Action vs narrative in political games
Recently Asi Burak published a book about Peacemaker , a game he and Erik Brown made while being students at the Carnegie Mellon’s ETC. The game deals with the Israli-Palestenian conflict and tries to portray both sides of it. As an Israeli I am well familiar with that conflict (or at least with one side of it) and when I first became aware of it it made me a little angry:”people thinking they can solve conflicts with games, is the conflict solved?! I don’t think so”.
As much as I enjoy being angry I enjoy being angry and right more and that is why I started playing that game. “I’ll play it and see that it’s bullshit” I said to myself. I was highly disappointed that my expectations were not met: first of all, the game is fun. Second of all, there are numerous articles dealing with the game and it’s use in different researches showing that it does help sway people with extreme views and makes them more empathetic and understanding towards the other side.
Lets start with the fun part. In the beginning of the game you can choose which side you want to be: the Israeli prime minister or the Palestinian president. The goal is to make both sides happy through the use of different actions while dealing with various random events (bombing, sanctions, etc.) that happen around you.
First fun point: you get to be in a position of power. The creators chose that in order to give the player a sense of agency and however frustrating being the president/prime minister might be sometimes (no one really wants to agree with you) it still feels good to have the power and the game made an extra effort of giving you so many different actions to choose from that it never becomes really frustrating. If Hamas won’t play along because they are busy tunnel building you can just go to Fatah or the UN and try to gain points by appealing to them.
Second fun point: ignoring horrible events. I don’t think anyone intended for that second point. It also raises the question of “wait, so if you ignore the bad stuff that happen — how do you become more empathetic towards the other side?”. Growing up in a climate that is very similar to the one the game is portraying (suicide bombers and exploding buses) I remember how everything felt super important, life changing and real. But I was also 10 and not the prime minister. As the prime minister you can’t go into action every time something happens because you will lose points and you will lose the game and the goal is peace. It’s in the name. So whenever a bus would explode in the game I had the pleasure of saying to my imaginary cabinet members “we have to move on. No time for tears, trust me I know what I’m doing.”
I think the empathy came into play when I saw how complicated it was to get things done and how many different players you needed to please along the way. For example, the Palestinians should have health services, let’s give them a hospital but you need to decide if you are doing in directly or indirectly (through the UN) and after that they might say no because you haven’t done enough to gain their trust and your own cabinet might lose trust in you if you do donate the hospital. Nothing was simple and you needed to work hard in order to make the big “life changing” gestures.
While Peacemaker was driven by the player’s choices and action “Revolution 1979: Black Friday” puts those aside for the sake of narrative. Like Peacemaker the game also deals with current events and political conflicts however it focuses on one specific one: the 1979 revolution in Iran and does not set resolving the conflict between government and people as a goal. It is much more story focused from that it’s empathy and emotional immersion stem and not from how much effort you put into the peace process.
From the first moment we jump straight into the story. You are Reza, a photographer, developing pictures in a dark room. The dark room in itself gives a feeling of secrecy, of something forbidden taking place. Soon enough soldiers barge in and take you into custody. There you are questioned while your brother is being tortured and you recall the events that led you there, how you joined the revolution and helped the resistance.
Through out the game Reza witnesses events that were part of the revolution and is asked for his opinion several times. Even though this does not seem to have a real affect on events (except that if you refuse to play along you may die) the game began with the title of “the choices you ake affects others around you” making it seem that those choices are more important than they might actually be.
Another strong element that helps the immersion is the photo taking. At the most part Reza’s role is that of a helper. He does not lead the revolution but is dragged along because of his friends and relatives who are involved. A lot of the time he states (or the player can choose to state) that this does not concern him. Given that the player probably doesn’t know a lot about the Iranian revolution history (I know I don’t) this is a good approach to take and it creates solidarity with Reza rather than feeling a dissonance.
However, the photography helps to make Reza part of what’s going on around him. Once in a while, while something important is happening (a rally, a demonstration), Reza is being asked to take pictures.The of that mechanism is a nice touch (focuses only when the indicator is in the right place and only then take the photo) but the best part about it is that after taking a successful photo the player is presented with the original one from the actual revolution. If Reza was taking a photo of the demonstrators, his photo will be presented next to an original photo from that time with a brief explanation about it’s significance. Showing the player that piece of history, and the fact that it is still relevant today (as an evidence of the rocky times in Iran’s past) gives a sense of importance to that simple task of taking photos since the original ones serve as a witness today.
Adding the photography as a way to bring in the history to the narrative. It might seem like it has the potential to interfere with the narrative but since the player is given almost no backstory it actually helps get the player more immersed in the game. The things you are witnessing actually happened and have meaning beyond the world of the game.
“Revolution 1979”’s approach could be used to portray the Israeli-Palestinian conflict however it would lose the benefit of being able to give a voice to both sides. On the other hand Peacemaker’s approach could have been used for the Iranian revolution and I do wonder what would be the added benefit from that.
