Companion Cubes and the Uncanny Valley

[logansrogue]

So I was reading about the Uncanny Valley. As an artist, I really love to fuck with the Uncanny Valley concept. I used it heavily in a digital painting of Voldemort I did, though I would have liked to have made it more realistic. It's the same basic principle behind making the most scary CGI characters or horror movie freaks. Think the girl from The Ring. She's a moving corpse, basically. She's a normal girl, but somethin' ain't quite right. It's freaky.

This phenomenon has been the main reason why I haven't bonded with my Sims 3 characters. They don't look right. When their eyeballs move about in their heads and they move their heads around, twitch their mouths - it kinda freaks me out. I made a Doctor in it and he looks like a moving Doctor doll. He's close but I don't *like* it. The Sims 2 sims are more like moving comic characters. There's an exaggerated warmth in them that I identify with and I love them so damned much, it's frightening.

Which brings us to Companion Cubes. <-- TV Tropes link! WARNING!

It occurred to me that we all have beloved anthropomorphised inanimate objects in our lives. I have plenty. What are yours? Here's a list of mine:

- Rob the Radio.
- Big Yin, the Main Computer.
- Athena Cortana, my laptop.
- Nina, my casio keyboard of awesomeness.
- Kate, my Rode mic.
- Zebra, my stuffed Zebra toy.
- We loved our old kombi-van like a member of the family. It was just called "The Kombi".

I would say that I bond to inanimate objects far too easily. It's a part of my hoarding problem, I think. I get attached to things and imbue them with a spirit, even though it's all in my head. It's a strange human behaviour, something that's hard-wired into our heads and as much difficulty as it can bring me, it can also bring me a lot of joy, strangely enough. I like having an active imagination!

Comments

[anarchicq.livejournal.com]

Penance - my knife. She found her way into the washer/dryer and broke. I very nearly cried.

Pendulum - my laptop.

Radar - the stuffed beanie baby bat I sleep with ever night that my ex gave me for christmas a few years back.

My artificial leg named Leggy

[rhyana.livejournal.com]

I love my Weighted Companion Cube. It always tells me to run the other way.

[wazira-sharira.livejournal.com]

I love the Sims 2 sims. They're the right blend of realistic and cartoony. I haven't seen the Sims 3 sims yet, but I know enough about just the gameplay that I know I don't want it, even without creepy-ass sims.

And I never named my old laptop, but I might name my new one.

[logansrogue.livejournal.com]

The gameplay is downright claustrophobic. It's a game, not a toy. There's no scope for the imagination. I hated it. *hugs Sims 2 to her chest*

[wazira-sharira.livejournal.com]

"It's a game, not a toy."

You know, that's a good way of putting it. The Sims 1 and 2 really were toys. They were high-tech dollhouses, and that's why people LIKED them. You didn't have to move through levels or do things in a particular way, you could just make Sims and have them do things. Or kill Sims off. Or use it as an architectural simulator with some occasionally fun extra features. If that's what made the first two so successful, I don't know why they'd change the third so much.

[logansrogue.livejournal.com]

The third is like a levelling game. To get the next book, you have to read the first one. Each book is more expensive than the last. To skill up your Sim takes HEAPS of times. They miss the fact that, the point of skilling up Sims before was never the challenge of skilling them up - it was basically a way of telling a story. I don't WANT it to be a challenge to do normal things in game. I want to be able to do these things and then tell a story with the game! To make a life and follow it through, not waste my time in repetitive bullshit. EA just don't get it.

[hotclaws.livejournal.com]

My laptop is Delilah and my mountain bike is Ambie.