Serious Games

As a child, like most children, I played a lot of different games with varying rules, talents, and strategies involved, but my purpose for playing these different games was almost always constant: diversion. I simply wanted to have fun. Recently, the invention of serious games has completely revolutionized not only the act of playing but the point and purpose of playing a game as well. Serious games allow a person to enjoy the fun and diversion normally associated with a game but also combine that with a deeper, more profound message or meaning. In this way, serious games can promote awareness of challenging situations or compel a person to action. Serious games can take several different forms: they serve the purposes of advertisement, education or learning, awareness, or event simulation.

Darfur is Dying is an example of such a serious game. The purpose of the game is to increase awareness of the genocide in Darfur and compel players to action to better the situation there. In this game, the player is a refugee from Darfur trying to obtain water for his village while avoiding Janjaweed, who will kill you if you’re caught. I tried five times to beat the game and successfully bring water back to the village, but each time I failed and was killed. The game is stressful and scary in its own right; the prospect of death is grim and imminent. There is also a section on a Darfur village, which explains all the problems that occur there. This is also compelling and tugs at heart strings.

I think this game, and serious games more generally, are an effective way of promoting awareness and possibly change. I found it to be convincing, and the most convenient part was that after I finished playing, the game provided me with several ways through which I could get involved and make a difference. This is probably the most important thing, as it give the player immediate access to further informational materials and access points from which to address the problem. A shortcoming of serious games is that players may miss the meaning, or that it is not compelling enough to spur action. In the end, while serious games may not be the overall best way to promote awareness, it can serve as one effective method to spur change among many different methods.