Former Offworld editor, current IGF Chair, and all around cool dude Brandon Boyer wrote in today to let us know about a new project of his called "Venus Patrol."
The idea, as he describes it, is to make an online space dedicated to the culture of games that is holistic and far-ranging; it'll avoid the news cycle and will view games as cultural artifacts alongside film, music, and literature. Basically, something similar to what he was doing at Offworld.
In Boyer's own words:
One of the things we've seen over and over is that when you bring in someone with a fresh perspective, someone not entirely steeped in or beholden to the usual videogame language — a multimedia & painter duo like Masaya Matsuura & Rodney Greenblat, a sculpture student like Keita Takahashi, a new media artist like Toshio Iwai, a graphic designer and DJ like Baiyon, an illustrator like Superbrothers — what results is something not only amazing & unique, but something that itself charts a new course for future games.
Bringing in that kind of perspective, and showing the wider creative world that videogames can be something more than what they're used to — and also something that it's entirely possible for them to lend their talents to in groundbreaking ways — is more or less exactly why I do what I do, and where I hope to take Venus Patrol.
As if to demonstrate all the cool people he works with, Boyer has put together a pretty amazing amount of swag for folks who donate to the Venus Patrol Kickstarter page, particularly if they hit the $75 mark. Prizes include:
* an exclusive wallpaper painted by KATAMARI DAMACY & NOBY NOBY BOY
creator Keita Takahashi
* MINECRAFT character skins from Pendleton Ward, creator of Adventure Time
* new games exclusive to the Kickstarter by CANABALT creator Adam
Saltsman, RADICAL FISHING/SUPER CRATE BOX creators Vlambeer, SWORD &
SWORCERY EP creator Superbrothers
* the first version of JOHANN SEBASTIAN JOUST (according to Tim
Schafer "the first killer app for the PlayStation Move") from DIE GUTE
FABRIK
* a new SWORD & SWORCERY 7" EP
* trading cards from comic book artist James Kochalka (currently also
working on his indie game with Pixeljam)
* two sets of 8-bit game-related prints from Double Fine artist Scott
C (behind PSYCHONAUTS, BRUTAL LEGEND and so on)
Competition's competition I suppose, but the world could use a few more online publications like Venus Patrol. And moreover, two sets of Scott Campbell prints for a worthy cause ain't a bad deal at all.
Venus Patrol: Charting a New Course for Videogame Culture [Kickstarter]
You can contact Kirk Hamilton, the author of this post, at kirk@kotaku.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.