Educational Video Games can Help the World Become a Better Place

While I am not a fan of game creators trying to sway the way people’s thought processes by including subtle hints, games that serve a sole purpose of informing an audience on a certain issues can be great for society. As Rachel Ament says of activism-focused games at the end of her article, Screen Saviors: Can Activism-Focused Games Change Our Behavior?, “The impact of activism-focused games might be difficult to quantify, but these game developers are still making important strides. They are skewering stereotypes of gamers, stretching the boundaries of their medium and steering their gaze outward- and toward the real world” (Ament, 2017).

The concept of educating people via video games might seem like a radical and crazy idea, but I think it can be a very effective one. People are much more likely to engage in material if it is in the form of a game. This is way games of all sorts can be one of the best mediums of information. Why is this true? I believe that it is because when you play a game, you are putting yourself in another person’s shoes. By doing this you are looking it from a whole new perspective. You can start to see why someone thinks a certain way and get a better understanding of something that you might have thought was ridiculous from the outside looking in.

Far too few people are able to consistently see issues from different perspectives. It is because of this that The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) are seeking to “find ways in which games can be used to foster empathy and understanding around the world” (Campbell, 2017). Way too many conflicts occur because of people not being accepting of other peoples’ cultures and world views. While I don’t think that games can end these conflicts altogether, I definitely think that they can serve as a step in the right direction.

One thing we do need to be wary of though, is the fact that video games can also easily be propagandized, so you need to take the information that you are receiving, analyze it, then come to a conclusion. Simply taking in information from a game, or any other medium of information, without analyzing it and coming up with your own conclusion can be a scary proposition. It is crucial to be able to understand the material thoroughly that you are receiving rather than just accepting it.

This is why I think that games that serve the purpose of informing people of issues that mostly everyone can agree on will be much more effective in the ways that they change society. A game that I think will do this effectively will be the board game Monkey Love Banana, a game that myself, Russel Jordan and Brady Crabtree are working on building. The game will take you through the process of your character, Paul the monkey, navigating the rainforest and all of its perils to find Paul’s precious bananas. The perils that I speak of will be tools of deforestation, such as bulldozers, chainsaws and logging trucks, and poachers. I think that most people can agree that they like monkey and that a world without monkeys and rainforests would be much worse, so our game that includes facts about monkeys, deforestation, and poaching will be much more likely to be successful in conveying facts on how to stop poaching and deforestation.

Educational games are a great medium for conveying information and changing the world that we live in for the better. Continual use and development of these games just might be the golden ticket for our society to gain perspectives, grow empathy, and maybe even save the rainforests and all of its inhabitants.

Works Cited

Ament, R. (2017, July 23). Screen Saviors: Can Activism-Focused Games Change Our Behavior? Retrieved from NPR: https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2017/07/23/538617205/screen-saviors-can-activism-focused-games-change-our-behavior

Campbell, C. (2017, January 24). Here’s Why the UN is Getting Interested in Video Games. Retrieved from Polygon: https://www.polygon.com/features/2017/1/24/14364864/unesco-video-games-report

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