Mind Switch

Score：

1. Prepare at least 2 phones (1 for commander, 1 for receiver) and at least 1 hidden earphones (for receiver only). The total number of equipment depends on the number of players, Maximum 4 player for each game.
2. There will be only 1 commander in each round, every commander has the ability to give orders to receivers, and commander will have 10-minute of control rights. Time will start to count when all the receivers arrive at their assigned location. After the 10-minutes limit, the next commander will take over.
3. Ask all the players to roll a dice, the order of commanding rights will be selected base on the results. (The player with greatest dice result will be the first commander, the player with second greatest dice result will be the second commander, etc.)
4. Make sure the commander and receiver/receivers have their phone, and all the receivers have their earphone activated.
5. Commander will first select a location, and receiver will go to the assigned location.
6. If there are more than 1 receiver, commander can ask different receivers to go to same or different locations, and the commander has the ability to choose to either let them do separate actions or interactions.
7. Commander will to give orders to the receivers, and receiver/receivers have to follow the command and make sure other non-players are not aware it is a game.
8. Some examples for the action can be like sit down with a random group of people and join the conversation, or ask a convenience store owner to sell him a car, etc.
9. The game will be ended after all the commanders played their round.

Art Statement:

The idea is inspired by the readings of happening art and the Yoko Ono’s work in Grapefruit. Based on the everyday happening art, I think it does not have to be something we see every day, but it also could be something that we feel every day. Thus, I think the social interaction is another type of everyday happening. After I look at some Yoko Ono’s scores, I tried to keep my words not only simple but also meaningful. Originally, I called this game “Mind Control” because it is easy to understand, but later I think I have to help people to understand more about the meaning of this game. At Last, I changed the name of game to “Mind Switch,” because I think those two words can best describe the score and the meaning of this game. Furthermore, another inspiration is from my friend. We had a conversation about the difficulty of expanding social networks, and people should have a better understanding of each other. People in nowadays are always judging others, but most of them just judging others by limited information, such as first impression, daily actions, etc. Later, he said it is hard to imagine that people can think as others. Therefore, this game was mainly designed to let people understand each other by putting us in other’s shoe, and help people to break the ice with strangers. Feel the way they feel, know the way they know. One of the major score in this game is about the limited control ability and unpredictable randomness. Because when you are the commander and you may give orders to receivers, and receivers may feel that the orders you give are full of randomness since they do not know what you are thinking. Also, you might feel the same way when you are being commanded. Therefore, the randomness is another element of this game. 

Finally, I hope this game can help me to deliver the message that people should know more about others. I hope that I can provide some inspiration to the players, and I hope people can have a little better understanding about themselves, strangers, and this society after this game.