It is as if you were on your phone Press Kit

Play Online (Phones only)

The basics

Developer: Pippin Barr
Release: 5 March 2025
Platform: Mobile
Code repository: https://www.github.com/pippinbarr/it-is-as-if-you-were-on-your-phone/
Price: $0.00

Description

Look at you! On your phone! But you’ve got a secret! And you won’t tell! You’re not on your phone! It is only as if you were on your phone! You’re just pretending to be on your phone! On your phone!

It is as if you were on your phone is an almost speculative game about an incredibly near future in which we’re all simultaneously under significant pressure to be on our phones all the time, but also to not be on our phones all the time. Our fingers want to touch the screen, our eyes want to watch the surface, our brains want to be occupied efficiently and always. But it’s also exhausting liking photos, swiping profiles, watching short-form video, and everything else we’re always doing. It is as if you were on your phone presents an alternative: pretend to be on your phone so that you pass as human, but actually do essentially nothing instead. Follow the prompts and be free.

History

I’ve made a bunch of games in the speculative “It is as if” series. One on Chess, one on Work, one on Making Love and one on Paperwork. It seemed fitting to keep expanding outward even further and to explore the idea of making a game about simply seeming to be using a phone at all, with no underlying context or objectives.

I fit this into a “speculative play” framework – games that function in part as experiences from the near future rather than the present – but really we already exist in a world where it could be calming and sane to simply pretend to be on your phone and not worry about the realities of what’s on there. So, you’re welcome?