G
GAHere
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This came across my Twitter feed today and I thought of our gamers here at CAF.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — An educational video game has been edited following a social media backlash over a scene depicting slaves being packed into a ship.
The creators of “Playing History: Slave Trade” removed a level Monday which featured black slave characters being dropped into a ship similar to the video game “Tetris.”
“Apologies to people who were offended by us using game mechanics to underline the point of how inhumane slavery was,” read a statement posted on the game’s page on Steam, an online store. “The goal was to enlighten and educate people — not to get sidetracked discussing a small 15-second part of the game.”
Complete article here:
bigstory.ap.org/article/5d74631b4356470395141acfea19b544/slave-trade-video-game-altered-after-social-media-backlash
This seems to be a challenge when it comes to teaching history of now politically incorrect subjects. How does one share Truth - good, bad, ugly - if the target audience doesn’t want to know about it? I get that on one hand we don’t want to perpetuate bad past behaviors, but on the other, we’re supposed to learn from the past.
I agree with what this company did: took out the particular game module for that level, kept the lesson in the game through the Mouse’s monologue. I also can appreciate their reasoning for responding to the backlash: they want their games to stimulate discussion of the particular historical topic, not anything else.
I’d be interested in your take on the topic.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — An educational video game has been edited following a social media backlash over a scene depicting slaves being packed into a ship.
The creators of “Playing History: Slave Trade” removed a level Monday which featured black slave characters being dropped into a ship similar to the video game “Tetris.”
“Apologies to people who were offended by us using game mechanics to underline the point of how inhumane slavery was,” read a statement posted on the game’s page on Steam, an online store. “The goal was to enlighten and educate people — not to get sidetracked discussing a small 15-second part of the game.”
Complete article here:
bigstory.ap.org/article/5d74631b4356470395141acfea19b544/slave-trade-video-game-altered-after-social-media-backlash
This seems to be a challenge when it comes to teaching history of now politically incorrect subjects. How does one share Truth - good, bad, ugly - if the target audience doesn’t want to know about it? I get that on one hand we don’t want to perpetuate bad past behaviors, but on the other, we’re supposed to learn from the past.
I agree with what this company did: took out the particular game module for that level, kept the lesson in the game through the Mouse’s monologue. I also can appreciate their reasoning for responding to the backlash: they want their games to stimulate discussion of the particular historical topic, not anything else.
I’d be interested in your take on the topic.
