Before Covid-19 became part of Nigeria’s reality in February 2020, I somehow hoped the virus wouldn’t breach Nigeria’s borders, and even if it did, that we would be able to control it as we’d done with Ebola a few years before. Unfortunately, the virus arrived, and like other countries before us, our lives (and routines) had to change —especially when infections began to rise and government had to impose a lockdown. If you live in a fast-paced city like Lagos, the idea of lockdown might, depending on your circumstances, seem like a relief. But I should have realised that things were not going to go as planned when on my way home on the eve of the lockdown, my neighbours and I were chased down the road by a cow that had broken loose from her handlers. As we raced to the safety of our respective houses, we barely had enough time to catch our breath, not to talk of “complimenting” one another’s athletic skills. With the benefit of hindsight, I should have been grateful to that cow, instead of cursing under my breath, because that chaotic sprint would be the last bit of physical activity I would have in a long time.
Before the pandemic, I had depended on the thrill that came with city life. There’s something about the intensity of social interactions that entertains and sometimes energises me, and when I wasn’t listening to my favourite playlist, reading a comic, or watching a movie, I’d leeched off those activities, even watching neighbours playing Ludo or the elderly playing Draughts or Ayò as I made my way home. When I was indoors, at weekends, I was often entertained by the action from “San Siro”, the school compound behind my house that served as a makeshift football pitch—even though the cheers and jeers were a nuisance sometimes.
But regardless of all the “fun” I seemed to be having, I had not been sleeping well and my anxiety was hitting the roof. Initially, I was thankful for the lockdown, because it seemed like an opportunity to rest, recover and enjoy the multimedia library I had been building. I longed for the respite! But as the streets became empty (and San Siro fell quiet), days stretched to weeks, the uncertainty increased and I found myself swinging from rest to introspection and from introspection back to anxiety. I had become hooked on searching for warnings, updates and precautions, and I had Nigeria Centre for Disease Control’s Twitter feed on speed dial.
The edgier this grim routine made me, the less appealing my favourite playlists and other escape mechanisms became to me. My concentration was so poor that I couldn’t sit through one track or read a page without growing impatient and as a result, I bounced from one hobby to another—cooking, baking, photography, joining the many Zoom events that had suddenly become commonplace—all in a bid to distract myself from the anxiety I was experiencing.
One day, while scrolling through my phone, looking for a suitable wallpaper, I stumbled on a two-year old folder where I had saved some strips from The GaMERCaT, a ‘pawsed’ comic strip by Samantha Whitten that tells the story of gamers’ experiences through its eponymous game-loving character, Gamercat; his owner, Malcolm, and his tight circle of feline friends: Glitch, Pixel, Sweet and Nano. Now, while Gamercat is not renowned for spending a lot of time outdoors, he has an active imagination that situates him within the many games he plays, and he understood the games enough to even work as an online gaming support tech. Rereading those colourful strips reset my outlook to my situation, and had me thinking that my imagination could help me overcome my cabin fever if I used it productively. But how could I venture into another, more colourful world when I could barely concentrate?
This question led me into YouTube, and by extension, the world of Virtual Reality, where I could comfortably be a spectator instead of doing the thinking. After unearthing a headset I’d owned since 2016, the first things I did were a rollercoaster ride that had been on my list of videos to watch later, and sailing the Nile—activities I’d dreamt of, but couldn’t do in person. More was to follow as these gave me an adrenaline boost and reawakened the thrillseeker in me, and, thanks to the BBC, I visited Buckingham Palace; took an underwater tour with giant manta rays in Mexico; met the largest dinosaur that ever lived; and even got to view a total solar eclipse from space, while finally launching the Candy Crush app that came with my not-so-young laptop.
However, I also wanted to know if there was similar content that captured my immediate surroundings, so that I could access local places without leaving the comfort of my home. My attempts at research didn’t reveal much information about content or the local VR and games industry itself, but left me with more questions: Who were the insiders in that industry? How did they define the industry? What were they creating and for whom? Why were they creating and if they weren’t creating, what was stopping them? Was the industry exclusive or accessible to and representative of everyone? Did people really care to know what went into making a game or any other multimedia content itself or were they simply focused on consuming? If they knew, would it influence their experience of the content? In trying to find answers to these questions, I had more ideas for a project I had been developing around Nigeria’s gaming industry and immersive content creators.
I started exploring the industry, reaching out to insiders through referrals and cold calls, and I’ve been able to interview some of them about their work and share same with the public. I’m also promoting their work as part of a “playlist” that’s evolving into an archive of locally-produced games. The main function of the project is to create an accessible public catalogue of industry professionals, their work and social media details, so that anyone interested in carrying out further research into the industry will have the required information at their fingertips, while sidestepping the stress I went through in gathering same. I’m also learning more about design philosophies, shared experiences and the industry’s various specialisations while experiencing some of its equally interesting products.
While carrying out preliminary research into Nigeria’s gaming industry, I discovered that some studios had vanished and so had the games they’d created. After clicking links that led to extinct content, I discovered Fose, a card-matching game by Flamation Studios. I also found out that the studio is run by Anthonia Nicol, who happens to be one of the very few women in the industry. Another discovery was Aboki Run, an endless runner game by Maliyo Games, one of the industry’s surviving studios. Fose tested my memory and observation skills, as I helped an Egyptian guard gather artefacts by matching identical cards. Aboki Run, on the other hand, had an exploratory twist to it, and the thrill of helping three friends discover the complexities of their environment was a welcome distraction.
However, I was curious to find games that incorporated local sights and sounds; elements that would give me a sense of being outdoors, a nostalgic trip, or something that could transport me to places I had never visited within Nigeria. Something a few local artists and studios like Imisi 3D and VR360 Stories have been able to achieve in sectors such as film and visual arts. While I am still searching for such games, a pre-lockdown conversation I had with Uchenna Okiya, a game designer, sticks in my mind. Uchenna had complained that Nigerian video game designers could not situate their creations within local environments because they lacked access to the required 3D assets. He was trying to plug the gap with Digital Thingz Hut, a marketplace for localised 3D assets. As a result of that conversation, we ended up spending an entire afternoon gallery-hopping, looking for artefacts to scan. I hope the project will get the traction it deserves and we’ll start seeing more games that capture our stories with fitting images.
With restrictions partially lifted, I’m grateful that I can now move around and I’m also less anxious, although there are warnings that the virus will be around for a while. Sometimes I wonder how else I would have escaped the gloom if I hadn’t stumbled on that old folder. I probably would have spent all my time gushing over my sister’s newly adopted puppy (who happens to share the same coat with Glitch, Gamercat’s protégé) and passed up the opportunity to actively explore a world of amazing content.
Adefoyeke Ajao (linktree, facebook) is a communication strategist who is interested in how social constructs are created and how various art forms can be used to express these constructs. She’s currently exploring Nigeria’s gaming industry having explored the worlds of film, internet memes, literature and visual arts.