Water Cooler Games
Water Cooler Games served as the web's primary forum for "videogames with an agenda" — coverage of the uses of video games in advertising, politics, education, and other everyday activities, outside the sphere of entertainment.

The site was maintained at watercoolergames.org from 2003-2009, where it was edited by myself and Gonzalo Frasca. It is now archived here in full.
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Digital Intifada + Game as Critic as Art videos
by Gonzalo Frasca March 13, 2006
categories: Activism Games

Vit Sisler from Charles University in Prague has posted two excellent articles about political games, mainly focusing on the work of Afkar Media (the second article is an interview to its executive producer, Radwan Kasmiya). I have some issues with them -that's not unexpected given the hot topic of Middle Eastern politics + political videogames. For example, it sort of gives a priori more legitimacy to the CMU project, which is still unavailable, because it is the work of "historians, political scientists and activists". Well, that doesn't necessarily will make the game any better and I think we should refrain from commenting about unpublished games (I have done that mistake myself). Don't get me wrong, I am really looking forward to play Peacemaker as well as Global Conflicts: Middle East.
In any case, I want to praise again this material. It is very well documented and brings lots of interesting insights. I'll definitively include both on my recommended readings for students of serious games.

For those of you who want to learn more about Radman Kasmiya's fascinating work on political videogames, you can watch the presentation that he gave at the recent Game as Critic as Art event that took place in Barcelona. And after you do that, you can watch the other presentations from Anne Marie Schleiner (who did a very interesting project about the US-Mexican border); Katharine Neil (talking about Escape from Woomera); Rafael Fajardo (La Migra and Crosser, as well as how he works with his students); Spanish critic Flavio Escribano and last, but not least, Laura Baigorri who was in charge of organizing this fantastic one-day event. There is also a video of my presentation but it is in Spanish.

Comments (1)

Got a couple of balancing (one pro once con) opinions from ElderWisdomCircle.org on this idea and translated it into German and Chinese, just in case:

Hello, 4 points below - any > hope for this?

> 1. Game board will use a world map with the Pacific

> Ocean in the middle instead of the Atlantic, or Europe.

> 2. A tunnel for trains only like the one under the English Channel will also be put at the Bering Strait and the Gibraltar Strait.

> 3. The flow of play will start at the tip of South America and go along the Pan American Highway and then all over the planet WITHOUT any boundaries of countries to stop these armchair tourists.

> 4. There would be no points for conflict or war in > this game; no points off either if the players > cannot get over the habit either.

> > > > ELDER RESPONSE: I know that I would love a game based on geography. I assume you are going to make up a cooperative type game, advancing depending on co-operation, instead of competition or conflict. Make in engaging and challenging - use give-and-take action instead of the typical "conflict" that leads to bloodshed. Think about blood line / lineage.

clopha deshotel on April 23, 2006 7:53 PM