› play Crosser™!
› play La Migra™!
cross-platform versions require Stagecast™ Player, and the Java™ Virtual Machine appropriate for your system. You will need to restart your browser after downloading the Stagecast Player. Then return
to this page and click on the links above.
Game links will load game into a browser window.
› download Crosser™ (cocoa)
› download La Migra™ (cocoa)
Mac only versions are self-contained applications that run in Mac 0S v7.6-v9.x links will download game.
Crosser™ & La Migra™ are a product of SWEAT.
COOL THINGS ABOUT CROSSER™ & LA MIGRA™
crosser™ & la migra™ are games
crosser™ & la migra™ are simple to learn
crosser™ & la migra™ are challenging to play
crosser™ & la migra™ are different every time you play
crosser™ & la migra™ are art
crosser™ & la migra™ are software
crosser™ & la migra™ are intellectual property
crosser™ & la migra™ are political commentary
crosser™ & la migra™ are cultural criticism
crosser™ & la migra™ are not politically correct
crosser™ & la migra™ are multi-level homage
crosser™ & la migra™ are cute
crosser™ & la migra™ are developed in a defunct development environment
crosser™ & la migra™ take advantage of the latest wave of economic globalization
crosser™ & la migra™ are for sale
With Crosser™ and La Migra™, we were attempting to create a subtle multi-level critique. Cute is deployed tactically and strategically to give the games a chance. Two points of view are presented so as to not be too comfortable in our own skin — as makers — and to attempt to feel the empathy we wish toinspire in others. If a “victory condition” can be said to exist, it is if the games are capable of invoking, evoking, or provoking thought, sensation and memory. With this metric they have been successful (as measured by my admittedly modest personal interactions). The reactions have typically been to respond to Crosser’s iconic nature by projecting onto it other aspects of border Crossing that it might portray. I find this reaction to be very interesting. It suggests to me that a creative imagination is being sparked into action in the minds of the player.
It could, conversely, be read as that the games are somehow incomplete. I don’t subscribe to this reading, though it was the subject of considerable self recrimination for quite some time. I’ve come to understand that the games, any games that attempt to deal with the real, will be incomplete. The map is not the territory, the stakes are not life and death, and a player can walk away when the thrill is gone. Rather, i have come to understand Crosser™ and La Migra™ as poems, where the absences and silences are as important as that which is stated. As makers, I — and my collaborators — have attempted to attend to these silences, so that they will be as meaningful as that which is expressed.
It was also important for us — the SWEAT collaborative — to investigate the emotional power of the early electronic games. They were iconic in an extreme. And yet they were found by players to be compelling. We stood on the shoulders of our antecedents, even as we made faces at them. Our recasting of iconography and game play points to the idea that even purposely “trivial” game play could have carried a non-trivial meaning.