Alex Austin
alexanderaustin.netI’m Alex, a designer creating interactive and experiential work that explores how people move through spaces and how systems shape that experience. I view video games as a legitimate art form, capable of creating meaning through interaction in ways other mediums can’t, and I’m interested in using them in more unconventional and immersive ways. My work often draws from early internet aesthetics and nostalgia, using familiar interactions to create something that feels both personal and subtly unsettling.
Reclusion
Reclusion is an interactive game that explores loneliness, isolation, and creeping paranoia. The player is confined to a small apartment, repeatedly performing mundane, cyclical tasks like drinking water, taking out the trash, doing laundry while the space around them slowly deteriorates. As trash accumulates, walls begin to rot, and the environment decays, mirroring a mental state that is gradually unraveling over time. Moments of potential connection such as a ringing phone or a knock at the door emerge intermittently, but are consistently avoided. These interruptions begin to feel intrusive and uncertain, blurring the line between real and imagined, and reinforcing a growing sense of anxiety, suspicion, and withdrawal from the outside world. Interaction with the game is done through a 3D-printed sculpture of a human figure, which the player must use as a physical interface, creating a layer of separation between the player and the experience. The sculpture acts as a symbolic stand-in for connection,cxrccc suggesting that the only means of interaction and communication must be done through a false human without any real connection.