I own a pocket watch from Stratford-upon-Avon, a trinket I picked up to commemorate viewing Macbeth at the Royal Shakespeare Theater. It’s a gorgeous little thing, clasped in silver, its open face and back revealing the clockwork precision within. Everything has a purpose: the hairspring that stores tension, the jagged teeth of the escapement wheel that tick out the seconds, the gems that cap the gears to minimize friction. Sometimes I wind it up just to set all those pieces in motion.

RUN, a hidden movement game by Moritz Dressler, reminds me of that pocket watch. As an object of mechanical fascination, there’s nothing quite like it. Everything has its proper place. It ticks smoothly.

But it’s also pointless. An artifact, a curiosity, rather than something I’m going to actually carry around.

Read the rest of this entry →