Water Cooler Games

by Ian Bogost May 1, 2009

Killer Flu, the Game

Health & Medicine Games, Newsgames

How timely! Some months ago, my studio Persuasive Games created a game about seasonal and pandemic flu. The game, called Killer Flu, was commissioned by the UK Clinical Virology Network and produced in association with Scotland's Traffic Games. Reading the current headlines about the so-called swine flu, you'd think that ...

by Ian Bogost April 22, 2009

Bailouts for your iPhone

Newsgames, Political Games

PlayScreen Games has released a sort of newsgame for iPhone, a sendup of the recent financial market bailout we know about all too well. Bailout Bonanza is essentially a clone of the classic Activision game Kaboom! -- the player moves or tilts the iPhone to maneuver a bucket at the ...

by Ian Bogost March 10, 2009

Hit the Christies

Newsgames, Political Games

The halted Christie's auction of two looted Chinese bronze figures has spawned a game, Hit the Christies. The game is, well, it's a punching bag emblazoned with "Christies" in Chinese. The player can hit it. According to the Wall Street Journal, the game has been played over 340,000 times. Despite Game ...

by Ian Bogost February 21, 2009

Knight News Game Award

Newsgames

Games for Change has announced plans to offer the Knight News Game Award at the 2009 Sixth Annual Games for Change Festival in May of this year. Here are the criteria from the website: Our definition of a news game - A digital game which is journalistic: it enhances people's ...

by Ian Bogost January 7, 2009

Raid Gaza!

Newsgames

Raid Gaza! is a new newsgame that critiques Israel's role in the current military conflict in Gaza. Unlike many newsgames, this one is actually quite playable and successfully embeds its message in gameplay. I've discussed the game in more detail on the Georgia Tech Newsgames Project blog, and I point ...

by Ian Bogost December 25, 2008

AIG UFO Exec Catcher

Newsgames

Remember that whole financial bailout thing? And remember how AIG got in some hot water for spending almost half a million dollars on an executive retreat just after the government's $85 billion takeover of the insurance company? Here's a little newsgame about it, called AIG UFO Exec Catcher. It's like ...

by Ian Bogost December 17, 2008

Bush Shoe Tabloid Games

Newsgames

In case you didn't see them elsewhere, a few of the tabloid games based on last week's shoe attack on President bush: Flying Babush Bush's Boot Camp Can you throw a shoe at Bush? Any more that I'm missing? Update: Ok, here's some more: Bush's Shoe Dodge (in this one ...

by Ian Bogost November 17, 2008

Announcing the Journalism & Games Research Project

Newsgames

I'm excited to announce the first public materials from a research project on Journalism and Videogames, which I've been pursuing with a small cabal of devoted students since the start of the term. Here's a brief explanation: What lies at the intersection of videogames and journalism? This research project, made ...

by Ian Bogost October 21, 2008

A Home for Tabloid Games

Newsgames

Over a year ago, we covered a series of Game Show Network newsgames, mostly small games about celebrity mishaps. Back then, I mentioned Zach Whalen's discussion of these titles, which he gave the apt name "tabloid games." ...

by Ian Bogost June 9, 2008

Pictures for Truth, an Amnesty International Game

Activism Games, Console & PC Games, Newsgames, Political Games

Pictures for Truth is a game about human rights violations in China, and also the first game developed for Amnesty International, according to its developers. Created by a group of professional game developers and volunteers from Quebec in their off time, the game puts the player in the role of ...

by Ian Bogost May 5, 2008

Boxing Politician Games. Again.

Newsgames, Political Games

It happens every election cycle, it seems. Games that allow players to make their favorite candidate box against their least favorite candidate, or some variation on a theme of same. We had Kerry vs. Kerry back in 2004, as well as the mobile game Bush vs. Kerry Boxing that same ...

by Ian Bogost April 3, 2008

Play the News Game

Newsgames, Political Games

ImpactGames, creators of PeaceMaker, have just soft-launched a public version of their title Play the News. new web-based news prediction game. It's a bit like fantasy sports, in that you play by predicting future performance, but instead of assembling a custom news docket, you play smaller mini-games for each story. ...

by Ian Bogost March 28, 2008

Paul McCartney Divorce Newsgame

Newsgames

The game is called Splash & Grab. Play as Heather Mills, and try to earn a larger divorce settlement by splashing water on McCartney, while avoiding the judge. I guess it's always nice to see another newsgame effort, but for the love of god does everything have to be Whack-a-Mole? ...

by Ian Bogost January 15, 2008

A Macworld Newsgame

Newsgames

Today is Macworld, Apple's big trade event in which Steve Jobs puts on a black shirt and shows the latest shiny Apple gadgets. It's a hugely anticipated thing for geeks of all operating system persuasions. While you're waiting for whatever products might be announced, you can play SteveNote Expo, a ...

by Ian Bogost July 4, 2007

Bong Hits 4 Jesus

Newsgames

Red Aphid offers Bong Hits 4 Jesus, a response to last week's Supreme Court decision about school districts' right to punish student speech promoting drug use. The game is very simple, just a yes/no quiz sort of thing, which is okay for a newsgame of this kind. It effectively shows ...

by Ian Bogost June 28, 2007

More Paris Tabloid Games

Newsgames

More silly Paris Hilton tabloid games. The first is just a toy really, a paper doll toy called Dress Paris in Jail. The second is Escape Paris, a room escape game. Quoth the instructions, "Escaping is SO HOT." The latter offers something of a modest challenge. ...

by Ian Bogost June 22, 2007

Points of Entry: New Newsgame at the New York Times

Newsgames

The New York Times has published this month's Persuasive Games newsgame, Points of Entry. In the game, players compete to award Green Cards under the Merit-Based Evaluation System included in legislation recently debated in Congress. The system, proposed in legislation sponsored by Senator Ted Kennedy, outlined a Federal standard for ...

by Ian Bogost June 14, 2007

My new column: Designing for Tragedy

Game Design, Newsgames, Political Games

Gamasutra has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, Designing for Tragedy, about V-Tech Rampage and making games about profoundly tragic events. Today, a month after Lambourn first released the game, discussion of it has all but disappeared. Some might point to this fact in an argument for the game’s insignificance; ...

by Ian Bogost June 12, 2007

Airport Security Awarded Jury Prize at Games for Change

Newsgames

This year's Games for Change Festival featured an expo in which some of the community showed games we had created during the last year. A panel of judges reviewed these games, and last night awards were given out for the "best games for change." I'm happy to announce that Persuasive ...

by Ian Bogost June 5, 2007

Tabloid Games

Newsgames

The Game Show Network has released a few newsgames, which we've discussed before here (1, 2, 3). Their latest, The Prison Life: Paris, came out yesterday, in time with the start of Paris Hilton's 45 day jail sentence. The gameplay involves helping Paris press vanity license plates. Over at Gameology, ...

by Ian Bogost June 4, 2007

CNN Gets in the (News)game

Newsgames

Two weeks ago over at Persuasive Games, we announced that the NY Times would be publishing our newsgames. There was a lot of response around the web, including several mentions of how the release represented a milestone in games as a medium (for example, at Raph Koster and Game Politics). ...

by Ian Bogost May 24, 2007

The New York Times Publishes Our Newsgames

Newsgames

Today, one of my videogames is on the front page of the Gray Lady. Almost four years ago, Gonzalo suggested "newsgames" as a genre that intersects videogames and political cartoons. Last year, my studio Persuasive Games took our own take on this genre with The Arcade Wire series (Airport Security, ...

by Ian Bogost May 2, 2007

Break the News, Don't Read It

Casual Games, Newsgames

MSNBC wrote to let us know about Newsbreaker, their Arkanoid clone + news. They call it an "educational online game" -- it takes RSS feeds and drops them into the background, behind the bricks. When you hit certain blocks, the headlines drop down, much like Arkanoid power-ups. The game has ...

by Ian Bogost March 28, 2007

Persuasive Games in Playboy

General, Newsgames

Playboy magazine devoted the Trend Watch portion of their page on games in the April issue on Games that give you something to think about as you twitch. Persuasive Games' Arcade Wire: Airport Security makes the list, as does Molleindustria's McDonald's Videogame, GameLab/UNICEF's Ayiti: Cost of Life, and Super Columbine ...

by Ian Bogost January 17, 2007

Airport Security in the Grey Lady

Newsgames

Joe Sharkey wrote a story for the New York Times business travel section about The Arcade Wire: Airport Security. It's a fun article, and I like it because it targets an audience of normal people, rather than gamers. You can read it here (after the usual NY Times registration wall). ...

by Ian Bogost December 28, 2006

GSN's Saddam Hussein Newsgame

Newsgames

The Game Show Network has been releasing small newsgames recently, including So You Think You Can Drive, about Mel Gibson's September DUI incident, and Throw the Book at OJ, about OJ Simpson's ill-fated book deal. Their new game is Saddam's Hangman, an inversion of the classic word guessing game: the ...

by Ian Bogost December 19, 2006

Throw the Book at OJ

Newsgames

The Game Show Network, who previously brought us a Mel Gibson newsgame, has created a new one lampooning the recent ill-fated O.J. Simpson book. Throw the Book at O.J. is a simple target shooting game in which the player throws books at O.J.'s head. Meanwhile, Simpson throws footballs at the ...

by Ian Bogost December 13, 2006

Happy Holidays from Persuasive Games: Xtreme Xmas Shopping

Newsgames

The end of the year is nigh, and with it come holiday greetings in the form of the latest installment in my studio's Arcade Wire newsgame series. For this month's game, we offer a holiday-themed topic: Xtreme Xmas Shopping. In the game, Crazed shoppers doing anything to get their hands ...

by Ian Bogost November 29, 2006

Persuasive Games releases The Arcade Wire: Bacteria Salad

Newsgames

My studio Persuasive Games has released Bacteria Salad, the latest game in the ongoing Arcade Wire series of newsgames, published by Addicting Games and Shockwave.com. Your goal is simple: Harvest mass amounts of cheap produce and sell it for as much profit as possible. But watch out for floods, animal ...

by Gonzalo Frasca October 18, 2006

New column: The little game that could + Barcelona this weekend

Newsgames

SeriousGamesSource just posted my new column. It's about how we all tend to glorify AAA games as the golden standard for quality, when actually such thing does not happen in other media such as film or print. Games with crappy graphics and less-than-great gameplay still play their role in our ...

by Ian Bogost October 18, 2006

Persuasive Games releases The Arcade Wire: Oil God

Newsgames

My studio Persuasive Games has released Oil God, the latest game in the ongoing Arcade Wire series of newsgames, published by Addicting Games and Shockwave.com. You are an Oil God! Wreak havoc on the world's oil supplies by unleashing war and disaster. Bend governments and economies to your will to ...

by Ian Bogost October 16, 2006

More Foley Games

Newsgames

Some of my students at Georgia Tech run a little game jam every Sunday called 4 second games (4sg). They spend four hours making games on a particular theme, with the requirement that each game be played in four seconds (or have a round that lasts four seconds, etc.). Last ...

by Ian Bogost October 6, 2006

Mark Foley in Help Hastert Hide the Perv

Newsgames

Soon after wondering what a Mark Foley newsgame might look like, Zach Whalen managed to dig one up over on The Huffington Post: Help Hastert Hide the Perv, by Ruckus Productions. The game has a funny Benny Hill theme and cute editorial cartoon graphics (if I can say such a ...

by Ian Bogost September 30, 2006

Iran releases state-funded oil disruption game

Educational Games, Newsgames, Political Games

According to the NY Times, the Iranian government has funded a videogame that illustrates how to disrupt world oil supplies by blowing up a U.S. tanker in strait of Hormuz. This recalls Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's warning that oil exports might be put in jeopardy if the U.S. doesn't back off ...

by Ian Bogost September 19, 2006

Persuasive Games releases The Arcade Wire: Airport Security

Newsgames

Gonzalo and his team coined the term "newsgame" back in 2003 with their excellent piece September 12. If you are a regular visitor to Water Cooler Games, you've probably noticed an increase in our coverage of newsgammes, including games about Zidane, Mel Gibson, and the Crocodile Hunter. Newsgames have a ...

by Ian Bogost September 18, 2006

Play (and code) the Munch Museum heist

Newsgames, Social Games

Recently I wrote about documentary games, games that depict an account of a real-life event. Silence Variations is a new one from Overdog. The game reenacts the 2004 armed robbery of the Munch Museum in Oslo, in which "Scream" and "Madonna" were stolen. The game was commissioned by Bergen Kunsthall ...

by Ian Bogost September 9, 2006

Mel Gibson Newsgame

Newsgames

Zach over at Gameology points to a newsgame about Mel Gibson's recent DUI incident-cum-incendiary drunken smear. So You Think You Can Drive, Mel is perhaps most interesting for its sponsor/publisher, The Game Show Network. To play, collect tequila bottles while avoiding state troopers and the Stars of David thrown by ...

by Gonzalo Frasca September 7, 2006

Croc Hunter Newsgame

Newsgames

Yesterday we were chatting with Ian and we brainstormed about what a "Death of a Crocodile Hunter" would look like. Not that we were considering doing such a game -actually, we discarded the idea as disrespectful and moved on. But ever since I worked at CNN, everytime that a major ...

by Ian Bogost August 4, 2006

Bush Backrub

Newsgames, Political Games

A new little newsgame over at AddictingGames.com, this one taking on the much-publicized impropmptu backrub Bush performed upon German chancellor Angela Merkel. The game, Bush Backrub, is simple enough: move Bush around behind cleverly selected world leaders. Click rapidly to offer a "Texan backrub." Keep the comfort meters full or ...

by Gonzalo Frasca July 25, 2006

Israel-Lebanon war newsgames

Newsgames

Ynetnews reports on two newsgames that target Hezbollah's Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. The first one, created by somebody called Amir Lotan, uses a Google Earth image -I assume that it is meant to be a picture of somewhere in Lebanon, Beirut perhaps? The gameplay is simple, whack-a-mole style. Nasrallah's face ...

by Ian Bogost July 20, 2006

Roll your own Zidane Headbutt Game

Casual Games, Newsgames

After the World Cup Final, we pointed readers to the Zidane Headbutt game. Since then, Atom Entertainment's Addicting Games site has published a revised version, with more Materazzi's and a scoring system. Another nice feature of the new version is that you are awarded more points for a chestbutt than ...

by Gonzalo Frasca July 10, 2006

Hothead Zidane newsgame

Newsgames

Et oui, mes amis, le jour de gloire n'est pas arrivé!:( The final match of the World Cup is always a must see. Yesterday's was not great and, even though France deserved to win, soccer is not about who deserves to win but about who scores more goals. I was ...

by Ian Bogost February 17, 2006

Dick Cheney's Texas Takedown

Newsgames, Political Games

Hot on the heels of yesterday's Huffington Post Cheney game, now there's Dick Cheney's Texas Takedown. This one is much more of a game, basically you have to shoot as many orange vest-clad hunting partners as possible within a time limit. The characters are cute (did I just call something ...

by Ian Bogost February 16, 2006

Living Game Worlds + Dick Cheney Quail Hunt

Newsgames, Political Games

The Living Game Worlds Symposium is on here at Tech. You can watch a live stream, or watch recaps of the sessions, including Will Wright's keynote, on the conference site. Raph Koster is also blogging it (1, 2). In other news, The Huffington Post (yes, that Huffington) has posted Dick ...

by Ian Bogost December 3, 2004

Interview with JFK Reloaded developer

Newsgames

Computer and Video Games has an interview with JFK Reloaded developer Kirk Ewing. It's the first comments I've seen from the developers after the original press release. (Thanks to commenter Wombat for pointing it out in the comments to our original post. Given the popularity of the topic, I thought ...

by Ian Bogost November 26, 2004

They are Games! (The Long Road Ahead)

Newsgames

While the Thanksgiving holiday in the US has interrupted some of the controversy around JFK Reloaded (on WCG: 1, 2), a Google News search today yields some 600 articles about the game worldwide. There is much still to be written formally about the game, and I plan to do ...

by Gonzalo Frasca November 23, 2004

My first thoughts on JFK Reloaded

Newsgames

Both Ian and myself did not expect JFK Reloaded to have such a big impact, but everybody in the news seems to be talking about it. I think that, even if some people may find it disgusting or not, it is an interesting example worth analyzing. Even though I think ...

by Ian Bogost November 22, 2004

JFK Reloaded

Newsgames

JFK Reloaded is a new game that recreates the assassination of John F. Kennedy. It was released today by Traffic Games to mark the 41st anniversary of the event. According to a Reuters article on the game, the Kennedys called it "despicable." But the developers say the game was ...

by Ian Bogost November 16, 2004

Play thy enemy

Console & PC Games, Newsgames, Political Games

WCG friend Clive Thompson writes at Slate on Halo 2 as a statement about military politics. ... the ideological payload here comes merely from the act of flipping sides in medias res. In jumping across the foxhole, you're forced to acknowledge that your enemy has its own subjective, if flawed, ...

by Ian Bogost November 12, 2004

Whose Reality Games?

Newsgames

I flew to the Serious Games Summit DC straight from our Videogames with an Agenda opening in London. As I was stumbling through the Reagan airport after my transatlantic, I remember noticing a very young couple waiting past security, near the escalators. These kids looked barely old enough to be ...

by Ian Bogost October 7, 2004

Playing Tragedy

Newsgames

German developer Replay Studios has announced Survivor, a "3rd-person Disaster Survival Game." According to the developer, "anyone who likes to know how it feels being aboard the Titanic after she hit the iceberg, could go for a try." Promised scenarios include the 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the 1985 Mexico ...

by Ian Bogost September 16, 2004

Playing as Kerry

Newsgames, Political Games

Following on the ongoing controversy about John Kerry's Vietnam war record, the NY Times reports (registration required) that Kuma Reality Games will release a game later this month that allows players to play John Kerry's Swift boat missions in Vietnam. Screenshots area available here. Reports NYT, The company says the ...

by Ian Bogost September 11, 2004

Newsgaming on BBC/NPR

Newsgames, Political Games

Today's edition of the BBC/NPR radio show "The World" aired a story on Newsgaming, featuring Gonzalo and September 12. Grand Text Auto friend Noah Wardrip-Fruin also gets a word in. ...

by Ian Bogost August 25, 2004

Newspaper Publishes Videogame, Developers Rejoice

Newsgames, Political Games

Last month I gave a presentation on "Playing the News" at the American Press Institute (filling in for Gonzalo, who couldn't make it, and for whom I provided the best bizarro-Gonzalo I could muster). Among the attendees was Gil Asakawa, executive producer for DenverPost.com. Game journalist and game research circle-runner ...

by Ian Bogost July 12, 2004

Kuma\PR : more on the reception of newsgaming

Console & PC Games, Newsgames, Political Games

Important note: Kuma and Kuma\War has no affiliation with Gonzalo's Newsgaming project; I am adopting the term "newsgaming" here in a more general sense. Inc. Magazine ran an interesting piece in their August issue on Kuma\War, the subscription-based game that lets you play recent events in the continued conflicts in ...

by Gonzalo Frasca April 27, 2004

Political games keep getting more press

Newsgames

After getting more media attention that I ever asked for (see www.ludology.org for my recent incursion on Spanish tabloids with the European royalty), I am glad to report that the press is still interested in political games. New York's 24-hour news station NY1 run a story on political games, focusing ...

by Ian Bogost April 22, 2004

Wired on Political Games

Activism Games, Newsgames, Political Games, Social Games

Wired News ran a nice article today on Playing Games with a Conscience, featuring quotes from myself, Gonzalo, and Noah Wardrip-Fruin, our friend from the field and Grand Text Auto. The article features Gonzalo's September 12 as well as Educational Simulations' Real Life 2004, which we discussed recently here on ...

by Gonzalo Frasca March 13, 2004

MADRID

Newsgames, Political Games

Here is MADRID, the new game that I just finished to put together along with the Newsgaming.com team. It was developed in just over a day and looks to be a simple homage to the victims of the attacks from 2 days ago. Clarification (from Ian): There seems to ...

by Gonzalo Frasca October 26, 2003

September 12th reaches 100.000 players

Activism Games, Newsgames, Political Games, Public Policy Games, Social Games

100 thousand persons have played Newsgaming.com's September 12th during the last few weeks. When I launched this journalistic/political game I knew I was taking quite a risk with its design/scope, but I am thrilled at seeing how well it is performing. So far, reviews have ranged from “an interesting experiment ...