As was mentioned on the blog a couple weeks ago, Comedy Central used its Indecision 2008 brand to release a number of election-related games on the web. I wrote that these games are in a unique position to make commentary because of their Comedy Central context. They lay somewhere in the middle of a serious news game and an irreverent editorial game. A handful of the games are actually quite good. Most are at least competent, illustrating the issue in a moderately effective way though weakened by poor design or ineffective commentary. A few are even just plain bad. But by examining each game in brief we can understanding where they succeed and fail and learn about designing these kinds of games in the future.
Pander-Monium
At its core a generic tile-swapping puzzle game that's a mix of Bejeweled and Yoshi (NES), Pander-Monium is about eliminating 'threats' so as to pander to voters around the country. The threats are illustrations on the tiles related to national security: weapons, shoe-bombs, nuclear blasts, etc. In addition, each level of difficulty is represented by a region of the country or state that poses its own threats: gay cowboys in Texas, rednecks in Missouri, tourists in New York. While the occasional stereotype might make you chuckle, there's nothing particularly humorous or satirical about this game. I would say that dring a good episode of The Daily Show or Colbert Report, you laugh but also learn something. This game does neither.
At its core a generic tile-swapping puzzle game that's a mix of Bejeweled and Yoshi (NES), Pander-Monium is about eliminating 'threats' so as to pander to voters around the country. The threats are illustrations on the tiles related to national security: weapons, shoe-bombs, nuclear blasts, etc. In addition, each level of difficulty is represented by a region of the country or state that poses its own threats: gay cowboys in Texas, rednecks in Missouri, tourists in New York. While the occasional stereotype might make you chuckle, there's nothing particularly humorous or satirical about this game. I would say that dring a good episode of The Daily Show or Colbert Report, you laugh but also learn something. This game does neither.
Money: The Name of the Game
This game is most out of place on the Comedy Central website. Not because it doesn't approach the election with an Indecision brand of humor, but because its cultural critique is actually much stronger. Part Sim City, part real-time strategy, Money is about building up a thriving economy through both positive and negative means. You build factories, places for your workers to live, manipulate the borders for immigrant workers to sneak in, build things for them to buy, and make institutions which change the economic dynamic (like an organization for outsourcing car production and a FEMA building). I spent an hour with it one afternoon and didn't put a dent in the total number of levels, which escalate in complexity. The levels many critiques. For example, the description of the apartment complex is "provides housing for 10 underpaid workers." Not only is the description a critique, but the way its used is too. You have to place the housing buildings close to the places of work so that the underpaid employees can travel on foot (imagine living next door to an oil refinery). This is just one example of how Money: The Name of the Game succeeds. It really merits a dedicated blog entry, as there is too much to cover in a short paragraph.
Joe the Plumber: Layin' Pipe
An Inconvenient Game
This one is interesting, though its impact may be lost on the fact that it is so difficult to win. The goal of the game is to select the deployment order of environmental policies and technologies to create a sustainable future for the planet Earth. So far as I can tell, there is only one order for beating them game (which I looked up on YouTube). This presents both a strength and weakness for the game. Rhetorically, the complexity of the system illustrates the complexity of establishing viable environmental and social policy. The problem is, much like Molleindustria's Oiligarchy, the game does not do a good enough job at teaching the player how they can reach a positive viable solution. It is still a strong game none the less.
AirMILF
A clever play off of Air Wolf's name, AirMILF is the game I had the most trouble coming to terms with. On the one hand, it controls well and there's something disturbingly satisfying about shooting wolves from a helicopter. On the other hand, it seems to using the bad kind of headline-grabbing exaggeration that normally turns me off from these games. Conflicted, I think to myself, "Comedy Central (aka whoever they hired to make the game), you made a vapid game just because the imagery was easy, and yet I understand that is where the game succeeds." If it were anywhere else but Indecision 2008, I would have lambasted the game. But, in context, it works.
Border Security
Made during the primary season, the most interesting aspect of this game is the difficulty system, which is based on the stances of all the candidates in the primary. Those seen to be weaker on immigration (and emigration, it should be noted) make the game run slower than candidates like Mitt Romney, which speed up the game and increase the difficulty significantly. The game is played by clicking on people running for the US/Mexico or Canada/US border to stop them from entering/leaving. I'm glad the game chose to include Canada, as it highlights an issue that most people ignore and sets the game apart from all the thoughtless and racist immigration games on the Internet.
This game is most out of place on the Comedy Central website. Not because it doesn't approach the election with an Indecision brand of humor, but because its cultural critique is actually much stronger. Part Sim City, part real-time strategy, Money is about building up a thriving economy through both positive and negative means. You build factories, places for your workers to live, manipulate the borders for immigrant workers to sneak in, build things for them to buy, and make institutions which change the economic dynamic (like an organization for outsourcing car production and a FEMA building). I spent an hour with it one afternoon and didn't put a dent in the total number of levels, which escalate in complexity. The levels many critiques. For example, the description of the apartment complex is "provides housing for 10 underpaid workers." Not only is the description a critique, but the way its used is too. You have to place the housing buildings close to the places of work so that the underpaid employees can travel on foot (imagine living next door to an oil refinery). This is just one example of how Money: The Name of the Game succeeds. It really merits a dedicated blog entry, as there is too much to cover in a short paragraph.
Joe the Plumber: Layin' Pipe
A Pipe Dreams clone dressed up with only the vaguest reference to Joe the Plumber. You tap the tiles to spin the pipe pieces so that they create one long pipe that allows the brown waste to get through. If you fail, an audio clip of John McCain saying, "hey Joe, you're rich, congratulations," plays. If you lose the game, a clip of McCain saying "that to me was so hurtful" plays. If you succeed, you get awarded points based on how many moves you made and how fast you did it, and a "clever" password related to the election so that you can come back to the level if you have to restart. It doesn't succeed at making any sort of statement and is barely a competent game.
An Inconvenient Game
This one is interesting, though its impact may be lost on the fact that it is so difficult to win. The goal of the game is to select the deployment order of environmental policies and technologies to create a sustainable future for the planet Earth. So far as I can tell, there is only one order for beating them game (which I looked up on YouTube). This presents both a strength and weakness for the game. Rhetorically, the complexity of the system illustrates the complexity of establishing viable environmental and social policy. The problem is, much like Molleindustria's Oiligarchy, the game does not do a good enough job at teaching the player how they can reach a positive viable solution. It is still a strong game none the less.
AirMILF
A clever play off of Air Wolf's name, AirMILF is the game I had the most trouble coming to terms with. On the one hand, it controls well and there's something disturbingly satisfying about shooting wolves from a helicopter. On the other hand, it seems to using the bad kind of headline-grabbing exaggeration that normally turns me off from these games. Conflicted, I think to myself, "Comedy Central (aka whoever they hired to make the game), you made a vapid game just because the imagery was easy, and yet I understand that is where the game succeeds." If it were anywhere else but Indecision 2008, I would have lambasted the game. But, in context, it works.
Border Security
Made during the primary season, the most interesting aspect of this game is the difficulty system, which is based on the stances of all the candidates in the primary. Those seen to be weaker on immigration (and emigration, it should be noted) make the game run slower than candidates like Mitt Romney, which speed up the game and increase the difficulty significantly. The game is played by clicking on people running for the US/Mexico or Canada/US border to stop them from entering/leaving. I'm glad the game chose to include Canada, as it highlights an issue that most people ignore and sets the game apart from all the thoughtless and racist immigration games on the Internet.
Fire 'Em All
Perhaps the worst game of the group, Fire 'Em All is a Whack-A-Mole clone in which John McCain fires people in his campaign to save money. There are only two variants of faces that pop up from behind the cubicle walls to click on, and you have to be sure not to click on them if they're holding contribution money. No message is portrayed in the game that isn't already described in the instruction window, and the play itself is stale and contrived.
H.M.O. No!
Perhaps the worst game of the group, Fire 'Em All is a Whack-A-Mole clone in which John McCain fires people in his campaign to save money. There are only two variants of faces that pop up from behind the cubicle walls to click on, and you have to be sure not to click on them if they're holding contribution money. No message is portrayed in the game that isn't already described in the instruction window, and the play itself is stale and contrived.
H.M.O. No!
You begin by picking a healthcare plan--either Democrat or Republican--and are presented with a message about why the patient you're about to work on got hurt that's related to your party's stance on an issue (the Republican, for example, faces a patient who got hurt while cleaning their AK-47). What ensues is a confusing maze-like game in which you drag a pair of forceps around a patient's insides to remove aforementioned bullet while taking care of other ailments you encounter along the way. You also have a time limit before the patient wakes up and cannot touch the walls of the body for fear that the patient will come out of their induced sleep. Perhaps the critique HMO No! is making is related to the sheer number of things the doctor has to take care of, but this is lost to the frustratingly slow player movement in such a frenetic environment. If this was done on purpose, then the game at least has some value. But I get the sense that it is just a matter of bad game design.
Don't Get Hurt
On the surface, this is a classic example of the "oh, I get it" game that I am not fond of. The point of the game is to not get hurt because medical care is unaffordable, but the problem is it's really difficult not to get hurt. "Oh, I get it." I must say that despite this, the game is doing something really interesting with gameplay. As the player runs along the street, objects that they have to dodge come at them from the right hand side of the screen. While this seems simple enough, the jumping mechanic used to dodge is tuned such that it's extremely difficult to react to things as they approach. You might jump over one obstacle but land on the next before you have a chance to change your course. Rhetorically, this highlights the impossibility of trying not to get hurt. The focus on the specifics of that single mechanic make this a successful game.
On the surface, this is a classic example of the "oh, I get it" game that I am not fond of. The point of the game is to not get hurt because medical care is unaffordable, but the problem is it's really difficult not to get hurt. "Oh, I get it." I must say that despite this, the game is doing something really interesting with gameplay. As the player runs along the street, objects that they have to dodge come at them from the right hand side of the screen. While this seems simple enough, the jumping mechanic used to dodge is tuned such that it's extremely difficult to react to things as they approach. You might jump over one obstacle but land on the next before you have a chance to change your course. Rhetorically, this highlights the impossibility of trying not to get hurt. The focus on the specifics of that single mechanic make this a successful game.
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