《歸真之旅》 Wanderhell

(這裡免費遊玩 play for free here)

這遊戲的靈感來源是我在象站上看到的 Dungeons 機器人帳號，它利用投票的方式來進行隨機創造的冒險。我看到其中一個在冒險開始的投票可以投「退休」，覺得如果大家一起在每個冒險開始的時候都投「退休」會很好笑，而且因為阻止了冒險同時也能讓每個冒險家完全避免死亡。因此我被《躺平與地下城》這點子引誘，雖然那不是我想為遊戲取的名字。

The inspiration for this game came from a bot account I saw on Mastodon called Dungeons, which used polls to advance randomly generated adventures. When I saw that you could vote to “retire” at the start of an adventure, I thought that it would be funny if everyone banded together to vote “retire” at the start of every adventure, and also let every adventurer completely avoid death by preventing adventure in the first place. So I was hooked by the idea of doing a game of Dungeons & Dropouts, although that wasn't what I wanted to name the game.

《歸真之旅》這遊戲名是《歸家之旅》的異軌，該烏托邦似的遊戲描述在擺脫暴力的戰後世界中的共同旅行。相反，《歸真之旅》是個反烏托邦似的遊戲，描述在資本主義和殖民主義製造的世界之中無法逃離的暴力和異化。《歸家之旅》是創造共同體的遊戲。《歸真之旅》是創造階級意識的遊戲。共產，依 prole.info 的辯論，其實需要克服共同體的鬥爭—需要克服分開或否認無產階級的資產階級共同體。《歸真之旅》是個除了在廢除被剝奪財產階級之中創造的共同體之外，什麼共同體都不承認的遊戲。此外，《歸真之旅》疑問在時空被工作和國界殖民化的世界裡為什麼要把共同旅行作為烏托邦。在遷移本質上就是被殖民力生產的情況之下，為何把暴力的擺脫處於移動的自由？

The title of Wanderhell is a détournement of Wanderhome, which is a utopian game about communal journeys in a post-war world free from violence. In contrast, Wanderhell is a dystopian game about the inescapability from violence and alienation in a world created by capitalism and colonialism. Wanderhome is a game of creating community. Wanderhell is a game of creating class consciousness. Communism, prole.info argues, actually requires a struggle of overcoming community—the bourgeois community that divides or denies the proletarian class. Wanderhell is a game that refuses to recognize any community except the community created by abolishing the dispossessed class. In addition, Wanderhell questions the utopianism of communal journeys in a world of time and space colonized by work and borders. When migration is inherently produced by colonial forces, why locate freedom from violence in freedom of mobility?

因此，移動的自由在《歸真之旅》之中具有暴力的功能。你扮演的是聲名狼藉的遊盪怪獸，就是在傳統 TRPG 中冒險家隨機能碰到的怪獸。在遊戲設計方面，遊蕩怪獸的目的通常就是要讓玩家感覺到冒險自然的危險，或是讓隨機的骰數創造新奇的遊戲狀況。總之，怪獸遊蕩的原因就是為了遊戲團扮演的冒險家的獨佔利益。

Hence, freedom of mobility in Wanderhell serves a violent function. You play as an infamous wandering monster, a monster that adventurers randomly encounter in traditional TRPGs. In terms of game design, the purpose of wandering monsters is often to let players feel the danger of adventuring in a natural way, or to let the randomness of dice create new and interesting game conditions. In short, the monster only wanders for the exclusive benefit of the adventurers played by the group.

這獨佔利益體現於《歸真之旅》地下城的經濟功能。你扮演的遊盪怪獸是黑耀公司的僱工；黑耀是我在《下世萬敵》之中創造的人類殖民地開拓者的重生點。黑耀公司創造的地下城不只是你的工作地，也是人類的殖民地—而且這次被殖民的不一定是非人的怪獸，可能是通過非人化被視為是怪獸的人。地下城是某個被指定剝削的地區—地下城化也就是與工業化和無產階級化相似。在地下城的怪獸就是為了玩家、冒險家、至上主義種族及帝國的獨佔利益而多層被剝奪財產的人。

This exclusive benefit is embodied in the economic function of dungeons in Wanderhell. You play as a wandering monster who is the employee of the Blackbright Company; Blackbright is the spawn point for human colonizers I created in Future Only Enemies. The dungeon created by Blackbright Company is not only your worksite, but a site of human colonization—and this time the colonized may not necessarily be nonhuman monsters, but humans regarded as monsters through dehumanization. A dungeon is an area designated for exploitation—dungeonization is meant to parallel industrialization and proletarianization. A monster in a dungeon one who is multiply dispossessed for the exclusive benefit of players, adventurers, supremacist races, and empire.

《歸真之旅》之中的遊蕩不是在體現移動的自由，而是在體現這些宰制與剝削造成的移動強迫。遊蕩這行業處於的零工經濟以自由移動的幻想為前提。就跟 Uber 一樣，黑耀吹捧控制自己為工作在時空移動的自由，把自由定義為自我管理的殖民化。在你遊蕩的每一階段，你意識到這宣傳的真面目、意識到靠工作生存的意義—就是必須再生產殖民化才能繼續活下去。在這個系統當中，任何關於工作自由的選擇—無論是工作時間、地點或職業—都只是剝削方式的選擇，都是暴力的自由。

Wandering in Wanderhell does not embody freedom of mobility, but the mobility forced by these dominations and exploitations. The industry of wandering is situated in a gig economy premised on the illusion of free mobility. Just like Uber, Blackbright touts your freedom to control your movement through time and space for work, defining freedom as self-managed colonization. At every stage of wandering, you realize the true nature of this propaganda, realize the meaning of relying on work to survive—it is being required to reproduce colonization in order to continue to survive. In this system, any choice regarding the freedom of work—whether it's in time, place, or profession—is only a choice in method of exploitation, is only a violent freedom.

《歸真之旅》的目的不是要單獨挑出《歸家之旅》來做批評，反而是要批評《歸家之旅》體現的一種逃避現實的烏托邦主義。我知道《歸家之旅》的設計家不是什麼沒體驗過資本主義壓迫的人，知道那設計家其實有當過無房可歸的人、知道設計家是有受到順性別加異性戀主義以及能者宰制壓迫的酷兒殘疾人。我也知道很多跟那設計家一樣被剝削的人是真的能在現實中的逃避找到痛苦解脫的感覺。但我就是不能。對我來說，唯一的解脫就是破壞和重新創造社會。對我來說，《歸家之旅》對社會的破壞實在是不夠。它本來就不是要這麼做。但《歸真之旅》就是。我也是。

The purpose of Wanderhell isn't to single out Wanderhome for criticism, but to criticize a certain type of utopianism embodied by Wanderhome. I know the designer of Wanderhome isn't somebody who has never experienced the oppression of capitalism, know that that designer has been unhoused, know that that designer is a queer disabled person who has been oppressed by cisheterosexism and ableism. I also know that many others exploited like that designer truly do find a sense of relief from suffering through escape from reality. But I can't. To me, the only relief comes from destroying and making society anew. Wanderhome does not destroy enough of society for me. It wasn't meant to. But Wanderhell was. And I am.

延伸閱讀 Further Reading