As a fidgety youngster, I often had to be told to stop making funny faces, drawing on walls, and (perhaps most often) playing with my food. Constant culinary rearrangement is still an impulse I struggle against, which is why Ian MacLarty‘s new experimental computer game, Full English Breakfast, is so appealing: for the express purpose of making art, the designer encourages, and actually requires you to play with food.
This so-called “breakfast simulator” is a small, downloadable file which opens on a tantalizing picture of the titular “full English breakfast” of fried eggs, toast, sausage, bacon, and beans. The player wields a fork like it’s the smudge tool in Photoshop, warping the picturesque breakfast in a way that’s reminiscent of My Little Pixel Pusher. A tap of the space bar reveals a knife, which functions like a rudimentary clone stamp, “pushing” pixels around in small sections at a time. From abstract portraits to a stylized egg-and-bacon solar system, a smorgasbord of possibilities can be created by acting like a messy eater.
Videos by VICE
Enjoy artworks created in Full English Breakfast below, and head over to the official website to try it out for yourself.
Visit Ian MacLarty’s website to download Full English Breakfast and check out more of his experimental games.
H/t Warp Door
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