Versus Software   game + free time = duck

In my last year of high school I had your typical Brazilian literature teacher, where he used to praise Brazilian authors in contrast with foreigner ones. He used to denounce reading foreigner authors and that the Brazilian mass should enjoy more of its local authors.

I pretty much disagreed with most of the things he said, but he did say one thing that struck me as true and it’s pretty much the only thing I took with me from his classes. He said:

An artist writes how he feels and how he feels is a direct consequence of the environment he finds himself at.

In other words an artist’s background, culture and the society around him influence his artistic views. Makes pretty much sense doesn’t it? But people usually apply this to writers and the normal standard of an artist. The catch is that it affects all creative thinkers, this includes engineers and software developers as well. Here’s an example.

Every now and then I read some article comparing the PlayStation 3 architecture with that of the Xbox360. Makes sense since they were both platforms developed to handle massive amounts of data. Usually those comparisons involve a instruction/triangle/frame/shading per second/pass view or how the 6 synchronous SPU cores compare with 3 asynchronous cores.

It’s all quite interesting, since for on one hand you have an architecture that’s basically massive raw power, running at the highest possible clock speed, with tons of ram. Big and bulky American muscle. On the other side you have a series of smaller cores, that require a more ellaborate design, streched throughout each individual node. Less but more refined, efficiency through group effort. When I see these sorts of things I think of only one thing: Motorcycles.

You have the classic American choppers, big bulky American muscle. Lots of fuel, big engine cylinders, raw power per torque. Made to last.

And then you have the Kawasaki’s lines. Less fuel per cycle, more refined in it’s architecture. Made to run fast.

Each of those types of Motorcycles present its ups and downs. With one you can go from coast to coast and back again. The other you can only go from one to state to the other but at top speed. They’re the same type of vehicle but the catch is that they were designed by engineers of different nationalities.

I’m not trying to throw the cliche dilemma of East vs. West here because I see it more as a general social example. Both engineering teams were given the same task: built me a motorcycle, but their final product is obviously different in terms of style and scope. To me a big part of it is that both teams had different cultural backgrounds, were in different societies and had thus different views on how to solve the same problem.

I think the same happened with the Xbox 360 and ps3 teams. Both had the same task: build me a video game, and the final product is obviously different.

Both systems have it’s ups and downs but the point I’m trying to make is that I think an ideal developer/engineer would be able to go beyond his cultural heritage and be able to reach the same conclusions the other team had, and in the end make the best overall decisions.

Generally I think a good artist is not bound by the limitations he found himself at. He is able to roam freely from it and create an art that doesn’t speak to only those individuals in his current social realm, but to all individuals. To me a good artist is universal in his approach of seeing and making art. As James Joyce put it brilliantly:

When the soul of a man is born in this country there are nets flung at it to hold it back from flight. You talk to me of nationality, language, religion. I shall try to fly by those nets

I think it’s a beautiful quote and strikes at the core of that which I spend so much time thinking about. Joyce is a relly good read, though unfortunally I don’t think my Literature teacher would read him.

At least you understand now why I disagreed with him so much.