(this is what’s in that pink box thingy) *Disclaimer: I can’t guarantee this to work for you because everyone has different skin with different sensitivities. Be careful and don’t use repeatedly unless you know you will be unharmed*
In Thunderbird Strike, a new side-scrolling game that launches at the ImagineNATIVEfestival this week in Toronto, players can control a thunderbird—a symbol in several Indigenous cultures—that destroys as much of the oil industry’s machinery and pipelines as it possibly can. And it’s so satisfying.
The game was created by Elizabeth LaPensée, an Anishinaabe, Métis, and Irish games developer, and assistant professor of media and information at Michigan State University. She told me in an interview that she wanted to create a game where Indigenous players could reclaim some agency around oil pipelines, even if through a video game.
“Especially when we’re talking in the context of pipelines, and the oil industry, there are some wins we can have. But ultimately protectors will be pushed out and the processes are going to move forward. It’s happening with mining and it’s happening with pipelines,” LaPensée told me over the phone.
They made it into a ringtone because it was old enough to be public domain, and Nokia (I think?) didn’t want to have to pay royalties.
… I like the full version.
are you SHITTING ME. This is one of those posts that makes you question your worldview a little bit, tbh
okay, not quite. not quite. but the truth is better.
the original tune is not this. the original tune is, however, public domain, so they’re not wrong. it’s francisco tárrega’s gran vals - check 0:12.
but THIS, what he’s playing, is the Valse Irritation d’après Nokia, also known as the ringtone waltz, written by Marc-André Hamelin, who is a terrific canadian pianist and who wrote this as a snap reaction to having people’s fucking cellphones go off at concerts.
