RSS feedSo You Think You Can Do Better? Computer Games Get Serious
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| A screengrab from Peacemaker, © www.peacemakergame.com |
It’s just one of a new wave of “serious computer games“. There’s also Darfur is Dying, the result of a competition launched jointly by Reebok Human Rights Foundation and the International Crisis Group. You choose to be a refugee dodging bullets to fetch water and other supplies, or face being killed or pressganged into the militia (boys) or raped and abused (girls). Grim stuff.
Then there’s Food Force, a Sim UN which challenges the gamer to balance budgets and logistics to deliver food to people in a dangerous zone. You can also try out A Force More Powerful, which was put together with the help of the co-founder of the Serbian youth opposition movement who helped bring down Milosevic. It’s all about coordinating non-violent direct action.
All are educational tools designed to introduce children and young adults to the complexities of international relations, and should go on general release in the near future. They’re getting an interesting reception on the net. Blog Sudanwatch believes that they’re part of the evidence for a grassroots movement of ordinary people using the internet and other media to present an alternative to mainstream news sources. Trend Blog has reasons to be sceptical:
“Experts and serious game advocates also fear, that with the rush of nonprofits to publish their own game, there soon will be too many bad or boring games. It is simply hard to mirror complex situations and build them into a ‘fun’ game. And this is the major challenge for game developers and political institutions.”
One blogger who has played Darfur is Dying, Microscopiq, is more enthusiastic about the game’s potential:
As simple as it is, Darfur is Dying engages the imagination — asking the player to see themselves in a different skin and a different place, where things we take for granted (like getting water) become complex and dangerous and not guaranteed. It stuck with me. There’s something about actively playing that role, however abstract, that brings this lesson home the way a thousand news stories just can’t. Or, maybe it’s the combination of those thousand news stories and the opportunity to imagine yourself as part of them. It’s anti-escapism.
Edited to add: Sim Sweatshop, an on-line game you can start playing right away. “Can you tirelessly make sports shoes for less than a dollar an hour as you struggle to support your family?” Why not find out?