"Playing Politics" Workshop

Kabul Kaboom and September 12th
Kabul Kaboom: You must dodge missiles and catch hamburgers in between, the slogan reads “the humanitarian game for the humanitarian war” and the instructions, “use the arrow keys to get the nice American food, but avoid their missiles, remember kids, you can’t win this game, just lose.”
September 12th: Similarly to Kabul Kaboom, the game instructions are more of a political message than anything, telling us ‘it isn’t a game,’ that ‘it never ends,’ and that ‘you choose to shoot or not shoot.’ Every civilian shot when aiming at terrorists becomes a terrorist.

1) I think that both games would have been very successful in communicating their intended messages to the audience over the internet; they lure people in with the promise of fun, and then position them with the civilian point of view, in this case the ‘war on terror’ and its consequences on the people is the focus of the games. The people have no escape and no choice and the relationship with America is confusing and hypocritical, the inevitability and bitterness expereinced by the people caught up in the middle is captured in the game instructions in particular.

2) The political message in both Kabul Kaboom and September 12th were immediately obvious through the names of the games, the instructions for play, then the game play itself. The understanding of the message becomes stronger as you progress through the games. I feel that a strong effect is created by the immediacy of the game, the player has to learn how to play applying the instructions as best they can, particularly in Kabul Kaboom, the game is fast paced and on first experience it moves too fast for you to able to navigate the avatar in time to dodge the missiles, this creates shock value. Especially with the image of a real bomb scene in the background of the cartoon remains of the avatar, and the slogan “game not over, play again.” In September 12th the game is slower, but you are just as powerless as you are in Kabul Kaboom, it is almost impossible to shoot terrorists without killing innocents – you end up creating more terrorists than there were to begin with. Taking control away from the player adds to the political message by making clear the powerlessness felt by the people involved. Another very effective part of each game is the fact that there is no ending and no real beginning, it remains the same the whole way through until you give up/close the window, this is emphasised by instructons that state there is no ending, reflecting the position that people are in during this war on terror. After playing the games we are left with thoughts about the issues involved, I think that it would encourage people to take an interest in the facts or discuss the game and the issues with others.

3) If I were to create my own political game, I would create one to reflect the relationship between Australia and America i.e. Howard’s seeming following of Bush’s policies - the war on terror, gay marriages etc.

My game would show a Howard avatar and a Bush avatar with its pants down and bottom showing. The aim of the game would be to navigate the Howard avatar through a maze in pursuit of the Bush avatar scoring points if you manage to touch the bush avatar as it moves over parts of the maze labelled “war on terror,” “Kyoto agreement,” “Ban Gay Marriage,” and etc. You lose the game if you lose track of the Bush avatar, you have to get as many “points” as you can before you get to the end of the maze. Perhaps at the end of the maze a screen with message will pop up depending on how many points you scored, for example, a high score may show a picture of Bush and Howard holding hands.