Even Further

The execution of "first play" and the mixture of individual orientations each of us bring to it originates in the steps described in my last submission. Even in those simple tasks - and their treatment - there is a notion of our next endeavors.

Having gone through all of the preliminary motions, ones that take seconds, we arrive at the point of circumstance where doubt, reflection, and consequence are often absent. Methods and styles differ, as do orientations and choices. Speculation as our only tool, first play reaches a natural intermission. Data exists in the immeasurable realm of privacy. The inclinations lay in the domain of personhood - seldom trekked and rarely annotated.

Thoughtless or excruciating, first play remains an extension of ideological imperatives; what we are, who we are, how we see, of necessity we bring to the Game. Before we step upon the bridge, like vigilant hounds warning the screaming, heckling villagers, we look to our origins and histories -- our masters whispering opinion and suggestion.

The art or craft of interpretation -- discovering hidden meanings or secrets -- in the essence of play, strategy, or the origins and intentions of the scenario itself are efforts embraced by hermeneutics. It is the initial framework -- the bridge -- upon which we walk or wobble toward our understandings. We call upon a specific knowledge base: some closely reading the long description, or reflecting on recurring themes, repeated parallels in an author's creations, or basic tentative guesses about what is about to befall or challenge us.

Whether one from this point on plays to completion, interrupts the progress at first sign of distress or miscalculation, or meticulously annotates tactical decisions for posterity or analysis, discoveries for reference on the next play - the "first play" is pristine, unaltered, and arises of a natural predilection.

In a simplistic paradigm the idea of "first play" separates into two formats: initiating and continuing the scenario to completion, or attempting the scenario - saving the game at progressive levels of successes - until defeat is probable or inescapable. A case might be made for a third that begins with "intention" of either of these and alters based on degrees of failure or success experienced during the "initial/first" encounter with the creation.

In overall methodology, I tend to discern two fundamental approaches within which all subsequent propensities will fall: deconstruction and reconstruction -- as it might obviously infer, a pulling apart and a putting together. Paradoxically, as each one reaches its later stages it takes on the form of the other in order to complete its intention.

The Deconstructionist's approach seeks to expose the scenario's secrets with multiple effects and techniques. A dismantler with a variety of tools from which to choose. Borrowing the term from the literary realm, it refers usually to criticism -- and when the scenario is sufficiently dissected probably no one better than the Deconstructionist can speak to its inner workings. But not as a rule on first play.

First plays are usually cut short at the sight of the unexpected, the unforeseen, or the illogical or unexplained. It is less a miscalculation than it is a desire to secure a firm grasp on the fragment that has come loose from the whole -- and one not procured by the player, but of either purposeful surprise or error in design. But the deconstructionist must learn which and why in order to arrive at assessment.

Keys to victory might typically involve the examination of the work in parts in order to confirm consistencies, discover inconsistencies, or isolate outright error and misinformation based on the long description. It is unlikely the deconstructionist has a grand strategy in mind other than a "rule of thumb" based on the terrain from the recon map and a "feel" based on previous works by the same author. He fully expects and accepts another day, another chance. Process over experience.

The techniques utilized are not totally unlike those of the literary namesake: initial assumptions and trials might be based on predetermined probabilities already demonstrated in previous scenarios by the same author, a constant state of vigilance is in place seeking internal contradictions in the creation, statements in the Guestbook (by the author or his peers) have some cognitive weight as possibility, and ultimately heuristic tools serve best.

Heuristic tools offer up first plays as trials, short term efforts to gauge results and to plan second or third plays that enable learned successes to prevail in the outcome. The design "error" is the most frustrating element in this process. The deconstructionist would likely say, "There is nothing wrong with trial and error as long as my trials aren't due to your error." Nothing is more intolerable than an assumption based on false information. Logical sequence and ordering of rational realistic and expected sequences may result in a completion of the scenario, but doubtful. Characteristic of deconstruction is an insatiable notion that superior results can be achieved with alternative/superior methods and the temptation to test those variations is often irresistible.

The Reconstructionist, on the other hand, focuses much less on definable tangible data and logical order and bases the initial play largely on a relationship between himself and the scenario - a direct experience within the play and its unfolding - a mental immersion into the flow of events (fantasy if you will) and simultaneously establishing a distance from the experience in order to reflect upon it.

The nearest relative to this process would be "phenomenological reduction," believing it possible to describe experience without presuppositions and uncover fundamental structures. This necessarily involves the development of values, feelings, and judgments providing meaning to the whole. As much as the author beseeches us to suspend belief upon entering his world, the reconstructionist creates new beliefs, validating the personal myth and evolving even further the original intention.

Creating what I have called the logical fictional base, is necessary in order to provide a working "meaning" to the experience, in the process reconstructing the original or a variant reality and following the patterns that surface as a result of that psychological immersion. Intuition becomes a guide, pre-established theoretical constructs are secondary to immediate considerations and empathic responses, and striving toward victory often takes a secondary role to striving toward an integrity-based, authentic and intimate connection with the creator, what was created, and what emerges in combination.

What emerges from any creation is the experience - regardless of distinct approach. While these two brief, potentially incoherent overviews of first play inclinations provides a feebly constructed bridge, it should at least allow first steps in the analysis (yes, it goes on) and serve as a hopeful alternative to the chasm that would otherwise suggest a leap into darkness or worse - indifference. But even that may still lay beyond us. Until then...