The objective is to obtain as much of the honey that is being poured on the sleeping male prostitute’s body by his time-travelling, sex-tourist robot companion as possible before glitches, caused by zombie-inflicted damage to the Ancient Greek mainframe, which was designed by wise albino sharks, desynchronise the simulation and return the player to the antiquated future, where it (the honey) may be traded for zombie-repelling weaponry and Xbox LIVE™ credit.

The Gay Science makes use of the revolutionary MONK™ peripheral for the Nintendo Wii, which consists of a touch-sensitive tablet, quill, lectern and uncomfortable wooden chair (with optional “Broken” upgrade). This is an exclusive feature of The Gay Science, and the game may not be operated by any other means. The player controls the on-screen action by using the quill to write haiku instructions on the tablet in a mixture of Sanskrit and Gregg shorthand. If the player fails to complete any instructions in the time allotted his warranty will become invalid.