Fri, 16 Apr 2004
America's army is a first person shooter 3D video game created by the
American Army to recruit young volunteers.
The game claims to acentuate the
organizational elements and teamwork of being in the Army and downplays the
reality of the deadly situation of the soliders in Iraq, or any war zone at that. In order to convery
both sides, I would like to see a more specific version of America's Army
released with the title Operation Iraqi Freedom, where the user can choose to
participate in a massive online game as a American solider, Iraqi militant or
innocent civilian. This will put the players in a more realistic environment
where they have to make decision like wether killing a civilian is acceptable,
which is an area of the war that was almost completely neglected in
non-military publicity.
Subversive video games are a contradiction as far as I can see. While amazing and engrossing and well made, most video games represent a condensed version of mainstream society, with all of it's biggotry and intollerance. I see this as a purely financial decision. It's in the best interest of the game makers to appeal to the widest audience possible. And more often than not the individuals funding the game want to make as much money as possible, and I assume taking an overtly critical viewpoint on any subject relating to nationalism would alienate lots of people.
So I would be curious if the non-profit model could apply to subversive video game design. The production would have to be on par with for profit commercial games. All too often when video games are used as an artistic medium with a message beyond entertainment, the quality of the game suffers. So the non-profit woule have a budget and production plan but there wouldn't be a profit motive so the content can be more free.
posted at: 00:00 | path:
/war |
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