Digital researcher Simon Yuill worked as Artist in Residence at the Media Centre earlier this year and the result is now on show at the Centre's Medialounge.

Simon and his team have devised spring-alpha, a computer-game world based on drawings by artist and advisor Chad McCail which follow a community's attempt to create a utopian society. We went along to take a look and, at first glance, it did not suggest any sort of heaven on earth...

There is a large games board on which stand four figures. Are these the protagonists in the game? One of the figures looks like a riot policeman but the eye is drawn to that of a naked man crawling on all fours with a dog's head!

Inside the world of spring_alpha

The exhibition notes do suggest that this is the starting point for the game: "Set in a fictitious industrial town, typical of many in Britain, elements of a dark science fiction emerge, reminiscent of John Wyndham, Alasdair Gray and J.G. Ballard."

Some words written by artist Chad McCail help explain the games board: "It is spring. A high-density council estate is bordered by a railway and a river. Many of the people who live there have worked nearby in the slaughterhouse and the arms factory. Their experience in these industries has engendered an overwhelming desire to find an alternative means of providing for themselves and their children..."

Take a seat and play the game...

To find out how they start to go about this you will have to play the spring_alpha game. TV monitors and computer screens take us into this virtual world. Some of the original sketches are on display and visitors can also sample some of the audio environment for the game devised by team member Mark Vernon. Another 3-D model, the interior of a house, suggests there may be a way out of the darkness.

But what makes spring_alpha a computer game with a difference? Simon Yuill says: "The narrative within the work recounts the attempts of a small urban community to create its own 'utopian' society. The narrative is used as a metaphor for the real-world issues the project explores, and a focus around which workshop ideas can develop. The game environment serves as a 'sketch pad' for testing out ideas for alternative forms of social practice at both the narrative level, in terms of the game story, and at a 'code' level, in terms of working with the actual data and communication structures that support the game."

The game is a 'sketch pad' for testing ideas about how we live.

Spring-alpha will be eventually be released as a free software "Open Source" fully functioning 3D computer game. This means other users will be able to implement their own versions of the game.

Meanwhile, artists from the Creative Keys community outreach scheme have been working with people in Newsome, Deighton and Crosland Moor using Chad McCail's work as their starting point. Some of their work can be seen at Huddersfield Art Gallery alongside McCail's own work in the exhibition Evolution Is Not Over Yet.

When the exhibitions come to an end development work will still continue on the game. The next job is to design a "personality engine" which will automatically create its virtual protagonists!

spring_alpha is at Huddersfield Media Centre until October 14th 2005 while Evolution Is Not Over is at Huddersfield Art Gallery until the same date.