Now that I have this fun desktop accessory that captures the feel of an old arcade, why did I do it? What is next for it?

The inspiration of this project came from a love of arcade games. Playing things like Pac-Man and Galaga has always been something that I have enjoyed. The unique style of this era of video games also just sticks out. At the time the available processing power was quite low, so the games had simple 8-bit designs, only a handful of available colors, and large limitations on the type of sound the machine can produce. This resulted in a completely new art style that is still prevalent in a lot of different parts of pop culture. It is just something that always reminds me of fun times and good experiences.

This style is also present in things like the movies TRON and Ready Player One. Both of those movies are very entertaining and call back to interesting parts of Pop culture. They are also movies that have captivated me.

Capturing this fascination for this era of pop culture was the purpose of this project. This era is also captured within the aesthetic, having the 8-bit bright artwork on the sides, the grainy sounding music, and flashing lights.

There isn’t really a plan for what is next for this project, it will be kept on my desk and display the artwork that is contained on it.

The original intent of this project is about what the result was. There was more artwork that ended up on the final piece capturing multiple different old games instead of just the original two. If I were to redo it I would love to actually make some kind of a game that would be playable within my little machine, but that is so far beyond my skill set at this time.

This semester has been a very interesting trip in the exploration of aesthetic and has been a nice change of pace from designing with the aesthetic as the main focus instead of that being ignored for functionality and has broadened my outlook on design.