Author
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Topic: Political Simulation Games
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kuri
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4202
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posted 01 November 2003 06:05 PM
I had a Tropico phase for a bit last year. I find that all of these games can only manipulate a few variables so that, of course, they can't ever come close to reality. No politician has the a population that is concerned with no more than 5 issues at any particular time! That being said, for a cold-war era Carribean island simulation this one seemed on the whole appropriate in what choices are avaliable. I also noticed that (art imitating life?) I (as leader off the island in the game) was more popular with Tropico's socialist faction whenever I followed all the warnings and messages about the popular mood and level of happiness -- but doing this all the time would make the prescribed goals of the scenario impossible to achieve.Also, I was annoyed that even when being a capitalist leader, you are still requires you to manage all economic activity. What's the point of going against ideals if doesn't make things easier? On the whole, I think there is a certain, not hard-right certainly, but 'mainstream' ideology underlining the choices avaliable in political RTS games. I don't imagine that programmers are by and large a radical group and I think these games are probably pretty benign as a form of media, because while most game companies are USian (I think) a small amount of complexity and choice is needed for the purposes of such games. (Black and white views of the world wouldn't make very challenging simulated realities.) Other computer games with underlying political messages, such as the shoot-'em-up games might not be so benign though. Soldier of Fortune would be a good example for it's shooting of "terrorists" and "criminals", all of course without any context, in fairly predictable regions of the world.... The plot lines of those games often seem to come straight out of Fox news and then amplified ten-fold. [ 01 November 2003: Message edited by: CJH ]
From: an employer more progressive than rabble.ca | Registered: Jun 2003
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