The Indifferent Wonder of an Edible Place
A downloadable game for Windows, macOS, and Linux
"In my country, history itself is edible.
Time masticated into tales,
people digested into stories.
Places leak mineral flavor.
Buildings are grated and ground.
Domes flattened into rotis, Blood boiled into dal.
The very earth on which we once grew,
is reabsorbed into the metabolism
of a nation that has decided to consume itself,
like an ouroboros.
A glorious violent meal.
A spectacular event.
A prelude to excreting people
who have been leached of all flavor and all difference.
The ideal members of a new state.
Excrement of the old."
- Mir UmarHassan 1960 (Translated 1983).
In 1960 when the state of Bombay split like an egg on the jagged edge of the Western Ghats and formed the territories of Gujarat and Maharashtra, the town of Matsyapura was abandoned by government decree - to make it easier to draw a clean border between the new states.
Mir UmarHassan, the fabled Gujarati poet, lamented this willful and violent erasure of an ancient town and in a delightful satirical poem, where he wrote about the vapid consumption of a place and the excretion of a people devoid of the flavors of their individual and munificent past.
With recent cause to recollect the horror of the demolition of Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, and in solidarity with the protests against the draconian actions of our government - we are revisiting UmarHassan's original poem.
The indifferent wonder of an edible place, is our attempt to ponder the violence of erasure and the profound grief of having to survive on the margins of history.
Created with support from Phoenix, Leicester which is supported by Arts Council England. And a site-specific variant of the game was displayed at Phoenix, Leicester and at the Video Game Art Gallery in Chicago.
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In The Indifferent Wonder Of An Edible Place, Studio Oleomingus manage to ask poignant questions about what it means to be a part of erasing history, and what can be done – if anything – to intervene. It is particularly heart-wrenching.
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Download
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Development log
- The Indifferent Wonder of an Edible PlaceFeb 06, 2020
Comments
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poignant, surreal, devastating <3
Short enough to sting, sharp enough to be remembered. Many thanks for this, very powerful.
You might be interested then in an upcoming workshop Dhruv (of Studio Oleomingus) is giving on writing: https://forms.gle/vKkFo6AD2sPjiYtS9
Hey there, OneFourtySevenAM here, and I just played your game for a video series I have called "Indie Picks". If you're at all interested in seeing what I thought of your game, feel free to watch the video.
What an incredible game!!! Really loved it! I just read that you all wrote the poem too and it's not a real poet??? that poem was SO GOOD holy crap!
I feel sorry that I can not help ease your pain.
I sincerely thank you for making this game, it is the kind of unique experience I'll never forget.
I love the graphic!
I like playing games from cultures other than my own, and this one didn't disappoint. Very beautiful and moving.
This is Art. I love it. Also, I ate every block except the one they asked me to, just to see what would happen. The tower defies gravity and I was stuck looking around in a blue box after finally eating the last brick (no pages of the story were displayed). So if you're as nosy/curious as me, there is your answer. I've saved you some time.
Thank you for your sacrifice, true gamer
Recommending users push past their preferences (controllers, alternate keyboard layouts) for only a few minutes to experience this brief and powerful work, most of which just involves reading. Really glad I did. Thank you, Oleomingus.
This is a deeply beautiful, moving thing.
Thank you so much! I am really glad you found the game to be moving experience.
What a beautiful game, it inspires a feeling of awe and fear in it's design and the written parts are really well done!
If you like the writing in this game, Dhruv (Studio Oleomingus founder) is giving a free workshop March 30: https://forms.gle/vKkFo6AD2sPjiYtS9
I haven't been able to open it. I'm on a Mac, and as per the instructions I unzipped the file, but it just expands and instead of a folder I just get the application, which gives me an error when I try to open it. I couldn't find a support email so perhaps you can reply here with some troubleshooting tips? Thanks, Annie.
Hello Annie,
Sorry that you are having trouble running the game on a Mac, while I don't have a Mac at hand to be able to test the problem - if you are running MacOs 10.15 Catalina, then it might be because the game is not notarized.
You could try downloading and playing the game through Steam, while we try and figure out what the problem might be : https://store.steampowered.com/app/1249300/The_Indifferent_Wonder_of_an_Edible_P...
Hope that helps!
Dhruv.
It does look like it would be interesting to download & play sometime.
This was a very beautiful game
Thank you!
Hello,
I stopped at the very beginning. The game is unplayable in AZERTY and you can't rebind the keys.
Regards.
You can actually rebind the keys on the "Input" tab at the launch window
Thank you very much i will check that. :)
Hey, I really wanna play this but for some reason every time i launch the game the camera is always slowly spinning and point upward? I unplugged all controllers and even the mouse and reset the game several times and it was still happening. any ideas?
Hello this is Dhruv from Oleomingus.
Thanks for reaching out and sorry to hear about the camera bug.
We have see that happen just once before on a Mac build on a different game of ours when the connected controller or driver kept forcing the player camera into a spin. But it is surprising here because this game does not support a controller at all. Nonetheless, if you could send me an email at studio(at)oleomingus(dot)com I will send you a build with the controller input completely disabled and I think that might fix the issue.
Thanks.
Here's my coverage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJaXQptB6aE
What an amazing game. Scary and magical all at once.
Thank you so much!
A gorgeous, moving, terrifying experience.
Thank you! I am really glad you enjoyed the game.
And it is good to know that the despair of its premise did seep through its various absurdities.