Aaron Oldenburg is a game designer and new media artist whose primary interest is in game rules as an expressive medium. His interactive work exhibited at art.tech in San Francisco, SIGGRAPH in Los Angeles, and VIDEOKILLS in Berlin. He received his MFA from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and is an Assistant Professor at University of Baltimore's Simulation and Digital Entertainment program. In October 2003 he finished two years as an HIV Health Extension Agent for the Peace Corps in Mali, West Africa.
http://www.aaronoldenburg.net

Baptize, video game, 2009

This is a s eries of experimental video games exploring religious actions.  As an atheist who nevertheless feels religion to be a part of my life, I choose certain rituals, activities or mental games that people play to reinforce their faith and attempt to simulate them. The rules of the game are meant to be learned through experimentation. I began with the verb "Baptize" because the essential expressive power of a game is through the repetitive performance of an action, and attempted to create game mechanics that expressed feelings associated with that verb.  When the player makes a connection with a non-player character, the character gets pulled toward the player and becomes part of the same mass, moving together, seeing through imperfectly-merged eyes.