After interacting with The Asylum, I came to a few conclusions and was bothered by one big question. First, the two conclusions: 1)I suck at helping mentally disturbed (although adorable) stuffed animals. 2)This game represents all that is evil and deceiving about our consumerist culture. Finally, the question: What do cuddly psychotic animals have to do with whiskey?

Since this is just a brief response, I'll focus on the consumerism. The most intriguing thing about this game for me was the introduction. The announcer explains to us that we are "spoiled by a consumerist culture" (which has basically turned us into souless, depressed individuals) and then as soon as we get into the game we have the option of buying the cute animals for $45 a pop. Eh?

The whole time I was playing the game, I could hear Adorno (in an annoying elitist tone) saying "See, I told you so." In the Dialectic of Enlightenment, Adorno and Horkheimer emphasize that the culture industry is extremely difficult to resist because as consumers we insist upon the very ideology that enslaves us. We deceive ourselves (or agree to participate in this ideology) not because we are incapable of independent thought, but because the culture industry uses effective psychological methods to win our favor.

The Asylum lures the consumer in with a brilliant strategy. The announcer at the beginning makes an explicit statement about the negative psychological effects of consumerist culture, and then he pours on the pathos. He treats us as victims of the culture industry, emphasizing our loneliness/detachment, and then he tells us about the lonely and disturbed stuffed animals (who are our only real friends in this f'ed up world). We can relate to/identify with these animals, who have also been victimized in some way. In other words, the game is using the very same psychological strategy to seduce consumers as the evil "consumerist culture" that it blames for our problems.

Does anyone else have thoughts about the consumerism element of this game? And, back to my other question: what does all of this have to do with whiskey??

- Steph